Category Archives: Insight

Soul Sickness & the Ring of Fire Eclipse

1 September 2016 – Astro-Weather: Did you feel the New Moon pushing into an annular eclipse of the Sun, crossing central Africa from Gabon to Madagascar, this morning around 4:07am? (see more below) When the moon creates a ring of sunlight during an eclipse instead of completely blocking the solar disk, it’s known as an annular eclipse or “ring of fire” eclipse

eclipse sept 1 2016

This evening the Saturn-Mars-Antares triangle is perfectly isosceles! Check it out at sunset.

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“The soul becomes dyed with the colour of its thoughts.” ~Marcus Aurelius

ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY

random-acts-of-kindness-illustration-HilstonJerrry Hilston

International Random Acts of Kindness Day

717 – Siege of Constantinople: The Muslim armada with 1,800 ships, is defeated by the Byzantine navy through the use of Greek fire

1449 – Tumu Crisis: Mongols capture the Emperor of China

1715 – Deathday of King Louis XIV of France, he reigned for 72 years—the longest of any major European monarch

1804 – Juno, one of the largest asteroids in the Main Belt, is discovered by the German astronomer Karl Ludwig Harding

1838 – Deathday of William Clark. Along with Meriwether Lewis, Clark helped lead the Lewis & Clark Expedition of 1804 to 1806 across the Louisiana Purchase to the Pacific Ocean, &claimed the Pacific Northwest for the United States.

1894 – Over 400 people die in the Great Hinckley Fire, Minnesota.

1897 – The Tremont Street Subway in Boston opens, becoming the first underground rapid transit system in North America

1914 – St. Petersburg, Russia, changes its name to Petrograd

1923 – The Great Kantō earthquake devastates Tokyo & Yokohama, killing over 105,000 people

1939 – Adolf Hitler signs an order to begin the systematic euthanasia of mentally ill & disabled people

1951 – United Nations Security Council Resolution 95 relating to Arab–Israeli conflict is adopted

hemingway life

1952 – The Old Man and the Sea, the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel by Ernest Hemingway, is first published

1969 – A coup in Libya brings Muammar Gaddafi to power

1974 – The SR-71 Blackbird sets (& still holds) the record for flying from New York to London in 1 hour, 54 minutes. A speed of 1,435.587 miles per hour

1979 – The American space probe Pioneer 11 becomes the first spacecraft to visit Saturn

1983 –Korean Air Lines Flight 007 is shot down by a Soviet Union jet fighter. All 269 on board die, including Congressman Lawrence McDonald

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new moon bluewoman!

~Opening to the medicine of the venom

~hag

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planet headElaina Booth

September is a powerful month of cosmic alliances, beginning with the Sun, Moon, & Earth aligning for an annular solar eclipse in Virgo. Although the path crosses central Africa & northern Madagascar, it will be felt globally.

We have an opportunity to look into our shadow self to then realign with our highest intentions. We can release at the deepest levels & honor what needs to end while starting out on a new foot.

It’s a dynamic opportunity to speak to the Beings of the celestial spheres, to be vulnerable & open to the truth as it really is within our deepest self. But that’s only a part of the picture…

The eclipse & New Moon cycle in Virgo is colored & highly influenced by Mercury’s retrograde – helping us to really feel into the thought patterns ready to be released that serve an old consciousness.

We take stock of our inner resources, honor our harvest & hone our craft. Its a non-linear time, with potential for great productivity.

Saturn square Neptune is dominant now too. Whenever the outer planets dance they open us to the global picture where social-political lessons can come into focus.

A closing square is about a shift in consciousness – realizing the overview of a cycle, summing up, & re-orienting – beginning to turn away from the old, accepting what is & forgiving what was, while beginning to feel the first influences of the new from the supersensible plane.

Saturn rules the structures enforcing the beliefs we hold. Neptune, on the other hand is a dissolver of boundaries, pointing toward unity, idealism – the best that can be imagined, spiritual unity, the visionary aspect of imagination.

Neptune says we must dream true about welcoming in the highest consciousness we can at this time. Neptune in Pisces is inviting us to look not outside ourselves for truth, meaning & direction, but within.

Saturn in Sagittarius is struggling with the last vestiges of dogma & the disillusionment of beliefs in a purely physical existence cut off from the feminine & Spirit.

Mutable signs ask for growth & being flexible, learning how to adapt to shifting circumstance.

Can you allow yourself a little quality time alone, every day, to fertilize the process instead of fixating on the ‘product’?

With this eclipse triggering the Saturn-Neptune square along with a square to heated Mars, what is dis-eased in our lives, may become apparent.

Soul sickness is evident in our world & has been a challenge to navigate. We have witnessed great suffering & division between cultures & ideals.

Eclipses tend to have a habit of revealing what has been hidden so it feels like this eclipse shatters the last illusion.

But in the midst of all these challenging patterns, there is an opening to use this potent energetic pattern to its tune into the highest frequencies within ourselves, if we align with Virgo’s healing wholeness.

Mercury retrograde, the ruler of this eclipse, invites you to slow down & take your time when considering your options at the moment.

Remember, an eclipse tends to amplify unconscious contents.

This is great for building up our discipline & doing the inner work- not so great for depression, repression, aggression, stuckness & moon-karma – so be awake!

The inner work we do on ourselves is what clears the blockages in our field that prevent us from being the empty chalice that is ready, willing, & able to be filled by Spirit- so focusing on our inner/shadow work, making necessary self- adjustments, & deepening in our integrity, self-honesty & truthfulness with others is a prerequisite to fully accessing all the gifts of this time.

