“To meditate is to become a stage where the eternal and transitory meet, so that our actions can become those of the eternal, for which we are but mediators; we are the eyes and the hands of the primal spirit, who sees and creates through us. Out of the spirit, then, let us create a better world.”-Rudolf Steiner
Hima af Kint
Dear Friends – Our imaginative cognition is a treasure when it spins out scenarios that are aligned with our higher “I”. Then it’s an indispensable tool in creating a reality that brings in the flow of the universe. Nothing manifests on the material plane unless it first exists as a mental picture. We can form images of the tools we hope to wield in the world, & the conditions we’d like to inhabit.
Rachel Handly
But for most of us, the imagination is as much a curse as a blessing. We are just as likely to use it to conjure up premonitions that are at odds with our conscious values. Fearful fantasies regularly pop up, many disguising themselves as rational thoughts & genuine intuitions. They hijack our psychic energy, directing it to exhaust itself in dead-end deliberations.
Meanwhile, ill-suited longings are also lurking in our unconscious mind, impelling us to want things that aren’t good for us. Anytime we surrender to their allure, our imagination is practicing a form of black magic.
Berty Willis
These unsavory aspects of our imagination are what Zen Buddhists describe as the chatter of the “monkey mind.” If we can stop associating our sense of self with this endless surge of slapdash distractions & fruitless fantasies, then we can ‘Be Here Now’ to see what is actually needed.
di Vinci
But whether our imagination is in service to our noble ideals or in the thrall of compulsive fears & inappropriate yearnings, there is one thing for sure: These thoughts can become prophesies.
Of course many of our visions of the future do not come to pass – Thank the good gods – The situations we expect to occur & the experiences we rehearse & dwell on, all the worry about the future, just zaps us, & lames our will. It’s downright self-destructive to keep infecting our imaginations with pictures of loss & failure, doom & gloom, fear & loathing.
Freddy Zentral
The far more sensible approach is to anticipate & actualize blessings…
Join us everyday at 10:10 am/pm when we can join our cognitive imagination together to become spiritual warriors, and endeavor to take up the practice of building up positive imaginations on the inner planes as a counterforce to the adversarial forces working in the world. This is a “key-call” to the Spiritual Powers aligned with love and light, to enlist their aid.
This verse can be an anchor for a group Thought-Form created by our Willed Visualization– to be conceived each day at 10:10 AM, (&/or PM)wherever you are, so it moves like a wave across the globe:
“When I think light, my soul shines, When my soul shines, the earth is a star, When the earth is a star, then I am, a true human being”. ~Herbert Hahn
Our Good Will becomes a cosmic energy field for healing – “Seed ideas in the group mind of humanity”, to co-create our highest intentions for the evolution of humanity – that the Earth may become a Sacred Planet – a Sun – and every Human Being a Star. “What is sown in our highest thought will grow and bear seed.” It only takes the square root of any number of people to create change.
See you, dear friends, in the ethers every day 10:10 AM, (&/or PM) (10 is the number of completion, but please don’t worry if you can’t tune in at 10:10, just do it whenever you think of it, which may be many times a day, or perhaps only occasionally, don’t stress it, just do what you can with a loving heart-mind)
PLEASE SHARE THE GOOD WORD (& Let me know if you are taking on the project)
“When 2 or more are gathered…”
~hag
Len Kemmer
“Learn to dance, or else the angels in heaven will not know what to do with you”. ~Saint Augustine
20 January 2022 – “Speaking with the Stars”: It’s time to get in your last good views of Jupiter for a while. As the month progresses this being will be seen lower & lower in the West after sunset.
~The Truth Of what we call our knowing Is both light & dark… Humans are always dying & waking… The rhythm between, we call life… Pay attention: Miracles are about To happen… ~hag
Here is today’s ‘I Think Speech‘ Podcast an important quote from Rudolf Steiner: ‘Manifestations of Karma’, LECTURE 8
“…the Egyptian-Chaldean period is repeated in our own…We may go back to the epoch of the Egyptian evolution, and there we find certain ritualistic ordinances and commands which appeared as given by the gods. And this they actually were. These ordinances related to certain ablutions which the Egyptians had to perform. This was a command of the gods, that found expression in a certain cult of cleanliness…
We now again, in our own period, encounter hygienic measures such as are given to humanity but in our time, for materialistic reasons. Here we see a repetition of what was lost at a corresponding period in Egypt. The fulfilment of what happened earlier is represented in the general karma in a most remarkable manner. In ancient Egypt the laws of cleanliness were laws of Divine revelation. The Egyptian believed that he was fulfilling his duty to humanity by caring for his particular cleanliness at every opportunity. This preoccupation for cleanliness comes to the fore again today, but under the influence of a mentality which is entirely materialistic. Modern man does not think that he is serving the gods when he is obeying such rules, but that he is serving himself. It is nevertheless a reappearance of what went before.
