Category Archives: Storytelling

Buddha & the Dragon

Diane Quinn

Dear Friends – Wednesday 26 May is Wesak* & the start of the eclipse season for 2021. Tonight, the silver disc of Bella Luna in her Full phase hovers huge in the heavens all night long, then as the birds begin to wake, her brilliant light will suddenly turn blood red, as she crosses Cauda Draconis – the Moon’s South Node or Dragon’s Tail, associated with misfortune & the need to pay for past debts – Cauda Draconis calls for us to heed our karma & to put an end to something that no longer serves…

Movie evening about Wesak | TS Adyar
Belliooeu Quuinerr

Here in Chicago the partial lunar eclipse can be seen starting at 3:30 am CT when we will be able to see the Super Flower Moon pass thru the darkest part of Earth’s shadow – catch her before she sets at 5:26 am CT  (it may be thundering & lightning here at the Great Inland Sea of Chicago, you may be sleeping, but we can still live into this image)

This cosmic & earthly event is happening while the world celebrates *Wesak, the biggest Buddhist festival of the year, which celebrates the ‘birth, enlightenment & death of the Buddha’ on one & the same day, traditionally when the Sun is in Taurus, & the Moon in Scorpio.

What does it mean that this year the coils of the Dragon wrap around the Buddha Moon?

The Buddha (whose name means: ‘The Awakened One’ or ‘One who Knows’) is regarded as the ninth incarnation of Lord Vishnu. He was born in 563 BC on the Full Moon of May in Vaisakh.

How to Celebrate Wesak – I AM University
TY Lin

The Full Moon in May is a mystically auspicious time – This ‘Buddha Moon’ is considered to be the greatest moment of spiritual contact for the entire year. Great polarities are said to be synthesized at this festival. Hope is revived in the world, & great seeds of beauty, truth, & goodness are planted within us – qualities needed for the unity of humankind.

Ancient Wisdom asserts that there will be a new coming of the World Avatar & those beings who assist them. But the reality set forth & embedded within this festival, is that WE, as a living unity called humanity, are to be that World Avatar, when we can live as “Christ in me”…

The Wesak Festival provides us each year with a reception of the tools of Love & Wisdom, to fulfill this ancient prophecy.

What all the higher beings have done, we can do also, taking up our responsibility as the 10th hierarchy to radiate the Christ Impulse out to all the kingdoms of Earth -becoming like little suns – emanating rays from the very core of our “I”, thru the vehicle of our bodies, from our purified hearts, & specifically from our forehead, where our third eye is located. This is the Bulls Eye of Taurus – the Sun of May – & the mystery of the transformative Scorpio Moon.

Strange Sculptures at Buddha Park in Vientiane, Laos
Buddha Park in Vientiane, Laos

And this year we will have to be extra vigilant – for we are called to meet Cauda Draconis. Rudolf Steinertells us:that when there is an eclipse of the moon, thoughts stream through darkness down upon the earth; and that such thoughts have a closer relationship with the subconscious life than with the conscious life of the human being. The old initiates often made use of a certain simile when speaking to their pupils. It is; of course, necessary to translate their words into modern language, but this is the gist of what they said: “Visionaries and dreamers love to go for rambles by moonlight, when the moon is full. There are, however, certain people who have no wish to receive the good thoughts coming to them from the cosmos, but who, on the contrary, are desirous of getting hold of evil, diabolical thoughts. Such people will choose the moment of a lunar eclipse for their nocturnal wanderings.” ~Human Questions and Cosmic Answers

Dara Lindy

Gautama Buddha once said: “Your mind is a powerful thing. When you filter it with positive thoughts, your life will start to change.”

Dear friends will you join me in bringing the energy of the Buddha into your thoughts tonight before bed & when you wake..? And for those that want to stand up to the dragon, know that I will be there with you before the Sun rises & the Moon sets.

Let your love flow outward through the universe, To its height, its depth, its broad extent, A limitless love, without hatred or enmity. Then as you stand or walk, Sit or lie down, As long as you are awake, Strive for this with a one-pointed mind; Your life will bring heaven to earth.” ~Gautama Buddha

~hag, from indications from Rudolf Steiner, The teachings of Buddha, Lucis Trust, & The Adler Planetarium

Here’s the Recording of Sangraal: A Pentecost Pilgrimage with the CRC, as well as other programs for your FREE viewing.

Today’s ‘I think Speech’ podcast

Manjushri Nagarakshasa – The Naga Deity | Buddhist art, Buddhism art, Tibet  art

Rudolf Steiner’s Lectures on this day (RSarchives)

ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY (Rudolf Steiner’s orginal Calendar of the Soul, The Present Age magazine, Wikipedia)

What is Halley's Comet?

