Category Archives: Insight

Holy Monday

Greetings Friends on this Holy Monday – You can listen to The “I Think Speech” Podcast HERE – On this day we remember how Christ uses the grove of fig trees to reveal to the disciples how the ‘Hosannas’ of the previous day were mere illusion, the last fruits of the old visionary clairvoyance, given by nature, & bound to the body. The seemingly harsh words He uses about the fig tree are a challenge to that ancient ecstatic vision. Here a momentous decision is made in the history of humankind. On that Monday in Holy Week Christ rejects a temptation. Had He allied Himself with the ancient clairvoyant forces, He might have found public recognition, like Judas wanted. Not only would the people have sung “Hosanna”; they would have crowned Him King. But a final pronouncement is made: Christ will find no link with the ancient forces. His sole aim is that humankind should find the way to awakening & freedom. Christ Jesus rejects the Hosannas of the people, bringing about the reversal in the cries of “Crucify Him”. For His mission is to show Humanity that we must act out of a consciousness that leads to freedom, even if it means tragedy; even if men in their spiritual blindness nail Him on the cross.

On the Cursing of the Fig Tree (St. John Chrysostom) | MYSTAGOGY RESOURCE  CENTER

His curse on the fig trees of those who had lent him the donkey is one of tough love. He acts purely from the nature of his Sun-Being, for when the Sun rises, the Moon inevitably goes pale. So the moon-forces of the old vision must fade away.

Then The Christ appears before the Temple, where many pilgrims are feverishly buying, selling, trading & bargaining. The Passover lamb must be slaughtered, & this is a source of big business; for the custom demands that the animals be brought to the Temple before they are sacrificed. Old Annas, the notorious miser of world history, knows how to make a profit. He has already made a vast fortune from this market. He has been the back slapper & string-puller in the corrupt political compromise with the Romans which is the basis of the Temple business. The pilgrims must change their local currency into the ‘official Roman currency.’ So the Temple has become an Exchange market. The Roman money men have even been admitted to the Temple, even though they are agents of the ‘Cult of Caesar’, because it was hoped by this compromise to at least keep them out of the Holy of Holies.

Now Christ comes on the scene. He is there to fulfil the custom of the feast. But when he sees this ungodly exchange, the fire of His burning will takes over. There is no need for Him to say much. The people are immediately seized with panic. Terror-stricken, they realize the decadence they have fallen into. The conscious restraint which was exercised by Jesus for 3 years is entirely transformed & has become the intensity of divine & human will combined. In their hearts the people know He has the right to tear down the mask of decadence in the Temple.

Jesus Cleanses the Temple (Mark 11:15-19)
El Greco

Matthew: 15 On reaching Jerusalem, Jesus entered the temple courts and began driving out those who were buying and selling there. He overturned the tables of the money changers and the benches of those selling doves, 16 and would not allow anyone to carry merchandise through the temple courts. 17 And as he taught them, he said, “Is it not written: ‘My house will be called a house of prayer for all nations’]? But you have made it ‘a den of thieves.’”

Holy Week and Easter: Famous Paintings

18 The chief priests and the teachers of the law heard this and began looking for a way to kill him, for they feared him, because the whole crowd was amazed at his teaching.

~hag, with gratitude for the indications from Mark 11: 12-25 & Christian Community Priest Emil Bock

ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY:

Arild Rosenkrantz

3 April 33 – According to the spiritual scientific research of Rudolf Steiner, Today is the Death Day of Christ Jesus…The original Good Friday when the Mystery of Gologtha occured.

& at the same time in Mexico Vitzliputzli crucified a powerful black magician. “Now at a certain time a being was born in Central America who set himself a definite task within this culture. The old, original inhabitants of Mexico linked the existence of this being with a definite idea or picture. They said he had entered the world as the son of a virgin who had conceived him through super earthly powers, inasmuch as it was a feathered being from the heavens who impregnated her. When one makes researches with the occult powers at one’s disposal, one finds that the being to whom the ancient Mexicans ascribed a virgin birth was born in the year 1 A.D. and lived to be thirty-three years old. These facts emerge when, as stated, one examines the matter with occult means. This being set himself a quite specific task.

At this same time in Central America another man was born who was destined by birth to become a high initiate of Taotl. This man had in his previous earthly incarnations been initiated as described above and through the fact that he had many, many times repeated the procedure involving the excision of the stomach, which has been described to you and which there is no need to recapitulate, he had been gradually equipped with a lofty earthly and super-earthly knowledge. This was one of the greatest black magicians, if not the greatest ever to tread the earth; he possessed the greatest secrets that are to be acquired on this path. He was faced directly with a momentous decision as the year 30 A.D. approached, namely whether or not, as a single human individual, to become so powerful through continuous initiation that he would come to know a certain basic secret. Through knowledge of this secret he would have then been able to give such a shock and impetus to the coming evolution of man on earth that humanity in the fourth and fifth post-Atlantean epochs would have been thrown into terrible darkness, with the result that what the ahrimanic powers had striven for in these epochs could have come into existence.

Then a conflict began between this super-magician and the being to whom a virgin birth was ascribed, and one finds from one’s research that it lasted for three years. The being of the virgin birth bore a name that, when we try to transpose it into our speech approximates Vitzliputzli. He is a human person who, among all these beings who otherwise only moved about in spirit form and could only be perceived through atavistic clairvoyance, in actual fact became man, so the story goes, through his virgin birth. The three year conflict ended when Vitzliputzli was able to have the great magician crucified, and not only through the crucifixion to annihilate his body but also to place his soul under a ban, by this means rendering its activities powerless as well as its knowledge. Thus the knowledge assimilated by the great magician of Taotl was killed. In this way Vitzliputzli was able to win again for earthly life all those souls who, as indicated, had already received the urge to follow Lucifer and leave the earth. Through the mighty victory he had gained over the powerful black magician, Vitzliputzli was able to imbue men again with the desire for earthly existence and successive incarnations.” ~ Rudolf Steiner, The Mexican Mysteries and the Knights Templar Inner Impulses of Evolution lecture 3

1925 – The Cremation of Rudolf Steiner at the Horburg cemetery in Basel

Image result for crown of thorns sunlight

The following moving descriptions of experiences and observations from the time of Rudolf Steiner’s taking leave of the earth are taken from an article by Werner Schäfer, whose selections we reprint here with his kind permission. They may speak for themselves without further commentary and serve to create a unifying mood for all those who would like to commemorate Rudolf Steiner’s being and work on the 95th anniversary of his death.

Ilona Schubert summarized in the following words what certainly corresponded to the experience of many people at that time when they said goodbye to Rudolf Steiner, whose body was laid out in the studio:

Silence weaved in the room. In deep sorrow, but also with infinite gratitude and love in their hearts, those present raised their thoughts to their great leader and teacher. The next morning – on the 3rd of April, the historical Good Friday – was the cremation, which was celebrated by Dr. Rittelmeyer with the ritual of the Christian Community, in the old crematorium in Basel. An immense crowd had arrived, and the small abdication hall could not accommodate them all. So the majority stood outside in the open air. I, too, was among them and could only follow the celebration from a distance. But it was no less a deep experience. Bright blue skies and bright sunshine, singing birds in the newly awakened world of spring – it was a magical Good Friday atmosphere like in Wagner’s “Parzival,” which united all of the people, inside and outside, and unified them in the consciousness that they have now given the final guiding direction to the one who is among the greatest spirits of mankind and whose work on earth they had been allowed to witness.”

The following report by Dr. Heinrich Hardt comes from the cremation of Rudolf Steiner’s body in Basel on April 3, 1925 (from “Mitteilungen aus der anthroposophischen Arbeit in Deutschland,” Easter 1950):

It was a cloudless, radiant spring sky under which the immense crowd gathered around the Basel Crematorium, which was full of people inside. Stuten’s music had faded away, and Albert Steffen’s speech was audible in fragments to us who were standing in the open air. Deep sorrow ran through me over the decease of the beloved teacher, and still another particular sorrow over the imminent departure of his precious earthly form, his spirit-imbued head, his grace-filled starry brow. All this was now to be handed over to the elements. – Warm memories of his indications and revelations, which are intimately connected to all of nature – the plants, the animals, the elemental beings – pervaded my soul, and despite all the dignity and beauty which had been bestowed upon the whole happening by human hearts and hands, I somehow felt: it could not be otherwise than that Nature herself, who is not compliant to us human beings, expressed her own participation in this hour. The nature beings themselves, who are fraternally familiar to our spiritual teacher – yes, they must, they will show their participation, simply their visible presence; otherwise, this unique, at the same time so painful and yet so sublime hour would remain incomplete. – At the gable of the grey crematorium one could see the shape of a large antique vase, and I looked toward it with a searching, expectant gaze: When and where does the large, beautiful bird come from, which sits on it, ignoring the closeness of so many people and thus proving that its presence is not accidental? – But the vase remained as it was. – There – it may have been two or three minutes later – quiet seagull cries and a very gentle roar caused me to look up at the sky. What did I see? – Exactly vertically above the crematorium, at a height of about 40 meters, stood a structure like a living crown. It was comprised of about 22 to 24 seagulls. Their flight was cheerful and lively. In front of the bright blue sky, their plumage sparkled silver and, on their breasts, gold. An indescribable triad of colours! From time to time, individual birds swung through the circle in half-lemniscate form and arranged themselves in a new order. The whole crowning wreath, this crown crowning everything as if held by the hands of gods, remained in exactly the same place for minutes. I nudged my friend on the right, and we looked up for a long time, deeply moved. A look at the others standing nearby showed us that, unfortunately, probably no one but us looked up. One felt impelled to call out, to nudge others, to draw their attention – we were, after all, still so young! – but the thought of creating a disturbance through such actions made us remain silent. – Only very gradually did the wedding flight – as the ornithologists call such an event – slowly float away, preserving its circle, backwards to the right as seen from our perspective. But just then, the open sun flashed forth! Our eyes were forced to close as the feathered, livingly moving high crown approached all too near with its radiant attire. – Most inwardly shaken by the beauty of this freely given, deeply touching event, we then left the site with the others, looked into the silently flowing Rhine, and thanked those birds as if out of secret solidarity for their indescribable encircling round.”

The following is taken from “Astronomy and Anthroposophy” (1930) by Elisabeth Vreede.  It describes a newly shining star on star atlases and globes, called “Nova 1925.” (See also Rudolf Steiner’s lectures of June 4, 1924 [GA 236] and July 6, 1924 [GA 237].)