Dhruvi Acharya
Thus all things are in a certain way cyclically fulfilled. If at a certain period people were not able to conceive certain measures against epidemics, these were times at which men could not do so because, according to the general wise world plan, the epidemics had to take effect in order to give human souls an opportunity of balancing what had been effected through the ahrimanic influence and certain earlier luciferic influences. If other conditions are now being brought about, these too are subject to certain great karmic laws. So we see that these matters cannot be regarded superficially.
How does this agree with our statement that if someone seeks an opportunity of being infected in an epidemic, this is the result of the necessary reaction against an earlier karmic cause. Have we the right now to take hygienic or other measures?
This is a profound question, and we must begin by collecting the necessary material for replying to it. We must understand that where the luciferic and ahrimanic principles are co-operating, whether concurrently or over longer periods, or where they are working against each other, there are manifested certain complications in human life. These complications appear under forms so diverse that we never see two identical cases. If we study human life, however, we shall find our way in the following manner: if in a particular case we try to discover the combined activity of Lucifer and Ahriman, we shall always find a thread by which this connection will become clear. We must discriminate clearly between internal and external man. We must examine the continuity in which karma is accomplished, and we must at the same time understand that we have still the possibility of influencing our inner being by means of certain karmic influences, so that in future a new karmic compensation may be prepared by the inner being.
Dhruvi Acharya
It may well happen that we, following for a time a downward grade, beget evil. We at first descend in order to develop the contrary impetus that will cause us to re-ascend. Let us suppose that a being, by yielding to certain influences, tends towards uncharitableness. This uncharitableness will in a later life appear as karmic result, and will develop inner forces in his organism.
We can then act in two ways — consciously, or else unconsciously. In our epoch we have not progressed so far as to do it consciously. With such a person we can take precautions by which these characteristics in his organism, derived from uncharitableness, will be driven out and we may act in such a way that the effect that is expressed in the external organism as a lack of charity will be counteracted. By these means, however, the soul will not be cleansed of all uncharitableness, but only the external organ of uncharitableness will have been expelled. For if we do nothing further, we shall have accomplished only half of our task, perhaps even nothing at all, or we may even do harm. We may perhaps have helped this person physically, externally, but we shall not have given succour to his soul. Now that the physical expression of uncharitableness has been removed he will not be able to give expression to this uncharitableness, but he will have to retain it within his inner organism until a future incarnation.
Dhruvi Acharya
Let us suppose that a great number of people, because of uncharitableness, had been impelled to absorb certain infectious germs, so that they succumbed to an epidemic. Let us further suppose we were in a position to protect them from this epidemic. We should in such a case preserve the physical body from the effects of uncharitableness, but by doing this we have not removed the inner tendency towards uncharitableness.
Dhruvi Acharya
If we want to bring a true healing, we must also undertake the duty of influencing the soul in such a way as to remove from it the tendency towards a lack of charity, or the disease will go deeper into the soul.
The organic expression of uncharitableness is killed in the external bodily sense for instance by vaccination against smallpox, but the soul continues to be sick. In one period of civilisation, when there prevailed a general tendency to develop a higher degree of egotism, and uncharitableness, an epidemic made its appearance. Such is the fact investigated by Spiritual Science. In anthroposophy it is our bounded duty to give expression to the truth.
Dhruvi Acharya
Now it will be clear why in our time the desire for the protection of vaccination appeared. We also understand why, among the best minds of our time, there also exists a kind of aversion to vaccination. This aversion corresponds to something within, and is the external expression of an inner reality, that seeks to karmicly rid itself of the cause of the disease.
So if on the one hand we destroy the physical expression of a previous fault, we should, on the other hand, undertake the duty of transforming the materialistic character of such a person by means of a corresponding spiritual education. This would constitute the indispensable counterpart without which we are performing only half our task. We are merely accomplishing something to which the person in question will himself have to produce a counterpart in a later incarnation. If we destroy the susceptibility to smallpox, for instance, we are concentrating only on the external side of karmic activity.
Dhruvi Acharya
If on the one side we go in for hygiene, it is necessary that on the other we should feel it our duty to contribute to the person whose organism has been so transformed, something also for the good of his soul. Vaccination will not be harmful if, subsequent to vaccination, the person receives a spiritual education. But if we concentrate upon one side only and lay no emphasis upon the other, we weigh down the balance unevenly.We see how essential it is that we should not undertake one task without the other.