We can also shift the patterns as we wear them out.  Then we can breathe into this space with a deeper kind of self-surrender, the kind where we get ourselves back refreshed, relaxed, restored.

From Rudolf Steiner:

An eclipse of the sun is due to the fact that the moon comes between the sun and the earth, cutting off the rays of the sun.

 At the time of a solar eclipse, for instance, something totally different takes place in the part of the earth affected from what is happening when there is no eclipse. When we know that on the one hand the rays of the sun penetrate down to the earth and on the other hand the forces or rays of will stream out to meet the sun.  At an eclipse, these forces radiate into the darkness, and there ensues a period of time, short though it may be, in which all that is of the nature of will upon the earth flows out into universal space in an abnormal way. It is different altogether from what takes place when there is no eclipse. Ordinarily, the physical sunlight unites with the radiations of will streaming towards it. When there is an eclipse, the forces of will flow unhindered into cosmic space.

 The old initiates knew these things. They saw that at such a moment all the unbridled impulses and instincts of humanity surge out into the cosmos. And they gave their pupils the following explanation. They said: Under normal conditions the evil impulses of will which are sent out into the cosmos by human beings are, as it were, burned up and consumed by the rays of the sun, so that they can injure only man himself, but can do no universal harm. When, however, there is an eclipse of the sun, opportunity is given for the evil which is willed on earth to spread over the cosmos. An eclipse is a physical event behind which there lies a significant spiritual reality.

 Eclipses of the sun and moon, recurring as they do in the course of every year, may really be looked upon as “safety-valves.” A safety-valve is there to avert danger, to provide an outlet for something or other — steam, for instance — at the right moment. One of the safety-valves which makes its appearance in the cosmos and to which we give the name of a solar eclipse, serves the purpose of carrying out into space in a Luciferic way, the evil that spreads over the earth, in order that evil may work havoc in a wider, less concentrated sphere. Such are the forces at work, in the cosmos.” ~Human Q’s & Cosmic A.

Together we can call on & co-create with Michael, a shield of light, using the sword to cut thru what does not serve.

See you there

Blessings & Peace ~Hazel Archer Ginsberg 

Deathday of Elisabeth Vreede

31 August 2016 – Astro-Weather: The meteor shower peaks before dawn. Although this minor shower usually produces only 6 meteors per hour, but viewers recorded up to 130 meteors per hour in 2007, & with the New Moon Solar eclipse arriving tomorrow, conditions couldn’t be better for checking it out

Aurigid-meteor-shower-finder-chart

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cots bookcover

Those who work with the Original indications in the Calendar of the Soul know that Rudolf Steiner lists the birth & death days, as well as other significant occurrences of various individualities, along with the dates in the calendar.  He said of this: “What is presented here can be useful to those who wish to follow the path of mankind’s spiritual development” ~Rudolf Steiner

ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY

Joseph of Arim & nico

Feast Day of Joseph of Arimathea & Nicodemus. Rudolf Steiner speaks about these individualities as initiates many times. Here are a few examples: http://www.rsarchive.org/Search.php http://wn.rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA103/English/AP1962/19080525p01.html

12 – Birthday of Caligula

Matthis Grünewald Isenheim altar

1528 – Deathday of  Matthias Grünewald a German Renaissance painter of religious works who ignored Renaissance classicism to continue the style of late medieval Central European art into the 16th century. Only ten paintings—several consisting of many panels—& thirty-five drawings survive, all religious, although many others were lost at sea in the Baltic on their way to Sweden as war booty. His largest and most famous work is the Isenheim Altarpiece

1740 – Birthday of Johann Friedrich Oberlin, mystic, philanthropist, social Christian. Rudolf Steiner spoke about him in his lectures on Occult History http://wn.rsarchive.org/GA/GA0126/19101227p01.html

1803 – Meriwether Lewis & William Clark start their expedition to the west

1869 – Deathday of Mary Ward, Irish astronomer & entomologist, killed when she fell under the wheels of an experimental steam car built by her cousins. She was the world’s first person known to be killed by a motor vehicle

1886 – The 7.0 Charleston earthquake hits South Carolina. Sixty people were killed & damage is estimated at $5–6 million

1888 – Mary Ann Nichols is murdered. She is the first of Jack the Ripper’s confirmed victims

1895 – German Count Ferdinand von Zeppelin patents his Navigable Balloon

1897 – Thomas Edison patents the Kinetoscope, the first movie projector

1907 – The Anglo-Russian Convention between the United Kingdom & Russia. The agreement led to the formation of the Triple Entente, linking the Russian Empire, the French Third Republic, & the United Kingdom of Great Britain & Ireland – igniting the Great War.

1939 – Nazi Germany mounts a staged attack on the Gleiwitz radio station, creating an excuse to attack Poland the following day thus starting World War II in Europe

elisabeth vreede book

1943 – Deathday of Elisabeth Vreede, a Dutch mathematician, astronomer & Anthroposophist – one of Rudolf Steiner’s closest co-workers, part of the the original Vorstand in Dornach (see more below)

1957 –Malaysia gains its independence from the United Kingdom

1980 – Flood in Ibadan after 12 hours of heavy downpour, killed over 300 people & properties worth millions destroyed

1986 – Aeroméxico Flight 498 collides with a Piper PA-28 Cherokee over Cerritos, California, killing 67 in the air & 15 on the ground

1986 – The Soviet passenger liner Admiral Nakhimov sinks in the Black Sea after colliding with the bulk carrier Pyotr Vasev, killing 423.

