2 October 2020 – “Speaking with the Stars”- Regulus was a bit below Venus at dawn.
And at sunset, The counterpart to Venus – Mars & Bella Luna make a striking pair. Later in the night, watch as they slowly draw farther apart.
Happy Friday dear friends –
Friday is sacred to the goddess Venus & named after Freyja, Old Norse for “The Lady”. In Norse mythology, she is associated with love, beauty, fertility, sex, war, gold. Freyja is a member of the Vanir, a group of gods associated with health, fertility, wisdom, & the ability to see the future. Many tales tell of her using ‘Seidr’, (pronounced “SAY-der”) = cord, string, web” – a form of pre-Christian Norse magic or shamanism concerned with discerning the course of fate & working within its structure to bring about change, which was done by weaving new events into being.
James Doyle Pemrose
Like Thor with his Hammer called Mjöllnir, Freyja wears the necklace Brísingamen, a brilliant golden torc created by the dwarves, the master craftsmen of the Norse cosmos. The first part of the name Brísingamen is “brísing” – a poetic term for fire or amber, gleaming like the sun – the dwarves that made the necklace were from the Brísinga tribe. The second part, “amen” means necklace of torc or metal.
Here is the story of how she came to possess Brísingamen:
Being a goddess of beauty, Freya naturally was very fond of glittering adornments, and, of precious jewels. One day, while wandering through Asgard, she came to the borders of Svartalfheim, the underground kingdom of the dwarves. There she was greeted by Dvalin and his three brothers. Little did she know, they had laid a trap for her – they had set up their forge in the opening of a deep, wide, rocky cave and were fashioning the most wonderful necklace of gold that was ever seen. “Do you like it?” said Dvalin, “this is Brisingamen, the Brising Necklace – it is the morning star, the rainbow, the moon and the fruitfulness of earth.”
Beside herself, with the beauty of what lay before her – for it sparkled like fire – she stopped, transfixed, to watch them at their work, until the necklace was finished there in her viewing.
“Will you sell me that necklace for a treasure of silver?” she asked, “for, indeed, I have never seen a fairer one, and I know I cannot live without it!”
“No!” answered the dwarves, “all the silver in the world would not buy from us the Brisingamen!” Stunned and desperate she cried, “Will you sell it to me for a treasure of gold?” “No!” barked the dwarves; “All the gold in the world could not buy it from us!”
Heartbroken, Freya pleaded “Well, is there any treasure in the world for which you would sell me that necklace, for now that I have seen Brisingamen, life without it is not to be endured!”
“Yes!” chimed all four dwarves, “there is a treasure for which we would sell Brisingamen – you can buy it from each of us – that treasure is your love. To each of us you must be wedded for a day and a night – for of such space is a marriage among the Dwarves of Svartalfheim – and then Brisingamen shall be yours.”
Kasia Krzysztofowicz
Silently and listening to a deep certainty never known to her before, feeling as if in a dream, she said, “Yes! For Brisingamen I will wed even with you!” So, the four dwarfish weddings were held in distant Svartalfheim.
Dani Kaulakis
Freyja, is often depicted in a cloak of falcon feathers, riding a chariot pulled by two cats, accompanied by the boar Hildisvíni. Freyja rules over her heavenly field, Fólkvangr, where she receives half of those who die in battle. The other half go to the god Odin’s hall, Valhalla. Within Fólkvangr lies her hall, Sessrúmnir. Freyja assists other deities by allowing them to use her feathered cloak, in matters of fertility & love.
Freyja is attested to in the Poetic Edda, compiled in the 13th century from earlier traditional sources; & in several Sagas of Icelanders; in the short story “Sörla þáttr”; in the poetry of skalds; & on into the modern age in Scandinavian folklore.
Freyja & the goddess Frigg ultimately stem from a single goddess common among the Germanic peoples; connecting her to the Valkyries, female battlefield choosers of the slain; & put her relation to other figures in Germanic mythology, including the thrice-burnt & thrice-reborn Gullveig/Heiðr, & the 1st century CE “Isis” of the Suebi. Freyja’s name appears in numerous place names in Scandinavia, with a high concentration in southern Sweden.
Various plants in Scandinavia once bore her name, but it was replaced with the name of the Virgin Mary during the process of Christianization. Cowslips (Primula veris) were traditionally associated with Freya, as was their domestic cousin Primrose (Primula vulgaris). Two old names for the Cowslip flower were “Lady’s Keys” or “Password”, as they could be used to travel magically to her hall, Sessrumnir, & get you in the door.
Dora Keltz
Rural Scandinavians continued to acknowledge Freyja as a supernatural figure into the 19th century, & Freyja inspires various works of art even today.
So dear friends, Perhaps now on Friday’s you may think on her & receive a blessing.
Mehregān (Persian: Mithra Festival) is a Zoroastrian & Persian festival, celebrated since the Zoroaster era, celebrating the Persian god Mithra (an earlier incarnation of Michael), & to honor the Yazata of “Mehr” which is responsible for friendship, affection & love. It is also widely referred to as Persian Festival of Autumn. Mehrgān was celebrated in an extravagant style at Persepolis. Not only was it the time for harvest, but it was also the time when the taxes were collected. Visitors from different parts of the Persian Empire brought gifts for the king all contributing to a lively festival.
If the gift-giver needed money at a later time, the court would then return twice the gift amount. Kings gave two audiences a year: one audience at Nowruz & another at Mehregān. During the Mehregān celebrations, the king wore a fur robe & gave away all his summer clothes.
Nowadays for this celebration, the participants wear new clothes & set a decorative, colorful table. The sides of the tablecloth are decorated with dry marjoram. A copy of the Khordeh Avesta (“little Avesta”), a mirror & a sormeh-dan (a traditional eyeliner or kohl) are placed on the table together with rosewater, sweets, flowers, vegetables & fruits, especially pomegranates & apples, & nuts such as almonds or pistachios. A few silver coins & lotus seeds are placed in a dish of water scented with marjoram extract.
A burner is also part of the table setting for kondor/loban (frankincense) & espand (seeds of Peganum harmala, Syrian rue) to be thrown on the flames.
At lunch time when the ceremony begins, everyone in the family stands in front of the mirror to pray. Sharbat is drunk & then—as a good omen—sormeh is applied around the eyes. Handfuls of wild marjoram, lotus & sugar plum seeds are thrown over one another’s heads while they embrace one another.
The International Day of Non-Violence
1869 – Birthday of Mahatma Gandhi, Indian activist & philosopher –referred to in India as Gandhi Jayanti, a national festival celebrated in India to mark the occasion of the birthday of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, the “Father of the Nation”. It is one of the three national holidays of the country
Memorial of the Holy Guardian Angels, Catholics set up altars in honor of guardian angels as early as the 4th Century, & local celebrations of a feast in honor of guardian angels go back to the 11th Century
1552 – Conquest of Kazan by Ivan the Terrible, The Grand Prince of Moscow. His conquests transformed Russia into a multiethnic & multicontinental state spanning almost one billion acres. Ivan managed countless changes in the progression from a medieval state to an empire & emerging regional power, & became the first ruler to be crowned as Tsar of All the Russias.
Historic sources present disparate accounts of Ivan’s complex personality: he was described as intelligent & devout, yet given to rages & prone to episodic outbreaks of mental instability, that increased with his age, affecting his reign. In one such outburst, he killed his groomed & chosen heir Ivan Ivanovich. This left the Tsardom to be passed to Ivan’s younger son, the weak & intellectually disabled Feodor Ivanovich.
Ivan’s legacy is complex: he was an able diplomat, a patron of arts & trade, founder of the Moscow Print Yard, Russia’s first publishing house, a leader highly popular among the common people (see Ivan the Terrible in Russian folklore) of Russia, but he is also remembered for his paranoia && arguably harsh treatment of the Russian nobility. The Massacre of Novgorod is regarded as one of the biggest demonstrations of his mental instability & brutality
1803 – Deathday of Samuel Adams, American philosopher & politician
1925 – John Logie Baird performs the first test of a working television system
1928 – The Opus Dei, is founded by Josemaría Escrivá.