Here we approach an important law of human evolution which acts so that the external and the internal must always be counter-balanced, and that it is not permissible to act with regard to the one only, leaving the other out of consideration. We here get a glimpse of an important relationship, and yet we have not even arrived at the significance of the question: ‘What is the relationship between hygiene and karma?’ As we shall see, the answer to this question will lead us still further into the depths of karma, and we shall further see that there exist karmic relationships between man’s birth and death. In addition, other personalities influence a human life, and man’s free will and karma must be in harmony.~ Rudolf Steiner, Manifestations of Karma, LECTURE 8
19 January 2022 – “Speaking with the Stars”: Sirius twinkles brightly around 8 pm below Orion in the southeast – below fiery Betelgeuse in Orion’s shoulder. Also after dark, face East and look very high. The bright star there is Capella, the Goat Star. To the right of it, by a couple of finger-widths at arm’s length, is a small, narrow triangle known as “the Kids.”
1736 – Birthday of James Watt, Scottish-English chemist & engineer, inventor of the steam engine.
1809 – Birthday of Edgar Allan Poe
1829 – Johann Wolfgang von Goethe’s Faust: The First Part of the Tragedy receives its premiere performance
1853 – Giuseppe Verdi’s opera Il trovatore receives its premiere performance in Rome.
1883 – The first electric lighting system employing overhead wires, built by Thomas Edison, begins service at Roselle, New Jersey
1938 – Deathday of Rosa Mayreder – an Austrian freethinker, author, painter, musician & feminist -The daughter of a wealthy Viennese innkeeper who was able to work as a painter & writer from her youth. She loved science & turned against the prevailing state of affairs that generally only allowed a higher education to men. She loved anthropology & physics, but soon came across the special meaning of language . Together with Hugo Wolf, she published the opera “The Corregidor“, she composed the libretto & was one of Wolf’s sponsors.
In 1881 she married her childhood friend, the architect & later rector of the Vienna University of Technology Karl Mayreder . In the women’s movement she worked with activist Marie Lang & Marianne Hainisch in the early 1890s. In 1893 she founded the General Austrian Women’s Association. From 1899 she published together with Marie Lang & Auguste Fickert the magazine “Documents of Women“.
Her books “The Critique of Femininity ” as well as ” Gender and Culture “ & also in conversations that she held in her diaries, she described to the ‘culture-makers’, that it was important for an equal ratio of the sexes. She gained recognition & approval in literary circles. The opposition was found especially in the field of medicine , which was perceived by her to falsely stress the ‘mental weakness of women’ as a haven of arbitrariness, but also the degradation of women as a sexual object. She turned against the discrimination of their gender & the existing double standards. Her works were widely distributed &translated into English.
Mayreder, who first worked as a painter also founded the “Art School for Women & Girls” in the years before the First World War with Olga Prager & Kurt Federn.
Before & during the war, she was involved with Bertha von Suttner in the peace movement, & in 1919 became the chairman of the “International Women’s League for Peace and Freedom” (IFFF).
Rosa Mayreder met Rudolf Steiner (with whom she entered into a long& extensive correspondence) through women’s rights campaigner Marie Lang. Mayreder wrote many passages in her diaries which describe how enlightening Rudolf Steiner was for her thinking. Steiner spent time with Mayreder & her husband at their villa discussing Goethe & politics over the years & right up until Stiner’s death.
~Today I will Seize darkness by its limbs & shake it – So that the souls of the good Ancient swallowed gods Fall out of the belly of obscurity – The old, the few, the forgotten Thought back into being Whispering the secrets of Renewal To bring Love into Willing… ~hag
16 January 2022 – “Speaking with the Stars”: Welcome to the Eve of the 1st Full Moon of 2022 – the Wolf Moon, Snow Moon or Hunger Moon. We experience the energy of a Full Moon as it is cresting, so 3 days before, & also for 3 days after; though the real power is in the Eve before hitting exact on January 17, at 5:48 p.m. CST
Interesting to think of the Hopi name for this moon – Paamuya or Moon of Life at its Height – comparing the January Full Moon to the Summer Sun, for it follows the path of the Sun six months from now, riding high in the sky.
Thinking of it in terms of constellations, the January Sun beams in front of the constellation Capricornus. The January Full Moon shines in front of the constellation Cancer. Six months from now, the Sun will shine in front of that constellation.
All Full Moons are opposite the Sun. So we can expect to see Bella Luna in the East at dusk, tonight and tomorrow. She will climb upward in the evening hours, and soar to her highest point around midnight. If you’re an earlier riser, watch for her these next couple of mornings, low in the Western sky during the wee hours before sunrise.
1838 – Birthday of Franz Brentano an influential German philosopher, psychologist, & priest whose work strongly influenced not only students Edmund Husserl, Sigmund Freud, Kazimierz Twardowski, Alexius Meinong, Carl Stumpf, Anton Marty, Christian von Ehrenfels, and Tomáš Masaryk, but many others whose work would follow &make use of his original ideas & concepts. Rudolf Steiner recalls the obituary he gave of Brentano as part of his lecture The Case for Anthroposophy where he also speaks about the Separation of the ‘Psychological from the Non-Psychological’ in Franz Brentano.