1987 – Thai Airways Flight 365 crashes into the ocean near Ko Phuket, Thailand, killing all 83 aboard

Diana, Princess of Wales

1997 – Deathday of Diana, Princess of Wales, her companion Dodi Fayed & driver Henri Paul die in a car crash in Paris

1999 – A LAPA Boeing 737-200 crashes during takeoff from Jorge Newbury Airport in Buenos Aires, killing 65, including two on the ground

2005 – The 2005 Al-Aaimmah bridge stampede in Baghdad kills 1,199 people

2012 – A 7.6-magnitude earthquake strikes the Philippine province of Eastern Samar

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sleeping Larry YoungLarry Young

My POD (Poem Of the Day)

~My hands are pillows of power

Awakening the sleepers…

For the Rhythm is a restless tide

***

Elisabeth Vreede

Elisabeth Vreede was born in Holland, at The Hague, on 16 July 1879. She was the second child of her father, who was a lawyer, & her mother, who was devoted to charitable work. She was a sensitive person, & later on in her life she played an important part in the Anthroposophical life in Holland.

Elisabeth Vreede came into contact with Theosophy in her home growing up. She was interested early on in the starry sky, & while learning French, she read the works of Camille Flammarion, a French astronomer & author. Because of his scientific background, he approached spiritism & reincarnation from the viewpoint of the scientific method, writing, “It is by the scientific method alone that we may make progress in the search for truth. Religious belief must not take the place of impartial analysis. We must be constantly on our guard against illusions.”

At the University of Leyden she studied mathematics, astronomy, Sanskrit, & philosophy (especially Hegel). She was also actively involved in student life, founding a boat club & was a council member of the students’ union.

The first meeting with Rudolf Steiner took place early on at the Theosophical Congress in London in 1903. Her parents were theosophists & she as well. Rudolf Steiner made a huge impression on her. A year later at the Congress of the Federation of European Sections of the Theosophical Society at Amsterdam in 1904, she heard a lecture on ‘Mathematics & Occultism’ that Steiner gave. The next European Congress was in 1906, where Steiner held a cycle of 18 lectures.

After receiving her diploma in 1906, she gave instruction at a higher girl’s school in mathematics until 1910. From 1910, she lived in Berlin, worked on her dissertation, & occasionally worked as a secretary for Rudolf Steiner. In April 1914, she moved to Dornach to help in the building of the first Goetheanum & was often found there carving wood.

During the War years (1916/17) Elisabeth Vreede broke off from her residence in Dornach in order to work in Berlin as a coworker of Elisabeth Rotten, a Quaker, peace activist & educational progressive, looking after prisoners of war. She was very much aware of the life & sufferings of her contemporaries.

After the War, Rudolf Steiner developed his idea of the threefold social order & she too had an intense interest in this initiative & work. She was the first to bring this idea of a threefold social order to England.

Around 1918, Dr. Vreede began to construct the library & archive at the Goetheanum. Using her own means, she purchased the expensive lecture transcripts as soon as they were typed from notes. In 1920 she moved to Arlesheim, Switzerland, where she had built a little house for herself. It was the second house for which Steiner had given the model in 1919.

In 1924, Steiner appointed her to head the Mathematical-Astronomical Section of the School of Spiritual Science of the recently reestablished Anthroposophical Society, & she belonged to the board of directors of the general Anthroposophical Society from 1925 to 1935.

Rudolf Steiner saw her in connection with the Platonic stream, & had indicated that she had incarnated earlier than planned in order to meet him on Earth.

Dr. Vreede gave a lecture on 3 January 1926, which was first publish in the Anthroposophical Movement in Vol. 6, Nos. 42 to 46, called The World of the Stars and Human Destiny. In it she addressed the appropriate use of Astrology in our time:

You will now understand to what purpose we have a horoscope, and that it is not there in the first instance for our own sake. You will understand that when a horoscope is made for a person’s satisfaction, there is always a certain amount of egoism connected with it; for he does not possess it for this purpose! And if you take the passages in our literature where Dr. Steiner speaks about Astrology (there are passages in many of the cycles and lectures) you will find how he emphasizes again and again that Astrology must be something social, which pays no attention to the individual but has social aims. In a true Astrology only what is universally human is considered and not the satisfaction of the egoism of the human being. By considering it egoistically, that deed of Michael is undone whereby other beings ought to be saved from plunging into the abyss.

When Dr. Steiner asked the position of the stars at the moment of a birth, it was always with reference to children who lacked one or other of the forces just described. It was then possible to learn from it which of these forces was not there in the right sense; thus it could be gathered what this human soul lacked before birth. And then it might be possible under certain circumstances to find a cure. Here we see how the matter is carried away from what is egoistic and into the social, when such abnormal children may in this way find a cure, which otherwise might perhaps not be possible. But in those children in whom certain forces were not brought in at birth these influences remain present. …Thus we see how Astrology can be used when it is kept in Michael’s sense, and not in the sense in which it is so often practiced today.”

In 1928 she invited Willi Sucher to come to Dornach & collaborated with him in working out the death asterograms of historical personalities, which was part of his substantial historic research, & which he further worked out in the late 30’s & 40’s, doing the charts & therapeutic research of special needs children in England & Scotland.

In 1935 the separation within the Anthroposophical Society took place & she was expelled from the executive council, her section passed to other leadership. She was excluded, along with her long-time friend & co-member, Dr. Ita Wegman, from the board of directors. She was also cut off from the observatory & archives that she herself helped assemble.

