Category Archives: Spring

The Vital Sting

Insight, Poetry, Quote, Remembering, Rudolf Steiner Quote, Soul to Soul, Speaking with the Stars, Spring

20 May 2019 – “Speaking with the Stars”: This evening look for the bright “wondering star” at the upper right of Bella Luna, which is none other than the Beneficent King: Jupiter.

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“…So the positions of the planets actually show what human beings themselves have previously engraved in those spheres. When we consider the position of the planets astronomically, and also the position of the planets in relation to the fixed stars, these are a kind of indication of what we have ourselves inscribed there. The actual planets are not of consequence; what affects us is what we have ourselves inscribed in each sphere. Here we have the real reason why the constellations of the planets do indeed work upon the human being. It is because the human being passes through the spheres. When the Moon stands in a particular position relative to Jupiter and to a fixed star, the members of this configuration work together. This means the qualities of Jupiter together with those of the Moon and the fixed star work upon the person, and thereby occurs what can come about through their working together. So it is actually our moral legacy, deposited during the life between death and birth, that appears karmically in the new life as star configurations in our destiny. That is the deeper basis for the constellation of the stars and its connection with human karma”. ~Rudolf Steiner, lecture March 3, 1913.

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Rudolf Steiner’s Lectures on this day

ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY

Nancy Albro

World Bee Day – Birthday in 1734 of Anton Janša, the pioneer of beekeeping.The purpose of this international day is to acknowledge the role of bees & other pollinators for our ecosytem

Image result for 325 – The First Council of Nicaea

325 – The First Council of Nicaea is formally opened, starting the first ecumenical council of the Christian Church. Its main accomplishments were settlement of the Christological issue of the divine nature of God the Son & His relationship to God the Father, the construction of the first part of the Nicene Creed, & establishing uniform observance of the date of Easter, & the promulgation of early canon law.

Image result for 1497 – John Cabot sets sail from Bristol, England, on his ship Matthew looking for a route to the west.

1497 – John Cabot sets sail from Bristol, England, on his ship Matthew looking for a route to the west.

Image result for 1498 – Portuguese explorer Vasco da Gama discovers the sea route to India when he arrives at Calicuta India.

1498 – Portuguese explorer Vasco da Gama discovers the sea route to India when he arrives at Calicuta India.

Image result for 1570 – Cartographer Abraham Ortelius issues Theatrum Orbis Terrarum, the first modern atlas.

1570 – Cartographer Abraham Ortelius issues Theatrum Orbis Terrarum, the first modern atlas.

Image result for 1609 – Shakespeare's sonnets are illicitly published in London, by Thomas Thorpe.

1609 – Shakespeare’s sonnets are illicitly published in London, by Thomas Thorpe.

Image result for 1631 – The city of Magdeburg in Germany is seized by forces of the Holy Roman Empire & most of its inhabitants massacred, in one of the bloodiest incidents of the Thirty Years' War.

1631 – The city of Magdeburg in Germany is seized by forces of the Holy Roman Empire & most of its inhabitants massacred, in one of the bloodiest incidents of the Thirty Years’ War.

Image result for 1645 – Yangzhou massacre: the 10-day massacre of 900,000 residents of the city of Yangzhou, part of the Transition from Ming to Qing.

1645 – Yangzhou massacre: the 10-day massacre of 900,000 residents of the city of Yangzhou, part of the Transition from Ming to Qing.

Image result for 1802 – By the Law of 20 May 1802, Napoleon Bonaparte reinstates slavery in the French colonies, revoking its abolition in the French Revolution.

1802 – By the Law of 20 May 1802, Napoleon Bonaparte reinstates slavery in the French colonies, revoking its abolition in the French Revolution.

Image result for 1813 – Napoleon Bonaparte leads his French troops into the Battle of Bautzen in Saxony, Germany, against the combined armies of Russia and Prussia. The battle ends the next day with a French victory

1813 – Napoleon Bonaparte leads his French troops into the Battle of Bautzen in Saxony, Germany, against the combined armies of Russia and Prussia. The battle ends the next day with a French victory

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1862 – U.S. President Abraham Lincoln signs the Homestead Act into law

Image result for 1883 – Krakatoa begins to erupt; the volcano explodes three months later, killing more than 36,000 people.

1883 – Krakatoa begins to erupt; the volcano explodes three months later, killing more than 36,000 people.

Image result for 1891 –The first public display of Thomas Edison's prototype kinetoscope.

1891 –The first public display of Thomas Edison’s prototype kinetoscope

Image result for 1902 – Cuba gains independence from the United States.

1902 – Cuba gains independence from the United States.

Image result for 1940 –The first prisoners arrive at a new concentration camp at Auschwitz.

1940 –The first prisoners arrive at a new concentration camp at Auschwitz.

Image result for 1956 – In Operation Redwing, the first United States airborne hydrogen bomb is dropped over Bikini Atoll in the Pacific Ocean

1956 – In Operation Redwing, the first United States airborne hydrogen bomb is dropped over Bikini Atoll in the Pacific Ocean

Image result for 1983 – First publications of the discovery of the HIV virus that causes AIDS in the journal Science by Luc Montagnier.

1983 – First publications of the discovery of the HIV virus that causes AIDS in the journal Science by Luc Montagnier.

Image result for 1989 – The Chinese authorities declare martial law in the face of pro-democracy demonstrations, setting the scene for the Tiananmen Square massacre.

1989 – The Chinese authorities declare martial law in the face of pro-democracy demonstrations, setting the scene for the Tiananmen Square massacre.

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POD (Poem Of the Day)

~To my body I gave the power of my heart
Bee love & create I said
Beat within the grace of the world’s rhythms
A radiant sun
In tune with the music of becoming
A ferry thru dark churning waves
An oasis flowing with fresh waters
On the high tide of blessings
To open my head
to pure thought unfolded
~hag

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Mulberry Mudd

The Honeybee, Sustainer of Life on Earth
By Gunther Hauk

Rarely are we aware of the very subtle interrelationships of life, for they are hidden by the facts that jump out at you. We all know that the bison provided meat, hides and bones for the American Indians. And yet, these gifts were almost side effects compared to the critical, yet less-seen role that the bison had of building up the deep, rich humus in the prairies, a richness in fertility creating the breadbasket of our nation. Our conventional agriculture is still relying on this richness, but depleting it by the year.

When we think of the honey bee, we think of her gifts of pollinating about 3/4 of our daily food, of the honey she prepares out of the nectar of plants, of pollen and propolis. These, too, are minor contributions to life on earth, compared to the far greater importance she holds as sustainer of life. She shares this task with all the stinging insects, the hornets and wasps, the other bee species and the ants.