1901 – Deathday of Arnold Böcklin a Swiss symbolist painter. Rudolf Steiner speaks about him in an incarnation as an Arthurian Knight
1945 – Adolf Hitler moves into his underground bunker, the so-called Führerbunker
1954 – Birthday of Sergei Olegovich Prokofieff – In the biographical sketch given by Rolf Herzog of the Christian Community we hear that Sergei kept secret his inner connection with the spiritual world; that as a child he never had the impression that this was his first time on the earth; and that, in his ninth year he rediscovered esoteric Christianity through the Parzival story which was read aloud to him from the libretto of Wagner’s opera by his grandfather, in their home in Moscow. Sergei, starting at the age of 14, spent his vacations in Max Voloschin’s home in the Crimea, where he found books by Rudolf Steiner in the comprehensive library there .
Sergei had a rich inner life with an intense adolescence of spiritual seeking that included many mystical experiences. From his own words: “Everything Rudolf Steiner spoke of was already known to me, but I was unable to express it in thoughts before then. What had lived in my soul as a general, undefined feeling was now penetrated by a conscious clarity of thought.”
In the years between 1971 and 1973, when he was 17 to 19 years old, he wrote extraordinary poetry about the path out of the darkness into the light – about spiritual battles and apocalyptic events, with profound honesty and dramatic inner force. “I was awakened in the night by the powerful inspiration, as though awakened by the verses themselves. I rushed to my desk in order to capture the poetic words and images quickly—often putting on paper a poem that had arisen fully formed in me—frequently more than one; it was as if they themselves were striving and streaming towards the page. They were the poems of a ‘soul on fire.’” These poems had remained hidden in a cupboard in his parent’s Moscow home— he had shown them to no one when they were written—until he rediscovered them there on a visit during his illness. He decided to publish them by a non-anthroposophical press in Moscow in a splendid volume of more than 400 pages entitled ‘The Mystic Fire of the Soul’.
The voice of the verses went silent around the time of his first moon node, when he decided out of the most profound depths of his soul not only to read the writings of Rudolf Steiner but also to choose anthroposophy as the central task of his life and his destiny. With this, his biography changed: “Only when the decision had been made and I experienced with full force that my life had received new meaning and purpose was I led out of my original lonely condition by the guidance of my destiny—I was taking the first steps to serve those ideals consciously which had previously lived below the surface in my soul and which now had become for me a fully conscious reality thanks to spiritual science.”
Prokofieff, wrote his first book, Rudolf Steiner and the Founding of the New Mysteries, while living in Soviet Russia. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, he was a co-founder of the Anthroposophical Society in Russia. At Easter 2001, he became a member of the Executive Council of the General Anthroposophical Society in Dornach, Switzerland.
At the core of his work is an attempt to develop a deepened understanding for Christianity on the basis of Rudolf Steiner’s spiritual-scientific research. Peter Selg, in his memorial address, after Sergei died an early death on 26 July 2014, described him as “this most inwardly faithful pupil of Rudolf Steiner and protector of his new revelation of Christ.” Sergei had a powerful way of bringing together complex connections & interrelationships from Steiner’s ideas.
As part of the Vorstand he felt it was his calling to fulfill Steiner’s ideal of making the Goetheanum into a contemporary Mystery Center. Read more about this amazing individual in the articles written about his life in ‘Anthroposophy Worldwide‘. Or pick up one of his many books, & read the fruits of his insights for yourself. Prokofieff was a prolific writer leaving us a treasure trove of Works.
1970 – Buckminster Fuller receives the Gold Medal award from the American Institute of Architects
Lydia Xeyon
RUDOLF STEINER’S CALENDAR OF THE SOUL translated (with added titles) by Roy Sadler EPIPHANY III Seeing With The Heart v42 The soul in gloom of winter moved to bring to light her life’s own force her impulse is to guide it far and in the dark forefeel through warmth of heart the life the senses will reveal.
In winter’s darkness can we experience what it can tell us about ourselves and the world, receiving through ‘warmth of heart’ new sense revelations? In the mirror verse, exploring the beauty of the world in midsummer light, can we lose ourselves, expand into the supersensory world to experience the Cosmic Self, the Christ?
THE SUMMER SOLSTICE Midsummer Wisdom v11 It rests this sun’s high hour with you to recognise the call of wisdom: In you, absorbed in worlds where beauty lies, through all your feeling realise: the human I can lose itself and find itself within the Cosmic I.
Sometimes you need another chance. Because sometimes…the timing is better the second time around! Starting now through January 18 you can register with pro-rated tuition for Applied Anthroposophy. Access to all previous recordings from these programs will be included, leaving you free to catch up on your own time as you jump right into our current courses.