Most strange was the developmental process of [a Nova], which was illuminated to a strongly visible brightness, and which was first seen on May 25, 1925. It appeared in a constellation of the southern hemisphere, which bears the name “the easel of the painter.” (The star is therefore called: Nova Pictoris.) It thus has a position that is entirely unique in the chronicle of the Novae, because these usually appear in or near the Milky Way, while this star is rather near the southern ecliptic pole. Since the star-rich southern sky is not observed as continuously as the northern one, the appearance of the star could go unnoticed for a long time. In any case, one later discovered that it figured on older photo plates as a star of size 13, and that it was already a star of size 3 on April 13th, 1925 – in other words, it had already become clearly visible, such that, in contrast to the aforementioned stars, it had a very slow increase and perhaps entered into the range of visibility at the beginning of April. On June 9th of the same year, it was almost a star of size 1; then it slowly decreased again to a star of size 9.” (The  new star may therefore have appeared immediately, or three days after, Rudolf Steiner’s death…

“In January 1926, it was seen surrounded by a strongly reddish aureole, like a solar protuberance. In March 1928, it suddenly appeared as a double star; it had split – a phenomenon unknown to new stars up until now, such that even astronomers of the northern hemisphere at first did not at all want to believe their colleagues from the southern hemisphere who had observed it. Then, one spoke much of unexpected world catastrophes and reminded of the fable of the frog, which wanted to inflate itself to the ox and then burst – by assuming, on the basis of the spectrum, that the star had not actually become hot, and that its enormous increase in brightness (50,000 times, after a calculation) could be attributed only to an actual surface enlargement, which had become the undoing of the star. But we do not need to be confused by these materialistic explanations. – At the same time, the star surrounded itself with nebulae, as also occurs otherwise, so that for a while it offered the spectacle of two red stars, surrounded by a veil of nebulae. Soon thereafter, it even split again, and there were four stars, one brighter in the middle, three smaller ones all around, all of whitish color and immersed in a rosy nebula. According to the relatively few astronomers who could observe it, it was a wonderful spectacle. Then rings formed around the individual stars. Over time, the individual parts moved even further apart.” (Does this apparition not bring to mind the scene arrangement in the Mystery Dramas for the three soul forces, where the central forms of “Maria, Philia, Astrid, Luna appear in a glowing cloud of light”?

The following observation by Annemarie Dubach-Donathone of the first Eurythmists, comes from nature during springtime. She later calls to mind Rudolf Steiner’s “Butterfly Cycle” (1923, GA 230), as she brings together Rudolf Steiner’s death with the content of these lectures:

They were unspeakably beautiful, blooming spring days in which this holy death was received by the earth. And in the following summer months, white butterflies flew in flocks such as I had never seen during any summer before or after in the Dornach meadows and grounds. This sight reminded us again and again of the glorious words Rudolf Steiner had spoken a year-and-a-half earlier in the 1923 autumn lectures about butterflies, the colourfully shimmering messengers of the spiritual world. With nostalgic wonder, we looked at the delicate miracle; at times, a distant, spiritual smile seemed to shine out from it.”

Epilogue by Marie Steiner in “The Course of my Life” by Rudolf Steiner:

His life, consecrated wholly to the sacrificial service of humanity, was requited with unspeakable hostility; his path of knowledge was transformed into a path of thorns. But he walked the whole way, and mastered it for all humanity. He broke through the limits of knowledge; they are no longer there. Before us lies this path of knowledge in the crystal clarity of thoughts of which this book itself affords evidence. He raised the human intellect up to the spirit, permeated and united it with the spiritual Being of the cosmos. In this he achieved the greatest human deed. The greatest divine deed he taught us to understand; the greatest human deed he achieved. How could he escape being hated with all the demonic power of which Hell is capable? But he repaid with love the lack of understanding with which he was confronted.

He died – a Sufferer, a Leader, an Achiever –
In such a world as trod him under foot,
Yet which to raise aloft his strength sufficed.
He lifted men; they hurled themselves against him,
They spewed forth hatred, blocked his forward way.
His work they shattered even as he wrought it.
They raged with venom and with flame,
And now with joy defile his memory: —
“So he is dead who led you into freedom,
To light, to consciousness, to comprehension
Of what is Godlike in the human soul,
To your own Ego, to the Christ.
Was this not criminal, this undertaking?
He did what once Prometheus expiated,
What gave to Socrates the poisoned cup –
The crime Barabbas wrought was not so vile –
A deed whose expiation is the cross:
He lived, himself, the future there before you.
“We demons cannot suffer such a thing.
We harry, hunt, pursue who dares such deeds,
With all those souls who give themselves to us,
With all those forces which obey our will.
For ours is the turning point of time
And ours this humanity which sickens,
Without its God, in weakness, vice, and error.
We never yield the booty we have won,
But tear to pieces him who dares such deeds.
” He dared – and, daring, he endured his fate—
In love, long-suffering, and tolerance
Of weak, incapable humanity,
Which ever all his work in peril set,
Which ever misconstrued his uttered word,
Which misinterpreted his kind forbearance,
And in their littleness knew not themselves,
Because his greatness was beyond their compass.
’Twas thus he bore us – we were out of breath
In following his stride, his very flight
Which ravished us away.
’Twas our weakness
That was the hindrance ever to his flight,
The lead that weighted down his forward footsteps….
Now he is free, an aid to Those on High,
‘Who take whatever hath been wrung from Earth
As safeguard of Their goal.
So now They greet The son of man who his creative power,
Unfolded thus to serve the Gods’ high will;
Who, for the age of hardened intellect,
And for the time of dead machinery,
Stamped clear the Spirit, called die Spirit forth….
They hindered him.
The Earth in shadow moves,
n cosmic space now see the shaping figures;
The Leader waits; the heavens part and open;
In joy and reverence stand the rangéd hosts.
But Earth is wrapped in gray enshrouding night.”

Dear Friends,   May the veil between the worlds part to unite us in our thinking, feeling & willing with the spirit of Rudolf Steiner, a true initiate, & beloved teacher.

Rudolf Steiner’s Lectures on this day

Feast Day of Mary of Egypt. also known as Maria Aegyptica. In Goethe’s Faust Mary of Egypt is one of the 3 penitent saints who pray to the Virgin Mary for forgiveness for Faust. Her words are set by Mahler in his 8th Symphony, as the final saint’s appeal to the Mater Gloriosa. Her Story: At the age of twelve she ran away from her parents to the city of Alexandria. Here she lived an extremely dissolute life. In her Vita it states that she often refused the money offered for her sexual favors, as she was driven “by an insatiable & an irrepressible passion,” and that she mainly lived by begging, supplemented by spinning flax.

After seventeen years of this lifestyle, she traveled to Jerusalem for the Great Feasts of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross. She undertook the journey as a sort of “anti-pilgrimage,” stating that she hoped to find in the pilgrim crowds at Jerusalem even more partners in her lust. She paid for her passage by offering sexual favors to other pilgrims, & she continued her habitual lifestyle for a short time in Jerusalem. Her Vita relates that when she tried to enter the Church of the Holy Sepulchre for the celebration, she was barred from doing so by an unseen force. Realizing that this was because of her impurity, she was struck with remorse, & upon seeing an icon of the Theotokos (the Virgin Mary) outside the church, she prayed for forgiveness & promised to give up the world (i.e., become an ascetic). Then she attempted again to enter the church, & this time was permitted in. After venerating the relic of the true cross, she returned to the icon to give thanks, & heard a voice telling her, “If you cross the Jordan, you will find glorious rest.” She immediately went to the monastery of Saint John the Baptist on the bank of the River Jordan, where she received absolution & afterwards Holy Communion. The next morning, she crossed the Jordan & retired to the desert to live the rest of her life as a hermit in penitence. She took with her only three loaves of bread, & once they were gone, lived only on what she could find in the wilderness.

Approximately one year before her death, she recounted her life to Saint Zosimas of Palestine, who encountered her in the desert. When he unexpectedly met her in the desert, she was completely naked & almost unrecognizable as human. She asked Zosimas to toss her his mantle to cover herself with, & then she narrated her life’s story to him, manifesting marvellous clairvoyance. She asked him to meet her at the banks of the Jordan, on Holy Thursday of the following year, & bring her Holy Communion. When he fulfilled her wish, she crossed the river to get to him by walking on the surface of the water, & received Holy Communion, telling him to meet her again in the desert the following Lent. The next year, Zosimas travelled to the same spot where he first met her, some twenty days’ journey from his monastery, & found her lying there dead. According to an inscription written in the sand next to her head, she had died on the very night he had given her Communion & had been somehow miraculously transported to the place he found her, & her body was preserved incorrupt. He buried her body with the assistance of a passing lion. On returning to the monastery he related her life story to the brethren, & it was preserved among them as oral tradition until it was written down by St. Sophronius.

In Italy, this Mary became associated with the patronage of fallen women much like Mary Magdalene, to whom similar traits were associated.

Feast Day of Saints Agape, Chionia, & Irene (Greek: Αγάπη, Χιονία και Ειρήνη meaning Love, Purity, & Peace, born in Thessaloniki) 3 virgin sisters who, were martyred for their faith in the year 304 AD. The story of their martyrdom is the subject of Dulcitius, a 10th-century medieval Latin drama by the secular canoness, Hrotsvitha of Gandersheim, the first known female playwright.

1682 – Deathday of Rosamunde, Princess of Cyprus – There is a play by Helmina von Chézy, with music which Franz Schubert composed for it. The story concerns the attempt of Rosamunde, who was brought up incognito as a shepherdess by the mariner’s widow Axa, to reclaim her throne. The long-established governor Fulgentius , who already has Rosamunde’s parents on his conscience, attempts to thwart Rosamunde, initially by intrigue, then by a marriage proposal & finally by an attempt at poisoning. Rosamunde, whose claim is backed by a deed in her father’s hand, enjoys the support of Cypriots & the Cretan Prince Alfonso, her intended husband. Finally, all the attempts of Fulgentius fail; he dies by his own poison, & Rosamunde ascends the throne.

Image result for 1895 – The trial in the libel case brought by Oscar Wilde

1895 – The trial in the libel case brought by Oscar Wilde begins, eventually resulting in his imprisonment on charges of homosexuality

1897 – Death day of Johannes Brahms, German pianist & composer

Image result for 1922 – Joseph Stalin becomes the first General Secretary of the Communist Party

1922 – Joseph Stalin becomes the first General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.