Rudolf Steiner is reputed to have said that Dr. Vreede understood his work more deeply than anyone else.

On the anniversary, in 1943, of Rudolf Steiner’s death, she spoke to the circle of friends & co-workers at the Ida Wegman clinic. They wanted to commemorate not just Rudolf Steiner but the many others who were leading Anthroposophists but were no longer known to most. She spoke in a devoted way about Edith Maryon, who also died in 1924, & Alice Sauerwein. She portrayed Count Keyserlingk & Louis Werbeck, Caroline von Heydebrand & Eugen Kolisko.

At the beginning of May 1943 she spoke once more on the 400th anniversary of the death of Copernicus. At the lecture it was noticed that only by exceptional exertion could she keep herself upright. Just a few days later on 6 May, she had to take to her bed. She had never been ill nor depended on people until that point. Thanks to the devoted care of Frau Schunemann, she was treated at home until her passing on 31 August 1943 in Ascona.

“The stars bear for us the traces of the Deeds of the Gods which lead through the Beings of the hierarchies to the frontiers of Divinity Itself.” ~Elisabeth Vreede

http://www.rsarchive.org/RelAuthors/VreedeElizabeth/Anthro_Astro.php

Beheading John the Baptist

29 August 2016 – Astro-Weather: Late summer nights are prime Milky Way time. After dark, the Milky Way runs from Sagittarius in the south, up & left across Aquila, through the big Summer Triangle very high in the east, & on down thru Cassiopeia to Perseus rising low in the north-northeast

Summer-Triangle milky

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History, historical life, will only be seen in the right light when a true consciousness of the connection of the so-called living with the so-called dead can be developed” – The Living and the Dead by Rudolf Steiner, Berlin, 5th February, 1918

ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY

John the baptist Gustave-Moreau-and-the-Apparition-of-St-Johns-Head-to-SalomeGustave-Moreau

33 – Beheading of John the Baptist

708 – Copper coins are minted in Japan for the first time

1632 – Birthday of John Locke, English physician & philosopher

1756 – Frederick the Great attacks Saxony, beginning the Seven Years’ War

1758 – The first American Indian reservation is established, at Indian Mills, New Jersey

1778 – American Revolutionary War: British & American forces at the Battle of Rhode Island

1786 – Shays’ Rebellion, an armed uprising of Massachusetts farmers, begins in response to high debt & tax burdens

1825 – Independence of Brazil from the Kingdom of Portugal

[#Beginning of Shooting Data Section] Nikon D2X 2006/09/28 14:11:58.6 TIFF - RGB (8-bit) Image Size: Small (2144 x 1424) Lens: 60mm F/2.8 Focal Length: 60mm Exposure Mode: Manual Metering Mode: Center-Weighted 1/80 sec - F/22 Exposure Comp.: 0 EV Sensitivity: ISO 100 Optimize Image: White Balance: Color Temp. (4300 K) AF Mode: AF-S Flash Sync Mode: Flash Mode: Auto Flash Comp: Color Mode: Mode III (Adobe RGB) Tone Comp.: Normal Hue Adjustment: 0° Saturation: Normal Sharpening: Normal Image Comment: Photo by Douglas A Lockard Long Exposure NR: Off High ISO NR: Off [#End of Shooting Data Section]

1831 – Michael Faraday discovers electromagnetic induction

1842 – End of the First Opium War; China is forced by England to accept the opium trade & to surrender Hong Kong

1885 – Gottlieb Daimler patents the Reitwagen – the world’s first internal combustion motorcycle

1898 – The Goodyear tire company is founded

1941 – Tallinn, the capital of Estonia, is occupied by Nazi Germany following an occupation by the Soviet Union

1943 – German-occupied Denmark scuttles most of its navy; Germany dissolves the Danish government

1949 –The Soviet Union tests its first atomic bomb– First Lightning or Joe 1

1965 – The Gemini V spacecraft returns to Earth

1966 – The Beatles perform their last concert at Candlestick Park in San Francisco

2005 – Hurricane Katrina devastates the U.S. Gulf Coast from Louisiana to the Florida Panhandle, killing an estimated 1,836 people & causing over $108 billion in damage

International Day against Nuclear Tests

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john the baptist closeDean Flock

John the Baptist, truly the greatest of all Men – Still human, He hovers as an Eagle in the realm of the Angels. After his beheading He became the protector of the 12 disciples of Jesus Christ & especially of John the Evangelist.

john-the-baptist-el-greco-st-john-the-evangelist-El Greco Rudolf_Steiner_1908

Did the Eagle land in the beginning of the 20th century on the shoulder of Rudolf Steiner to guide him towards the Second Coming?

Elijah_Richard AndersonRichard Anderson

 “Elijah was destined to be one of the ruling figures in the régime inaugurated by Moses. There had to be Individualities who were not wholly contained in the human personality; one part of their being was in the earthly personality and the other in the spiritual world. Elijah was an Individuality of this nature. Only part of his being was present in his personality on the physical plane; the Ego-hood of Elijah could not penetrate fully into his physical body. He must therefore be called a personality ‘filled with the Spirit’. A figure such as Elijah could not possibly be brought into existence through the normal forces by which other men are placed in the world. In the normal way the human being develops in the mother’s body in such a way that through physical processes the Individuality who has been incarnated previously simply unites with the physical embryo. This could not be so in the case of an Individuality such as Elijah. Other forces had to intervene, concerned with the part of the Individuality that reached into the spiritual world. His development was necessarily attended by influences working upon him from outside. Hence when such Individualities are incarnated they appear as men who are ‘inspired’, ‘impelled by the Spirit’. They appear as ecstatic personalities whose utterances far surpass anything that might issue from their normal intelligence.