1937 – Dominican Republic ‘strongman’ Rafael Trujillo orders the execution of the Haitian population living within the borderlands; approximately 20,000 are killed over the next five days
1947 – Deathday of P. D. Ouspensky, a Russian mathematician & esotericist known for his expositions of the early work of the Greek-Armenian teacher of esoteric doctrine George Gurdjieff, whom he met in Moscow in 1915. He shared the (Gurdjieff) “system” for 25 years in England & the United States, having separated from Gurdjieff in 1924 personally, for reasons he explains in the last chapter of his book In Search of the Miraculous, a recounting of what he learned from Gurdjieff during those years. After Ouspensky broke away from Gurdjieff, he taught the “Fourth Way”, as he understood it, to his independent groups.
Gurdjieff proposed that there are three ways of self-development generally known in esoteric circles. These are the Way of the Fakir, dealing exclusively with the physical body, the Way of the Monk, dealing with the emotions, & the Way of the Yogi, dealing with the mind. What is common about the three ways is that they demand complete seclusion from the world. According to Gurdjieff, there is a Fourth Way which does not demand its followers to abandon the world. The work of self-development takes place right in the midst of ordinary life. Gurdjieff called his system a school of the Fourth Way where a person learns to work in harmony with his physical body, emotions & mind. Ouspensky picked up this idea & continued his own school along this line.
He finally gave up the system in 1947. (“A Record of Meetings”, published posthumously) “you must make a new beginning” after confessing “I’ve left the system”
1968 – Deathday of Marcel Duchamp, French painter & sculptor
1990 – Xiamen Airlines Flight 8301 is hijacked & lands at Guangzhou, where it crashes into two other airliners on the ground, killing 128
1996 – The Electronic Freedom of Information Act Amendments are signed by U.S. President Bill Clinton
1996 – Aeroperú Flight 603, a Boeing 757, crashes into the Pacific Ocean shortly after takeoff from Lima, Peru, killing 70
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All Souls Festival:
The Connection Between Epidemics, the Souls of the Dead, & the Spiritual World – Leading thoughts by Hazel Archer-Ginsberg.
With Group Eurythmy, Singing & Break out Sessions.
In-person at Elderberries Biodynamic Outpost & 3 fold Cultural Hub, in conjunction with the Rudolf Steiner Branch Chicago, 4249-51 N. Lincoln Ave.
Ahura Mazdah spake to Zarathustra: “When I created Mithras, who possesses the cosmic intelligence, I created him to be as venerable, as praiseworthy as Myself: Ahura Mazda”.
Zarathustra looked into the brilliant light & declared: “Him, the powerful Yazata (= worthy of worship or veneration), the mighty Mithras towering above all creatures, I shall honor Him Who owns the wide fields of the intelligences, Who knows the right sayings, Who is silent, yet earnest, Who has a thousand ears, Who is fair, Who has ten thousand eyes, Who stands on a broad rampart, Who is mighty and sleepless and vigilant.
Mithras we look to: Him Who owns wide fields of eternity, the vigilant one, Whose dwelling is as wide as the universe. It is built within matter. It is spacious, exposed to no needs, radiant, and offering shelter all around. Eight helpers of Mithras are dwelling as his spies on all the mountains, on all the ramparts. …
Mithras, the owner of wide fields of light, drives around raising His arms for the sake of safety. He guides His fair chariot, able to withstand all dangers and encrested with golden ornaments, to the radiant House of Praise. The chariot is drawn by four white steeds which are immortal and enjoy the nourishment of the spirit. Their front hoofs are fashioned of gold, their hind ones of silver.”
Then are enumerated the hosts accompanying Mithras at the right and left as he descends. The story goes on: In the chariot of Mithras, who owns wide fields of universe, there are a thousand bows…Moving through the air they fly on the head of the Devas. In the chariot of Mithras, who owns wide fields of intelligences, there are a thousand arrows, golden-pointed, furnished with vulture feathers, set with barbs, beautifully fashioned…Moving through the air, they fly on the heads of the Devas. (The same is said of spears, axes, daggers, clubs, and clubs with a hundred studs.)
Sorely afraid is the evil-doing Anra Mainyav (=Ahriman) and all the other evil beings. Ahriman shivers in fear declaring: “Let us in no wise expose ourselves to the blows of Mithras, who owns wide fields of light, waxing and working earnest for our despair. Mayest thou not, O Mithras, wax furious and send blows against us, thou, who art the most valiant of the Yazata and ownest wide fields of light.”
– From the Avesta, the primary collection of religious texts of Zoroastrianism.
Zarathustra, Revealing the Sacred Names of Mithras in the fight against Ahriman: “Mayest thou bestow grace upon me, providence and destiny, when I am writing down these first transmitted Mysteries. I am writing them down for my child, Immortality, the Mystic worthy of this our might, which the great God Helios Mithras has given to me at the hands of his Archangel, so that I, an eagle, may enter Heaven and envisage all”. (Then it is said of Mithras:)
“O Lord, Who hast closed with the spirit-breath the fiery keys of Heaven, thou two-bodied One, reigning over the fire, the light’s creator and guardian, breathing light, invigorated by fire, spirit-radiant, fire-rejoicing, radiantly beauteous, light-dweller, flame-whirler, light-creating, fire-planting, fire-enraged, lightning-swept, light-glorified, light-expanded, light-supporting, star-conqueror: Reveal to me the names that have not been known to mortal nature; the names never pronounced by a human tongue in lucid language, never pronounced by a human sound, or a human voice. Reveal to me the eternally living and reverenced names of you O great servant of Ahura Mazda and of man. – From a Mithras Liturgy of the Avesta.
~adapted by hag
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Mary Gulfleisch
1 October 2020 – “Speaking with the Stars”: The Full Harvest Moon 5:05 pm cdt TODAY! You can watch our beloved satellite clear the horizon & rise in the east just moments after sunset & remain visible in the sky all night. It’s the first of two Full Moons this month — the second -a Blue Moon will occur on All Hallows Eve October 31.
Mercury reaches greatest eastern elongation (26° from the Sun) at 11 am CDT Today. You can spot the solar system’s smallest planet this evening, in the southwest 30 minutes after sunset, By then, some of the brightest stars should be popping out of the twilight: Arcturus, Vega, Deneb, Altair, and Fomalhaut. Jupiter & Saturn should appear about the same time.
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George Mason
“History is a cyclic poem written by time upon the memories of humanity”. ~Percy Bysshe Shelley
286 -Feast Day of Saint Piatus, a Belgian saint, native of Benevento, Italy, Tradition states that he was ordained by Dionysios the Areopagite. He was martyred under Maximianby having the top of his skull sliced off. He may be recognized in depictions holding the sliced portion of his skull. Some of his relics can be found at Chartres Cathedral
331 BC – Alexander the Great defeats Darius III of Persia in the Battle of Gaugamela
1811 – The first steamboat to sail the Mississippi River arrives in New Orleans
1814 – Opening of the Congress of Vienna, intended to redraw Europe’s political map after the defeat of Napoleon the previous spring
1847 – Birthday of Annie Besant a prominent British socialist, theosophist, women’s rights activist, writer, orator & supporter of Irish & Indian self-rule.
In 1890 Besant met Helena Blavatsky. She became a member of the Theosophical Society & a prominent lecturer. She established the first overseas Lodge of the International Order of Co-Freemasonry, Le Droit Humain. Over the next few years she established lodges in many parts of the British Empire. In 1907 she became president of the Theosophical Society, whose international headquarters were in Adyar, Madras. She also became involved in politics in India, joining the Indian National Congress. When World War I broke out in 1914, she helped launch the Home Rule Leagueto campaign for democracy in India. This led to her election as president of the India National Congress. In the late 1920s, Besant travelled to the United States with her protégé & adopted son Jiddu Krishnamurti, whom she claimed was the new Messiah & incarnation of Buddha. Krishnamurti rejected these claims in 1929.