Image result for 1968 – Martin Luther King Jr. delivers his "I've Been to the Mountaintop" speech. He was assassinated the next day

1968 – Martin Luther King Jr. delivers his “I’ve Been to the Mountaintop” speech. He was assassinated the next day

altar piece Colijin de Coter

Mary Magdalene & the Women at the Tomb – A Festival of Resurrection with Hazel Archer-Ginsberg, Song-Circle with Velsum Voices = Lucien Dante Lazar & Ultra-Violet Archer 

Holy Saturday 8 April 2023

1 pm – 3pm CT hybrid event 

in-person at the Rudolf Steiner Branch 4249 North Lincoln Avenue, Chicago, IL 60618 (map)

& on zoom https://us06web.zoom.us/j/7050174041

Meeting ID: 705 017 4041

For more Info. contact Hag@RSChicago.org Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator

$10 more or less…www.rschicago.org/donate

PRESENTS:

The Mystery of Ascension with Hazel Archer-Ginsberg

This course is available on Zoom. You will be emailed a Zoom link closer to the time of the class. The course will be recorded and you will receive a link to watch it. Go to the Infinity Foundation web site to enroll

Course Number 231154 / Zoom
Date: Thursday, May 11
Time 7:00 – 8:30 PM CST
Cost $33/23 payment 10 days in advance

Gerald Shepherd

When we tune into the Cycle of the Seasons, we experience that as the Earth breathes out in the Springtime, the beings of nature reach upwards towards the heights. The longing of the human soul also strives to meet this mood of ascension, which attunes all life to the cosmic expanses.

Together we will gain insights in how to rise up to our Higher Self by participating in this harmonizing spring-dialogue between the worlds.

This reconnection between heaven & earth was prefigured in the story of Jacob’s ladder from the Old Testament. Through his dream of the ‘stairway to heaven’, Jacob gave us a prophecy in the picture of a golden ladder on which choirs of Angels traverse between the ‘Above & Below’. The Mystery of the Ascension of Christ, 40 days after the Resurrection at Easter, fulfilled Jacob’s Prophecy. Christ as the Being of Love became the living bridge connecting us to the eternal.

Through this workshop we will learn how humanity will also be transfigured in the fullness of time. The company of the Angelic Hierarchies wait for us, their younger siblings, to ascend, first of all in our thinking, to meet them in fellowship, as they work all the while by our sides.

Nancy Poer

~Vitae Sophia~A Whitsun Festival of United Soul Endeavor  with Hazel Archer-Ginsberg, Velsum Voices & Eurythmy

Saturday 27 May 2023 a Hybrid event in person* & on zoom

We are called to redeem the ether spheres to create an Ecclesia, a chalice for The Sophia. Then the spirit flame can spread out to become what Steiner called a “World Whitsun”, which began in earnest at the Christmas Conference. The Whitsun Festival highlights one of the greatest challenges of being human: placing our individual gifts, in right relationship within the social realm. This challenge is especially strong now during this ‘pandemic’. Our groups striving to know Spiritual Science must work together as a community, to have the possibility to create a new culture where a sacrament is possible in every encounter. Our individual strength is enhanced by weaving our gifts together, kindling our social world in conscious community.

Zoom: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/83663366670?pwd=L292UzlOR1pkZjBXSWpxK1B2b0o1dz09 Meeting ID: 836 6336 6670 / Passcode: 397593

For more Info. contact Hag@RSChicago.org Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator
*Rudolf Steiner Branch 4249 North Lincoln Avenue, Chicago, IL 60618 (mapwww.rschicago.org/donate


Find a collection of the many RECORDINGS of Presentations, Programs & Festivals HERE

The Good Doctor’s Deathday

Dr. Rudolf Steiner 25 February 1861 – 30 March 1925

Today, Dear Friends – on 30 March 2023, we mark the 98th anniversary of Rudolf Steiner’s Rebirth into the Spiritual World.

In the ‘Michael Prophesy’ Steiner spoke about how those involved with Anthroposophy would reincarnate after 80 years to be able to take advantage of the Michael Age to further the work of Spiritual Science…

That leads me to wonder…Is Rudolf Steiner, & those who were with him, here today? I often get this picture of Rudolf Steiner as a teenager (young woman?) living in California, just graduating from a Waldorf School…

How can we do our part to support the young people who are coming in today to find Anthroposophy?

Thinking back to Steiner’s time – After the burning of the 1st Goetheanum 100 years ago, at the Christmas Conference in 1923, when Rudolf Steiner re-founded & joined the Anthroposophical Society with the ‘movement’ ie. the good spirits working thru Anthroposophia, he also took on the karma of all its members.

Starting just after that Dr. Steiner showed signs of illness, made acute thru the tea party poisoning on New Year’s Day 1924 – The adversarial powers knew he was doing powerful work so they became relentless, working thru the dark brotherhoods to try & incapacitate him –

Yet the Christ in him, empowered by his selfless sacrificial deed enacted at the refounding gave him enormous inner strength & he continued to lecture & travel like never before. He was often giving 4 lectures a day for the various courses taking place concurrently. Many of these focused on practical anthroposophy, such as education, agriculture, medicine & the Christian Community.

If we are truly awake to the history of the ‘Society’ we must come to see more & more how the most profound cause of his early death was the lack of consciousness by the members – who were not upholding their responsibility to take up Steiner’s indications in a moral way – They were like children – fighting amounst themselves – dependent – leaning on Steiner – burdening him with their unresolved karma. This made them unable to protect what was theirs – the 1st Goetheanum – With its burning Steiner’s etheric forces were damaged, thus allowing the poison to take a stronger effect.

~hag

He gave his last in-person lecture on Michaelmas September 1924. Yet even after that, Rudolf Steiner continued to work on his autobiography & ‘Leading Thoughts’ during the last months of his life until  he died on 30 March 1925 at 10 am with the Sun in Pisces & the Moon in Taurus.

From “The Life and Work of Rudolf Steiner’ by Guenther Wachsmuth: “Even the last weeks in March 1925, during which he had to endure unspeakable suffering, were devoted in the most intense concentration to spiritual research, creative work, & bestowal…

…the beginning of his shared anthroposophical work with Marie von Sivers stood before his inner eye. It had not been easy for Marie Steiner to live with the increasing intense collaboration between Rudolf Steiner & Ita Wegman over the course of the last few years. Ita Wegman was so entirely different than she was. Now she was forced to deny herself the opportunity to care for the person she loved the most. Trouble with her legs inhibited her from doing this. That they had spoken about this with each other is evident from a letter he wrote her in Berlin on his official birthday:

“I write you these lines at about the same time that you would usually be sitting at my side. Thinking about how beautiful it is to listen to you speck about your activities & to speak with you about various aspects of your work moves me deeply. And when I know that you have now & again been able to read my Autobiography the description of our shared work, I feel deeply how closely connected we are. That destiny has brought other people close to me is simply the way destiny works. And my sickness has shown just how incisive this destiny can be. But you found the way to understanding; this is a blessing for me. To feel the unity of feeling & thinking in discernment is something I can do only with you. That I was not able to show you the last pages of the Steffen article before it went to the printer was a hardship for me. Then for myself, I find inner competence only in your judgement. Through you art is raised into the realms of the hierarchies. I gaze with wonder upon everything you achieve & with such devotion. In my thoughts I am with you” ~RS

Shielded under the devoted care of Dr. Ita Wegman, he still communicated many a spiritual message received, & he had us to report to him what was occurring on the hill of Dornach. He loved the living noise of hammering & scaffold-building which penetrated from the building place of the Goetheanum into the quiet of his sickroom, announcing the building in the process of coming into being. He was united through his council & help with this work to his last breath & beyond death.

From Albert Steffen: “The last moments in his earthly life were free from all struggle with the physical entity, free from all uncertainty such as characterizes the death of so many human beings; his countenance spoke of peace, grace, inner certitude, spiritual vision. He folded his hands over his breast; his eyes were shiningly & strongly directed into worlds with which in vision he was united. As he drew his last breath, he himself closed his eyes; but this filled the room not with the experience of an end, but with that of a most sublime spiritual action. An exalted, transfigured wakefulness spoke out of his countenance, out of the praying strength of the hands. As the great artists of the Middle Ages gave to the pictures of the knights resting upon the sarcophagus the expression indicating that their closed eyes were still beholding, their resting form was still able to stride forward, so did the figure here resting speak of a super-terrestrial wakefulness, of a striding forward into the spheres of the spirit.

The forward striding figure of the Christ statue, pointing into the expanses of the universe, which he himself had created & at whose feet he now lay, spoke for the eye of those left behind on earth what was taking place for the spirit of a great human being who had dedicated his life to the annunciation of the Christ. Even in dying, Rudolf Steiner bestowed upon humanity the most sublime gift of consolation: the certitude that death is a waking entrance into worlds of life & action.”

From Christian Community Priest Friedrich Rittelmeyer speaking about his death: “None of us had expected that Rudolf Steiner would succumb to the illness. The mortal sheath, just abandoned by the spirit setting out on its far journey, was resting on the death-bed at the foot of the Christ statue which stood there almost completed. Those who looked at the face of the dead could see what the spirit can make of the body in the life of a truly great man on earth. The sublimity and purity of his features was equal to every test and unsurpassed. Perhaps the death mask, if it is ever reproduced as a picture, will be a means of convincing many. Again and again one’s gaze turned from the forsaken earthly body to the great Christ figure which points with compelling gesture into the future. The disciple had fallen at the feet of the Master. It was as if Christ were taking the disciple to Himself with sheltering arms while He Himself went forward with unceasing step towards the future of the world. The disciple’s mission was fulfilled. The Master’s brow was radiant with the light of divine world-purposes. When, at the wish of Frau Dr. Steiner, and in the solemnly decorated hall where Dr. Steiner had given most of his great lectures, I was performing the burial service according to the ritual of The Christian Community, a drop of the sprinkled water fell in the centre of the forehead and shone there through the whole service like a sparkling diamond. The light of many candles was reflected in this glittering star – even as the revelations of light from higher worlds had been reflected in his spirit. Thus adorned, the body sank into the coffin. To me it was as if higher Spirits had indicated in an earthly picture what it had been our lot to experience. When the service was at an end, one impression lived mightily within my soul: “This work is now completed. Like a great question it stands there before mankind. If all who belong to that work dedicate their powers to it with single purpose, it will prevail!”