The man who lived as ‘Elijah’ was an outstanding example of this. The words uttered by his mouth and the actions performed by his hands did not proceed only from the part of his being actually present in his personality; they were manifestations of divine-spiritual Beings in the background.

When this Individuality was born again he was to unite with the body of the child born to Zacharias and Elisabeth. We know from the Gospel itself that John the Baptist is to be regarded as the reborn Elijah. But in him we have to do with an Individuality who in his earlier incarnations had not habitually developed or brought fully into operation all the forces present in the normal course of life. In the normal course of life the inner power or force of the Ego becomes active while the physical body of the human being is developing in the mother’s womb. The Elijah-Individuality in earlier times had not descended deeply enough to be involved in the inner processes operating here. The Ego had not, as in normal circumstances, been stirred into activity by its own forces, but from outside. This was now to happen again. But the Ego was now farther from the spiritual world and nearer to the Earth, much more closely connected with the Earth than the Beings who had formerly guided Elijah. The transition leading to the amalgamation of the Buddha-stream with the Zarathustra-stream was now to be brought about.

Everything was to be rejuvenated. Thus it was the Nirmanakaya of Buddha which now stirred the Ego-force of John into activity, having the same effect as spiritual forces that had formerly worked upon Elijah. At certain times the being known as Elijah had been rapt in states of ecstasy; then the God spoke, filling his Ego with a force which could be communicated to the outer world. Now again a spiritual force was present — the Nirmanakaya of Buddha hovering above the head of the Nathan Jesus; this force worked upon Elisabeth when John was to be born, stimulated within her the embryo of John in the sixth month of pregnancy, and wakened the Ego. But being nearer to the Earth this force now worked as more than an inspiration; it had an actual formative effect upon the Ego of John. Under the influence of the visit of her who is there called ‘Mary’, the Ego of John the Baptist awoke into activity. The Nirmanakaya of Buddha was here working upon the Ego of the former Elijah — now the Ego of John the Baptist — wakening it and penetrating right into the physical substance.” ~Rudolf Steiner, from The Gospel of St. Luke

John the baptist beheading CaravaggioSalomeLondonCaravaggio

“If we pass on to the sixth chapter of Mark we hear fully described how King Herod had John the Baptist beheaded. The tortured conscience of Herod arouses a strange foreboding in him. When he hears all that has occurred through Christ Jesus he says, “John, whom I beheaded, has been restored to life!” Herod feels that, though the physical personality of John had gone away, he is now all the more present! He feels that his atmosphere, his spirituality — which was none other than the spirituality of Elijah, is still there. His tormented conscience causes him to be aware that John the Baptist, that is, Elijah, is still there.

But then something strange happens. We are shown how, after John the Baptist had met his physical death, Christ Jesus came to the very neighborhood where John had worked. I want you to take particular notice of a remarkable passage and not to skim over it lightly, for the words of the Gospels are not written for rhetorical effect, nor journalistically. Something very significant is said here. Jesus Christ appears among the throng of followers and disciples of John the Baptist, and this fact is expressed in a sentence to which we must give careful attention: “And as Jesus came out He saw a great crowd,” by which could be meant only the disciples of John, “and He had compassion on them …” (Mark 6:34.) Why compassion? Because they had lost their master, they were there without John, whose headless corpse we are told had been carried to his grave. But even more precisely is it said, “for they were like sheep who had lost their shepherd. And He began to teach them many things.” It cannot be indicated any more clearly how He teaches John’s disciples. He teaches them because the spirit of Elijah, which is at the same time the spirit of John the Baptist, is still active among them. Thus it is again indicated with dramatic power in these significant passages of the Mark Gospel how the spirit of Christ Jesus entered into what had been prepared by the spirit of Elijah-John. Even so this is only one of the main points, around which many other significant things are grouped.

I will now call your attention to one thing more. I have several times pointed out how this spirit of Elijah or John continued to act in such a way as to impress its impulses into world history. I have often mentioned that the soul of Elijah-John appeared again in the painter Raphael. This is one of those facts that call attention to the metamorphoses of souls that take place under the impetus given by the Mystery of Golgotha. Because it was also necessary that in the post-Christian era such a soul should work in Raphael through the medium of a single personality; what in ancient times was so comprehensive and world encompassing now appears in such a different personality as that of Raphael. Can we not feel that the aura that hovered round Elijah-John is also present in Raphael? That in Raphael there were such similarities to these two others that we could even say that this element was too great to be able to enter into a single personality but hovered round it, so that the revelations received by this personality seemed like an illumination? Such was indeed the case with Raphael!” ~Rudolf Steiner, Gospel of Mark: Lecture 3

Raphael Raffaello Sanzio da Urbinoself portrait of Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino known as  Raphael

“The truth is, my dear friends, this earthly personality of Raphael was completely yielded up and was only present through what Lazarus-John gave to this soul to be poured out into colour and line for all mankind.

Such was the life of this being. And it was so, that this Raphael life could only be, as it were, absolved in another life of thirty years — in Novalis. And so we see Raphael die young, Novalis die young — one being, who came forth from Elijah-John, appearing before mankind in two different forms, preparing through art and through poetry the true Michael mood of soul, sent down by the Michael stream as messenger to men on Earth.