She is thought to be the reincarnation of Giordano Bruno…?
1880 – First electric lamp factory is opened by Thomas Edison
1890 – Yosemite National Park is established by the U.S. Congress
1908 – Ford puts the Model T car on the market at a price of US$825.
1910 – Los Angeles Times bombing: by union members belonging to the International Association of Bridge & Structural Iron Workers. The explosion started a fire which killed 21 newspaper employees & injured 100 more.
1918 – Arab forces under T. E. Lawrence, also known as “Lawrence of Arabia”, capture Damascus
1924 – Birthday of Jimmy Carter, American lieutenant & politician, 39th President of the United States, Nobel Prize laureate
1928 – General Secretary Joseph Stalin of the Soviet Union introduces its First five-year plan, including the creation of “kolkhoz” collective farming systems that stretched over thousands of acres of land & had hundreds of peasants working on them. This essentially destroyed the kulaks as a class, & also brought about the slaughter of millions of farm animals that these peasants would rather kill than give up to the gigantic farms. To meet the goals of the first five-year plan the Soviet Union began using the labor of its growing prisoner population. This disruption led to a famine in Ukraine, Russia, Kazakhstan as well as areas of the Northern Caucasus.
1957 – First appearance of In God we trust on U.S. paper currency
1961 – The United States Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) is formed, becoming the country’s first centralized military espionage organization
1964 – Japanese Shinkansen (“bullet trains“) begin high-speed rail service from Tokyo to Osaka
1985 – The Israeli Air Force bombs Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) headquarters in Tunis
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My POD (Poem Of The Day)
~I looked in & saw the dragon writhing In rags of mortality Spitting the cold fire of fear Binding & Hardening… & yet my blood was hot Pulsing with scintillating sparks Forged From the sword of the Archai… Now my tongue flicks flames Licking the fingers of gods Knowing I am Free ~hag
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All Souls Festival:
The Connection Between Epidemics, the Souls of the Dead, & the Spiritual World – Leading thoughts by Hazel Archer-Ginsberg.
With Group Eurythmy, Singing & Break out Sessions.
In-person at Elderberries Biodynamic Outpost & 3 fold Cultural Hub, in conjunction with the Rudolf Steiner Branch Chicago, 4249-51 N. Lincoln Ave.
20 September 1913 – The laying of the Foundation Stone of the 1st Goetheanum. Since only 3 days advance notice could be given, only about 40 folks were present to brave the equinoctial storm that broke on them just as the ceremony was beginning, there in Dornach, at sunset on the Autumnal Equinox. Torrents of rain fell, & a gale howled around them as Rudolf Steiner’s powerful voice sounded out above the blare of the elements. A few members took up some vine stakes that had been piled nearby & lite them, providing the only illumination for the ceremony. Rudolf Steiner called upon the hierarchies to help & protect the undertaking. Then he spoke of the increasing power & malignity of “dark Ahriman clouding vision, who means to spread the darkness of chaos over fully awakened spiritual sight,” & how the human soul, symbolized in the Foundation Stone, must find the strength, in spite of the fear of the spirit induced in humankind by Ahriman, to undertake its spiritual task.
In the ceremony, Rudolf Steiner intoned, for the first time, the ancient prayer that had once echoed in the soul of Jesus of Nazareth when he witnessed the celebration of an ancient Mystery rite that had fallen into decadence. In that overwhelming moment the young man from Nazareth experienced the ‘Fall of Man’ & had to bear within himself all the sorrow that resulted for humanity. This ‘Macrocosmic Lord’s Prayer’ which Steiner later made public in his lectures on the Fifth Gospel, included as its essential element the recognition of the human being’s falling away from the Divine at the beginning of human evolution. The Lord’s Prayer, as given to humankind by the Christ, is the metamorphosis of this ancient prayer.
To emphasize the significance this macrocosmic Prayer had for Rudolf Steiner, a year later on 19 September 1914,” in the Schreinerei, he says: “It was, my dear friends, one of the most sublime moments of my experience in the course of our Movement when for the first time I was allowed to utter the words of the Macrocosmic Lord’s Prayer.”
By linking the Fifth Gospel with the laying of the Foundation Stone of the Goetheanum building, Rudolf Steiner accomplished a deed that stands like a Mystery in the history of our movement.
Here is the full transcript of Rudolf Steiner’s words that faithful night 107 years ago today:
“Thrice the human soul rises up to the three secrets of existence: First they are symbols; then they are tokens when the soul reads the eternal world word; but the profoundest depths of the world secrets are vividly bound to the soul when this soul is able to create its own sheath out of the kingdom of the hierarchies — So be sheathed!
First symbol, then token, now sheathed so that you may become a firm Corner Stone of our striving, for our seeking inasmuch as we have seen it to be right in the evolution of mankind. Let us make of the Stone that is a token of our soul one that is sheathed.”
To the copper stone was added the document that contained the solemn vow of humankind toward the spiritual world; which closed with the words: “Laid by the Johannes Building Association…on the twentieth day of September 1880, after the Mystery of Golgotha, that is, 1913 after the birth of Christ, when Mercury as evening star stood in Libra, the Balance.”
At this point Architect Schmid-Curtius & Engineer Englert cover the Stone, on which Marie von Sivers has laid a bunch of roses — 12 red & 1 white on the earth. Then Rudolf Steiner & the others cross their arms & crosswise take each others hands round the Foundation Stone: Dr. Steiner, Dr. Peipers, Dr. Grosheintz, Marie von Sivers, Architect Schmid & Engineer Englert. Then all except Dr. Steiner depart from the pit. — which has nine steps.
“My dear Sisters & Brothers, Let us today, on this festival evening, understand one another truly. Let us understand that this deed really signifies for our souls a vow. Our endeavours have brought it about that here, at this place, whence we look far out in the four elemental directions of the compass rose, we are permitted to erect this emblem of spiritual life for the new age. Let us understand that on this day, feeling our souls united with that which we have laid symbolically into the earth, we faithfully dedicate ourselves to this spiritual stream in the evolution of mankind which we have recognized as right.
Let us try, my dear Sisters and Brothers, to make this vow in our souls: that in this moment we will look away from all the minutiae of life, from all that binds us — must of necessity bind us – as human beings to the daily round. Let us try in this moment to awaken in ourselves the thought of all that links the human soul with the striving of the Turning Point of Time. Let us try to think for a moment that, as we do what we have vowed to do this evening, we must bear within us the consciousness of looking into far, far cycles of time, in order to become aware of how the mission, of which this Building is to be the emblem, will take its place in the great mission of mankind upon our planet earth. Not in pride and vainglory – in humility, devotion and readiness for sacrifice, let — us try to lift our souls to the great plans, the great purposes of man’s activity on earth.
Let us try to put ourselves into the position in which we really ought to be and must be if we understand this moment aright. Let us try to think how there once entered into our earth-evolution the great announcement, the great communication, the primeval, eternal Gospel of divine-spiritual life, how it passed over the earth at a time when the divine spirits themselves were still the great teachers of mankind. Let us try, my dear Sisters and Brothers, to transfer ourselves back into those sacred ages of earth existence, of which a last yearning, a very last memory still dawns on us when, maybe in ancient Greece, with the last echoes of the mystery-wisdom and simultaneously with the first tones of philosophy, we listen to their great Plato telling of the eternal forms and the eternal substance of the world. And let us try to grasp what since those times has spread over our earth evolution as luciferic and ahrimanic influences.
Let us try to make clear to ourselves how the connection with the divine cosmic existence, with the willing, with the feeling and with the divine-spiritual knowing, has faded from the human soul. Let us try in this moment to feel deep, deep in our own souls what in the countries of the east, the north, the west, the south, those human souls whom we acknowledge as the noblest are feeling today, though they get no further than, let us say, a vague, inadequate longing and hoping for the spirit. Look around you, my dear Sisters and Brothers, and see how this undefined longing, this vague hoping for the spirit prevails throughout mankind today. Feel, and harken, here by the Foundation Stone of our emblem, how in the vague yearning and hoping of mankind for the spirit, there is audible the cry for the answer, for that answer which can be given where Spiritual Science can be present, with its Gospel of the Knowledge of the Spirit.