240 BC – First recorded perihelion passage of Halley’s Comet.

Gregor VII. (1020–1085) · geboren.am

1085 – Death-day of Gregor VII – One of the great reforming popes, best known for the ‘Investiture Controversy’, attacking the practice of simony (trafficking for money in “spiritual things”- named after Simon Magus, who is described in Acts 8:9–24 as offering Peter & John, payment in exchange for their empowering him to impart the Holy Spirit to anyone he laid hands on) & his dispute with Henry IV. In Rudolf Steiner’s Karma Lectures Vol. I/12 he was revealed as Haeckel in a previous life.

Ralph Waldo Emerson and the Transcendentalism Movement - SciHi BlogSciHi  Blog

1803 – Birthday of Ralph Waldo Emerson an American essayist, lecturer, & poet who led the Transcendentalist movement of the mid-19th century. He was seen as a champion of individualism.

Quigley's Cabinet: The legacy of Edward Bulwer-Lytton

1803- Birthday of Edward Bulwer-Lytton an English novelist, poet, playwright, & politician. Theosophists Annie Besant & especially Helena Blavatsky incorporated his thoughts & ideas, from: ‘The Last Days of Pompeii’, ‘Vril’, ‘The Power of the Coming Race’ & my fav. ‘Zanoni’, in her own books. He coined the phrases “the great unwashed”,”pursuit of the almighty dollar”, “the pen is mightier than the sword”, “dweller on the threshold”, as well as the well-known opening line “It was a dark and stormy night”.

Porträt Wilhelm Jordan (1819 - 1904) | Europeana

1904 – Birthday of Wilhelm Jordan a German writer & politician, seen as “a precursor of Nietzsche and pioneer of Darwin in Germany”; Known for his books ‘mysterium’ Demiurgos & his translation of the Edda.

Sophia Community Circle – WEDNESDAY 2 JUNE 2021

We are She – She are We – Embodying Love in Wisdom with Hazel & Ultra-Violet Archer

9:30 am PT / 10:30 am MT / 11:30 am CT / 12:30 pm ET / 5:30 pm GMT / 6:30 pm CET

Inner Layers

Here is the podcast for HOLY SATURN DAY on ‘I Think Speech’

In the New Mysteries we follow the path of Rosicrucian/Christian initiation through Holy Week. With every step, from the recognition of the old atavistic Sun on Palm Sunday, through to the meeting of the Saturn-Spirit and The Harrowing of Hell, we sow healing seeds, sprouted in the blood of Christ, that spark the rising of the New Sun of Easter, within ourselves and in the Universe.

Each day of the week brings us in contact with the Wandering Stars, the Spiritual Beings of the planetary spheres, (Today is Saturn Day) this leads to a conquest of a corresponding layer in the interior of the earth. The Beatitudes are the spiritual weapon we must wield to fortify the development of self-determination in the human ego led by Christ, giving us the strength to make the darkness transparent. Like Christ, we must descend to ascend.   

Every year we have a chance to recapitulate the original Easter event. We rest on the Sabbath, Saturn-day – In Christo morimur – This is the Mystic-death or temple sleep of the initiate; remembering that In the Garden of Gethsemane – the midpoint of the earth, the epicenter of the cosmos – between the rocky hill of Golgotha, part of the lunar Mount Moriah, and it’s polar opposite the Solar Mount Zion, there was a New Tomb where the body of Christ rested, and yet it was the Oldest Tomb, for it was formerly a primal fissure, a gorge splitting Jerusalem in two, called by some Adam’s Grave –known as the gate to the underworld. 

The earthquakes of Good Friday and Holy Saturday tore open the original fissure.  As the veil of the Temple “was rent in twain”, vistas were opened into the interior of the earth. “He was lowered into the grave of the earth’, and so it was, that The Christ went into the Earth’s Interior, His blood becoming the medicine for our continued evolution. The darkness of Saturn is lit up from within by the Resurrected Sun. The Easter garden begins to bloom, so that our soul can behold, like the Magdalana before us, The Risen One as the gardener of the New Jerusalem.  

In ‘The Birth of a New Agriculture: Koberwitz 1924’ , we learn that the earth underwent a change through the deed of redemption on Golgotha, a transformation of the unruly Mars powers of rusty iron into the silvery light of Mercury. This transforming of iron thru the sacred mystery of the Christ-blood is a determining factor in the transformation of earthly substance, which will later be carried over into the transubstantiation of the earth. The spirit radiates from the heights and yet is also carried to us by the eternal divine world of the depths. ‘May there ascend from the Depths the prayer that is heard in the Heights’.  We can send our prayer to the Christ-heart in the earth’s depths, to help overcome and redeem the adversarial powers that hold sway in the nine layers of the earth’s interior. The agricultural course was a stepping stone to this ultimate aim.  