The Applied Anthroposophy Course (AAC) had over 180 people from all over the world participate in the first semester. You have two options to register this January:
2. Register for the Full Program which includes the Seed Series as well as the option to join up to six themed Chrysalis Groups that meet each week. (I lead the Thursday morning Chrysalis Group: ‘The Cycle of the Year as Path of Initiation’ with artist Nancy Melvin, 9:30 am CT. )
Greetings friends – Warmth of the Shepherds soul & wisdom of the Kings to All! Can you feel our Epic Holy Nights Storytelling resounding – glinting & fructifying the ethers..? Here is the link with the 13 readings & all the recourses of our Epic of Gilgamesh – Enjoy
My beloved CG & I took a little road trip North to the wilds of Lake Geneva WI. to digest the nourishment from the spiritual worlds, & the good will of community during this potent time – such a powerful bridge between the old & New Year. Our respite was cut short when we got a call from our girl that the furnace went out & that when she came to feed Lucy the cat it was 35 degrees in the house. Yikes…
While hiking along the lake on January 7, I was thinking of Gene Gollogly, who crossed the threshold suddenly one year ago on that date. The sky was crystal clear & the Sun had a rainbow aura in the subzero air. As I moved my limbs, trudging thru the snow, I pictured also my dear friend Dr. David Gershan expanding into spiritual world (from Nancy Poer: ‘David Gershan had taken the booster shot 48 hours before he died on 3 Jan. I have the sense that Gershan has had his chosen death timing, with perhaps the shot being a chosen aspect. It is my hope he will be an awakened bridge from the spirit on this whole thing and can work to awaken and strengthen and inspire us in truths once he settles in’)
Other Anthroposophical souls that passed during this Holy Time of the re-birth of the light: Gertrude Reif Hughes on 5 Jan. 2022, & both Numael Pulido, & Speech artist Sophia Walsh on 7 January 2022.
This was sent out by Nancy Poer: ‘A year ago on January 6, 2021, this film was part of a beautiful, long prepared Epiphany Festival for Joan of Arc (who was born on Epiphany) by Hazel Archer-Ginsberg, and the group in Chicago (Lucien Dante Lazar: The Passage; Mary Ruud: Eurythmy; Mary Spalding: Joan’s biography). With an odd juxtaposition, at the very same time as this film was being shown for people participating around the world, the capitol was being stormed in Washington, DC.
Joan and her magnificent deeds need to be known everywhere now. Nowhere in history do we have more valiant bravery, or the extraordinary capacity to do the impossible against all odds. Her deed was to stop the unholy alliances of the elite who ruled Europe, working to prevent the age of the Consciousness Soul (1413) from fulfilling its task. A heaven sent emissary, Joan’s spiritual guides sustained her, Micha-el the great Archangel who guides our current age of freedom, cosmopolitan awareness, acceptance of diversity and service to the higher good. Her guiding saints, Catherine and Margaret gave her compassionate solace amidst the staggering challenges she faced.
We know her exact words because her greatest fear came true, she was betrayed, captured, sold to the English and put to trial. They were recorded for posterity. Some of the most inspiring words she gave in the course of her victorious sacrifice for humanity: “I was born for this!”
We can resonate with the issues of Joan’s day. While the royal elite indulged themselves in a bubble of decadent privilege, the peasants lived in near starvation. For over 100 years they suffered and word spread among the people that France would “be saved by a maid.” Joan was hailed by multitudes of the common people who loved her and looked to her for salvation.
Everything about her biography is unexplainable with earthly materialistic conjecture. It can only be appreciated with a spiritual picture of aid from higher sources. Brilliant in military strategy, sublimely adroit as she countered ruthless interrogation in trial courts meant to destroy her. As a child she was just a simple unlettered peasant girl. Born to pious and poor parents, she was diligent in her duties to mind the flocks. More serious than her playmates, her inner life was deep and rich. She spend hours daily in mass at the nearby church, and fell to her knees in the fields as the church bells rang out Angelus, praying to the holy mother and for the welfare of those less fortunate than herself. Yet, it would be a vengeful church Bishop who would later try to condemn her to death as a witch.
She stands for the courage and inspiration that we, too, may be instruments for the holy good to come into the evolution of humanity. Even if ours are small un-remarked deeds for change, together may we have the courage and spiritual faith to help change the course of history for our time. Joan of Arc reminds us that we, too, chose to be born for our time.’