“Sustainer of life?? Isn’t this a bit exaggerated?”- you might ask. It may seem so, but the facts verify this statement. Let me explain. If we pose the question about which group of organic substances are at the basis of all life processes in plant, animal and the human being, the answer might astonish and surprise most people. It’s the acids! Little do we consider acids as the basis of our physical life since we experience them as caustic, corrosive, or even dangerous. This they are, but in homeopathic dilution, we find them in all life processes in nature, in every part of our body: DNA, fatty acids, amino acids, peptic acid, uric acid, folic acid, just to name the more familiar ones. Without these acids, no life processes could take place.

In plants it is the oxalic acid that provides the basic life-giving substance. Oxalis clover, rhubarb, and wood sorrel have lots of it and we can taste the sour acid element more easily than in most vegetables. In the animal kingdom, specifically in the stinging insects, it is the formic acid that plays a major role. Formic acid (formica = the ant) is the poison we feel when an ant bites us or a wasp or bee stings us. Each of these species produces a variation of formic acid.

As the bees and wasps receive nectar and pollen from the flowers, they are able to take in some of this oxalic acid, but they do not only take, they also provide a gift for the plants. As these insects fly and crawl through nature, they in return distribute their formic acid. An old forest ranger in Germany once told me that wherever ants are missing in forests, the forests lose their vitality and die more quickly than if there is an ample amount of these insects around. Thus, ant colonies are being reestablished and protected in European forests to keep the trees healthy.

This formic acid, in finest dilution, wafts through the air and in Spring the germinating seeds and budding perennials receive this formic acid that has been produced the year before and still saturates the atmosphere, as their Spring tonic. So, on such a basic level, these stinging insects are the nurturers of life on earth since plants provide food, directly or indirectly, to all other beings.

Oxalic and formic acid each acts as an invigorator, as a boost to the life processes for the other kingdom. It is with the help of minute quantities of formic acid that the earth’s entire plant life grows and thrives. And, on the other hand, it is the plants’ oxalic acid that stimulates and invigorates all of the animal and human kingdom. The commonly accepted image we have of life being based on fight and competition, with the survival of the fittest, loses its sting when we consider this grandiose symbiosis, this mutually beneficial interrelationship.

Let us take a closer look at the role these acids play in our very own lives. As we eat our spinach, broccoli, chard, carrots, the fruit and berries, we also take up the oxalic acid contained in them. Now a mysterious transformation occurs: we are able to change this acid into our very own formic acid. Actually, one can achieve this very process in the chemical laboratory. Glycerin is added to oxalic acid in a retort; when heated, carbon dioxide escapes and the steamy vapors will condense, lo and behold, as formic acid. As we have small amounts of glycerin in our body, the fire of our digestion is able to instigate this transformation and we all know that carbon dioxide is exhaled with our breath.

It is an established fact that our entire endocrine processes—governing growth, health, reproduction—function by virtue of miniscule amounts of the secretion created by the pituitary gland. Little, if any, scientific knowledge exists that on the same level of importance, this process of transforming oxalic acid into formic acid lets us live as spiritual beings in a physical body *(Rudolf Steiner, “Bees”).

For our life on Earth we depend on the vast numbers of individual stinging insects, which enliven the plant kingdom with their formic acid. Our attitude toward these insects will have to undergo a drastic revision, away from disdain, anger, and fear toward gratitude and respect, toward nurturing instead of killing.

Considering the honey bee, the ants, wasps and hornets, we can now understand that our lives depend on them. But why does the honey bee take a special place among all these formic acid producing insects? In contrast to the solitary bumblebee, carpenter and orchard bees, the hornets and wasps, honey bees live through the winter as a colony of perhaps 10 -20 thousand individual workers. By the end of March they may have already doubled their numbers and by the summer solstice reach 40-60 thousand individual worker bees. Bumble or orchard bees, wasps or hornets have only young queens surviving the winter and it takes two to three more months until a colony of several hundred insects can do their enlivening work in nature. The vast numbers of honeybees flying already in early Spring not only contribute to the much needed pollination, but to the amount of formic acid released into nature.

Now we may better appreciate the statement that our very lives depend on the care of the honeybee, on beekeeping. To those who are aware of this fact, Colony Collapse disorder (not only a national, but rather a global phenomenon) becomes a crisis far more serious than global warming. In the US alone we have lost millions of colonies in the last two decades. Can farmers, gardeners, forest rangers witness a decline in natural vitality? You bet! Not only our elm trees are practically gone, now it’s our ash trees, coastal oaks, beeches and other species that are being diminished in great numbers. Of course we will try to find the causes in beetles, viruses or air pollution. These may be a contributing factor, but on a much deeper level, it is the diminishing of the multitudes of stinging insects—many of these are simply diminished by the monocultures and lack of forage, as well as by all the poisons and pollution put into our environment— that pose a real threat to nature’s and our own well-being.

My book “Toward Saving the Honeybee” (first published in 2002) predicted a serious crisis if the present day exploitive, highly mechanized beekeeping practices, combined with our poison-loaded agriculture, do not find their way to a new paradigm. Both are the major components, are at the root of the Colony Collapse Disorder phenomenon.

In 2006, before CCD, Spikenard Farm was founded with the vision to establish a biodynamic farm with a honeybee sanctuary at its heart. A sanctuary is a place where a being is cared for in the best possible way so that a healing can take place. Annual and perennial forage is being planted and organic, sustainable beekeeping methods are being taught, methods that are, to a great part, diametrically opposed to conventional beekeeping practice.

In 1923, in his lectures on bees and other insects, Rudolf Steiner said that, if we were not to change the industrialized beekeeping methods (which had been introduced two to three decades before), the honeybee might not survive the 20th century. This statement was not accepted by Mr. Mueller, the beekeeper attending the lectures. Steiner simply said that the long-term effect of these methods could not be seen right away. He offered Mr. Mueller a conversation in 80 years.

I wonder what Mr. Mueller has to say now?

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Sun. 26 May 25th 2019 – The ‘Easter Paradox’ Workshop 1 pm – 4pm

The 2nd Coming leading to a “World Whitsun”

A Journey thru the ‘Easter Paradox’ of 2019, thru Ascension into Whitsun as a ‘United Soul Endeavor’ 

Eurythmy with Mary Ruud: AUM = A – I stand for myself, U- I stand for humanity, M – I stand for Life

Social Sculpture with Deborah Rogers: Are you an ‘Autumn Person’ or a ‘Spring-time Person’? Through Art, the bridge between science & spirit, we warm the ‘I’, to open the heart, in support of healthy community.

What are my gifts-What are my tools? How can I place them in right relationship within the social realm? How can I hone them to strengthen and enhance the world? Leading Thoughts & original art-collage projections with Hazel Archer-Ginsberg

Enter the Labyrinth of Vitae Sophia – Human hearts, once warmed, can rise up to meet the source of wisdom, like flowers turning toward the sun.  