From Ita Wegman Nachrichtenblatt 1925: “At 3 am, I noticed a slight change in his breathing. I approached his bed; he was awake. He looked at me & asked whether I was tired. This question touched me. His pulse was not as strong as it had been, but much faster. I called Dr. Noll in order to speak with him about what ought to be done. Herr Steiner was not astonished to see him there in the middle of the night & greeted him amiably. “I don’t feel too bad” he said “I just can’t sleep.” We turned the light out again. At 4 am, he called me because the pain had reappeared. He said, “As soon as the day comes, we want to continue the treatment that I suggested”…Naturally, we didn’t wait for the day to come but did what was necessary. But then the situation changed quickly – his pulse grew weaker, his breathing more rapid. And we had to experience how his life was gradually extinguished…He went as though it were the obvious thing to do. It seemed to me as though the dice had been thrown for a last decision. When they fell, there was no struggle, no attempt to remain upon the earth any longer. He gazed calmly into the space before him for a time, said a couple of tender words to me, consciously closed his eyes & folded his hands

Again from “The Life and Work of Rudolf Steiner’ by Guenther Wachsmuth: In the lofty darkened space of the studio stood the bier of him who had completed this earthly life, surrounded by a sea of flowers, by the light of candles, the death watch by his side day & night. Many hundreds of persons came in soundless silence for the last visit, went back into life comforted, trusting, having received in their affliction assurance of the virtuousness of the Spirit, of rebirth. On the 3rd day the body was brought into the great workshop, to lie in state finally in the lecture hall, at the place from which he had for decades proclaimed the knowledge of the spirit. At the request of Frau Marie Steiner, Fredrich Rittelmeyer conducted the funeral service which was the gift of Rudolf Steiner to the Christian Community.

The next morning the coffin was carried away for cremation. When it was passing by the newly erected structure of the new Goetheanum, the workers at the building stood still on the scaffolding & greeted the master builder & friend. At the cremation ritual, Albert Steffen united us with our beloved teacher in a picture of his being which only the artist could draw in such shining perfection. He spoke of “the friend of God and leader of humanity”. And what has come into being in us earthly persons through the leadership & schooling of Rudolf Steiner as a certitude, what we are called upon to do in his spirit, he summarized in the following words:

“He has again showed the world to us in such a way that we know it has come forth out of god. He has died in such a way that we feel: Christ lives in this death. May his immortal Spirit be resurrected in our deeds. We will, as well as we can, make them holy.”

“To create centres of peace & love in which the Christ can resurrect.”
~written on the urn that holds the ashes of Rudolf Steiner

What a blessing to receive the teachings of this great initiate. May we continue our connection with him in the spiritual worlds, ever enlivening our Michaelic work with The Christ & the Being of Anthroposophia here on earth that we may co-create these “centres of peace & love in which the Christ can resurrect.”

~Hazel Archer-Ginsberg

30 March 2023 – “Speaking with the Stars”: Tonight, the waxing gibbous moon is near the Beehive star cluster in the constellation Cancer the Crab. The twin stars – Castor and Pollux – of Gemini the Twins will also be nearby.

This chart shows the view on March 30, 2023, looking west after sunset. Jupiter is getting harder to see, dropping into the sunset glare. But Mercury will be ascending in the west – getting higher each evening – throughout early April.

Daveed

Rudolf Steiner’s Lectures on this day

ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY

1916 – Playright Edouard Schure betrayed Rudolf Steiner due to his nationalism during the First World War (They reconcilled in 1922, although Marie Steiner never spoke to him again)

1963 – Death Day of George Adams – born in Poland to a Jewish family as George Kaufmann, he went on to receive an honors degree in Chemistry from Cambridge University. In 1914 he encountered Rudolf Steiner’s “Occult Science” & become a member of the Emerson Group in London in 1916.

Preoccupied with problems of social reform, he rejected all manner of violence, remaining a conscientious objector throughout the First World War – a “militant revolutionary” as he described himself. He was imprisoned after refusing to serve with other conscientious objectors in the Non-Combatant Corps & was only released in 1919, after a hunger strikeDuring his time as conscientious objector he had come to know Mary Fox, a Quaker & in 1920 they married.

His interest in Steiner’s ideas on social reform & his intention to translate the book The Threefold Social Order (GA 23) caused him to visit Steiner together with Ethel Bowen Wedgwood in Dornach, Switzerland. Steiner advised him to become involved in some form of social work, something Adams could readily accept amid the social collapse in Central & Eastern Europe following the war. He went on several journeys to Poland as part of the English / American Quaker organization.

In 1920 he took part in the inauguration of the first Goetheanum building. On his return to England, he cooperated with some friends on spreading the ideas of Social three folding as well as the anthroposophical ideas of Steiner. His wife Mary Adams began her work as librarian & translator for the Anthroposophical Society in London that she was to carry for many years. In addition, Adams was the free verbal translator of around 110 lectures of Steiner into English. He went on to translate many of Steiner’s written works, often with his wife Mary.

He was often in Dornach during these times & experienced the burning of the first Goetheanum on New Year’s Eve 1922/23, he was also part of the Christmas Foundation meeting of the General Anthroposophical Society in 1923/24. In 1924 he became one of the Goetheanum-Speakers authorized by Steiner.

While working as a free co-worker of the Anthroposophical Society in Britain as lecturer & workshop holder after 1925, Adams turned again to the study of the natural sciences & mathematics, concentrating particularly on projective geometry while working with Elisabeth Vreede, leader of the Section for Mathematics & Astronomy at the Goetheanum. At the beginning of the 1930s, Adams published a series of articles & essays about projective, synthetic geometry & its relationship to physics, to Goethe’s theory of metamorphosis & to anthroposophical spiritual science, particularly the pioneering work “Of Etheric Space” in the magazine Natura of the Goetheanum’s Medical Section. Here for the first time is mentioned the concept of “counter-space”, as Steiner indicated in the third of his courses on the Natural Sciences (GA 323), explained by means of non-Euclidean geometry. Some years later Louis Locher was to discover the same thing independently of Adams. From that time on the conceptual development of the idea of counter-space in its relation to normal spatial thinking became the focal point of Adams’ further scientific research. In 1933 the comprehensive work Space & the Light of the Creation – Synthetic Geometry in the light of Spiritual Science appeared, which was an overview of the spiritual scientific meaning of synthetic geometry.

When Elisabeth Vreede & Ita Wegman were dismissed from the executive of the General Anthroposophical Society in Dornach, a number of other prominent members of the German, Dutch &British Societies were expelled, including Adams. This brought to an end his cooperation with the Mathematical -Astronomical Section. When the Chairman of the Anthroposophical Society in Great Britain, D. N. Dunlop, died in May 1935, Adams took over as general secretary. In this task, Olive Whicher became his closest co-worker,& he introduced her to projective geometry.

At the outbreak of the Second World War, Adams volunteered as interpreter in a prisoner of war camp. His close ties to Germany were soon the subject of investigation & he was dismissed after six months. He changed his name at this point from George Kaufmann to George Adams, taking the maiden name of his mother. In the following years Adams was one of the monitors of the Polish broadcasting corporation in the service of the BBC & he learnt several additional Slavic languages. Much of his free time was spent in the British Library studying the development of modern mathematical sciences to augment them with his thoughts about counter-space.

After the war, he was given a scholarship by the British Anthroposophical Society at Rudolf Steiner House in order to investigate with Whicher the geometric principles underlying the world of plants. It had been unclear where the corresponding projective counterpart of the infinite plane of Euclidean space, the infinite midpoint of the non-Euclidean space (was to be found in the plant world. In 1947, Adams expressed the idea that such a midpoint did not just exist, but that there was one to be found in every bud. This idea was connected with that of the lemniscatory correlation between space & counter- In 1949 and 1952, two books appeared with the titles: The Living Plant & the Science of Physical & Ethereal Space & The Plant between Sun & Earth.

In 1947, at the request of his friends Fried Geuter & Michael Wilson of Sunfield Homes in Clent near Birmingham, Whicher & he moved to Clent, where they founded the Goethean Science Foundation with Wilson to undertake scientific research. The peaceful countryside & a secure financial base provided an ideal environment for the work that followed.

Shortly before this, in 1946, Adams had made contact with the Goetheanum & its Mathematical-Astronomical Section under the provisional guidance of Louis Locher. He wished, despite their differences, to work together on common issues. He again participated actively in many conferences & discussions at the Goetheanum & in Germany. He also took up contact again with Georg Unger, who went on to found the Mathematisch-Physicalisches Institut in 1956, where Adams reported regularly on his work. Unger visited Clent for common research gatherings. In 1935, Olive Whicher joined Adams in London & worked with him in research into mathematics & physics until his death in 1963. He discovered how to describe Steiner’s findings about negative space in geometric terms, & was particularly adept with projective geometry & the application of path curves. He translated & published numerous books, lectures, & articles.

So interesting to think that this great human being has the same Death Day as Rudolf Steiner!

So does Dorothy S. Osmond, another translator of Anthroposophical literature, who died in 1978; & Norbert Glas, Anthroposophical doctor who died in 1986.

~Ninetta Sombart

“Lazarus – Come Forth” – Through The Word & Eurythmy w/ Rev. Jeana Lee, Mary Ruud & Hazel Archer-Ginsberg

Starting at Sundown Friday 31 March 2023
7 pm – 8:30 pm CT at the Christian Community 2135 W. Wilson

Leading Thoughts & Close of Day with Rev. Jeana Lee – Vesper singer – Ultra Violet Archer

Continuing on Lazarus Saturday 1 April 2023
10 am – 12 noon CT
at the Rudolf Steiner Branch Chicago 4249 N. Lincoln Ave

Night School Check-in w/ Hazel Archer – Eurythmy w/ Mary Ruud – Music Ultra-Violet Archer

$10 more or less
Please bring a potluck dish to share for the luncheon after the Festival

For more info. contact Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator Hag@rschicago.org

altar piece Colijin de Coter

Mary Magdalene & the Women at the Tomb – A Festival of Resurrection with Hazel Archer-Ginsberg, Song-Circle with Velsum Voices = Lucien Dante Lazar & Ultra-Violet Archer 

Holy Saturday 8 April 2023

1 pm – 3pm CT hybrid event 

in-person at the Rudolf Steiner Branch 4249 North Lincoln Avenue, Chicago, IL 60618 (map)

& on zoom https://us06web.zoom.us/j/7050174041

Meeting ID: 705 017 4041

For more Info. contact Hag@RSChicago.org Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator

$10 more or less…www.rschicago.org/donate

PRESENTS:

The Mystery of Ascension with Hazel Archer-Ginsberg

This course is available on Zoom. You will be emailed a Zoom link closer to the time of the class. The course will be recorded and you will receive a link to watch it. Go to the Infinity Foundation web site to enroll

Course Number 231154 / Zoom
Date: Thursday, May 11
Time 7:00 – 8:30 PM CST
Cost $33/23 payment 10 days in advance

Gerald Shepherd

When we tune into the Cycle of the Seasons, we experience that as the Earth breathes out in the Springtime, the beings of nature reach upwards towards the heights. The longing of the human soul also strives to meet this mood of ascension, which attunes all life to the cosmic expanses.