~Nancy Jewel Poer, January 6th Holy Night Series, 2021,2022
”The human being is only able to overcome the fear of death and to face death courageously if he knows that an immortal everlasting core is in his inside for which death is only a change of the way of life. As soon as the human being finds the immortal core in himself with the help of occult science, he educates himself more and more for overcoming all such feelings, last also the fear of death. However, the more materialistic the human being becomes, the more he is frightened at death. Occult science has to show how the everlasting life, how karma entails the big balance in the spiritual life. This spiritual science cannot show the beatitudes behind the scenery of life without showing the dreadful powers at the same time, the enemies who lie in wait for him. This is true. However, it also shows how he can overcome any fear of these enemies. It shows how he can face all that with a free, courageous eye. It teaches him to become objective and impartial if he brings himself patiently to its education.” ~ Rudolf Steiner – https://wn.rsarchive.org/…/eLib2015/19071212p01.html…
9 January 2022 – “Speaking with the Stars”: Venus moves between us and the Sun today – The phenomenon is called the planet’s inferior conjunction. The directions of the five inferior conjunctions of Venus determine their differing characters, by determining their places in Venus’ true (heliocentric) orbit, which is tilted and slightly elliptical. Today Venus is in Sagittarius; 5 degrees north of the Sun; 0.27 AU; 63″
RUDOLF STEINER’S CALENDAR OF THE SOUL translated (with added titles) by Roy Sadler In the three verses after Christmas, the Three Kings present themselves; first the Golden King in Verse 39, then the Kings of Silver and Bronze, each with his gift: a new thinking, feeling and willing. (from Eloise Krivosheia with inspiration from her sister, Roberta van Schilfgaarde in anthroposophyla.org/calendar-of-the-soul-verses)
NEW YEAR The Chalice of the Sense of Self v39 Completely open to the spirit’s revelation I win the light of Cosmic Being; thought’s clarifying power grows to give me who I am and waking from the power of thinking my own real feeling flows.
At Epiphany the Soul Calendar moves into its 4th quarter, Selfhood’s intuitive realm, with the third of seven mentions of the heart and the first of the three of love, both only appearing in the winter and coming again in Epiphany’s second week.
EPIPHANY Love’s Offering v40 And when I am in spirit depths then in my ground of soul my own dry well of self-delusion fills with power of the World Word’s fire the heart-formed love world wills.
EPIPHANY II At the Altar of the Heart v41 The soul’s creative power from depths of heart aspires to fire the forces of the gods to right activity in human life and form itself in human love and human deeds.
The Holy Grail Study Group with the CRC ALL ARE WELCOME Mysteries of the Holy Grail – from Arthur and Parzival to Modern Initiation January 12, 2021 – 7:15 pm Central (8:15 pm Eastern)
“Since the Mystery of Golgotha, someone who begins to ask questions will be able to find the right way of doing so, and will also get the right feeling for the new Isis Mystery. What matters today, then, is to ask the right questions, and develop the right attitude to the spiritual world view that can now be presented. Someone who merely wishes to judge can read any number of books and lectures without learning anything apart from mere words. Someone, on the other hand, who approaches in a questing mood, will learn far more than can be found in the words. He will find that these words bear fruit in the powers of growth that lie in his own soul. Anything the spirit teaches us must become real inner experience. That is the important thing.” ~Rudolf Steiner, The Mysteries of the Holy Grail, Chapter 7, “The Questioning Stance of Soul”, excerpts from Steiner’s lectures given at Berlin on 6 January 1914 … focus of the January 12 meeting.
These chapters from the book can be found online at the CRC’s website by clicking this link A transcript of the 6 January, 1914 lecture can be found on the RS Archive by clicking this link The Central Regional Council of the Anthroposophical Society in America invites you to join our ongoing study conversation. The study has been divided among two volunteers who will summarize their section to rebuild it as a foundation for our conversation. Please familiarize yourself with the lecture if possible so you will feel comfortable sharing your reflections and thoughts with the group. This collection of lectures has been republished by Rudolf Steiner Press under the title: “The Mysteries of the Holy Grail — from Arthur and Parzival to Modern Initiation.” The book was compiled and edited by Matthew Barton, published by Rudolf Steiner Press in 2010.
This will be a “Zoom” conference call allowing us an opportunity to see one another while conversing (or audio only if you prefer). To connect to the audio/video-conference:
Meeting ID: 882 1050 5106 One tap mobile +13017158592,,81116556762# US (Germantown) +13126266799,,81116556762# US (Chicago)
Dial by your location +1 301 715 8592 US (Germantown) +1 312 626 6799 US (Chicago) +1 646 558 8656 US (New York) +1 253 215 8782 US (Tacoma) +1 346 248 7799 US (Houston) +1 669 900 6833 US (San Jose) Meeting ID: 882 1050 5106
7:15 Welcome and Introductions 7:18 Verse 7:25 Study led by volunteers Note: CRC team will ID volunteers Travis – pg. 53 to 57 (top) Tom – pg. 57 to 61 7:50 Conversation 8:25 ID volunteers for next meeting 8:28 Close with verse There is a knighthood of the 21st century whose riders do not ride through the darkness of physical forests as of old, but through the forest of darkened minds. They are armed with a spiritual armor and an inner sun makes them radiant. Out of them shines healing, healing that flows from the knowledge of the human being as a spiritual being. They must create inner order, inner justice, peace and conviction in the darkness of our time. ~Karl Konig
Dear friends – I am finding this 3rd week of Advent to be particularly challenging. After taking in some thoughts given in the comments – thank you Kyle, Maverick, Steve, Nicholas, Rick…I will continue to grapple…Please add your comments below to further the conversation…
Focus: The Astral World Symbol: the animal Abandoned by: Guardian Angels Virtues: Bravery, fortitude and presence of mind Beware of temptation to lose your self-control
Ok, so I am learning how in the Air trial we see how we imprint or project ourselves & our thoughts into the world, both good & bad. The world thinks in us & we think in the world.
