29 September 2018 – “Speaking with the Stars”: There’s roughly a two-hour window of darkness now between twilight’s end & moonrise The window gets longer every night this week. Late tonight when the Moon does rise, it’s in company with Aldebaran. By Sunday morning the 30th, the Moon and Aldebaran are shining very high toward the south.
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“In the karma of every single Anthroposophist is written: Become a person of initiative; observe whether out of the hindrances of your body or any other hindrances that thwart you, you do not discover initiative to be the center of your being. Suffering and joy for you will actually depend on whether or not you can discover personal initiative. As if in letters of gold, there should always stand before the soul of the Anthroposophist: ‘Initiative is part of your karma; much of what meets you in life will depend on whether you can bring this initiative to consciousness’. ~Rudolf Steiner.
ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY
Rudolf Steiner’s Lectures on this day
The Feast Day of St. Michael & All the Heavenly Hosts, also called MICHAELMAS
1227 – Frederick II, Holy Roman Emperor, is excommunicated by Pope Gregory IX for his failure to participate in the Crusades. A man of extraordinary culture, energy, & ability Frederick II was called stupor mundi (the wonder of the world), by Nietzsche, also the first European, the first modern ruler – by many historians, Frederick established in Sicily & southern Italy a modern, centrally governed kingdom with an efficient bureaucracy.
He was a King of Germany, of Italy, & Burgundy. His other royal title was King of Jerusalem by virtue of marriage & his connection with the Sixth Crusade.
He was frequently at war with the Papacy, hemmed in between Frederick’s lands in northern Italy & his Kingdom of Sicily (the Regno) to the south. Pope Gregory IX went so far as to call him an Antichrist.
Speaking six languages (Latin, Sicilian, German, French, Greek & Arabic, Frederick was an avid patron of science & the arts. He played a major role in promoting literature through the Sicilian School of poetry. His Sicilian royal court in Palermo, saw the first use of a literary form of an Italo-Romance language, Sicilian. The poetry that emanated from the school had a significant influence on literature & on what was to become the modern Italian language.
He was also the first king who explicitly outlawed trials by ordeal as they were considered irrational.
Caravaggio
1571 – Birthday of Caravaggio, Italian painter
1717 – An earthquake strikes Antigua Guatemala, destroying much of the city’s architecture & making authorities consider moving the capital to a different city
1812- Birthday of Caspar Hauser, grown up in the total isolation of a darkened cell. Theories link him with the grand ducal House of BadenThese claims, & his subsequent death by stabbing, sparked much debate & controversy.
“…It was the case of that human being, so enigmatic for many people, who was once placed into this city in a mysterious way, and who in just as mysterious a way met his death in Ansbach. An author, in order to indicate the mystery of his life, wrote that as he was carried out to burial the sun was setting on the one horizon and the moon was rising on the other. I speak, as you know, of Caspar Hauser. If you disregard all the pros and cons that have been asserted, if you look only at what has been fully verified, you will know that this foundling — who was one day simply there in the street, and who since he did not know whence he came, was called the Child of Europe — could neither read nor write when he was found. At an age of twenty years he possessed nothing of what is gained through the intellect but he had a remarkable memory. As they began to instruct him, as logic entered his soul, his memory disappeared. This transition in consciousness was accompanied by something else. He possessed at first an incredible, an entirely inborn truthfulness and it was precisely in this truthfulness that he went more and more astray. The more he nibbled, so to say, at intellectuality, the more it vanished. There would be many things to study were we to enter deeply into this human soul which had been artificially held back. It is not difficult for the student of Spiritual Science to credit the popular tradition, so unacceptable to the learned people of to-day, which relates that while Caspar Hauser still knew nothing, while he still had no idea that there were beings besides himself of different form, he exercised a remarkable effect upon quite savage creatures. Savage animals humbled themselves and became mild, something streamed from him that made such beasts gentle, although they savagely attacked anyone else. We could in fact penetrate deeply into the soul of this remarkable personality, so enigmatic to many, and you would see how things that cannot be explained from ordinary life are led back through Spiritual Science to spiritual facts. Such facts cannot be learnt by speculation but only by spiritual observation, though they are comprehensible to an unbiased and logical thinking.
All this has only been said in order to show you that the modern consciousness has evolved from another, an age-old-state when man was not in direct touch with outer objects in the modern sense, but on the other hand was in connection with facts and beings of the spiritual world.” ~Rudolf Steiner, The Apocalypse of St. John, Spiritual Science — The Gospel — The Future of Mankind
1885 – The first public electric tramway in the world is opened in Blackpool, England
1902 – Deathday of Émile Zola a French novelist, playwright, journalist, the best-known practitioner of the literary school of naturalism, & an important contributor to the development of theatrical naturalism. He was a major figure in the political liberalization of France & in the exoneration of the falsely accused & convicted army officer Alfred Dreyfus, which is encapsulated in the renowned newspaper headline J’accuse. Zola was nominated for the first & second Nobel Prize in Literature in 1901 & 1902. His death from carbon monoxide poisoning is suspected to have been murder
1924 – Ludwig Polzer holds his 1st First Class Lesson
1954 – The convention establishing CERN (the European Organization for Nuclear Research) is signed
1957 – Twenty MCi of radioactive material is released in an explosion at the Soviet Mayak nuclear plant at Chelyabinsk
1981 – Deathday of Adolf Arenson, German composer & Anthroposopher. Arenson editied many of Rudolf Steiner’s works, & composed the music for many of the plays & productions. Steiner mentions him at the end of Wonders of the World lecture 1
2008 – Following the bankruptcies of Lehman Brothers & Washington Mutual, The Dow Jones Industrial Average falls 777.68 points, the largest single-day point loss in its history
2009 – The 8.1 Mw Samoa earthquake strikes with a maximum Mercalli intensity. A destructive tsunami follows, leaving 1189 dead & hundreds injured.