And now we behold the wonderful artistic power of Raphael come to life again in Novalis in poetry that stirs and enraptures the hearts of men. All that through Raphael was given to human eyes to see, — of this could human hearts drink deep, when it came again in Novalis selfself portrait of Novalis.

When we consider the life of Novalis, what an echo we find there of the Raphael life for which Hermann Grimm had so fine an understanding! His beloved dies in her youth. He is himself still young. What is he going to do with his life now that she has died? He tells us himself. He says that his life on Earth will be henceforth to “die after her”, to follow her on the way of death. He wants to pass over already now into the super-sensible, to lead again the Raphael life, not touching the Earth, but living out in poetry his magic idealism. He would fain not let himself be touched by Earth life.

When we read the “Fragments” of Novalis, and give ourselves up to the life that flows so abundantly in them, we can discover the secret of the deep impression they make on us. Whatever we have before us in immediate sense-reality, whatever the eye can see and recognise as beautiful — all this, through the magic idealism that lives in the soul of Novalis, appears in his poetry with a well-nigh heavenly splendour. The meanest and simplest material thing — with the magic idealism of his poetry he can make it live again in all its spiritual light and glory.

And so we see in Novalis a radiant and splendid forerunner of that Michael stream which is now to lead you all, my dear friends, while you live; and then, after you have gone through the gate of death, you will find in the spiritual super-sensible worlds all those others — among them also the being of whom I have been speaking to you today — all those with whom you are to prepare the work that shall be accomplished at the end of the century, and that shall lead mankind past the great crisis in which it is involved”. ~ The Last Address given by Rudolf Steiner The Individuality of Elias, John, Raphael, Novalis, Dornach, Michaelmas Eve, 1924

John the Baptist Leonardo_da_Vinci_025Leonardo da Vinci

Venus-Jupiter Conjunction

27 August 2016 – Astro-Weather:

Venus-Jupiter-27Aug2016-cc

Venus-Jupiter conjunction*. Starting about 20 minutes after sunset, look low above the horizon due west (left of where the Sun went down). The two planets will be less than ½° apart at the time of twilight for most of the world. That’s so close that you may need binoculars to see that they are two objects, not one!

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george-orwell-fabrizio-cassettaFabrizio Cassetta

The most effective way to destroy people is to deny and obliterate their own understanding of their history.” ~George Orwell

ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY

348 – Ulfilas devised the Gothic alphabet & translated the Bible from Greek into the Gothic language

410 – The sacking of Rome by the Visigoths ends after three days

1730 – Birthday of Johann Georg Hamann, ‘the Magnus of the North –A German philosopher, whose work was used by his student J. G. Herder as a main support of the Sturm und Drang movement. Goethe & Kierkegaard considered him to be the finest mind of his time

1770 – Birthday of Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, a German philosopher of “absolute idealism” described a “Protestant Aquinas – the originator of the thesis, antithesis, synthesis triad along with Johann Gottlieb Fichte. Hegel has influenced many thinkers & writers- the philosophies of Marx & Nietzsche, phenomenology, German existentialism, & psychoanalysis

1813 – French Emperor Napoleon I defeats a larger force of Austrians, Russians, & Prussians at the Battle of Dresden

1832 – Black Hawk, leader of the Sauk tribe of Native Americans, surrenders to U.S. authorities, ending the Black Hawk War

1859 – Petroleum is discovered in Titusville, Pennsylvania leading to the world’s first commercially successful oil well

1881 – The Georgia hurricane makes landfall near Savannah, Georgia, resulting in an estimated 700 deaths

1883 – Eruption of Krakatoa: Four enormous explosions destroy the island of Krakatoa & cause years of climate change

1893 – The Sea Islands hurricane strikes the United States near Savannah, Georgia, killing an estimated 1,000-2,000 people

1916 – The Kingdom of Romania declares war on Austria-Hungary, entering World War I as one of the Allied nations

1924 – Introduction of the Michael sign by Rudolf Steiner after a breach of the mantras from the 1st Class of the School of Spiritual Science in London

1942 – Sarny Massacre – the execution of 18,000 people mostly Jews, in the Nazi-occupied city of Sarny, then part of Poland, on August 27 – 28, 1942

1962 – The Mariner 2 unmanned space mission is launched to Venus by NASA

1963 – Deathday of W. E. B. Du Bois, American sociologist, historian, & activist

1975 – Deathday of Haile Selassie, Ethiopian emperor

1991 – Moldova declares independence from the USSR

2003 – Mars makes its closest approach to Earth in nearly 60,000 years

2011 – Hurricane Irene strikes the United States east coast, killing 77 & causing an estimated $15.6 billion in damage

***

shadow long2

My POD (Poem Of the Day)

~Looking at my shadow against the curtain –

It moves as I do. It’s hands are mine

I clap them & stamp my feet

Making my shadow dance

Asking: Is the darkness all I have to fear?

~hag

***

Venus-Jupiter conj 27Aug2016

Venus-Jupiter conjunction

It might seem odd to talk about the Star of Bethlehem during the month of August, instead of in December, when we recount the story of three wise men guided to the birthplace of the Matthew Jesus child, by a bright object in the sky.

There have been numerous possible ‘scientific’ explanations of what the Star of Bethlehem may have been. One of those proposed possibilities will play out in the night sky tonight after sundown (Aug. 27, 2016): an exceedingly close encounter between the two brightest planets, Venus & Jupiter.

Two planets coming this close together makes for a very striking sight.