Ordinary sense based thinking has to be silenced so that it can unite with a harmonious will. When thought is willed it becomes an organ of perception. It becomes conscious of the way our Astral body penetrates into the world & becomes one with all we see.
When we do this we realize that we are the creators of the future, we imprint outwardly what we think inwardly & this becomes the outer world that we will face today – & even imprints our physical bodies in our next incarnation.
More & more it is being revealed that the Cyber World has 2 sides – it can be a tool for communion, or it can be used to further the advent of the ‘8th Sphere’ which has risen higher than ever before into the realm of the human soul – causing a kind of unconsciousness paralysis in the human will. This unconsciousness is the 1st layer – allowing the melding of human thought with demonic delusion to take place.
The only way to counteract the attacks on human thinking is to free it thru spiritual exercises that create a consciousness in all 3 soul forces, so that thinking becomes an awakened organ of will– in alignment with Divine Will.
Working with after images & complementary colors is the new Christic Yoga for this Michaelic age. We must use Lucifer’s gift of imagination as a tool – but we don’t use fantasy, we employ cognitive imagination to activate our Divine Will – this does not allow the Luciferic powers to interfere or the Ahrimanic beings to enslave.
We are meant to learn to breathe light in thru our transformed organ of thought & breathe it out thru our eyes – to shine healing grace out into the sense bound world.
When we look out into the world in this way we see how our soul can be a beacon of light revealing the spirit in all things so that we see the essence – We breathe light in & out! In this way we don’t see the physical world lit up only by electric light, but by our spiritual light.
But yes, my friends, in doing this we will also come face to face with all that is dark & imperfect in our soul. What lives inside us unconsciously is now lit up to be looked at – & we are faced with what we are. This is the first thing we see when we do these exercises.
We lose the floor from under our feet, we are up in the air without a foothold – we recognize the dross we carry unconsciously – which is what we imprint on the world around us.
Friends let’s break the spell that wants to keep us trapped in the 8th sphere – which is striving to be the new normal.
We must become capable of seeing this dross & transforming it in the light of Christ, so that by working on perfecting our lower desires, thru moral thinking, we can build together – the Temple of our true heart – where love lives.
This lecture by Rudolf Steiner explains it much better than I can: The Mission of the Archangel Michael. Lecture 6 – The Ancient Yoga Culture and the New Yoga Will. The Michael Culture of the Future, November 30, 1919
“We shall have the possibility of grasping, the nature of the sense process of man in its relation to the outer world. Man’s conceptions are very coarse and clumsy, indeed, which maintain that the outer world merely acts upon us and we, in turn, merely react upon it. In reality, there takes place a soul process from the outside toward the inside, which is taken hold of by the deeply subconscious, inner soul process, so that the two processes overlap. From outside, cosmic thoughts work into us, from inside, humanity’s will works outward. Humanity’s will and cosmic thought cross in this crossing point, just as the objective and the subjective element once crossed in the breath. We must learn to feel how our will works through our eyes and how the activity of the senses delicately mingles with the passivity, bringing about the crossing of cosmic thoughts and humanity’s will. We must develop this new Yoga will. Then something will be imparted to us that of like nature to that which was imparted to human beings in the breathing process three millennia ago. Our comprehension must become much more soul-like, much more spiritual. If we learn, in nature, to receive the soul element together with sense perception, then we shall have the Christ relationship to outer nature. This Christ relationship to outer nature will be something like a kind of spiritual breathing process.”
16 December 2021 – “Speaking with the Stars”: Left of Orion after dinnertime is the constellation Gemini. Castor and Pollux, the head stars of the Gemini stick-figure twins, are at its left end; the twins are lying on their sides. Castor is the higher one. Bella Luna crosses Taurus as it waxes toward full, on the night of the 18th.
Comet Leonard has been emerging just above the southwest horizon in evening twilight, a little bit higher each day
1859 – Death day of Wilhelm Grimm, German anthropologist and author – the younger brother of Jacob Grimm, of the literary duo the Brothers Grimm.