Try to engrave into your souls the greatness of the moment through which we are passing this evening. If we can hear the longing call of mankind for the spirit and resolve to erect the true Building from out of which the tidings of the spirit shall ever more and more be proclaimed – if we feel this in the life of this our world, then we understand one another truly this evening. Then we know – not in pride and nowise over – valuing our own efforts, but in humility, in devotion and readiness for sacrifice – that in our indefatigable endeavours we must be the continuers of that spiritual work which has been extinguished in the west in the course of advancing human evolution. Inevitably, through the adverse influence of the ahrimanic forces, that evolution ended by bringing mankind to the point where we stand today, the point where souls could only wither and waste away, should that cry of longing for the spirit go unheard.
My dear Sisters and Brothers, let us feel this anxiety! It must be so if – aglow with the fire of love – we are to fight on in that great spiritual conflict it was granted us to inherit, in that great spiritual conflict which was when they repelled the Ahrimanic onslaught of the Moors. Led by karma, we stand at this moment at a place through which important streams of spiritual life have flowed; let us feel within ourselves this evening the full gravity of the situation. Mankind in days gone by had reached the culminating point in its striving for personality. When in the fullness of this earthly personality, the ancient heritage, received from the divine leaders of the very beginning of earth-evolution, had exhausted itself, then in the east the Cosmic Word appeared: In the Beginning was the Word, And the Word was with God, And a God was the Word. And the Word was made manifest to the souls of men and spoke to the souls of men: Fill earth-evolution with the purpose and meaning of the earth! Now the Word Itself has passed over into the earth aura, has been received into the spiritual aura of the earth. Fourfold has been the proclamation of the Cosmic Word through the centuries numbering now well-nigh two thousand years. Thus has the light of cosmic worlds shone into earth-evolution. Deeper and ever deeper Ahriman sank, and had perforce to sink.
Let us feel ourselves surrounded by the souls of men in whom the cry of yearning for the spirit resounds. But let us feel, my dear Sisters and Brothers, how these human souls all round us might be left crying out in vain, since Ahriman, dark Ahriman, is spreading chaos over all spiritual knowledge of the worlds of the higher hierarchies for which they strive. Feel that in our time the possibility has indeed arisen of adding to the spirit-word, four times proclaimed, that other proclamation which I can now present, but in a symbol only. From the east it came – the light and the Word of the proclamation. From out of the east it passed over to the west, four times proclaimed in the four Gospels; awaiting the advent from the west of the mirror that will add knowledge to what is still only proclamation in the four times uttered Cosmic Word. It pierces deeply into our hearts and souls when we listen to that Sermon on the Mount, which was uttered in the hour when the time for the ripening of human personality was fulfilled, when the ancient light of the spirit had vanished and the new spirit-light appeared. The new spirit-light has appeared! But after it appeared, it travelled through the centuries of human evolution from east to west, waiting for understanding of the words which once in the Sermon on the Mount had sounded their way into human hearts. Deep-toned rings out of the depths of our cosmic evolution that immemorial, undying Prayer, uttered as proclamation of the cosmic word when the Mystery of Golgotha was enacted. Deep-toned rang out the undying Prayer which from the innermost core of the human heart was to make known to the microcosm, in depths of soul, the secret of existence. That secret was to be heard in the Lord’s Prayer, as we know it, and as it reverberated from east towards west. Yet it waited patiently, this cosmic word which sank then into the microcosm – waited in order that one day it might resound in harmony with the Fifth Gospel; for the souls of men had to mature before they could understand that which as the most ancient of all, because it is the Macrocosmic Gospel, is now to reverberate from the west like an echo to the Gospel of the east.
If we bring understanding to this present moment, then understanding will also dawn in us that to the Four Gospels a Fifth Gospel can be added. So, on this present evening, may there ring forth in addition to the secrets of the Microcosm, the words which express the secrets of the Macrocosm. As a first revelation of the Fifth Gospel there shall even now sound forth the macrocosmic counter-image of the microcosmic Prayer that was once proclaimed from east to west. So let sound forth towards it as a sign of understanding the macrocosmic World-Prayer of the Fifth primeval Gospel which is connected with the Moon and Jupiter, even as the four Gospels are connected with the earth: AUM, Amen! The Evils hold sway, Witness of Egoity becoming free, Selfhood-Guilt through others incurred, Experienced in the Daily Bread, Wherein the Will of the Heavens does not rule. In that Man severed himself from Your Kingdom, And forgot Your Names, Ye Fathers in the Heavens.
The ‘Our Father’ had been given to mankind as Prayer. There now resounds in answer to the microcosmic Paternoster, which was proclaimed from the east to the west, the primeval macrocosmic Prayer. So does it echoing sound, when, rightly understood by human souls, the Prayer rings out into cosmic spaces and is given back with the words imprinted from out of the macrocosm. Let us take it with us, the macrocosmic Lord’s Prayer, feeling that with it we begin to acquire understanding or the Gospel of Knowledge: the Fifth Gospel. From this grave moment let us take home earnestly and worthily in our souls: our Will.
Let us take home the certainty that all wisdom for which the human soul is seeking – if the seeking be true – is a reflex of cosmic wisdom; and that it makes fruitful from out of the love that is sovereign in the evolution of mankind all of human love that is rooted in the soul’s own selfless love.
Throughout all earthly ages and into all men’s souls there works, out of strong human will that has filled itself with the meaning of existence and the meaning of the earth, a further strengthening – a strengthening through the cosmic power for which men crave today, casting uncertain glances towards a spirit for which they hope – but which they refuse to know, because Ahriman has buried an unconscious fear in the human soul, wherever the spirit is spoken of today. Let us feel this, my Sisters and Brothers, at this moment. Feel this, and you will be able to arm yourselves for your spiritual task and as revealers of the spirit-light, will prove yourselves strong in thought, even in the hour when dark Ahriman, clouding wisdom, means to spread the darkness of chaos over fully-awakened spiritual sight’.
My Sisters and Brothers, fill your souls with the longing for real knowledge of the spirit, for true human love, for strength of will. And try to quicken in yourselves that spirit which has trust in the utterance of the Cosmic Word as it echoes to us out of cosmic distances and out of the wide expanse of space, sounding into our souls. This is what one who has grasped the meaning of existence must truly feel in this evening hour: Human souls have reached the limit of their striving. Feel in humility, not in pride, in devotion and willingness for sacrifice, not in arrogant presumption, what is to come of the emblem for which we have laid the Foundation Stone today.
Feel this portent of the knowledge which should come to us because it is given to us to know: In our time, the veil enshrouding the spiritual beings in the expanses of space must be pierced through, as the spiritual beings come to speak to us of the meaning of existence. Everywhere, everywhere in the surrounding world the souls of men must needs receive into themselves the meaning of existence. Hear how, in whatever cultural centres there is talk of or knowledge of the spirit, of religion, of art, the energies of souls are growing more and more barren. Feel how you must learn to quicken these souls, these energies, out of Imaginations, Inspirations, Intuitions of the spirit. Feel what he will find who hears aright the ring of creative spirituality. Those who in addition to the old Lord’s Prayer learn to understand the meaning of the Prayer from the Fifth Gospel, they will recognize the root of that meaning out of the Turning Point of our Time. If we learn to understand the meaning of these words, we shall seek to receive into ourselves the seeds that must blossom now if earth- evolution is not to wither, if it is still to bear fruit and thrive, so that through the will of man the earth can reach the goal set her from the very beginning.
Feel, then, this evening, that the wisdom and the meaning of the new knowledge, of the new love and of the great new strength must come alive in the souls of men. The souls who will be working amid the blossoming and the fruits of future ages of earth-evolution will have to understand that which we today mean to implant in our souls for the first time: the macrocosmic voice of the age – less, eternal Prayer, sounding towards us. AUM, Amen! The Evils hold sway, Witness of Egoity becoming free, Selfhood-Guilt through others incurred, Experienced in the Daily Bread, Wherein the Will of the Heavens does not rule, In that Man severed himself from Your Kingdom, Ye Fathers in the Heavens.