Spiritual science tells us that when the blood flowed into the earth from the cross on Golgotha, a new Sun-globe was born in the interior of the earth. This golden earth-center is the legendary land of Shambhalla, hidden away, yet waiting to be re-discovered by the seeking, Christ-guided human soul.   

The Tomb becomes the altar, a sacred place to commune with the gods – with the souls of the departed as our intermediaries. The tomb becomes the Round table, and the Parsifal question leads us to find Christ in the etheric.   

Before the mystery of Golgotha, the task of evolution was that the cosmos would become human, after this turning point, the human becomes cosmos -The New Sun -The imperishable resurrection-body uniting with the Cosmic- Sophia.  

Gerald Wagner

TODAY we continue our journey on the 8-Fold Path to Easter every morning of Holy Week, at 8 am PT / 9 am MT/ 10 am CT / 11 am ET / 3 pm UT / 4 pm CET for 30 minutes,

3 March Holy SATURDAY – with Nancy Poer – To pay attention to one’s ideas. – ‘RIGHT OPINION.’

*For the artistic part  please have a cookie sheet or large baking dish filled with half an inch of earth or ashes

Join Zoom Meeting https://zoom.us/j/95633444828?pwd=Wk56K08vK2dNQUhhK0Q2S09zQWJrQT09 Meeting ID: 956 3344 4828 – Passcode: bee

Dial by your location Find your local number: https://zoom.us/u/aX8X3nrr3 Meeting ID: 956 3344 4828 – Passcode: 425730

The octave of the New Sun
4 April EASTER SUNDAY – with Luicien Dante Lazar
To turn one’s gaze inwards – ‘RIGHT EXAMINATION.’

The mystery of icon-preserving bees

“Human Bee-ing at Easter Time”

Easter Sunday 4 April 2021, at 12 pm PT/1 pm MT/ 2 pm CT/ 3pm ET / 7 UT / 8 pm CET
Join Zoom Meeting https://zoom.us/j/7052931041?pwd=Z0ZmT05FdDZIclE4RFBLZWNwWXJ5QT09 
Meeting ID: 705 293 1041 – Passcode: Easter

Dial by your location – Meeting ID: 705 293 1041 – Passcode: 776400 – Find your local number: https://zoom.us/u/a961qZZhF

What can the bees teach us about consciously engaging with the Earth and deepening our inner festival life? And how does this inner festival life affect the beings all around us?

Let us discover the tasks of our time and journey with the Bee into her connection to the Earth, the Cosmos, and the Human Soul… during the Easter expansion.

This small ceremony will include artistic and meditative activity. Please have ready: some real honey and a spoon, a beeswax candle and matches, paper and colored pencils.

Zoom Host – Lisa Dalton

Group Eurythmy with Mary Ruud

Dottie Zold – On the Buddha’s 8-Fold Path

Logo for the Emerald Ark Sanctuary

Keynote with Ines Katharina Kinchen who makes her home at the , a small biodynamic initiative nestled in the in the Appalachian Mountains of eastern Tennessee, surrounded by the Cherokee National Forest. Here she lives with her son Marquise, tends to the bees, the animals and the land, and facilitates workshops.

Ines is a Resonance Medicine practitioner, a kindergarten teacher at the Asheville Waldorf School, and the founder of the Honeybee Habitat Project.

We close with singing with Lucien Dante Lazar & Eurythmy with Mary Ruud

Potluck Social Time in the Schreinerei – Please bring food & drink to share

$10 Suggested Donation (can’t make it? or joining us online? please consider supporting this event, Thank you)

Hazel Archer is inviting you to a scheduled Zoom meeting.