Eurythmy with Mary Ruud: Living into the Foundation Stone of Love  – How can we take our individual Inner Whitsun & expand it, into what Steiner calls the “World Festival of Knowledge” a path leading from ‘Sprit Recollection’, to ‘Sprit Sensing’, to ‘Sprit Beholding’?

$10 for art supplies & Snacks to Share Encouraged

for more info. contact Hazel

Read a compilation of research into this year’s interesting ‘Easter Paradox’ – A Cosmic Wake Up Call: The Easter Paradox of 2019

Also on 7 May at the Rudolf Steiner House in Ann Arbor MI, the headquarters for the Anthroposophical Society in America

also:

10 am – 1 pm Saturday 8 June 2019 -4804 Sewanee Road, Nashville, TN 37220. for more info. contact Cathy Green cgreen@grasslandaquatics.com

also

12 Noon Potluck, Program 1 pm -4 pm Whitsunday 9 June 2019, In Knoxville, TN. for more info. contact William Rogers wmerogers@gmail.com

11-12 June 2019, Ashville, TN. for more info. contact Marnie Muller 

*Hazel Archer-Ginsberg is the founder of the website and blog Reverse Ritual – Understanding Anthroposophy through the Rhythms of the Year (www.reverseritual.com). She is an Essayist, Lecturer, Poet, Trans-denominational Minister, and “Anthroposopher.” She works as the Festivals Coordinator & Council Member of the Chicago Rudolf Steiner Branch as well as with the Traveling Speakers Program, and she serves on the Central Regional Council of the Anthroposophical Society.

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Friday 7 June 2019, 7-9pm

4804 Sewanee Road, Nashville, TN

‘Preparation, Illumination & Initiation’ – The Rosy Cross

Incorporating ‘The Golden Legend’, & the Plant vs. Human Kingdoms, To enliven our work with ‘The Rose Cross Meditation’.

Using our head, hands & heart we will enact this powerful Rosicrucian tool given to us by Rudolf Steiner, as a soul path of initiation, using imaginative cognition to build spiritual etheric forces; a Metamorphoses of Self & of World.

Hazel Archer-Ginsberg – Founder of Reverse Ritual Understanding Anthroposophy through the Rhythms of the Year. Essayist, Lecturer, Poet, Trans-denominational Minister, Anthroposopher, working as the Festivals Coordinator & Council Member of the Chicago Rudolf Steiner Branch, The Traveling Speakers Program, & the Central Regional Council of the Anthroposophical Society.

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Mother Whit

Celestial Event, Festival, Insight, Quote, Remembering, Spring

We are deep in the midst of Easter-Tide during this evocative year of the ‘Paradox’. And so our spiritual scientific research experiment continues.

Our 1st esoteric Ascension came right after May Day.

I had the honor of presenting ‘Climbing Jacobs Ladder’, an Ascension festival of the Hierarchies & of the Elements, in Ann Arbor; standing where Dr. Ernst Katz often spoke, in the Rudolf Steiner House – headquarters for the Anthroposophical Society of America.

Every year, when the earth begins to breathe out in the springtime, the mystery of the Ascension of Christ, Who is the Spirit of the Earth, is renewed.

‎Ayse Domeniconi‎

Along with the rescuing of our etheric body, the fulfillment of the secret promise of the Ascension is the 2nd coming!

And at the moment of the Ascension the true meaning of death as a birth into the spiritual world, was made manifest. For when the Risen Christ returned ‘to sit at the right hand of the Father’, He became the bridge, revealing the secret that the human soul can reach the highest sphere of the Father Ground of the World, where Christ derived the forces for His Resurrection Body  –  & where our future stage of Spirit Man, is derived.  

Ascension also provides the opportunity for The Holy Spirit, who illuminates the individual ego-consciousness, to be able to appear in earthly evolution at Whitsun; flashing in thru this opened gate, to pour into earth existence the truth of the Mystery of Golgotha & the Ascension in full wisdom.

But in order for this to happen Christ had to Ascend. Steiner tells us, ’Then after 10 days He sent the Holy Spirit- that divine Being of the Trinity that does not overpower, but enhances the individual ego of human beings.’

So now the Christ impulse can enter human souls thru the mediation of the Holy Spirit, enabling us to retain our “I” in freedom.

Sri Aurobindo

How lyrically profound that our esoteric Whitsun comes today on Mother’s Day! A true acknowledgement of the Divine Sophia, & an advancement away from family ties into a conscious community freely connected thru the Holy Spirit, to Christ.

Laura Summer

In the East, Whitsun or Pentecost is called Trinity Sunday, since with the completion of the 3 parts of the moveable feasts of Easter-Tide, we have been brought into contact with the 3 persons of the godhead. We receive the Resurrection forces thru The Son; at Ascension we gain access to the sphere of The father; & at Pentecost we receive the Holy Spirit.

In truth, dear friends, we can recognize 3 Whitsun events in history.

Image result for christ breathes the holy spirit John 20:21
Mandy Halls

The 1st experience, occurred on the evening after the Resurrection.

‘Jesus said to them again, “Peace to you! As the Father has sent Me, I also send you.” And when He had said this, He breathed on them, and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit.  If you forgive anyone’s sins, their sins are forgiven; if you do not forgive them, they are not forgiven.’ ~ John 20:21

Forgiveness is the 1st step in building a conscious community.

This 1st Whitsun was recorded only by John. Thru the 1st Christian initiation, Lazarus, who became John, ‘the disciple whom Jesus loved’, was, along with Mary the Mother of Jesus, & the earthly bearer of the Divine Sophia forces, were the only conscious witnesses to the Mystery of Golgotha. The rest of the apostles would stay in a dream state until Pentecost 50 days later.

The 2nd event is described in the Acts of the Apostles 2:1-4 –

‘When the Day of Pentecost had fully come, they were all together with one accord in the upper room.  And suddenly there came a sound from heaven, like a mighty rushing wind, and it filled the whole house where they were gathered. Then there appeared to them tongues of fire, like flames which divided until they came to rest on each of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak with foreign tongues, each uttering what the spirit gave them to say’.

Image result for speaking in tongues painting
Manny Krest

The Holy Spirit descends 1st to their heads, & then penetrates into their hearts, so that the larynx could be opened to speak the language of the heart, uniting them in a new community.

Rudolf Steiner tells us in his ‘Philosophy of Spiritual Activity’: ‘Only because human individuals are one spirit can they also enjoy life side by side. The free person lives in confidence that the other free person belongs with them to a spiritual world and in their intentions will meet with them’.

In 1907 Steiner created a Whitsun congress in Munich as a new Rosicrucian impulse, displaying the 7 seals of St. John’s Apocalypse, a representation of the 7 stages of Christian initiation.