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POD (Poem Of the Day)
~my hives shimmer with grace
golden in the grey day
the ever busy bees work at home today
cleaning house
singing appeasements to the undines…
the sukkah waits
as the countenance of Michael
radiates
the power of Divine Will
in Love
~hag
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A deep holiness broods over the dying light. Now, in ourselves we must find our own power of bestowing warmth; that we may shine from within. In the realm of the senses the plant world sinks down into death. Inwardly the fire-spirits, offspring of the lofty Beings of the Sun, bearing the Archetypal pictures of the plant kingdom, stream down into the womb of Mother Earth. All around us we see withering, the color leaving to reveal the essence. As human beings we must not allow the death of nature to draw us into sleep. In autumn we must discover the force of resurrection within, so that we can pass with full consciousness thru the gate of death with a wakened soul, in our time. This is possible by what Michael bestows as the Fire of Will. We can come into communion with the most hidden secrets of existence now, whispering: Feel yourself as bearer of the Motherhood of Nature, to conceive in love the fiery germ of Self.
Blessings of Michaelmas dear friends.
~hag
see you in NOLA
AGM of the ASA Friday, Oct 5 – Sunday, Oct 7 2018 in New Orleans, Louisiana
CLICK HERE TO REGISTER ONLINE!
First Grace United Methodist Church 3401 Canal Street, New Orleans (Check out their amazing history here!)
Pre-conference: Thursday, Oct 4: Living in the Branches National Branch and Group Gathering
Friday 5 October 2018 4:00-5:15 pm Cain and Abel: Building a bridge between the Two Streams, with Hazel Archer-Ginsberg
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Friday 19 October 2018, 7 – 9 pm
COMMUNITY MEETING: ”A healing conversation about equality and the threefold social order: What is living in us now?”
Facilitated by Paulette Arnold
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Friday 2 November 2018, 7 – 9 pm
ALL SOULS FESTIVAL
Earthly Death / Cosmic Life
Storytelling: The Descent of Inanna – An archetype of the soul in the spirit world
Lemniscate Journey thru the Planetary Spheres & the Zodiac –Artistic Exploration – Which Wandering or Fixed Star calls to you?
Didgeridoo
Remembering those who have Crossed the Threshold
The Hallelujah in Eurythmy
Contact Carolyn Arnett with the names of loved ones, who have died this year, to be read in the circle. (773-539-3688) c.roorda.arnett@gmail.com
$10 Donation & Snacks to Share Encouraged
For more info. contact Hazel Archer Ginsberg
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Friday 30 November 2018 – 7 – 9 pm
HIDDEN IN PLAIN SIGHT: THE MYSTERY OF THE APOCALYPSE with Margaret Shipman
‘Apocalypse’ today almost always means war, but its primary definition is REVELATION. the Book of Revelations seems warlike until we begin to delve into the messages, seals, trumpets and bowls as stages of initiation! We will explore the complexities of this amazing book of the Bible by taking a journey through the 7-pointed star and the Apocalyptic Seals of the 1907 Munich Conference.
$15 or pay what you will, Snacks to Share Encouraged
AND:
Saturday 1 December 2018 – 10 am – noon
THE CHRISTMAS CONFERENCE with Margaret Shipman
How can we begin to understand the importance of The Christmas Conference of 1923/24? Can it be understood as so profound to consider it a second turning point of time?
We will take a journey with the foundation stone, beginning with the laying of the first stone, a physical one, for the first Goetheanum, in 1913. Then — through the phoenix experience of the 1922/23 fire, and its journey back to earth a year later—we find it again, as a foundation stone meditation planted into our hearts. The introduction of The Foundation Stone Meditation was a central focus of the Christmas Conference week. It was one of three great gifts which Rudolf Steiner brought at this time as powerful spiritual tools for human evolution.
$15 or pay what you will, Snacks to Share Encouraged
Margaret Shipman has been a member of the Anthroposophical Society for 30 years and considers the work of Rudolf Steiner to be the core of her life. In 2002 she started a national study group for anthroposophy – ‘Geographically Engaged Members Studygroup’, or G.E.M.S. She is also a cellist and pianist and spent 36 years repairing and making instruments of the violin family. She co-authored the book titled Violin Restoration with her mentor, Hans Weisshaar, who was in the second-ever Waldorf class and met Rudolf Steiner as a child.
For more info. contact coordinator Hazel Archer Ginsberg
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Rudolf Steiner Branch of The Anthroposophical Society, 4249 North Lincoln Avenue. Chicago, IL 60618 (map) Check out our Web site! Chicago, IL (Anthroposophical Society in America)
The Elderberries 3-Fold Space is currently available for rental on PEER SPACE for classes, events, meetings, retreats, art exhibits, family parties, etc…
Stephanie Allison
Dereck Clark
Anna Kulisz
Caravaggio