It must be remembered that the Chaldeans who occupied Mesopotamia 2,000 years ago were astute observers of the night sky & were very familiar with the motions of the sun, moon & planets. They would never simply mistake something like the bright star Sirius or a bright planet as being something out of the ordinary. These ancient stargazers were much better acquainted with the stars & constellations than anyone in our 21st century world. But if something very rare took place in the sky, the ancient skywatchers would have noticed it immediately.

Tonight’s Venus-Jupiter encounter is one of those rare events, & something similar appeared in the sky more than 20 centuries ago.

Taken literally, the biblical account of the story of the Star of Bethlehem calls for not one, but two “stars.” One to be seen at the start of the Magi’s journey, while the other appearing to them upon their arrival in Bethlehem.

Interestingly, in August of 3 B.C., Venus & Jupiter were prominent in the predawn eastern sky, & on Aug. 12 B.C. they came within just 0.15 degrees of each other as seen from the Middle East. Incidentally, this sign would have been seen “in the east,” explaining the phrase in the Book of Matthew.

Ten months later, Venus & Jupiter got together again for an even more spectacular encore on June 17, 2 B.C., when at sundown from Babylonia they were separated by just 0.01 degrees, (just like tonight!!!) right above the western horizon as the sky grew dark.

The two planets could have appeared to coalesce into a single “star” somewhat brighter than Venus alone.

The fact that Jupiter & Venus had such a close conjunction at this time in history has led some people to theorize that it could be an explanation for the Star of Bethlehem. Not quite Astrosophy, but interesting none-the-less.

It certainly will be interesting to see what kind of spectacle Venus & Jupiter will offer this evening. Unfortunately, unlike 2,000 years ago, seeing the two planets will be a bit of a challenge. Skywatchers who wish to observe the event should make sure they have a clear view of the western horizon, with no tall obstructions, like trees or buildings, to block the view.

In other parts of the world, Venus & Jupiter will appear to come quite close to each other, though not quite as close as NY viewers will see them.

To appreciate just how often Venus & Jupiter come so close together, we have to go as far back as Nov. 14. 1660. Our next opportunity will come on the morning of Nov. 22, 2065, when Venus & Jupiter will be merged together as one brilliant singular point of light as they rise above the east-southeast horizon just before sunrise.

See you then

Blessings & Peace ~Hazel Archer Ginsberg 

“Per corem Leonis in signo virginis in sororitatem steallarum te salvamus”

23 August 2016 – Astro-Weather: Saturn, Mars, & Antares finally line up. They make a nearly straight, vertical line in the south-southwest as the stars come out, as shown below. Tomorrow the line will be nearly as straight, but with Mars now on the other side of the Saturn-Antares line, at the time of twilight

august 23 2016

***

ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY

“That men do not learn very much from the lessons of history is the most important of all the lessons that history has to teach.” ~Aldous Huxley

Feast Day of Rose of Lima

Black Ribbon Day of Remembrance for Victims of Stalinism & Nazism

International Day for the Remembrance of the Slave Trade & its Abolition

30 BC – After the successful invasion of Egypt, Octavian executes Marcus Antonius Antyllus, eldest son of Mark Antony, & Caesarion, the last king of the Ptolemaic dynasty of Egypt & only child of Julius Caesar & Cleopatra

20 BC – Ludi Volcanalici = games or chariot races, held within the temple precinct of Vulcan for the fire god’s Feast Day, to mark the treaty with Parthia by Augustus

vesuveus

79 – Mount Vesuvius begins stirring, on the feast day of Vulcan, the Roman god of fire

1244 – Siege of Jerusalem: The city’s citadel, the Tower of David, surrenders to Khwarezmian (Persian) Empire

1382 – Siege of Moscow: The Golden Horde led by khan Tokhtamysh lays siege

1572 –St. Bartholomew’s Day massacre a wave of Catholic mob violence, directed against the Huguenots (French Calvinist Protestants) during the French Wars of Religion. Traditionally believed to have been instigated by Catherine de’ Medici, the mother of King Charles IX.

1754 – Birthday of Louis XVI of France

1839 – The United Kingdom captures Hong Kong. The ensuing 3-year conflict will later be known as the First Opium War

1914 – World War I: Japan declares war on Germany

1926 – Deathday of Rudolph Valentino, Italian-American actor

1939 – World War II: Nazi Germany & the Soviet Union sign a non-aggression treaty, the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact. In a secret addition to the pact, the Baltic states, Finland, Romania, & Poland are divided between the two nations.

1942 – World War II: Beginning of the Battle of Stalingrad

1944 – World War II: Marseille is liberated by the Allies

1944 – Freckleton Air Disaster: A United States Army Air Forces B-24 Liberator bomber crashes into a school in Freckleton, England killing 61 people

earth rise nasa

1966 – Lunar Orbiter 1 takes the first photograph of Earth from orbit around the Moon

1970 –César Chávez leads the Salad Bowl strike, the largest farm worker strike in U.S. history

1973 – A bank robbery in Stockholm, Sweden, turns into a hostage crisis, who begin to sympathize with their captors, leading to the term “Stockholm syndrome

song revo

1989 – Singing Revolution: Two million people from Estonia, Latvia & Lithuania stand on the Vilnius–Tallinn road, holding hands for restoration of independence

1990 – Armenia declares its independence from the Soviet Union

1990 – Saddam Hussein appears on Iraqi state television with a number of Western “guests” (actually hostages) to try to prevent the Gulf War

1991 – Tim Berners-Lee opens the World Wide Web to new users

1996 – Osama bin Laden issues message entitled ‘A declaration of war against the Americans occupying the land of the two holy places.’