Thus we will go our separate ways – taking with us in our souls the consciousness of the meaning of the earnestness and the dignity of the solemn act we have performed. The consciousness which remains of this evening shall kindle in us the striving for knowledge of a new revelation given to mankind, for which the human soul thirsts, from which it will drink. But only then when, without fear, it wins faith and confidence in what the Science of the Spirit can make known, the Science that is to unite once more those three that, for a time, per – force took their several roads through the evolution of mankind: Religion, Art and Science.
Let us take this with us, my Sisters and Brothers, as a memory of this hour we have celebrated together, and as something we would wish never to forget.”
With a final invocation of the hierarchies, which included this time the elementals that were calling to be heard in the storm, the Foundation Stone-the copper (sacred to Venus) double dodecahedron, “symbol in its twofold twelvefoldness of the striving human soul, was sunk as microcosm into the macrocosm” let down “into the condensed kingdom of the elements.”
The Foundation Stone was covered over & cemented in.
Ten years later, after the tragic fire; at the Christmas Foundation meeting of 1923/24, Dr. Steiner presented a ‘Spiritual Foundation Stone of Love,’ – the ‘Dodecahedron of the human being’ as he called it, to the members of the newly-formed General Anthroposophical Society, called to initiate a new phase in the revelation of the Mysteries. The meditation is a mantric revelation in which sound, form & rhythm integrate with the esoteric meaning found in its 5 layers, an evocative multiplicity, to awaken the Human Soul.
The Foundation Stone that was laid into the earth on this day 107 years ago; is still there under the 2nd Goetheanum. May it also live within our hearts striving to unveil the truths which will set us free.
~hag
Resources: “Rudolf Steiner: Herald of a New Epoch” by Stewart Easton, “The Christmas Foundation; Beginning of a new Cosmic Age” by Rudolf Grosse
1906 – Founding of the Paracelsus Branch, Basel Switzerland
1913 – The laying of the Foundation Stone of the 1st Goetheanum
1913 – Founding of the Moscow Branch of the Anthroposophical Society
1933 – Deathday of Annie Besant. In 1890 Besant met Helena Blavatsky. She became a member of the Theosophical Society & a prominent lecturer. She established the first overseas Lodge of the International Order of Co-Freemasonry, Le Droit Humain. Over the next few years she established lodges in many parts of the British Empire. In 1907 she became president of the Theosophical Society, whose international headquarters were in Adyar, Madras. She also became involved in politics in India, joining the Indian National Congress. When World War I broke out in 1914, she helped launch the Home Rule League to campaign for democracy in India. This led to her election as president of the India National Congress. In the late 1920s, Besant travelled to the United States with her protégé & adopted son Jiddu Krishnamurti, whom she claimed was the new Messiah & incarnation of Buddha. Krishnamurti rejected these claims in 1929. She is thought to be the reincarnation of Giordano Bruno
1941 – Holocaust 403 Jews (128 men, 176 women & 99 children) were murdered by Einsatzkommando 3 in Nemencing, Latvia.
1942 – Holocaust in Letychiv, Ukraine. In the course of two days the German SS murders at least 3,000 Jews
Umbra Perchiazzi
The Central Regional Council Invites ALL to our Michaelmas Festival: ‘Courage Born of Wisdom’ – Wednesday 23 September 2020 –On ZOOM – 7:15 pm CDT – 8:30 pm
1st CRC performs a telling of a tale from ancient Chaldea where EA gives birth to Marduk, precursor to Michael.
Proverbs 24: 1-9
then “Wisdom Built herself a house*”…7 members of the various sections of the Anthroposophical Society will stand as Wisdom’s 7 Pillars to share how Courage was born from Wisdom leading to their work in the world.
Pedagogical Section –Michael Holdrege Youth Section – Stephan Ambrose Medical Section –Drs. Molly & Quentin McMullen Eurythmy – Barbara Richardson Social Science Section – Doug Wylie BioDynamic Agriculture – Rand Carter Three-Folding – Dorothy Hinkle-Uhlig
with Original songs by Lucien Dante Lazar!
& a closing about the connection between Michael, The Christ & Anthroposophia!
Meeting ID: 820 7046 0900 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: 820 7046 0900
LucienDante Lazar– Ring the Iron Bell – Welcome (10 minutes)
Group Singing: Michaelmas Time Song (5 Minutes)
Angela Foster – 1. Social Sculpture: The Purifying Fire (10 minutes) (for those joining on zoom, supplies needed for decoupage: votive or prayer candle, tissue paper, images of Joan, magazines, glue)
2. Leading Thoughts, & ‘Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc – Preface’ (10 minutes)
Mary Spalding – ‘Courage Dear Hearts’ Biography of Jeanne d’Arc (10 minutes)
Copper Rod Eurythmy: (10 minutes)
Joan of Arc, Sophie Scholl, Saint Odilie and Jesus of Nazareth. (20 minutes) ‘We are dealing here with a superhuman entity, a being who lived in the spiritual world and heard humanity crying out in misery, calling out to the spiritual worlds for help. This being prepared to receive the Christ Being.’ ‘Humanity cried out in pain and torment, and its cries rose up to that spirit being, who responded by seeking permission from the Sun Spirit to become imbued with Christ.’
We will look at the biographies of these individuals who developed the quality and capacity to work out of ‘a culture of selflessness’ in their community, and the impact this had on the world as young people becoming. We can understand these individuals’ path of sacrifice, as a reflection of the archetype of Jesus of Nazareth, during his growing and seeking years as spoken of in Rudolf Steiner’s Fifth Gospel.
‘Michael is a being of Strength, Courage and Will. He is Sun spirit. He wishes to be regarded.’
Group Singing: Firmly on the Earth I Stand (5 minutes)
Biography Work in Break out Groups – Sharing a story of courage from our lives: Each person takes 3 minutes to tell their tale. (15 minutes)
Harvest from the break out groups – Large Group Sharing (5-10 minutes)
‘The Passage’ by Lucian Dante Lazar (15 minutes)
Impressions, Q’s from the piece – Large Group Sharing (5-10 minutes)
The Mars / Saturn Square (10 minutes)
Everyone takes a turn Ringing the IRON, Rudolf Steiner’s ‘Verse for the Michaelic Age’ given at his ‘Last Address’ (5 minutes)
Group 1: Springing from Powers of the Sun, Radiant Spirit-powers, blessing all Worlds! For Michael’s garment of rays We are predestined by Thought Divine.
Group 2: Michael, the Christ-messenger, reveals in us Bearing humankind aloft — the sacred Will of Worlds. You, radiant Beings of Ether-Worlds, Bear the Christ-Word to human beings.
Group 1: Thus shall the Heralds of Christ appear To our thirstily waiting souls. Your Word of Light shines forth to us In the cosmic age of the Spirit-Human.
Group 2: We, disciples who would know the spirit, Follow Michael’s beckoning Wisdom, To take the Word of Love, Willed by Worlds, Into our highest aims of soul-work; actively!
12:30 pm – Goodbye – Thank you – Off to Zinniker Farm –
*From Petra Zinniker: Our fall preparation making will take place on September 26th at 1:30pm, here at the farm. We will be making 3 preparations this year: Horn manure, Chamomile and Dandelion preparations, and have a potluck dinner with a campfire afterwards.
*Please bring a dish to pass and a lawn chair for the potluck*
Please RSVP! Space is limited. Although this is an outdoor event we want to make sure everyone can find the space they need. Dress for the weather!