Together we will gain insights in how to rise up to our Higher Self by participating in this harmonizing spring-dialogue between the worlds.

This reconnection between heaven & earth was prefigured in the story of Jacob’s ladder from the Old Testament. Through his dream of the ‘stairway to heaven’, Jacob gave us a prophecy in the picture of a golden ladder on which choirs of Angels traverse between the ‘Above & Below’. The Mystery of the Ascension of Christ, 40 days after the Resurrection at Easter, fulfilled Jacob’s Prophecy. Christ as the Being of Love became the living bridge connecting us to the eternal.

Through this workshop we will learn how humanity will also be transfigured in the fullness of time. The company of the Angelic Hierarchies wait for us, their younger siblings, to ascend, first of all in our thinking, to meet them in fellowship, as they work all the while by our sides.

Nancy Poer

~Vitae Sophia~A Whitsun Festival of United Soul Endeavor  with Hazel Archer-Ginsberg, Velsum Voices & Eurythmy

Saturday 27 May 2023 a Hybrid event in person* & on zoom

We are called to redeem the ether spheres to create an Ecclesia, a chalice for The Sophia. Then the spirit flame can spread out to become what Steiner called a “World Whitsun”, which began in earnest at the Christmas Conference. The Whitsun Festival highlights one of the greatest challenges of being human: placing our individual gifts, in right relationship within the social realm. This challenge is especially strong now during this ‘pandemic’. Our groups striving to know Spiritual Science must work together as a community, to have the possibility to create a new culture where a sacrament is possible in every encounter. Our individual strength is enhanced by weaving our gifts together, kindling our social world in conscious community.

Zoom: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/83663366670?pwd=L292UzlOR1pkZjBXSWpxK1B2b0o1dz09 Meeting ID: 836 6336 6670 / Passcode: 397593

For more Info. contact Hag@RSChicago.org Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator
*Rudolf Steiner Branch 4249 North Lincoln Avenue, Chicago, IL 60618 (mapwww.rschicago.org/donate


Find a collection of the many RECORDINGS of Presentations, Programs & Festivals HERE

Hail Mary

Pin on Fra Fillipo Lippi 1406 -1469
Fra Fillipo Lippi

Make your Annunciation today!
That YOUR Conception will Be Immaculate
~hag

Love works magic.
It is the final purpose of the world story
The Amen of the universe.

~Novalis

Pin on Visionary Art
BARBARA MARIOTTI

The Feast of the Annunciation, also known as Lady Day, the Feast of the Incarnation (Festum Incarnationis), Conceptio Christi (Christ’s Conception), commemorates the visit of the Archangel Gabriel to the Luke Mary holding the energy of the Virgin Sophia, to facilatate the pouring in of the Holy Spirit, so that Mary could concieve the Son of God. Gabriel’s salutation: “Hail, Mary full of grace, the LORD is with thee” (Luke 1:28; gratia plena Dominus tecum), & Mary’s response to God’s will, “be it done to me according to thy word” (Luke 1:38; fiat mihi secundum verbum tuum). The “angelic salutation” is the origin of the Hail Mary prayer & the Angelus; the second part of the prayer comes from the salutation of Saint Elizabeth to Mary at the Visitation.

Chart via John Jardine Goss/ EarthSky.

25 March 2021 – “Speaking with the Stars”: Look for the lovely gathering of Bella Luna, Venus & the Pleiades star cluster. People around Bangladesh, Hong Kong & Malaysia, will see the moon occult – or pass in front of – the planet Venus!

Annunciation - Wikiwand

Rudolf Steiner’s Lectures on this day

ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY

1801 – Deathday of Novalis. From Rudolf Steiner:  “…Novalis could glance back to a time in which gods moved among men, when everything took place spiritually because spirits and souls had not yet descended into earthly bodies. He perceived a point of transition: how death hit the world and how the human beings during this time placed death as their earthly shadowing and how he tried to brighten it up through fantasy and art. But death remained a riddle.

Then something of universal significance happened. Novalis could perceive the universal meaning of what had happened at that time on earth. Souls from the kingdoms of nature descended to the earth. Forgotten were the memories of their spiritual original existence, yet a unique spiritual Being remained in this universal womb of creation from which everything descended. One Being provisionally held back; it had held itself above and only provisionally sent its gift of grace downward, and then, when human beings needed it the most, it also descend into the earthly sphere. It remained in the spiritual spheres above the being of the spiritual light, this Being was hidden behind the physical sun. It held itself in heavenly spheres and descended when human beings needed to once again be able to rise up to spiritual worlds. It descended with the Mystery of Golgotha when Christ appeared in a physical body.

Humanity understands Christ in His universal unfolding when the life of Jesus of Nazareth is followed back to His spiritual origins, to the unsolvable riddle of death. The Greek spirit of death appears as a pondering muse, as an enigma which cannot be solved. Even the Greeks sensed that the riddle which is hidden in the youth’s soul, found its solution with the Event of Golgotha, that here victory overcomes death and as a result a new impulse is given to humanity.

This Novalis could see and as a result there appeared to him, from the mystery of faith and the mystery wisdom, the Star which the old Magi had followed. As a result he understood the actual essence of what the Christ death implied. In the night of the soul the riddle of death revealed itself to him, the riddle of the Christ. This was it, which this extraordinary individual wanted to learn — through the memory of earlier lives — what the Christ, what the event of Golgotha signified for the world.” Novalis and his “Hymns to the Night” Lecture by Rudolf Steiner in Berlin, “Matinee” 26 October 1908

~hag

In ancient times, over the widespread families of men an iron Fate ruled with dumb force. A gloomy oppression swathed their heavy souls — the earth was boundless — the abode of the gods and their home. From eternal ages stood its mysterious structure. Beyond the red hills of the morning, in the sacred bosom of the sea, dwelt the sun, the all-enkindling, living Light. An aged giant upbore the blissful world. Fast beneath mountains lay the first-born sons of mother Earth. Helpless in their destroying fury against the new, glorious race of gods, and their kindred, glad-hearted men. The ocean’s dark green abyss was the lap of a goddess. In crystal grottos revelled a luxuriant folk. Rivers, trees, flowers, and beasts had human wits. Sweeter tasted the wine — poured out by Youth-abundance — a god in the grape-clusters — a loving, motherly goddess upgrew in the full golden sheaves — love’s sacred inebriation was a sweet worship of the fairest of the god-ladies — Life rustled through the centuries like one spring-time, an ever-variegated festival of heaven-children and earth-dwellers. All races childlike adored the ethereal, thousand-fold flame as the one sublimest thing in the world.” ~Novalis

Image result for 1655 – Saturn's largest moon, Titan, is discovered by Christiaan Huygens

1655 – Saturn’s largest moon, Titan, is discovered by Christiaan Huygens.

Image result for arturo toscanini quotes

1867 – Birthday of Arturo Toscanini, Italian-American cellist & conductor

1918 – Deathday of Claude Debussy, French composer

1957 – United States Customs seizes copies of Allen Ginsberg’s poem “Howl” on obscenity grounds.

Selma to Montgomery March - MLK, Purpose & Distance - HISTORY

1965 – Civil rights activists led by Martin Luther King Jr. successfully complete their 4-day 50-mile march from Selma to the capitol in Montgomery, Alabama

The Categories of Aristotle – a process of contraction…
Is there a path to expansion…..?

PUBLIC LECTURE AND EURYTHMY WORKSHOP WITH CLAUDIA FONTANA

Friday 24 March 2023 – Lecture 7 pm CT – 8:30 pm –

Purchase tickets at the door or pay online $12

Saturday 25 March 2023 – Workshop – 9 am CT– (10:30 am 1/2 hour break – 11 am) 12:30 pm CT Purchase tickets at the door or pay online $50

Does one have to be a philosopher of great erudition to approach Aristotle’s gift to humanity……his Categories?

Perhaps , YES! But an initial acquaintance with them can lead out of the confinement of the intellectual concept to an experience of expansion supported by Eurythmy.

In the evening lecture Claudia will introduce the life of the Categories before they became concepts – Bringing the symbols in a sequence of sounds  (called the Evolutionary Sequence ) out of their conceptual form, to life, supported by Eurythmy and examples of poetry.

During the workshop we will enter into the movement of the poetry presented  during the lecture. This will be accessible to Eurythmists as well as to anyone interested in the life of language, poetry and our alphabet.

at the Rudolf Steiner Branch of The Anthroposophical Society
4249 North Lincoln Avenue. Chicago, IL 60618 (map)
https://www.rschicago.org/happenings/calendar 
www.rschicago.org/donate

For more info contact Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator
Hazel Archer-Ginsberg

Claudia Fontana saw a Eurythmy performance when still a teenager. Unbeknownst to her at the time, that performance was the gate to her destiny path. Soon thereafter she studied Eurythmy in Vienna and subsequently spent fourteen years as a performer with the Dornach, London and Stuttgart Eurythmeum ensembles. Teaching became the next challenge which she happily met in the United States, Europe. Before Covid, she spent seven years teaching all levels in Thailand, Malaysia and China. She resides in Ann Arbor, MI still performing and teaching.