1900 – Deathday of Karl Julius Schröer, Rudolf Steiner’s professor – Steiner speaks about him in his Karmic Relationships Lectures in Vol 4, lecture 10 his former incarnations as Plato / Hroswitha are given. He was the son of the educator and writer Tobias Gottfried Schröer (Socrates in a former life)
1901 – Birthday of Margaret Mead, American anthropologist and author
Holiday Market at the Rudolf Steiner Branch 4249 N. Lincoln Ave. Chicago 18 December 2021 – from 11 am – 4 pm
Thursday 23 December 2021 – The Eve of the Eve – 11 am PT / 12 pm MT / 1 pm CT / 2 pm ET / 7 pm UTC
A Christmas Festival with Christian Community Priest Rev. Jeana Lee, Movement with Lucien Dante Lazar
‘Divine Love and the Holy Child Within’
This will be a hybrid in-person & Zoom event Featuring our 2 camera technology with Mary Spalding
Doors open at 12:30 pm (Zoom Room open 12:45 pm for Social time) Snacks to Share Encouraged
Suggested donation $15.00 – At the door or via the Rudolf Steiner Branch PayPal donation site – *Please make a note on the first line – type in: “Christmas Fest”! The Festival will be recorded
All around the world the season of midwinter is the traditional time for community bonding through storytelling. In laying the groundwork for the 100-year anniversary of the Christmas Conference, we bring the ancient Sumerian saga “The Epic of Gilgamesh” to life. Rudolf Steiner explored this story in Occult History during the Holy Nights of 1910; and again with the lectures “World History in the Light of Anthroposophy” given during those fateful Holy Nights in 1923 for the re-founding of the Society.
The Epic of Gilgamesh is perhaps the oldest written tale on Earth. The Sumerian version dates from around 3000 B.C. Later it was compiled from 12 clay tablets written in Akkadian cuneiform.
It is the “Hero’s Journey” of human evolution, a story of friendship, and a quest for the meaning of life – revealing Steiner’s core mission of bringing karma and reincarnation to the west.
Myths, fairytales, historical epics, and sagas open us up to powerful archetypes behind the human condition, revealing clues to ourselves – from the past, the present, and the future. What will we uncover about ourselves and each other during this year’s Holy Nights adventure in storytelling?
Tune in for any or all of the episodes of this dramatic reading, re-worked by Hazel Archer from various translations, and featuring friends from around the world.
What: The Epic of Gilgamesh: Story Telling during the Holy Nights hosted by the ASA, Hazel Archer, and friends.
Time: 22 minutes daily at 9 am PT / 10 am MT / 11 am CT / 12 pm ET / 5 pm UTC
Dates: December 24, 2021- January 5, 2022 for 13 consecutive days Can’t join us live? No problem. Each gathering will be recorded and posted on our Holy Nights page (link will be emailed upon registration).
How: Register Here! Then check your email for confirmation with the Zoom registration link.
Eurythmy for the Holy Nights with Jan Ranck ‘Tuning to the Stars’: Sacred Geometry, the Planets and the Zodiac
LIVE IN-PERSON 26-30 Dec. 2021 at the Rudolf Steiner Branch Chicago 4 pm – 5 pm And at 7pm on 31 Dec. as part of our Annual NYE Gathering (details below)
$100 for all 6 sessions, or $22 for each individual session.
Make your payment using the Rudolf Steiner Branch PayPal or QuickPay with Zelle to chase@rschicago.org (Please indicate in the notes that it is for the “Holy Nights Eurythmy”)
Cash at the door, or send a check to: Rudolf Steiner Branch 4249 North Lincoln Avenue Chicago, IL 60618-2953 USA
* Jan Ranck – Born in the USA, Jan Ranck studied music and comparative arts at Indiana University in Bloomington. She accompanied the London Stage Group on their 1976 USA tour and went on to study eurythmy at the Eurythmeum in Dornach with Lea van der Pals, where she subsequently taught. In 1984 she joined the faculty of The London School of Eurythmy. She left there to complete her eurythmy therapy training in Stuttgart in 1989, moving afterward to Israel, where she founded and directed the Jerusalem Eurythmy Ensemble (1990) and the Jerusalem Academy of Eurythmy (1992) and was an instructor in the Jerusalem Waldorf Teacher Bachelor Program in David Yellin Academic College from 1999. Jan has held Master Classes at various venues worldwide, including the Goetheanum and the MA Program in Eurythmy held at Emerson College and Spring Valley. She is the representative for Israel in the International Eurythmy Therapy Forum.
Friday 31 December 2021 Doors open at 6:30 pm
Join us for our Annual NYE Conscious Community Gathering – The Theme for 2022 is Cabaret – a Cultural Sharing!
All are invited to take the stage with an offering.
Circles Edge & other Waldorf alum will also perform
Please bring Food & Drink to share
$20 Cash at the door or Make your payment using the Rudolf Steiner Branch PayPal or QuickPay with Zelle to chase@rschicago.org (Please indicate in the notes that it is for the “NYE”)
All proceeds go to support the Rudolf Steiner Branch – the young People hosting & The Band (Can’t make it? send a $ gift PayPal)
7 – 8 pm – Holy Nights Eurythmy with Jan Ranck (separate fee $22 see above)
8 pm – Potluck Social
8:30 pm – Circles Edge & Friends warm the stage & host the open mic
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