Tuesday, September 29 MICHAELMAS ‘Talisman for Courage’ Art Workshop with Victoria Martin 6:30 pm – 8:30 pm
MICHAELMAS ‘Talisman for Courage’ Art Workshop in person at the Rudolf Steiner Chicago Branch 4249 N. Lincoln Ave. Chicago. 6:30-8:30 PM Facilitated by Victoria Martin
6:30 (sunset) Doors open: orientation. Tea, nuts, and fruit are served
7 PM sharp Visual lecture and demonstration
7:15 PM –8:00 PM workshop – Pastels on flat canvas good for 100+ years (archival materials)
8:00– 8:30 PM discussion – We will learn all about symbols of The Michaelmas: Wings, Iron Meteorites/Stars, Scales of Judgment, Sword of Justice, and the Serpent/Dragon. There will be a wide selection of easy to render visual images in any/all of these 5 categories at each workstation. We will use a black charcoal pencil and the colors red, gold, and turquoise archival pastels on raw canvas size 11” x 11” this Talisman will be suitable for mounting on stretchers or framing (no glass needed).
Limited to 10 participants $15 tuition + $5 materials = $20 or pay what you will. Observers and guests are welcome at no charge, but please bring tree nuts, greens, fruit, or other paleo snacks.
We will discuss organizing some of the ALIANT Next Steps
Review ELIANT’s Charter, Vision, and Mission Statement –
Take up a biweekly study of Rudolf Steiner’s Speaker’s Lectures for the Threefold Commonwealth from 1921, found in Communicating Anthroposophy. (We place an order and coordinate shipping, if you are interested please message us, and if you would like support purchasing a book, let us know! ) –
Study our countries’ Constitution wherever we are living.
Join Zoom Meetinghttps://zoom.us/j/96695622019 Meeting ID: 966 9562 2019 One tap mobile +13462487799,,96695622019# US (Houston) +14086380968,,96695622019# US (San Jose)
Dial by your location +1 346 248 7799 US (Houston) +1 408 638 0968 US (San Jose) +1 669 900 6833 US (San Jose) +1 253 215 8782 US (Tacoma) +1 646 876 9923 US (New York) +1 301 715 8592 US (Germantown) +1 312 626 6799 US (Chicago) Meeting ID: 966 9562 2019 Find your local number: https://zoom.us/u/aeEGUaSyqT
Most folks can remember where they were, on that September morning, 19 years & counting ago.
It was autumn, & the new school year had just started. The Perseid meteor showers had been weak in 2001. Yet Michaelmas was on my mind. My husband & I had slept late that day. My morning mediation was scattered, distracted. I went into the kitchen to make breakfast, my daughter, who was not yet 2 years old, was playing up in her room, when the phone rang. It was my friend Rowan. She was crying & whispering: ‘Turn on your TV’ she said. I laughed & said ‘Rowan what is it? You know we don’t watch the tube”. She said ‘O Hazel honey, just turn it on’.
We were in shock. I don’t have to go into what we all felt at that moment.
We tuned off the TV, & I called to see if school was still in session. The folks at the Chicago Waldorf School said, yes, stressing how we all needed to keep the media away from the young ones. In a daze I got the girl ready for our parent/child class. While the children played, the parents sat, quiet, nodding to each other, holding the sacred space for the innocents, speaking only with our eyes about what we had seen.
When I got home my husband said the 2nd tower was hit -The horrendous images repeating in an endless loop.
Miguel Tio
For many days after, when I would take my girl for walks, or where ever I was, – at work, at the market, I felt a deepened connection to my fellow human beings. People looked each other in the eyes. Folks were kind, helpful, really considerate, even in traffic. We were all brothers & sisters, bonded by this world altering event.
We were all one. Humanity united that day.
In trying to make sense of it all, I thought, perhaps this horrible tragedy would become a catalyst for true change. I saw it as a loosening of our collective etheric bodies, providing an opportunity for the angels to work with us, opening humanity to a threshold experience, an initiation, preparing us for the brotherhood of the next epoch.
Remember how still, & quiet it was under clear blue skies in those 1st few days, after, when all the air traffic was halted? Peaceful, heightened, open.
But soon the shock & vulnerable, open eyed connection gave way to patriotic rhetoric; hateful & boiling, it radiated out infecting the planet. And anyone not jumping on the war wagon was called trader/unpatriotic/’conspiracy theory’ lunatic, & roundly silenced.
Lies became truth. Phantoms became reality. Blood was exchanged for oil. Corporations became people. Our civil liberties were bought & sold. Homeland security invaded our right to privacy -The human soul oppressed by systematic illusion.
Never mind that VP Dick Cheney was running the largest war-games exercises at the same time as the ‘attacks’. Never mind the connection of the Saudi’s with the Bush dynasty. Never mind the mind, for thinking had been outlawed.
The fallout from 9/11 continues, but perhaps with time, truths will surface that will bring change & healing, AND there is always help from the ever present spiritual world, if we look for it. Michael will continue to pour his cosmic iron into our blood; it is up to us to use it to fight the dragon.
David T Nelson
“For once, therefore, a man woke up and saw that what mattered was not to proclaim democracy but to see the full reality, not to follow slogans, but to see things as they are. This would be particularly important today, for people would then realize that the events which reign with such blood and terror over the whole of humanity are guided and directed from just a few centers. People will never realize this if they persist in the delusion that nation is fighting nation, and allow the European and American Press to lull them to sleep over the kinds of relations that are said to exist between nations.” ~Rudolf Steiner, Fall of the Spirits of Darkness, : Lecture 14: Into the Future, Dornach, 28 October 1917
Insider Traders Knew About Attacks Before They Happened. Right before the 9/11 attacks, some fishy business happened within the stock market & insurance firms. An “extraordinary” amount of put options were placed on United Airlines & American Airlines stocks, the same airlines that were hijacked during the attacks. Many speculate that traders were tipped off about the attacks & profited from the tragedy. The Securities & Exchange Commission launched an insider trading investigation in which Osama bin Laden was a suspect, after receiving information from at least one Wall Street firm.
The North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) generals reported that they learned of the hijackings in time to scramble fighter jets, but that they were ordered to stand down ‘because it was a part of a Military war game’.
Is this just like Pearl Harbor? Did our government want to use the attacks to justify an invasion on Iraq & Afghanistan to secure oil interests?
Commercial airplanes’ frames are constructed with a very light aluminum material in order to make it easier to fly. Some believe that missiles or explosives were used to ensure the buildings collapsed. Many scientists & engineers say it looked like a controlled demolition. Many speculate that the towers were in fact blown down with explosives placed in selected locations. Some witnesses recounted hearing explosions inside the building as they attempted to escape. Many architects even maintain that a plane’s fuel cannot produce enough heat to melt the steel frames of the two buildings that collapsed.
The Pentagon crash may be the most puzzling event of the day. Theorists maintain that the impact holes in the Pentagon were much smaller than a commercial American Airlines plane. They also question why the plane was not shot down prior to impact, as well as why the plane impacted a section of the Pentagon that was vacant due to renovations.
According to official reports, the passengers onboard Flight 93 attempted to take back the plane from the hijackers & the subsequent struggle caused the aircraft to crash into an open field in Pennsylvania. As with the Pentagon attack, theorists state that very little plane wreckage was actually discovered in the field – that the crash site itself was too small for an airliner that size, arguing instead that the plane was shot down by the military & so it disintegrated over a larger area.
In the aftermath of the attacks, passports & identification were found as evidence. How did the passports of the terrorists made out of paper survive the same explosion that destroyed buildings?
The vision of St. John ~el Greco
I know you are tired dear friend. It’s all so much. And I know today is an emotional day. But together we can continue to ask urgent & difficult questions, so that we may share healing, which often comes thru shattering insights. This can help us achieve humanity’s highest evolution.
Olga Fröbe-Kapteyn
We can’t rest until we reveal what lies at the root of the corona – our individual & collective Crown – vs. the virus, & the worldwide pandemic it has caused. What are the deeper, spiritual realities? Which entities stand behind the virus? What can we do to meet them? How can we be spiritually hygienic? What therapeutic practices can we employ?
~hag
Is this present pandemic meant to be seen as part of a larger series of world-events – Can we find the connections? All of humanity is being called upon to respond in a radically transformative way. How will we face the issues relating to government lockdowns, police corruption, & the rise of the protest movements that have sprung up in opposition to them. How do these events point to real questions of individual freedom – not a selfish ‘me 1st freedom’, but a true freedom based on love, good will & compassion toward everyone?