Juan de Flandes

“Lazarus – Come Forth” – Through The Word & Eurythmy

w/ Rev. Jeana Lee, Mary Ruud & Hazel Archer-Ginsberg

Starting at Sundown Friday 31 March 2023
7 pm – 8:30 pm CT at the Christian Community 2135 W. Wilson

Leading Thoughts & Close of Day with Rev. Jeana Lee

Continuing on Lazarus Saturday 1 April 2023
10 am – 12 noon CT
at the Rudolf Steiner Branch Chicago 4249 N. Lincoln Ave

Night School Check-in w/ Hazel Archer – Eurythmy w/ Mary Ruud

$10 more or less or pay what you will
Please bring a potluck dish to share for the luncheon after the Festival

For more info. contact Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator Hag@rschicago.org

Mary Magdalene & the Women at the Tomb – A Festival of Recogniton

with Hazel Archer-Ginsberg,

Song-Circle with Velsum, 

Holy Saturday 8 April 2023

1 pm – 3pm CT hybrid event in-person at the Rudolf Steiner Branch Chicago & on zoom

https://us06web.zoom.us/j/7050174041

Meeting ID: 705 017 4041

For more Info. contact Hag@RSChicago.org Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator
Rudolf Steiner Branch 4249 North Lincoln Avenue, Chicago, IL 60618 (map)
www.rschicago.org/donate

PRESENTS:

The Mystery of Ascension with Hazel Archer-Ginsberg

This course is available on Zoom. You will be emailed a Zoom link closer to the time of the class. The course will be recorded and you will receive a link to watch it. Go to the Infinity Foundation web site to enroll

Course Number 231154 / Zoom
Date: Thursday, May 11
Time 7:00 – 8:30 PM CST
Cost $33/23 payment 10 days in advance

For more info contact Aline Hanle aline@infinityfoundation.org

Gerald Shepherd

When we tune into the Cycle of the Seasons, we experience that as the Earth breathes out in the Springtime, the beings of nature reach upwards towards the heights. The longing of the human soul also strives to meet this mood of ascension, which attunes all life to the cosmic expanses.

Together we will gain insights in how to rise up to our Higher Self by participating in this harmonizing spring-dialogue between the worlds.

This reconnection between heaven & earth was prefigured in the story of Jacob’s ladder from the Old Testament. Through his dream of the ‘stairway to heaven’, Jacob gave us a prophecy in the picture of a golden ladder on which choirs of Angels traverse between the ‘Above & Below’. The Mystery of the Ascension of Christ, 40 days after the Resurrection at Easter, fulfilled Jacob’s Prophecy. Christ as the Being of Love became the living bridge connecting us to the eternal.

Through this workshop we will learn how humanity will also be transfigured in the fullness of time. The company of the Angelic Hierarchies wait for us, their younger siblings, to ascend, first of all in our thinking, to meet them in fellowship, as they work all the while by our sides.

Nancy Poer

~Vitae Sophia~A Whitsun Festival of United Soul Endeavor 

with Hazel Archer-Ginsberg, Velsum Voices & Eurythmy

1- 3 pm CT – Saturday 27 May 2023 a Hybrid event in person* & on zoom

We are called to redeem the ether spheres to create an Ecclesia, a chalice for The Sophia. Then the spirit flame can spread out to become what Steiner called a “World Whitsun”, which began in earnest at the Christmas Conference. The Whitsun Festival highlights one of the greatest challenges of being human: placing our individual gifts, in right relationship within the social realm. This challenge is especially strong now during this ‘pandemic’. Our groups striving to know Spiritual Science must work together as a community, to have the possibility to create a new culture where a sacrament is possible in every encounter. Our individual strength is enhanced by weaving our gifts together, kindling our social world in conscious community.

Zoom: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/83663366670?pwd=L292UzlOR1pkZjBXSWpxK1B2b0o1dz09 Meeting ID: 836 6336 6670 / Passcode: 397593

For more Info. contact Hag@RSChicago.org Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator
*Rudolf Steiner Branch 4249 North Lincoln Avenue, Chicago, IL 60618 (mapwww.rschicago.org/donate


Find a collection of the many RECORDINGS of Presentations, Programs & Festivals HERE

a human generation

Dear friends – As I am preparing for our Easter Festival, opening to the mysteries of Mary Magdalene, which starting coming thru over the Holy Nights, I came across this highly evocative quote from Rudolf Steiner that awakens us to the cycles we are immersed in – so powerfully rendered in the Foundation Stone Meditation as: For the Christ-will encircling us holds sway, In world rhythms, bestowing Grace upon souls – giving us much food for thought as we move thru the Cycle of the Year as a Path of Initiation…

I hope it stimulates you as it has me:

“…The time interval between Christmas and Easter is to be understood as consisting of thirty-three years. This is the key. What does this mean? That the Christmas festival celebrated this year (2023) belongs to the Easter festival that follows thirty-three years later (2056), while the Easter festival we celebrate this year belongs to the Christmas of (1990). In (1990) humanity celebrated a Christmas festival that really belongs to the Easter of this year (2023), and the Christmas festival we celebrate this year belongs, not to the Easter of next spring but to the one thirty-three years hence (2056). According to our reckoning, this period — thirty-three years — is the period of a human generation, thus a complete generation of humanity must elapse between Christmas festivals and the Easter festivals that are connected with them. This is the key, my dear friends, for reading the new astrology, in which attention is directed to the stars that shine within the historical evolution of humanity itself.

How can this be fulfilled? It can be fulfilled by human beings using the Christmas festival in order to realize that events happening at approximately the present time (we can only say approximately in such matters) refer back in their historical connections in such a way that we are able to perceive their birthdays or beginnings in the events of thirty-three years ago, and that events of today also provide a birthday or beginning for events that will ripen to fruition in the course of the next thirty-three years.

All things in historic evolution arise transfigured after thirty-three years, as from a grave, by virtue of a power connected with the holiest of all redemptions: the Mystery of Golgotha.

It does not suffice, however, to sentimentalize about the Mystery of Golgotha. An understanding of the Mystery of Golgotha demands the highest powers of wisdom of which the human being is capable. It must be experienced by the deepest forces that can stir the soul of man. When he searches its depths for the light kindled by wisdom, when the human being does not merely speak of love but is enflamed by it through the union of the soul with the cosmic soul that streams and pulses through this turning point of time, only then does he acquire insight and understanding into the mysteries of existence. In days of old the wise men who sought for guidance in the conduct of affairs of human beings asked knowledge of the stars, and the stars gave an answer; so, today, those who wish to act wisely in guiding the social life of humanity must give heed to the stars that rise and set in the course of historic evolution. Just as we calculate the cyclic rotations of celestial bodies, so must we learn to calculate the cyclic rotations of historic events by means of a true science of history. The time-cycles of history can be measured by the interval that extends from Christmas to the Easter thirty-three years ahead, and the spirits of these time-cycles regulate that element in which the human soul lives and weaves in so far as it is not a mere personal being but is part of the warp and woof of historic evolution…

Christ spoke to humanity in these words, “Lo! I am with you always even to the end of the world...”

Just as Christ Jesus passed through death in such a way as to make death an illusion and resurrection the reality — this is the content of the Easter mystery — so did Christ Jesus pass through birth in such a way as to render birth an illusion and “transformation of being” within the spiritual world the reality, for in the spiritual world there is neither birth nor death, only changes of condition, only metamorphoses. Not until humanity is prepared to look up to that world in which birth and death both lose their physical meaning will the Christmas and Easter festivals regain their true import and sanctity…”  ~Rudolf Steiner, Et Incarnatus Est: The Time Cycle of Historic Events, 23 December 1917, Basel, GA 180

Metonic cycle - Wikipedia

And so dear friends – What is coming to birth from 1990 at Easter-Tide this year? And what are we implanting that will come to light for the Holy Nights of 2056?

~hag

22 March 2023 – “Speaking with the Stars”: Look very low in the west during twilight for the thin crescent Moon paired with departing Jupiter.

Rudolf Steiner’s Lectures on this day

ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY

1828 – Birthday of Fercher von Steinwand, an Austrian poet. Here is what Rudolf Steiner had to say about him in THE RIDDLE OF MAN, GA 20, Pictures from the Thought-Life of Austria

“I learned to know him at the end of the 1880’s in Vienna and for a short time associated with him personally. He was sixty years old at the time: a true figure of light, even externally; an engaging warmth shone from his noble features, eloquent eyes, and expressive gestures; through tranquil clarity and self-possession, this soul of an older man still gave the effect of youthful freshness. And when one came to know this soul better, its particular nature and creations, one could see how a feeling life instilled by the Carinthian Mountains united in this soul with a contemplative life in the power of the idealism in German world views. This contemplation (Sinnen) was already entirely native to his soul as a poetic world of pictures; this contemplation pointed with this world of pictures into the depths of existence; it confronted world riddles artistically, without the originality of artistic creation paling thereby into thought-poetry; one can observe this kind of contemplation in the following lines from Fercher von Steinwand’s Chorus of Primal Dreams:

Out of all regions
Ever ascended,
Wanders an ether in far-radiant arches;
Travel the billows to
Depths ever silent.
There with our all-seeing
Will as their cargo,
Wending their way through the fog go our ferries;
Sail between wonderful
Banks new arising.
There before all-warming
Eyes of soft mildness
Winding and turning we fashion our patterns
Out all around dreaming
Regions of star-fields.
There to misfortune we
N’er are indebted,
There we constructed our fortresses hovering, And tribulations we
Joyfully shattered.
He who would paint you with
Most holy features,
Highest abode of our contemplative urgings:
Wait for the swiftest
Servants of love!

The following verses seek to portray how the soul, in thinking-waking daydreams, lives in far-away starry worlds and in immediate reality; then the poet continues:

No matter what careful
Powers accomplish,
Only on dreaming’s own wide-spreading pinions
Can what is mighty be
Gained now forever.
Every o’erpowering greatness of action,
All of the angels who guard what was planted
Are given counsel by
Dreams that inspire them.

Fercher von Steinwand then sings further about the penetrating of thinking, spiritualized to the point of dreaming, into the depths of the world, and about the penetrating of that kind of dreaming which is an awakening out of our ordinary waking state into those depths where the life of what is spiritual in the world can make itself tangible to the soul:

Life that our pulsating
Hearts have perceived,
Life that our struggling hearts have ascended
To all the welcoming
Cries of the spirits:

And then Fercher von Steinwand lets sound forth to the human spirit what the beings of the spirit realm speak to the soul that opens itself to them in inner contemplation:

Healed ones, now be here by
Loving encircled!
What you were seeking in uplifting hours,
Here, you selected ones,
Is it disclosed;
Here in the grandeur of
Halls of the Godhead,
Where to the heart other hearts are so pleasing,
Where buried voices are
Sounding forth newly
Where now the care-worn are
Royally striving,
Radiant souls now in smiles are all wreathed,
Round all the wrecks of the
Wheels of the ages —
Only the blinded ones,
Earth-bound and foolish,
Were for the gulf of destruction begotten,
Lost to the worlds of
Spirit perfection!
Weal to the sens’tive one
Round whom we hover,
Whom we enliven to bloss’ming existence,
All without weaving in
Fugitive shadows!