This Whitsun spirit came alive again for the 3rd time in history at the founding of the Christmas Conference, with the laying of the Foundation Stone of Love into the hearts of those connected with the Anthroposophical movement.

Iona Miller

Just like the Grail Mystery of old, the experience of the Holy Spirit in the image of a dove appears above the chalice. And now thru the process of etherizing our blood, it rises as an etheric stream from the heart to the head, a reversal of the Whitsun experience.

One of our most important tasks is to consciously unite these 2 opposite streams. The Foundation Stone with its mantric expression is the key, in which the individual & social principles are united harmoniously.

Denise Yocco

Lifting out of the ‘me’ into the ‘we’, so that the spirit flame can enter & spread out thru us, to become what Steiner called a “World Whitsun”, which began in earnest at the Christmas Conference, where the reversed Whitsun, was born, the idea of taking the spirit that has flowed thru the head into the heart, transforming it into the wisdom of love to redeem our intelligence, & then give it back out as a gift to humanity.

Our work is to take our individual Inner Whitsun & expand it, into what Steiner calls  the “World Festival of Knowledge” a path leading from ‘Spirit Recalling’, to ‘Spirit Mindfulness’, to ‘Spirit Beholding.’

Blessings dear friends on this auspicious day

~hag xox

Traversing Eternity

History, Insight, Lecture, Poetry, Rudolf Steiner Quote, Speaking with the Stars, Spring,

2 May 2019 – “Speaking with the Stars”: Venus rises above the eastern horizon about an hour before sunrise. The brilliant planet of Love dominates the predawn sky as the rosy glow heralding the Sun’s arrival grows brighter. Look for her next to the waning crescent Moon.

Image result for venus moon painting

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Rudolf Steiner’s Lectures on this day 

ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY

Image result for leonardo da vinci

1519 – Death Day of Leonardo da Vinci, Italian painter, sculptor, & architect. “…We know how Leonardo worked at the “Last Supper”. He often went and sat on the scaffolding and brooded for hours in front of the wall, then he would take a brush and make a few strokes and go away again. Sometimes he only went and stared at the picture and went away again. When he was painting the Christ Figure, his hand trembled. Indeed, if we put together all that we can find concerning this subject we must say that neither outwardly nor inwardly was Leonardo happy when painting this world-renowned picture. Now there were people at that time in Milan who were displeased with the slow progress of the picture, for instance a Prior of the monastery, who could not see why an artist could not paint such a picture quickly, and complained to the Duke. He too thought the affair had lasted too long. Leonardo answered: “The picture is to represent Jesus Christ and Judas, the two greatest contrasts; one cannot paint them in one year; there are no models for them in the world, neither for Judas nor for Christ”. After he had been working at the picture for years, he said he did not know whether he could finish it after all! Then he said that if finally he found no model for Judas he could always use the Prior himself! It was thus extraordinarily difficult to bring the picture to a conclusion but within himself Leonardo did not feel happy. For this picture showed the contrast between what lived in his soul and what he was able to represent on the canvas. Here it is necessary to bring forward a hypothesis of Spiritual Science, which may be reached by anyone who studies what can by degrees be learned about this picture.” ~Rudolf Steiner, Leonardo da Vinci, His Spiritual and Intellectual Greatness, At the Turning Point of the New Age

Image result for 1611 – The King James Version of the Bible is published

1611 – The King James Version of the Bible is published for the first time in London, England, by printer Robert Barker

Image result for Catherine the Great of Russia

1729 – Birthday of Catherine the Great of Russia, the longest-ruling female leader of Russia. The Catherinian Era, is often considered the Golden Age of the Russian Empire & the Russian nobility. She enthusiastically supported the ideals of The Enlightenment, thus earning the status of an enlightened despot. As a patron of the arts she presided over the age of the Russian Enlightenment, a period when the Smolny Institute, the first state-financed higher education institution for women in Europe, was established.

Image result for Novalis

1772 – Birthday of Novalis, the pseudonym & pen name of Georg Philipp Friedrich Freiherr von Hardenberg, poet, author, mystic, & philosopher of Early German Romanticism. His study of mineralogy & management of salt mines in Saxony, was often ignored by his contemporary readers Novalis concerned himself with the scientific doctrine of Johann Gottlieb Fichte, which greatly influenced his world view, transforming Fichte’s Nicht-Ich (German “not I”) to a Du (“you”), an equal subject to the Ich (“I”). This was the starting point for Novalis’ Liebesreligion (“religion of love”) dedicated to his beloved Sophie who died of tuberculosis.

Image result for Raphael the painter young

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

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

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

1933 – Gleichschaltung: Adolf Hitler bans trade unions

Image result for 1945 –Fall of Berlin

1945 –Fall of Berlin: The Soviet Union announces the capture of Berlin & Soviet soldiers hoist their red flag over the Reichstag building

Image result for 1952 – The world's first ever jet airliner, the De Havilland Comet 1

1952 – The world’s first ever jet airliner, the De Havilland Comet 1 makes its maiden flight, from London to Johannesburg

1972 – In the early morning hours a fire breaks out at the Sunshine Mine located between Kellogg and Wallace, Idaho, killing 91 workers.

1986 –The City of Chernobyl is evacuated six days after the disaster

1998 – The European Central Bank is founded in Brussels in order to define & execute the European Union’s monetary policy

Image result for GPS Clinton

2000 – President Bill Clinton announces that accurate GPS access would no longer be restricted to the United States military

2008 – Cyclone Nargis makes landfall in Burma killing over 138,000 people & leaving millions of people homeless

2008 – Chaitén Volcano begins erupting in Chile, forcing the evacuation of more than 4,500 people.

2011 – Osama bin Laden, is killed by the United States special forces in

2014 – Two mudslides in Badakhshan, Afghanistan, leave over 2,500 people dead

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Jeanie Tomanek

POD (Poem Of the Day)

~The portals of perception
Raw & cluttered await
The revealing –
It is my Self I see –
A 1000 colors swirling in liquid light
A star covered in rising clouds
Hung by a thread from its ocean Moon
Hail Self
Traversing eternity
In moral steps of time
Where the Guardian beckons
~hag

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“…The hatred and antipathy in the world today can indeed be followed by international love with healing in its wings. This is indeed possible. But we are living in an age when all that is possible must be consciously, deliberately and freely striven for by human beings. There must be knowledge of the conditions requisite for uniting the peoples of the Earth, in order that, as a result of this knowledge, each individual people may help to make the waves of love follow those of hatred.

Human love alone has power to heal the wounds of hatred. If humankind has no wish for this love, chaos will remain. That is the terrible alternative now facing human beings who have knowledge. Those who realize its terrors know that the souls of men dare not sleep, for otherwise, as a result of the powerlessness caused by the sleep into which the souls of the peoples have fallen, the healing waves of love will not be able to flow over the waves of hatred.