~hag
And above all, how does all this relate to the essential event of our time – The revealing of The Christ in the etheric; which remains largely hidden behind the veil of materialism?
~Standing in the light of Wisdom’s humble Peace & Love ~hag
***
On Sunday, September 20th, the day the foundation stone was laid into the first Goetheanum, we invite everyone back to share and offer a plenum.
HOW WE WILL HARVEST: 12 pm pacific, 1pm mountain, 2pm central, 3pm eastern, 9pm Europe / Dornach
Zoom details & Schedule TBA – I have been asked to share a few Leading Thoughts around the Michaelmas Season
We will discuss organizing some of the ALIANT Next Steps
Review ELIANT’s Charter, Vision, and Mission Statement –
Take up a biweekly study of Rudolf Steiner’s Speaker’s Lectures for the Threefold Commonwealth from 1921, found in Communicating Anthroposophy. (We place an order and coordinate shipping, if you are interested please message us, and if you would like support purchasing a book, let us know! ) –
Study our countries’ Constitution wherever we are living.
CRC performs a telling of a tale from ancient Chaldea where EA gives birth to Marduk, precursor to Michael.
Proverbs 24: 1-9
then “Wisdom Built herself a house*”…7 members of the various sections of the Anthroposophical Society will stand as Wisdom’s 7 Pillars to share how Courage was born from Wisdom leading to their work in the world.
Pedagogical Section –Michael Holdrege Youth Section – Stephan Ambrose Medical Section –Drs. Molly & Quentin McMullen Eurythmy – Barbara Richardson Social Science Section – Doug Wylie BioDynamic Agriculture – Rand Carter Three-Folding – Dorothy Hinkle-Uhlig
with Original songs by Lucien Dante Lazar!
& a closing about the connection between Michael, The Christ & Anthroposophia!
Meeting ID: 820 7046 0900 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: 820 7046 0900
Lucien – Ring the Iron Bell – Welcome (How does our Festival form a Being of Courage in this Now?) (10 – 15 minutes?)
Group Singing: Michaelmas Time Song (5 Minutes)
Angela Foster – Leading Thoughts, & ‘Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc – Preface’ (20-30 minutes)
Mary Spalding – ‘Courage Dear Hearts’ Biography of Jeanne d’Arc (10 minutes)
Mary S, or Mary R, or Jan R? Copper Rod Eurythmy: (5-10 minutes)
Dottie Zold & Frank Agrama – Michael, Joan of Arc, St Oldie & the Elderberries Impulse of Selflessness (20-30 minutes)
Group Singing: Firmly on the Earth I Stand Song? (5 minutes)
Paulette Arnold? – Biography Work in Break out Groups –Sharing a story of courage from our lives: Each person takes 3 minutes to tell their tale. (15 minutes)
Large Group Sharing (5-10 minutes) which can lead into or be part of:
Angela Foster – Social Sculpture – Weaving the Chalice (20 minutes)
Jonathan Hadley?– The Mars / Saturn Square (5-10 minutes)
Everyone takes a turn Ringing the IRON, verse, goodbye (5-10 minutes)
Group 1: Springing from Powers of the Sun,
Radiant Spirit-powers, blessing all Worlds!
For Michael's garment of rays
We are predestined by Thought Divine.
Group 2: Michael, the Christ-messenger, reveals in us
Bearing humankind aloft — the sacred Will of Worlds.
You, radiant Beings of Ether-Worlds,
Bear the Christ-Word to human beings.
Group 1: Thus shall the Heralds of Christ appear
To our thirstily waiting souls.
Your Word of Light shines forth to us
In the cosmic age of the Spirit-Human.
Group 2: We, disciples who would know the spirit,
Follow Michael's beckoning Wisdom,
To take the Word of Love, Willed by Worlds,
Into our highest aims of soul-work; actively!
~From Rudolf Steiner's Last Address
hag – Final Leading Thoughts – Goodbye – Thank you –POTLUCK, Please bring a dish & beverages to Share!
~i shepherd the birds in flowering branches wet with steaming fragrance… ~hag
***
“In Zarathustra Nietzsche sketches the world for which he had searched in vain in Wagner, separated from all reality…The disappointment which his idealism had caused him, drove him into a hostile mood toward all idealism. During the time following his separation from Wagner, his works become accusations against ideals. “One error after another is placed upon ice; the ideal is not refuted — it freezes to death.”
After this Nietzsche looks for refuge in reality; he deepens himself in the more recent natural science, in order that through it he can gain a true guide to reality. All worlds beyond this world, which lead human beings away from reality, now become abominable, remote worlds for him, conceived out of the fantasy of weak human beings, who do not have sufficient strength to find their satisfaction in immediate, fresh existence. Natural science has placed the human being at the end of a purely natural evolution. Through the fact that the latter has conceived the human being out of itself, all that is below him has taken on a higher meaning. Therefore, man should not deny its significance and wish to make himself an image of something beyond this world. He should understand that he is not the meaning of a super-earthly power, but the “meaning of this earth.” What he wishes to attain above what exists, he should not strive for in enmity against what exists.
Nietzsche looks within reality itself for the germ of the higher, which is to make reality bearable…Humanity has the possibility to become superhumanity. Evolution has always been. The human being should also work at evolution. The laws of evolution are greater, more comprehensive than all that has already been developed. One should not only look upon that which exists, but one must go back to primeval forces which have engendered the real.
An ancient world conception questioned how “good and evil” came into the world. It believed that it had to go behind existence in order to discover “in the eternal” the reasons for “good and evil.” But with the “eternal,” with the “beyond,” Nietzsche had also to reject the “eternal” evaluation of “good and evil.” Man has come into existence through the natural; and “good and evil” have come into existence with him. The creation of mankind is “good and evil.” And deeper than the created is the creator. The “human being” stands “beyond good and evil.” He has made the one thing to be good, the other to be evil. He may not let himself be chained through his former “good and evil.” He can follow further the path of evolution which he has taken till now. From the worm he has become a human being; from man he can develop to the superman. He can create a new good and evil. He may “reevaluate” present day values.
Nietzsche was torn through his spiritual darkness. The evolution of the worm to the human being was the idea which he had gained from the more recent natural science. He himself did not become a scientist; he had adopted the idea of evolution from others. For them it was a matter of the intellect; for him it became a matter of the heart. The others waged a spiritual battle against all old prejudices. Nietzsche asked himself how he could live with the new idea. His battle took place entirely within his own soul. He needed the further development to the superman in order to be able to bear mankind.
Thus, by itself, in lonely heights, his sensitive spirit had to overcome the natural science which he had taken into himself. During his last creative period, Nietzsche tried to attain from reality itself what earlier he thought he could gain in illusion, in an ideal realm. Life is assigned a task which is firmly rooted in life, and yet leads over and above this life. In this immediate existence one cannot remain standing in real life, or in the life illuminated by natural science. In this life there also must be suffering. This remained Nietzsche’s opinion. The “superman” is also a means to make life bearable. All this points to the fact that Nietzsche was born to “suffer from existence.” His genius consisted in the searching for bases for consolation.
The struggle for world conceptions has often engendered martyrs. Nietzsche has produced no new ideas for a world conception. One will always recognize that his genius does not lie in the production of new ideas. But he suffered deeply because of the thoughts surrounding him. In compensation for this suffering he found the enraptured tones of his Zarathustra. He became the poet of the new world conception; the hymns in praise of the “superman” are the personal, the poetic reply to the problems and results of the more recent natural science.
All that the nineteenth century produced in ideas, would also have been produced without Nietzsche. In the eyes of the future he will not be considered an original philosopher, a founder of religions, or a prophet; for the future he will be a martyr of knowledge, who in poetry found words with which to express his suffering”.