2000 – Gulf Air Flight 072 crashes into the Persian Gulf killing 143

2011 – A magnitude 5.8 earthquake occurs in Virginia as a result of ‘Fracking’. Damage occurs to monuments & structures in Washington D.C. with damage estimated at 300 million

***

mother dauhter

~Oh Mother see how I have ripened, becoming

Upright & tall as a weed tree on the parkway.

Seeds sown on the wind

Swell up in the shade of the city street

Conversing with the blacktop softening in the sun.

When the light comes after

The shadow playing in a passing cloud

Bent on the steam of my breathing

All is blue bliss

Even into deep caverns

Where secret waters run high

Pacing with the star-tides.

Quenching the lioness

I shine

Renewing Regulus in the heart of heaven

A circus ring riding

High on the rising wheat

With the Virgin pushing past

Hells plush taverns

Into Benediction,

A sweet prayer of Love in action

A chord ever chiming

In a soft whisper thru my August soul

~hag

***

virgosky

Per corem Leonis in signo virginis in sororitatem steallarum te salvamus

Maybe because I watched ‘Mists of Avalon’ with my daughter last night, I awoke with that mysteries Latin phrase in my head. It makes me think of Steiner’s verse:

Stars once spoke to Man

It is World destiny that they are silent now.

To be aware of the silence

Can become pain for earthly Man.

But in the deepening silence

There grows and ripens

What Man speaks to the Stars

To be aware of the speaking

Can be strength for Spirit-Man” (Give to Marie Steiner by Rudolf Steiner on Christmas Day 1922)

This mantra speaks to the evolution of human consciousness: From the time when human beings were vessels thru which the gods – the spiritual beings of the stars, once spoke; into the Copernican revolution when modern science needed to prevail, teaching us to know the measure & number of the physical world; into our current time of the Consciousness Soul Age, when we can learn once again to Speak with the Stars.

When attempting to understand a shift in consciousness as vast as the one in which every one of us is involved at this very second, you have to think big. Really big. You have to stretch your mind & imagination. The fact is, when it’s time for a change, the conveyor belt moves right along, & like it or not, you must move along with it, or fall right off into oblivion.

If you can climb an imaginary tree to the highest limb, you can see over the treetops & look far ahead, to the farthest horizon, where the future curves out of sight. Then turn around & look in the opposite direction far into the past. Then maybe we can make a clearer assumption about where we are right now.

About twenty-six thousand years ago, according to archaeological evidence, warrior goddesses ruled the world. They hunted, they fished & were generally in charge of things. Women dominated the known world. The fixed star Regulus, the heart of Leo the Lion, transited the sign of Virgo, around that time.

And as of a year ago today, Regulus, entered Virgo. Here we are again! On the brink of enormous social transformation. Are women coming back into power? Doesn’t look that way when you see how hard the good ol’ boys are trying to hang on to their war toys. And yet, we stand at this very moment on the threshold of a new age. The Age of The Woman.

Looking back about two thousand years ago, we see that Julius Caesar was being born -As were the grandparents of Jesus Christ. No one would have ever been able to predict the evolutionary story that would unfold from those events. Just think of it. Julius Caesar & Christ’s little old Jewish Gramma – who could think they would end up together & evolve the union of the Roman Empire & Judaism into a universal Christianity!

Who could have ever foreseen that? So it’s impossible to see two thousand years into the future without a wildly active imagination. But this time in our history, right now, Regulus has moved once again into Virgo, the sign of the Virgin. i.e. the ‘whole’ Woman. Here She comes folks, so better start strewing NON-GMO kernels of corn in her path.

But what will happen to the Plutocratic elite cabal of banksters who are now secretly running the world from their gated mansions, deposing democratically elected officials & replacing them with their bankster puppets?

Don’t worry. Think big. Think ahead. There will be a war between the individual & the System. That’s already happening. Pluto in Capricorn will take care of the bankster elite. Once they have gained all the power possible & captured control of all the money, which they intend to do, they will all be knocked off when the goddesses storm the castle.

But don’t hold your breath – It’s not going to be tomorrow. These things don’t happen overnight. These things have to be done delicately.

But where did it all start? And where does the fixed star Regulus fit in to the story?

It is my thought that perhaps Regulus, being the beginnings of the human heart, is one of the Guides of our Solar System, & ultimately the cycles of human social evolution. Regulus the heart of the Lion, brings Galactic power, juice & spiritual messages to the people of the Earth from a Higher Source, influencing the direction of our consciousness & growth. Every time the Sun, Moon, planets, asteroids, Nodes & all the other spiritual bodies pass beneath Regulus, they get a jolt, a cosmic-heart message that seeps into the mass consciousness, no matter how long it takes.

When we look into the night sky now & see Regulus, we are only now consciously perceiving light that was sent streaming toward us in the nineteen thirties. While there may be all sorts of conclusions we can draw from that, at the end of the day, they are still merely anecdotal speculations.

But think on this: You may remember the stories that people were told for years about the appearance of the Virgin Mary to the Children of Fatima. It was said that she deposited three letters to be opened at different time intervals, to be read by the reigning Pope, containing messages for the human race. It was said that when the Pope opened the last one, he fainted – & never revealed the contents to the world.

It’s time now. Wouldn’t you like to know what was in that letter?

“Per corem Leonis in signo virginis in sororitatem steallarum te salvamus”. which means: “Through the heart of the lion, in the sign of the woman, we welcome you in the sisterhood of the stars”

Blessings & Peace ~Hazel Archer Ginsberg