Human beings who realize this will acquire the kind of knowledge that flows from a spiritual conception of the relationships between the peoples. They will take this knowledge into their feeling — love for humanity will be born. They will take this knowledge into their will – deeds for humanity will be accomplished.

The evolution of the age, with all the terrible paralysis that is appearing at the present time, places a solemn duty before the soul: to gather together all that can unite humankind in love and array it in opposition to the destructive elements that have made their appearance in recent times. This quest for loving unification, for unifying love is not merely a vague feeling. To those who understand the conditions of life today, it is the very highest duty of man.” ~Rudolf Steiner, ‘The Peoples of the Earth in the Light of Anthroposophy’, Stuttgart, March 10th, 1920 http://wn.rsarchive.org/Lectures/19200310p01.html

In 1962, Karl König offered this verse to the friends in America:
The eternal rays
Of the Holy Spirits of Light
Build the tower of human trust,
Which is formed in our hearts
Out of brotherly love.
The eternal piers
of the helping Spirit-Messengers
Bear the bridge of faithfulness
That arches from I to I
In what we do.
So do we become united and strong
In the work that we have begun
And which we are committed in the spirit
To bring to completion.
May the greeting from soul to soul
Ring through the fellowship of our doing.

***

Tuesday 7 May 2019 in Ann Arbor Michigan

& also

Sat. 25 May 2019 –  7 pm – 9 pm in Chicago

Climbing Jacobs Ladder: Celebrating the Feast of Ascension

Leading Thoughts & original art-collage projections with Hazel Archer-Ginsberg

Eurythmy with Mary Ruud

Social Art with Nancy Melvin

$10 Donation & Snacks to Share Encouraged

Read about this year’s interesting ‘Easter Paradox’ – A Cosmic Wake Up Call: The Easter Paradox of 2019

***

The Karma Project 
A Western Approach to Reincarnation & Karma
May 8, 2019 – 7:15 pm CST (8:15 pm EST)View this email in your browser
The Central Regional Council of the Anthroposophical Society in America invites you to a presentation on the psychological understanding of karma, with special guests Drs. Roberta Nelson and David Tresemer.

Guidance – and challenge – from Rudolf Steiner (August 3, 1924): “If we want to experience our karma in a comfortable way — it will surely take vengeance on us in one way or another … to be anthroposophists we must be able to observe our own experience of karma with constant wide-awake attention.”
Roberta Nelson is Faculty Chair in the 3-year programs offered by the Association for Anthroposophic Psychology (AAP). She has a doctorate in Counselor Education that qualifies her to supervise, educate, and counsel. In addition, Roberta is dual licensed as a Licensed Professional Clinical Counselor (LPCC) as well as a Licensed Addiction Counselor (LAC) in the state of North Dakota. She has other trainings and certifications in Psychosynthesis, EMDR, NVC, and other modalities.
 
David Tresemer is President of AAP. He has a doctorate in psychology from Harvard. He has written about various aspects of anthroposophy applied to issues in our world, the most relevant for this webinar being contributing to and editing of The Counselor: As If Soul and Spirit Matter (to which Roberta Nelson was a major contributor) and Slow Counseling, as well as quarterly columns in Lilipohmagazine.

Our approach on May 8: An anthroposophic psychology must take seriously the different functions of body, soul, and spirit. Spirit—light, freedom, beyond time and space; Physical Body—vehicle for experience and expression; Soul—the mediator. Karma—held as precious in Spirit, stamped into the Physical Body, and worked in Soul. Whereas the Spirit sings in light and freedom, the Soul learns through darkness and constraints, through struggles. The anthroposophic notion of karma helps us understand how we can wrestle with our own being, transforming through experience.
 
Audio-video: We will have some images on screen, though we will describe these to those who join by telephone.

PREPARATION: Please have a pen and blank paper. If you have chalk-based pastels, please have those ready as well.

 Audioconference Details
 
Option 1.  Click link below if you wish to connect through your computer (a headset is recommended): https://zoom.us/j/689514145
 
Option 2.  Call in using your telephone.
United States: (646) 558-8656 or: (669) 900-6833
Access Code: 689-514-145
 
Please join us!Agenda (Central Time)
 
7:15  Welcome and introductions
7:18  Verse
7:20  Introduce guest speaker
7:25  Guest Speakers: Drs. Roberta Nelson & David Tresemer (45 minutes)
8:10  Q&A – Please state your name, location before asking a question
8:28  Close with verse

***

Sunday 19 May 2019, 2 pm – 4 pm- Social Sculpture Workshop around the ‘URPFLANZE’ with Victoria Martin. More details to follow

$20 for art supplies + Snacks to Share Encouraged 

for more info. contact Hazel Archer-Ginsberg

***

Whitsun: A Festival of United Soul Endeavor with Hazel Archer-Ginsberg

Sunday 2 June 2019 at the Branch 2 pm – 4 pm

also

10 am – 1 pm Saturday 8 June 2019 -4804 Sewanee Road, Nashville, TN 37220. for more info. contact Cathy Green cgreen@grasslandaquatics.com

also

12 Noon Potluck, Program 1 pm -4 pm Whitsunday 9 June 2019, In Knoxville, TN. for more info. contact William Rogers wmerogers@gmail.com

also

7 pm – 10 pm 11 June 2019, Ashville, TN. for more info. contact Marnie Muller 

Eurythmy: AUM = A – I stand for myself, U- I stand for humanity, M – I stand for Life

Social Sculpture: Steiner’s ‘Blue Dot Exercise’: Through Art, the bridge between science & spirit, we warm the ‘I’, to open the heart, in support of healthy community.

Leading Thoughts with Hazel Archer-Ginsberg*

What are my gifts-What are my tools? How can I place them in right relationship within the social realm? How can I hone them to strengthen and enhance the world?

Enter the Labyrinth of Vitae Sophia: Human hearts, once warmed, can rise up to meet the source of wisdom, like flowers turning toward the sun.

Living into the Foundation Stone of Love: How can we take our individual Inner Whitsun & expand it, into what Steiner calls the “World Festival of Knowledge” a path leading from ‘Sprit Recollection’, to ‘Sprit Sensing’, to ‘Sprit Beholding’?

*Hazel Archer-Ginsberg is the founder of the website and blog Reverse Ritual – Understanding Anthroposophy through the Rhythms of the Year (www.reverseritual.com). She is an Essayist, Lecturer, Poet, Trans-denominational Minister, and “Anthroposopher.” She works as the Festivals Coordinator & Council Member of the Chicago Rudolf Steiner Branch as well as with the Traveling Speakers Program, and she serves on the Central Regional Council of the Anthroposophical Society.