In the literary works of Fercher von Steinwand there then follows upon this Chorus of Primal Dreams his Chorus of Primal Impulses:

In the distances unbounded
Of our ancient mother Night.
Hark — to be in inward conflict
Seems the deep mysterious might!
Do we hear present’ment striding?
Is our longing wide awake?
Was a spirit-lightning lit?
Are our dreams through spaces gliding?
How now are powers by powers enraptured,
Blessed exchanges!
Now sudden hastenings.
Then quiet lingerings,
Reveling listenings
Change into beckonings
Marveling fearings!
Charm of desiring
Mounts, and sinks down,
Sinks into hatred.
Faced with the pallid
Picture of embracing
Cannot clasp hatred.
Ramifications dim,
Inclinings burgeoning,
Send forth their tendrils.
Ponderous inklings
Dawn and go faltering
O’er the wide spaces,
Seem to give counsel
Or to give guidance.
What they’re preparing
Is it the sowing
Of immense actions,
Of radiant ages?
Who felt the furrows
To be creative!
Who wandered through them
Blissfully savoring,
Or disentangling,
Grandeurs discovering!
Yonder the stir is like spirits embracing
We are enwarmed
And are receiving,
Seeking, and thinking,
See ourselves lifted,
Woven in joy with
Highest beginnings.
You wafting ‘round us,
In us arising:
“You are ideas! —”

May duration grow accustomed
To what urge has conjured up;
May adorning and appeasement
In creation’s stream prevail.
Sweetest light! in noble ringing
Mounts my heart aloft to you:
Linger at your western gate;
Help to crown the deed of love!
Risen from all earthly bonds is our impulse Soul — resurrected!
But what is ripened
Ruling, and valid
Proves to be spirit!
All that is circling,
All earth foundations,
All heavenly kindlings are
Self-made in spirit,
Came forth from spirit,
Work through the spirit
Powerful freedom from chaos did fashion
Space for good fortune!
Cloaked, with the dew of its deep-breathing mildness, Forest and field!
Cared that the dew and the light be companions,
Forming the hem of deep transfiguration —
Cared that each droplet should float at the threshold
of Spiritual radiance!

In Ferchervon Steinwand’s Complete Works there are also several indications about his life given by the poet himself when pressed by friends on the occasion of his seventieth birthday, He wrote, “I began life on March 22, 1828 upon the heights of the Steinwand above the banks of the Möll in Carinthia (Kärten); that means, in the midst of a defiant congregation of mountains with their heads held high, beneath whose domineering grandeur burdened human beings seem continuously to grow poorer.”

Since, in his Chorus of Primal Impulses, we find the world view of German idealism cast in the form of a poetic creation, it is interesting to see how the poet, on his paths through Austrian spiritual life, receives impulses from this world view already in his youth. He describes how he enters the university in Graz: “With my credentials — which of course consisted only of my report cards — held tight against my chest, I presented myself to the dean. That was Professor Edlauer, a criminologist of high repute. He hoped to see me (he said) industriously present in his lecture course on natural law. Behind the curtain of this innocent title he presented us for the whole semester, in rousing lectures, with those German philosophers who, under the fatherly care of our well-meaning spiritual guardians were banned and kept from us: Fichte, Schelling, Hegel, and so on — heroes, therefore; that means men who founded and fructified all areas of pure thinking, who gave the language and created the concepts for all the other sciences, and who, consequently, are illustrious names shining from our street comers today and seeming almost strange there in their particular diamond clarity. This semester was my vita nuova!”

Whoever learns to know Fercher von Steinwand’s tragedy Dankmar, his Countess Seelenbrand, his German Tones from Austria, and other works of his will be able through this to feel many of the forces that were working in the Austrian spiritual life of the second half of the nineteenth century. And everything about Fercher von Steinwand testifies to the fact that one receives out of his soul a picture from this spiritual life in clarity, truth, and genuineness. The amiable Austrian poet in dialect Leopold Hormann felt rightly when he wrote the words:

Far from all baseness
All avarice and meanness;
Foe of publicity,
That loathesome false lady;
German in soul,
Strong yet with kindness
Great in his thinking,
No faltering and wavering,
Proof against all objections: —
Fercher von Steinwand!

1832 – The DeathDay of Johann Wolfgang von Goethe – who Steiner names as a ‘sculptor & follower of Plato’ in Karmic Relations Vol 4 Lecture 10 – Where is he now?

The Categories of Aristotle – a process of contraction…
Is there a path to expansion…..?

PUBLIC LECTURE AND EURYTHMY WORKSHOP WITH CLAUDIA FONTANA

Friday 24 March 2023 – Lecture 7 pm CT – 8:30 pm –

Purchase tickets at the door or pay online $12

Saturday 25 March 2023 – Workshop – 9 am CT– (10:30 am 1/2 hour break – 11 am) 12:30 pm CT Purchase tickets at the door or pay online $50

Does one have to be a philosopher of great erudition to approach Aristotle’s gift to humanity……his Categories?

Perhaps , YES! But an initial acquaintance with them can lead out of the confinement of the intellectual concept to an experience of expansion supported by Eurythmy.

In the evening lecture Claudia will introduce the life of the Categories before they became concepts – Bringing the symbols in a sequence of sounds  (called the Evolutionary Sequence ) out of their conceptual form, to life, supported by Eurythmy and examples of poetry.

During the workshop we will enter into the movement of the poetry presented  during the lecture. This will be accessible to Eurythmists as well as to anyone interested in the life of language, poetry and our alphabet.

at the Rudolf Steiner Branch of The Anthroposophical Society
4249 North Lincoln Avenue. Chicago, IL 60618 (map)
https://www.rschicago.org/happenings/calendar 
www.rschicago.org/donate

For more info contact Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator
Hazel Archer-Ginsberg

Claudia Fontana saw a Eurythmy performance when still a teenager. Unbeknownst to her at the time, that performance was the gate to her destiny path. Soon thereafter she studied Eurythmy in Vienna and subsequently spent fourteen years as a performer with the Dornach, London and Stuttgart Eurythmeum ensembles. Teaching became the next challenge which she happily met in the United States, Europe. Before Covid, she spent seven years teaching all levels in Thailand, Malaysia and China. She resides in Ann Arbor, MI still performing and teaching.

Juan de Flandes

“Lazarus – Come Forth” – Through The Word & Eurythmy

w/ Rev. Jeana Lee, Mary Ruud & Hazel Archer-Ginsberg

Starting at Sundown Friday 31 March 2023
7 pm – 8:30 pm CT at the Christian Community 2135 W. Wilson

Leading Thoughts & Close of Day with Rev. Jeana Lee

Continuing on Lazarus Saturday 1 April 2023
10 am – 12 noon CT
at the Rudolf Steiner Branch Chicago 4249 N. Lincoln Ave

Night School Check-in w/ Hazel Archer – Eurythmy w/ Mary Ruud

$10 more or less or pay what you will
Please bring a potluck dish to share for the luncheon after the Festival

For more info. contact Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator Hag@rschicago.org

Mary Magdalene & the Women at the Tomb – A Festival of Recogniton

with Hazel Archer-Ginsberg,

Song-Circle with Velsum, 

Holy Saturday 8 April 2023

1 pm – 3pm CT hybrid event in-person at the Rudolf Steiner Branch Chicago & on zoom

https://us06web.zoom.us/j/7050174041

Meeting ID: 705 017 4041

For more Info. contact Hag@RSChicago.org Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator
Rudolf Steiner Branch 4249 North Lincoln Avenue, Chicago, IL 60618 (map)
www.rschicago.org/donate

PRESENTS:

The Mystery of Ascension with Hazel Archer-Ginsberg

This course is available on Zoom. You will be emailed a Zoom link closer to the time of the class. The course will be recorded and you will receive a link to watch it. Go to the Infinity Foundation web site to enroll

Course Number 231154 / Zoom
Date: Thursday, May 11
Time 7:00 – 8:30 PM CST
Cost $33/23 payment 10 days in advance

For more info contact Aline Hanle aline@infinityfoundation.org

Gerald Shepherd

When we tune into the Cycle of the Seasons, we experience that as the Earth breathes out in the Springtime, the beings of nature reach upwards towards the heights. The longing of the human soul also strives to meet this mood of ascension, which attunes all life to the cosmic expanses.

Together we will gain insights in how to rise up to our Higher Self by participating in this harmonizing spring-dialogue between the worlds.

This reconnection between heaven & earth was prefigured in the story of Jacob’s ladder from the Old Testament. Through his dream of the ‘stairway to heaven’, Jacob gave us a prophecy in the picture of a golden ladder on which choirs of Angels traverse between the ‘Above & Below’. The Mystery of the Ascension of Christ, 40 days after the Resurrection at Easter, fulfilled Jacob’s Prophecy. Christ as the Being of Love became the living bridge connecting us to the eternal.

Through this workshop we will learn how humanity will also be transfigured in the fullness of time. The company of the Angelic Hierarchies wait for us, their younger siblings, to ascend, first of all in our thinking, to meet them in fellowship, as they work all the while by our sides.

Nancy Poer

~Vitae Sophia~A Whitsun Festival of United Soul Endeavor 

with Hazel Archer-Ginsberg, Velsum Voices & Eurythmy

1- 3 pm CTSaturday 27 May 2023 a Hybrid event in person* & on zoom

We are called to redeem the ether spheres to create an Ecclesia, a chalice for The Sophia. Then the spirit flame can spread out to become what Steiner called a “World Whitsun”, which began in earnest at the Christmas Conference. The Whitsun Festival highlights one of the greatest challenges of being human: placing our individual gifts, in right relationship within the social realm. This challenge is especially strong now during this ‘pandemic’. Our groups striving to know Spiritual Science must work together as a community, to have the possibility to create a new culture where a sacrament is possible in every encounter. Our individual strength is enhanced by weaving our gifts together, kindling our social world in conscious community.