~Rudolf Steiner, Friedrich Nietzsche, Fighter for Freedom, Part 4: The Personality of Friedrich Nietzsche, A Memorial Address
“Human history becomes more and more a race between education and catastrophe.” ~H.G. Wells
ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY
25 August 2020 – “Speaking with the Stars”: First-quarter Moon. Come nightfall, Bella Luna shines just above Antares & the head of Scorpius.
79 – Deathday of Pliny the Elder, Roman commander & philosopher – died while attempting to rescue a friend from the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in Stabiae that had just destroyed the cities of Pompeii & Herculaneum. The prevailing wind caused by the sixth & largest pyroclastic surge of the eruption overcame his ship
El Greco
1270 – Deathday of Louis IX of France, the Crusader King, devoted to his people, founding hospitals, visiting the sick like his patron St. Francis, even caring for people with leprosy. Louis united France. Every day he invited 13 guests from among the poor to eat with him.
1530 – Birthday of Ivan the Terrible
1609 – Galileo Galilei demonstrates his first telescope to Venetian lawmakers
1744 – Birthday of Johann Gottfried Herder, German poet, philosopher, friend of Goethe
“…Herder looks upon the sunrise as a symbol of all waking life — not only in Nature, but also in the human soul, in the human heart. The feeling of dawn within the human soul itself, as though the sun were rising from inner depths — this was wonderfully portrayed by Herder when he tried to show how the poetic mood entered into human evolution, and how this poetic feeling had once upon a time been quickened by all that man could experience when he looked at the rising sun.” ~Rudolf Steiner, Human Questions and Cosmic Answers
1814 – The U.S. Library of Congress was destroyed by British forces
1867 – Deathday of Michael Faraday, English physicist & chemist, who contributed to the study of electromagnetism. Albert Einstein kept a picture of Faraday on his study wall, alongside pictures of Isaac Newton & James Clerk Physicist Ernest Rutherford stated, “When we consider the magnitude and extent of his discoveries and their influence on the progress of science and of industry, there is no honour too great to pay to the memory of Faraday, one of the greatest scientific discoverers of all time”.
Richio Galvez
1900 – Deathday of Friedrich Nietzsche. Rudolf Steiner mentioned that in a previous life he was a Franciscan monk. Steiner also wrote: Friedrich Nietzsche, Fighter for Freedom GA5. The enigmatic Friedrich Nietzsche was seen by Steiner, but was lying in a coma near death. Nietzsche’s philosophy receives a scholarly & critical treatment & is then related to Nietzsche, the man.
At one point in his life, Rudolf Steiner brought out an edition of some of Nietzsche’s writings. In seeing that Nietzsche’s ideas received a public exposure, Steiner was not identifying himself as one of Nietzsche’s disciples, but rather assuring philosophical readers that this important link in the spiritual development of occidental thought should not be ignored.
Here is Steiner’s Memorial Address The Personality of Friedrich Nietzsche
1914 – World War I: The library of the Catholic University of Leuven is deliberately destroyed by the German Army. Hundreds of thousands of irreplaceable volumes Gothic & Renaissance manuscripts are lost
1916 – The United States National Park Service is created
1933 – The Diexi earthquake strikes Sichuan, China & kills 9,000 people
1944 – World War II: Paris is liberated by the Allies
1948 – The House Un-American Activities Committee holds first-ever televised congressional hearing: “Confrontation Day” between Whittaker Chambers and Alger Hiss.
1950 – President Harry Truman orders the U.S. Army to seize control of the nation’s railroads to avert a strike
1981 – Voyager 2 spacecraft makes its closest approach to Saturn
1989 – Voyager 2 spacecraft makes its closest approach to Neptune
2012 – Voyager 1 spacecraft enters interstellar space becoming the first man-made object to do so
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August 27-30How We Will 2020: 3-Folding our Cultural Revolution is continuing its journey of transforming our ideals into action. The theme this year is Forming Curative Communities: actively uniting with one another in the emerging economic, political/rights and social/cultural/spiritual forms seeking to reshape the ills plaguing humanity into a healthy social organism for our time.
Elderberries Biodynamic Outpost & Cultural Hub: 4251 N. Lincoln Ave. Chicago 60618
Co-Sponsored by the Rudolf Steiner Branch Chicago
Schedule
Thursday August 27 9:00 Joan Jaeckel and Rosemary McMullen: Welcome: Forming Curative Communities of Responsibility 9:30 Nana Woo and Truus Gareats: Eurythmy 9:45 Stan Padilla: New Fire 10:30 Break 15 minutes 11:00 Naim Edwards: Edible Landscapes 12:15 Lunch 1:30 Dottie Zold & Joan Jaeckel: Threefold Activism – 1919-1921 & Research Fellowship 2:15 Kait Ziegler: Poor People’s Campaign: A National Call for Moral Revival – On the Front Lines 3:30 Break 30 minutes 4:00 Akil Bell: WILLING MOVEMENT: Three questions could support the inspiring of the formation of curative communities. 5:15 Dinner 6:30 Monika: Myriad Village – Co-creating Intentional Communities 7:15 Angela Foster: Green Snake and the Beautiful Lily End 8 pm
Friday August 28 9:00 Truus Gareats & Nana Woo: Eurythmy 9:15 Stan Padilla: New Fire 9:45 Frank & Patrice: Unbreakable Agreement & ALIANT 10:20 Break 10 minutes 10:30 Michaela Gloeckler: Archetypal Pictures – Ita Wegman and the Young Doctors Noon Lunch 1:15 Bart Eddy: Brightmoor Makers Rocking Hearts for Detroit 2:15 Melody Brink: stART international trauma pedagogy – Lesbos – On the Front Lines 3:00 John Bloom: Toward Justice Through Freedom 4:45 Dinner 6:00 Daniel Collett: Seeds 6:10 Kim Sherobbi: To Nurture Community Leadership – Birwood Community House & The James and Grace Lee Boggs Center 7:00 Angela Foster: Green Snake and the Beautiful Lily Goethe’s Day of Birth 8:00 End
Saturday August 29 9:00 Truus Garaets & Nana Woo: Eurythmy 9:15 Stan Padilla: New Fire 9:30 Laura Summer: Art Dispersal – Art for 100% of the People 10:00 Michaela Gloeckler: Forward Together 11:30Break 15 minutes 11:45 Melody Brink: The Birdhunters of Antropocenia in story-form, written by Nathaniel Williams and with original music by Aldo Lavaggi 12:20 Lunch 1:15 Bart Eddy: Ideas to Action 2:15 John Bloom: Capital, Money, Spirit and Matter 3:45 Break 30 minutes 4:15 Patrice Maynard: Prototyping ALIANT Alliance 5:30Dinner 7:00 Brandon & Lucien: Song Offering & Painting 7:15 Community-led conversation: A Christian/Buddhist/Spirit Conversation: Money –what does love got to do with it? 8:15 End
Sunday August 30 9:00 Truus Garaets & Nana Woo: Eurythmy 9:15 Nicanor Perlas: The Future is What We Fight For 10:45 Break 11:00 Hazel Archer-Ginsberg: The New Isis Myth 11:30 Laura Summer: Art Dispersal 1:00 Lunch 2:00 Patrice Maynard: Prototyping ALIANT Alliance 3:15 Lucien: Tone, Words, Trees 3:45 Janna, Elizabeth & Frank: Standing Under the Sign of Michael 4:15 Stan & Robbi: Closing the Sacred Fire Community 5:00 End
EXTRA DAY FOR THOSE WISHING TO JOIN ON Monday, August 31st
9:00 Mutual Aid Networks (MANS): Kait Ziegler of the Poor People’s Campaign: A National Call for Moral Revival will share how she and GroundGamesLA raised $100,000 in a week’s time to support unprotected families during the Covid 19 early days by using the MANS format created by Stephanie Rearick of Madison, Wisconsin.
10:15 Next Steps ALIANT: Patrice, Frank, Dottie together with friends will lead a conversation on next steps…
New Music by Ultra-Violet Archer PILOT put together during the Corona-Crisis when she had to leave Oberlin College. She is now at YIP. Bandcamp is good to artists, most of the proceeds go to the musicians – Support young artists!