Read about this year’s interesting ‘Easter Paradox’ – A Cosmic Wake Up Call: The Easter Paradox of 2019

*** 

Your Wedding Day

Celestial Event, Central Regional Council, Chicago Event, Festival, History, Spring

1 May 2019 – “Speaking with the Stars”: This week provides skywatchers with their final opportunity to get a good view of Sirius, the night sky’s brightest star, before evening twilight swallows it. This scintillating luminary gleams in the southwestern sky.

Related image

Rudolf Steiner’s Lectures on this day

ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY

The feast of ‘Joseph The worker’ Joseph was a “tekton,”, this is often translated as carpenter, but woodworker, craftsman, handyman, or even day laborer, are all good translations. Jesus worked as a “tekton” for upwards of 18 years.

Origins of the Workers May Day

Image result for 1776 – Establishment of the Illuminati in Upper Bavaria, by Jesuit-taught Adam Weishaupt.

1776 – Establishment of the Illuminati in Upper Bavaria, by Jesuit-taught Adam Weishaupt.

Image result for Mozart's opera The Marriage of Figaro

1786 – In Vienna, Austria, Mozart’s opera The Marriage of Figaro is performed for the first time.

Image result for Albert Parsons, head of the Chicago Knights of Labor, with his wife Lucy Parsons & two children, led 80,000 people down Michigan Avenue,

1884 –At its convention in Chicago the Federation of Organized Trades & Labor Unions resolved that “eight hours shall constitute a legal day’s labour and that we recommend to labour organisations throughout this jurisdiction that they so direct their laws as to conform to this resolution.” Albert Parsons, head of the Chicago Knights of Labor, with his wife Lucy Parsons & two children, led 80,000 people down Michigan Avenue, Chicago, in what is regarded as the first modern May Day Parade, with the cry, “Eight-hour day with no cut in pay.” In support of the eight-hour day. In the next few days they were joined nationwide by 350,000 workers who went on strike at 1,200 factories, including 70,000 in Chicago, 45,000 in New York, 32,000 in Cincinnati, & additional thousands in other cities. Some workers gained shorter hours (eight or nine) with no reduction in pay; others accepted pay cuts with the reduction in hours.

Image result for chicago board of trade building

1885 – The original Chicago Board of Trade Building opens for business

1893 – The World’s Columbian Exposition opens in Chicago.

Image result for pluto painting
Caravaggio 

1930 – The dwarf planet Pluto is officially named.

Image result for empire state building

1931 – The Empire State Building is dedicated in New York City.

1942 – Deathday of Gustav Steiner, Rudolf Steiner’s handicapped brother

Image result for Joseph Goebbels & his wife Magda commit suicide

1945 –Nazi propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels & his wife Magda commit suicide in the Reich Garden outside the Führerbunker. Their children are also killed by having cyanide pills inserted into their mouths by their mother, Magda

Also on May 1, 1945, hundreds of people committed mass suicide in the town of Demmin, Germany. The suicides occurred during a mass panic that was provoked by atrocities committed by soldiers of the Soviet Red Army, who had sacked the town the day before. It is acknowledged to be the largest mass suicide ever recorded in Germany.

Nazi officials, the police, the Wehrmacht & a number of citizens had left the town before the arrival of the Red Army, while thousands of refugees from the East had also taken refuge in Demmin. The retreating Wehrmacht had blown up the bridges over the rivers, which enclosed the town trapping the remaining civilians. The Soviet units looted & burned down the town, & committed rapes & executions.

Over 2, 500 inhabitants & refugees then committed suicide, with many families committing suicide together. Most bodies were buried in mass graves, & after the war, discussion of the mass suicide was tabooed by the East German Communist government.

Image result for Fidel Castro, proclaims Cuba a socialist nation & abolishes elections.

1961 – The Prime Minister of Cuba, Fidel Castro, proclaims Cuba a socialist nation & abolishes elections.

Related image

1987 – Pope John Paul II beatifies Edith Stein, a Jewish-born Carmelite nun who was gassed in the Nazi concentration camp at Auschwitz.

Image result for 2009 – Same-sex marriage is legalized in Sweden.

2009 – Same-sex marriage is legalized in Sweden.

***

Congratulations Beloved –
& Welcome to Your Royal Wedding Party
Where You marry You…Come on, Say I do…
as you dance to the beat of your laughing heart
around the blazing bonfire in MayDay Jubilation…
Break taboos, buck the rut rote,
& overthrow conventional surface stuff
with your blithe grace & jaunty charm
in your one-of-a-kind Wedding gown…

There are a couple of caveats though:
the beautiful truth won’t always be simple & bright;
a good marriage takes work to gleam & Green…
it can get murky & dense, convoluted, or kaleidoscopic…
the bird song whispering sweet somethings may sound
more like a marching band
pounding out a kinky version of Beethoven’s 5th
than a double flute playing a quaint folk song…
(if you’re lucky)

When you Give Peace & Dance (remember when?)
you’re likely to be quivery & atwitter in your vows
due to encounters with the Great Unknown –
arrivals from beyond the Wild Blue Yonder –
that will blow your mind to recalibrate
your philosophy of life. So Rejoice…
Your appointments with the numinous
are likely to be stirring, awe-inspiring & fire-friendly…

Your old self is the fuel you will use to burn
your old self to the ground…This bonfire will liberate
your new self, which may be trapped
in a gnarly snarl deep inside your old self…
don’t let the flames freak you –
for very quickly a sense of relief & release will predominate…
Then, as the New You commits its way to freedom,
escaping its cramped quarters – flexing its vital force
in mystic union…you will be blessed
with a foreshadowing of your future bliss…
The intoxication that follows will bring you clarity, peace of mind
& a mighty orgasm of communal de-light…
See you there…

Blessings & peace –
~hag

***

Tuesday 7 May 2019 in Ann Arbor Michigan

& also

Sat. 25 May 2019 –  7 pm – 9 pm in Chicago

Climbing Jacobs Ladder: Celebrating the Feast of Ascension

Leading Thoughts & original art-collage projections with Hazel Archer-Ginsberg

Eurythmy with Mary Ruud

Social Art with Nancy Melvin

$10 Donation & Snacks to Share Encouraged

Read about this year’s interesting ‘Easter Paradox’ – A Cosmic Wake Up Call: The Easter Paradox of 2019

***

The Karma Project 
A Western Approach to Reincarnation & Karma
May 8, 2019 – 7:15 pm CST (8:15 pm EST)View this email in your browser
The Central Regional Council of the Anthroposophical Society in America invites you to a presentation on the psychological understanding of karma, with special guests Drs. Roberta Nelson and David Tresemer.