Zoom: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/83663366670?pwd=L292UzlOR1pkZjBXSWpxK1B2b0o1dz09 Meeting ID: 836 6336 6670 / Passcode: 397593

For more Info. contact Hag@RSChicago.org Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator
*Rudolf Steiner Branch 4249 North Lincoln Avenue, Chicago, IL 60618 (mapwww.rschicago.org/donate


Find a collection of the many RECORDINGS of Presentations, Programs & Festivals HERE

Age quod agis

Bernardino Luini (Thanks to Faith DiVecchio for this image)

Dear friends, I have been deep into research, study & contemplation of the individuality we call Mary Magdalene. The work has intensified during this Lenten-Tide Season in preparation for our Easter Festival here at the Chicago Rudolf Steiner Branch, on Holy Saturday. (see annoucement below). Besides the leading thoughts & art images I will share, I am writing a poem encompassing these findings & insights, which Velsum Voices will transform into a song for us to sing together on the day of the Fest.  

There are so many amazing resources to work with. Besides the Synoptic Gospels, there are the Gnostic texts, most notably ‘The Gospel of Mary Magdalene a 1st century papyrus codex discovered in Cairo in 1896, written in Sahidic Coptic.

After taking 46 pages of notes, I have narrowed things down to 8 pages from which I am curating the poem. And for the presentation itself I have decided to hone it into a few essential elements: The casting out of the 7 demons as initiation, The Anointing, Holding witness at the foot of the Cross & at the Tomb, & the 3 Marys as The Myrrhophores – an ancient sect of women who work with Threshold oils.

I have been holding this process close, but decided to mention it today as it is the Deathday in 604 of Pope Gregory I, the one who denigrated The Magdalene by mislabeling her a prostitute – issued in Homily 33 from 591 AD (Leloup xiv). And although the Catholic Church officially redacted this decree in 1969, his depiction of Mary Magdalene is still believed by many as the “Gospel Truth”. The power of one pope to change the world’s perception of a powerful woman, hundreds of years after the fact, & for over a thousand years into the future, gives one pause for thought.

Then on 3 June 2016 = ‘the Feast of the Solemnity of the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus’, Pope Francis, elevated the Sainthood of Mary Magdalene giving her Feast Day as 22 July. The announcement quotes: 

~Rabanus Maurus Magnentius (a Frankish Benedictine monk born in 780, theologian, poet, archbishop in Mainz, Germany) in his Prologue from: ‘De vita Mariae Magdalenae = On the life of Mary Magdalene, he said of her that she was: ‘Beloved of Christ and greatly loved by Christ’ “Dilectrix Christi et a Christo plurimum dilecta”.

Saint Anselm of Canterbury hails her: “Chosen because you are beloved and beloved because you are chosen of God” (“Electa dilectrix et dilecta electrix Dei” ~ Oratio LXXIII ad sanctam Mariam Magdalenam)

The ‘Angelic Doctor’Saint Thomas Aquinas calls Mary Magdalene the “apostolorum apostola” = Apostle of the apostles – because she announces to the 11 what they in turn are able to announce to the whole world after the Pentecost.

According to the 2016 Vatican press release the decision will reflect more deeply on the dignity of women, and the greatness of the mystery of Divine Mercy.”

This made me think of: Exodus 25:22“The Ark of the Covenant was a box of acacia wood overlaid with gold both inside and out. It had a golden cover called the Mercy Seat with two golden Cherubim spreading their wings above. It was the place God chose to meet with His people.

Dear Friends – Something powerful is seeking to come thru at this time, so strong that even the Vatican feels the shift in the ethers.

Olivia Tautkus

I will leave you to ponder, as I am, this connection between Mary Magdalene & the Mercy Seat – Thinking on how ‘the veil was rent in twain’ with Christ’s deed on Golgotha – revealing the ‘Holy of Holies’ to all –

Blessings on this 1st Sunday of Passion-Tide.

~hag

RUDOLF STEINER’S CALENDAR OF THE SOUL
translated with added titles by Roy Sadler
LENT 4, PASSIONTIDE I
The Passiontide Hope
v49
‘I feel the force of Cosmic Being’,
speaks clear thinking,
recalling its own spirit’s growth
in world nights’ darkness,
and turning to the dawning cosmic day
with inner rays of hope.

Its mirror verse is at the fire festival of Beltane. In ancient times it was a full moon Celtic marriage festival. ‘Marry’ is my free translation of ‘unite’.
EASTERTIDE IV, BELTANE
The Marriage Gift
v4
‘I feel the essence of my being’,
speaks senses’ feeling
that in the sunlit world unites
with floods of light;
to clarity of thought
it would bring warmth
and marry Man and World.

The Categories of Aristotle – a process of contraction…
Is there a path to expansion…..?

PUBLIC LECTURE AND EURYTHMY WORKSHOP WITH CLAUDIA FONTANA

Friday 24 March 2023 – Lecture 7 pm CT – 8:30 pm – Purchase tickets at the door or pay online
$12

Saturday 25 March 2023 – Workshop – 9 am CT– (10:30 am 1/2 hour break – 11 am) 12:30 pm CT CT– Purchase tickets at the door or pay online $50

The Categories of AristotleA process of contraction…exploring a path to expansion

Does one have to be a philosopher of great erudition to approach Aristotle’s gift to humanity……his Categories?

Perhaps , YES! But an initial acquaintance with them can lead out of the confinement of the intellectual concept to an experience of expansion supported by Eurythmy.

In the evening lecture Claudia will introduce the life of the Categories before they became concepts – Bringing the symbols in a sequence of sounds  (called the Evolutionary Sequence ) out of their conceptual form, to life, supported by Eurythmy and examples of poetry.

During the workshop we will enter into the movement of the poetry presented  during the lecture. This will be accessible to Eurythmists as well as to anyone interested in the life of language, poetry and our alphabet.

at the Rudolf Steiner Branch of The Anthroposophical Society
4249 North Lincoln Avenue. Chicago, IL 60618 (map)
https://www.rschicago.org/happenings/calendar 
www.rschicago.org/donate

For more info contact Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator
Hazel Archer-Ginsberg

Claudia Fontana saw a Eurythmy performance when still a teenager. Unbeknownst to her at the time, that performance was the gate to her destiny path. Soon thereafter she studied Eurythmy in Vienna and subsequently spent fourteen years as a performer with the Dornach, London and Stuttgart Eurythmeum ensembles. Teaching became the next challenge which she happily met in the United States, Europe. Before Covid, she spent seven years teaching all levels in Thailand, Malaysia and China. She resides in Ann Arbor, MI still performing and teaching.

“Lazarus – Come Forth” – An exploration of the 1st Christian Initiation, thru the Word & Eurythmy

with Rev. Jeana Lee, Mary Ruud & Hazel Archer-Ginsberg

Starting at Sundown on Friday 31 March 2023
7 pm – 8:30 pm CT at the Christian Community 2135 W. Wilson Leading Thoughts & Close of Day with Rev. Jeana Lee

Continuing on Lazarus Saturday 1 April 2023
10 am – 12 noon CT Night School Check-in w/ Hazel Archer – Eurythmy w/ Mary Ruud
at the Rudolf Steiner Branch Chicago 4249 N. Lincoln Ave

$10 more or less or pay what you will
Please bring a potluck dish to share for the luncheon after the Festival

For more info. contact Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator Hag@rschicago.org

Mary Magdalene & the Women at the Tomb – A Festival of Resurrection

with Hazel Archer-Ginsberg,

Song-Circle with Velsum, 

Eurythmy – & an artistic break out session

Holy Saturday 8 April 2023

1 pm – 3pm CT hybrid event in-person at the Rudolf Steiner Branch Chicago & on zoom

https://us06web.zoom.us/j/7050174041

Meeting ID: 705 017 4041

For more Info. contact Hag@RSChicago.org Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator
Rudolf Steiner Branch 4249 North Lincoln Avenue, Chicago, IL 60618 (map)
www.rschicago.org/donate

PRESENTS:

The Mystery of Ascension with Hazel Archer-Ginsberg

This course is available on Zoom. You will be emailed a Zoom link closer to the time of the class. The course will be recorded and you will receive a link to watch it. Go to the Infinity Foundation web site to enroll

Course Number 231154 / Zoom
Date: Thursday, May 11
Time 7:00 – 8:30 PM CST
Cost $33/23 payment 10 days in advance

Gerald Shepherd

When we tune into the Cycle of the Seasons, we experience that as the Earth breathes out in the Springtime, the beings of nature reach upwards towards the heights. The longing of the human soul also strives to meet this mood of ascension, which attunes all life to the cosmic expanses.

Together we will gain insights in how to rise up to our Higher Self by participating in this harmonizing spring-dialogue between the worlds.

This reconnection between heaven & earth was prefigured in the story of Jacob’s ladder from the Old Testament. Through his dream of the ‘stairway to heaven’, Jacob gave us a prophecy in the picture of a golden ladder on which choirs of Angels traverse between the ‘Above & Below’. The Mystery of the Ascension of Christ, 40 days after the Resurrection at Easter, fulfilled Jacob’s Prophecy. Christ as the Being of Love became the living bridge connecting us to the eternal.

Through this workshop we will learn how humanity will also be transfigured in the fullness of time. The company of the Angelic Hierarchies wait for us, their younger siblings, to ascend, first of all in our thinking, to meet them in fellowship, as they work all the while by our sides.

Nancy Poer

~Vitae Sophia~A Whitsun Festival of United Soul Endeavor 

with Hazel Archer-Ginsberg, Velsum Voices & Eurythmy

Saturday 27 May 2023 a Hybrid event in person* & on zoom

We are called to redeem the ether spheres to create an Ecclesia, a chalice for The Sophia. Then the spirit flame can spread out to become what Steiner called a “World Whitsun”, which began in earnest at the Christmas Conference. The Whitsun Festival highlights one of the greatest challenges of being human: placing our individual gifts, in right relationship within the social realm. This challenge is especially strong now during this ‘pandemic’. Our groups striving to know Spiritual Science must work together as a community, to have the possibility to create a new culture where a sacrament is possible in every encounter. Our individual strength is enhanced by weaving our gifts together, kindling our social world in conscious community.

Zoom: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/83663366670?pwd=L292UzlOR1pkZjBXSWpxK1B2b0o1dz09 Meeting ID: 836 6336 6670 / Passcode: 397593

For more Info. contact Hag@RSChicago.org Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator
*Rudolf Steiner Branch 4249 North Lincoln Avenue, Chicago, IL 60618 (mapwww.rschicago.org/donate


Find a collection of the many RECORDINGS of Presentations, Programs & Festivals HERE