Guidance – and challenge – from Rudolf Steiner (August 3, 1924): “If we want to experience our karma in a comfortable way — it will surely take vengeance on us in one way or another … to be anthroposophists we must be able to observe our own experience of karma with constant wide-awake attention.”
Roberta Nelson is Faculty Chair in the 3-year programs offered by the Association for Anthroposophic Psychology (AAP). She has a doctorate in Counselor Education that qualifies her to supervise, educate, and counsel. In addition, Roberta is dual licensed as a Licensed Professional Clinical Counselor (LPCC) as well as a Licensed Addiction Counselor (LAC) in the state of North Dakota. She has other trainings and certifications in Psychosynthesis, EMDR, NVC, and other modalities.
 
David Tresemer is President of AAP. He has a doctorate in psychology from Harvard. He has written about various aspects of anthroposophy applied to issues in our world, the most relevant for this webinar being contributing to and editing of The Counselor: As If Soul and Spirit Matter (to which Roberta Nelson was a major contributor) and Slow Counseling, as well as quarterly columns in Lilipohmagazine.

Our approach on May 8: An anthroposophic psychology must take seriously the different functions of body, soul, and spirit. Spirit—light, freedom, beyond time and space; Physical Body—vehicle for experience and expression; Soul—the mediator. Karma—held as precious in Spirit, stamped into the Physical Body, and worked in Soul. Whereas the Spirit sings in light and freedom, the Soul learns through darkness and constraints, through struggles. The anthroposophic notion of karma helps us understand how we can wrestle with our own being, transforming through experience.
 
Audio-video: We will have some images on screen, though we will describe these to those who join by telephone.

PREPARATION: Please have a pen and blank paper. If you have chalk-based pastels, please have those ready as well.

 Audioconference Details
 
Option 1.  Click link below if you wish to connect through your computer (a headset is recommended): https://zoom.us/j/689514145
 
Option 2.  Call in using your telephone.
United States: (646) 558-8656 or: (669) 900-6833
Access Code: 689-514-145
 
Please join us!Agenda (Central Time)
 
7:15  Welcome and introductions
7:18  Verse
7:20  Introduce guest speaker
7:25  Guest Speakers: Drs. Roberta Nelson & David Tresemer (45 minutes)
8:10  Q&A – Please state your name, location before asking a question
8:28  Close with verse

***

Sunday 19 May 2019, 2 pm – 4 pm- Social Sculpture Workshop around the ‘URPFLANZE’ with Victoria Martin. More details to follow

$20 for art supplies + Snacks to Share Encouraged 

for more info. contact Hazel Archer-Ginsberg

***

Whitsun: A Festival of United Soul Endeavor with Hazel Archer-Ginsberg

Sunday 2 June 2019 at the Branch 2 pm – 4 pm

also

10 am – 1 pm Saturday 8 June 2019 -4804 Sewanee Road, Nashville, TN 37220. for more info. contact Cathy Green cgreen@grasslandaquatics.com

also

12 Noon Potluck, Program 1 pm -4 pm Whitsunday 9 June 2019, In Knoxville, TN. for more info. contact William Rogers wmerogers@gmail.com

also

7 pm – 10 pm 11 June 2019, Ashville, TN. for more info. contact Marnie Muller 

Eurythmy: AUM = A – I stand for myself, U- I stand for humanity, M – I stand for Life

Social Sculpture: Steiner’s ‘Blue Dot Exercise’: Through Art, the bridge between science & spirit, we warm the ‘I’, to open the heart, in support of healthy community.

Leading Thoughts with Hazel Archer-Ginsberg*

What are my gifts-What are my tools? How can I place them in right relationship within the social realm? How can I hone them to strengthen and enhance the world?

Enter the Labyrinth of Vitae Sophia: Human hearts, once warmed, can rise up to meet the source of wisdom, like flowers turning toward the sun.

Living into the Foundation Stone of Love: How can we take our individual Inner Whitsun & expand it, into what Steiner calls the “World Festival of Knowledge” a path leading from ‘Sprit Recollection’, to ‘Sprit Sensing’, to ‘Sprit Beholding’?

*Hazel Archer-Ginsberg is the founder of the website and blog Reverse Ritual – Understanding Anthroposophy through the Rhythms of the Year (www.reverseritual.com). She is an Essayist, Lecturer, Poet, Trans-denominational Minister, and “Anthroposopher.” She works as the Festivals Coordinator & Council Member of the Chicago Rudolf Steiner Branch as well as with the Traveling Speakers Program, and she serves on the Central Regional Council of the Anthroposophical Society.

Read about this year’s interesting ‘Easter Paradox’ – A Cosmic Wake Up Call: The Easter Paradox of 2019

*** 

Walpurgisnacht

Celestial Event, Festival, History, Poetry, Remembering, Soul to Soul, Speaking with the Stars, Spring

30 April 2019 – “Speaking with the Stars”: Arcturus is the brightest star high in the east these evenings. Spica shines lower right of it by about three fists. To the right of Spica by half that distance is the distinctive four-star constellation of Corvus, the Crow of Spring.

Lynnette Shelley

As Mars marches eastward across Taurus this week, it approaches the two stars that represent the Bull’s horns: Beta & Zeta Tauri. This evening, the Red Planet forms an isosceles triangle with the pair.

***

Rudolf Steiner’s Lectures on this day 

ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY

Fritz Roeber

Walpurgis Night, In Germanic folklore Walpurgisnacht, also called Hexennacht, literally “Witches’ Night” – the eve of the feast day of Saint Walpurga, an 8th-century abbess in Francia.  In Goethe’s Faust we see 2 scenes: ‘Romantic Walpurgis Night’ the night of a witches’ meeting on the Brocken, the highest peak in the Harz Mountains, a range of wooded hills in central Germany; and later in Part 2 a ‘Classical Walpurgis Night’ is featured.

65 – Seneca, teacher of Nero, murdered

Image result for 1789 – On the balcony of Federal Hall on Wall Street in New York City, George Washington takes the oath of office

1789 – On the balcony of Federal Hall on Wall Street in New York City, George Washington takes the oath of office to become the first elected President of the United States.

Image result for 1812 – Birthday of the enigmatic Kaspar Hauser

1812 – Birthday of the enigmatic Kaspar Hauser

1877 – Birthday of Alice B. Toklas, an American-born member of the Parisian avant-garde of the early 20th century. Life partner of American writer Gertrude Stein

Image result for 1885 – The Niagara Reservation becomes New York's first state park

1885 – The Niagara Reservation becomes New York’s first state park, ensuring that Niagara Falls will not be devoted solely to industrial & commercial use

Image result for 1939 – The 1939-40 New York World's Fair opens

1939 – The 1939-40 New York World’s Fair opens

Image result for hitler suicide

1945 – Adolf Hitler commits suicide

Image result for 1963 – The Bristol Bus Boycott

1963 – The Bristol Bus Boycott is held to protest the Company’s refusal to employ Black or Asian bus crews, drawing national attention to racial discrimination in the United Kingdom

***

Arthur Rackham

POD (Poem Of the Day) for Flora on Beltane:
May Day Maya
Pleiadian Goddess 
Bright light of the 7 Sisters
Mountain Nymph transformed,
We ascend your beacon mound
& kindle there
The oakwood of the Bel-Fire
To rival the Sun
& call the Summer heat.
Zeus’s lover
Hermes Mother
Inspire processions
Of chimney sweeps & milkmaids
To leap the healing flames
& sky-clad singing:
“Ride a cock horse to Banburry Cross
To see a fine lady on a white horse”
Walk the circuit
& beat the bounds
With the young Summer King
& the Queen of the May
For the feast of flowers
Is calling forth the consort
Come, come, come unto me
& celebrate with the orders of Elementals.
Bold maidens bathing in the dew of May morn
Sword dancing & singing
In deep forest frivolity
Striking open ancient ley lines in bulls-eye archery
Marking the unrestrained tryst,
A Maypole in Holy-Rood-Mass
Wrapped & weaved in ribbons & ivy
For the May-Eve rites.
Robin Hood makes ready the hunt,
Maid Marian has gone-a-Maying. 
~Lady Hazel

***

This is the Eve of Beltane or May Day. Beltane, the old Celtic name for May Day, means bright fire or fire of Bel, the name of the Solar force, whose feast marks the beginning of the 2nd half of the year.

Wood from 9 sacred trees is gathered, & the great Bel-fire is built & ritualistically ignited by the High priestess or Arch-Druid. People would jump these ‘need-fires’ for fertility, healing & protection.

Torches lit from it were carried home to re-light the hearth fires. The folk would walk their animals in-between them to ensure a productive season – this is the mating season after all for man & beast.

There were other May Day customs, like walking the circuit of one’s property, repairing fences & boundary markers, processions of all kinds, archery tournaments, Morris dances, sword play, & of course making merry with music & drinking.

May morning is a time when the veil between the worlds can easily be pushed aside; but instead of the spirits coming into our realm from the other side, which is the case with Halloween, the polar opposite of Mayday on the wheel of the year -the fairies can enchant us over into their mystical realms.

This is a magical time, perfect for gathering ‘wild’ water, especially the May morning dew, or water from hidden wells & springs. These wild waters were collected & used to bath in for beauty, or to drink for health.

May Day is considered the start of summer – the time of milk & honey. This sensuous fertile energy is totally universal, & can be applied on many different levels. When we acknowledge these creative forces in the dance of our lives, it takes us to our own personal, modern-day version of dancing around the maypole, where we weave & combine the opposing energies within ourselves, blending them into one balanced source.

So yes, whether you know it or not, there will be at least one song that plays in your sub-conscious head on this eve of the 1st day of May, when you become perhaps, the Queen of the May, or Jack-in the Green. Our body like the body of the earth instinctively knows its Beltane, the time of vitality & passion & new growth. And the wisdom of our spirit seeks the natural union of polarities that occur at this time, giving us the opportunity for integration, in the alchemical dance of our souls…

Because under all the sexual innuendo & frivolity, it’s really all about the inner mystic marriage, the union of fire & water -opposites complimenting each other, to become one, bringing all the elements into balance.

You’ll just have to go dancing naked in the forest preserve on your own time…

For now, let’s work to unify the polarities of our being, by sparking the new fire of creative fertility & passion, & marrying it with the beautiful, healing waters of compassion & pure love. So we can truly celebrate the marriage feast of our lives, with a grounded, mindful joy.

So if it is your will – light your Bel-fire, marry it to the water, by floating it in the chalice of your choice. Take the time you need there…To do or not, what you will…Whisper your marriage vows into the water…or dance the 1st dance…or smash the glass…whatever your ceremony calls for…short simple or silent…it doesn’t matter…a 3 day bacchanal, with dancing puppets…it’s all good…cause it’s all about what’s inside…

Peace & Love

~Lady Hazel

***

Tuesday 7 May 2019 in Ann Arbor Michigan

& also

Sat. 25 May 2019 –  7 pm – 9 pm in Chicago

Climbing Jacobs Ladder: Celebrating the Feast of Ascension

Leading Thoughts & original art-collage projections with Hazel Archer-Ginsberg

Eurythmy with Mary Ruud

Social Art with Nancy Melvin

$10 Donation & Snacks to Share Encouraged

Read about this year’s interesting ‘Easter Paradox’ – A Cosmic Wake Up Call: The Easter Paradox of 2019

***

Sunday 19 May 2019, 2 pm – 4 pm- Social Sculpture Workshop around the ‘URPFLANZE’ with Victoria Martin. More details to follow

$20 for art supplies + Snacks to Share Encouraged 

for more info. contact Hazel Archer-Ginsberg

***

Whitsun: A Festival of United Soul Endeavor with Hazel Archer-Ginsberg

Sunday 2 June 2019 at the Branch 2 pm – 4 pm

also

10 am – 1 pm Saturday 8 June 2019 -4804 Sewanee Road, Nashville, TN 37220. for more info. contact Cathy Green cgreen@grasslandaquatics.com

also

12 Noon Potluck, Program 1 pm -4 pm Whitsunday 9 June 2019, In Knoxville, TN. for more info. contact William Rogers wmerogers@gmail.com

also

7 pm – 10 pm 11 June 2019, Ashville, TN. for more info. contact Marnie Muller 

Eurythmy: AUM = A – I stand for myself, U- I stand for humanity, M – I stand for Life

Social Sculpture: Steiner’s ‘Blue Dot Exercise’: Through Art, the bridge between science & spirit, we warm the ‘I’, to open the heart, in support of healthy community.

Leading Thoughts with Hazel Archer-Ginsberg*

What are my gifts-What are my tools? How can I place them in right relationship within the social realm? How can I hone them to strengthen and enhance the world?

Enter the Labyrinth of Vitae Sophia: Human hearts, once warmed, can rise up to meet the source of wisdom, like flowers turning toward the sun.

Living into the Foundation Stone of Love: How can we take our individual Inner Whitsun & expand it, into what Steiner calls the “World Festival of Knowledge” a path leading from ‘Sprit Recollection’, to ‘Sprit Sensing’, to ‘Sprit Beholding’?

*Hazel Archer-Ginsberg is the founder of the website and blog Reverse Ritual – Understanding Anthroposophy through the Rhythms of the Year (www.reverseritual.com). She is an Essayist, Lecturer, Poet, Trans-denominational Minister, and “Anthroposopher.” She works as the Festivals Coordinator & Council Member of the Chicago Rudolf Steiner Branch as well as with the Traveling Speakers Program, and she serves on the Central Regional Council of the Anthroposophical Society.

Read about this year’s interesting ‘Easter Paradox’ – A Cosmic Wake Up Call: The Easter Paradox of 2019