Topic: Easter Festival for the Elementals

Time: Apr 4, 2021 02:00 PM Central Time (US and Canada)

Join Zoom Meeting https://zoom.us/j/7052931041?pwd=Z0ZmT05FdDZIclE4RFBLZWNwWXJ5QT09 
Meeting ID: 705 293 1041 – Passcode: Easter

Dial by your location – Meeting ID: 705 293 1041 – Passcode: 776400 – Find your local number: https://zoom.us/u/a961qZZhF

For more info. or to volunteer to host one of the days contact Hazel Archer

Events & Festivals Committee of the Rudolf Steiner Branch

of The Anthroposophical Society, 4249 North Lincoln Ave.
Chicago, IL 60618 (map
https://donate.rschicago.org/ 

23 March 2021 – “Speaking with the Stars”

Image result for veil painting harrowing of hell
Harrowing of Hell on Holy Saturday

Rudolf Steiner’s Lectures on this day

ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY

1775 – American Revolutionary War: Patrick Henry delivers his speech – “Give me liberty, or give me death!” – at St. John’s Episcopal Church, Richmond, Virginia

1919 – In Milan, Italy, Benito Mussolini founds his Fascist political movement

1933 – The Reichstag passes the Enabling Act of 1933, making Adolf Hitler dictator of Germany

1938 – Deathday of Friedrich Rittelmeyer, a Protestant German minister, & theologian; friend of Rudolf Steiner; co-founder & driving force of The Christian Community. Growing up in Frankish Schweinfurt – his father was a Lutheran minister – it was already clear to him as a child that he wanted to go into a religious profession. From 1890 Rittelmeyer studied philosophy & Protestant theology. His teacher Oswald Külpe, encouraged him to write his dissertation on Friedrich Nietzsche.

He also went on a study trip to meet theologians & socially-engaged ministers of the time, as well as members of the Moravian Church. From 1895 to 1902 he was at the Stadtvikar in Würzburg. In 1903 he took up the preachership of Heilig-Geist-Kirche in Nuremberg. There he married Julie Kerler on 5 April 1904. Rittelmeyer worked & closely collaborated with Christian Geyer, the head preacher of the Sebalduskirche, together they produced two joint volumes of sermons. Around 1910 they both led discussions with the Bavarian church council on a liberal interpretation of the Bible.

Also in 1910 the Nuremberg school teacher Michael Bauer enabled Rittelmeyer to have his first encounter with Rudolf Steiner, the founder of anthroposophy. Rittelmeyer described the encounter & discussed Steiner’s personality & work in his book ‘Rudolf Steiner Enters my Life’:

“In earlier ages, the fact alone that such an all-embracing genius gave witness to Christ as being the greatest reality in earthly history, would have had a profound effect. But in Rudolf Steiner much more was present. One could put it like this: he comprehended all branches of learning so spiritually and so deeply, and he recognized Christ in such big and broad dimensions that eventually Christ shines forth as the true light in all spheres of life. He observed strictly the necessity for each sphere to form its own method according to its intrinsic laws. He never carried religion into anything from without. But he illuminated all realms of knowledge with such powerful light, that Christ became visible in it. A Christ, it is true, far greater than the Christ of the Churches; but a Christ related to the Bible and to the Christ of the early Christians.”

“Thus, he advanced the science of language to the point where it could understand why Christ is called ‘the Word’. Thus, he carried medicine to the point where medicine could understand again ‘the body of Christ’. Thus, he carried astronomy to the point where Christ became visible as the true ‘Light’…he taught how science could again become reverent and devout. He built a temple for all sciences, so high and so broad, that their servants could work in it without sacrificing an iota of their personal freedom or of the special characteristics of their province.  He united the learning of the age with Christ, and Christ with the learning of the age.”

In 1916 Rittelmeyer was sent to the Neue Kirche in Berlin, working as preacher there. He soon came to oppose the First World War & with 4 other Berlin theologians signed a proclamation of peace & understanding on the occasion of Reformation Day (October 1917).

In September 1922 he established the “Movement for Religious Revival” (Christengemeinschaft) Rittelmeyer acted as its first “Erzoberlenker” or Head Preiest, & from its base in Stuttgart was the leading envoy right up to his death.

Holy Tuesday

WORD FOR THE DAY-17MAR16 | Living Waters

Here is the podcast of HOLY TUESDAY on ‘I Think Speech as well as some reminisces from a few of his close friends & colleagues around the Deathday of Rudolf Steiner

You will find the recordings of The 8-Fold Path to Easter Here

Please join us for the rest of the Journey (see details below)

On the morning of Holy Tuesday Christ Jesus enters the city of Jerusalem with His disciples once more. The waves of applause & joyful enthusiasm have long since died away. Jesus is immersed in the tension of the impending completion of his ultimate mission, but He is still obedient to the Jewish Law fulfilling the sacred customs for the preparation of Passover. A hoovering mood predicts that He is the sacrifice to be offered. From day to day the powerful sense of His spiritual presence in the city has increased. The people’s confused antipathy is already surging up to Him as flames that will consume the sacrifice. Now the day of Mars has come & the conflict flares up in earnest.

Swords and Symbols

The crowd is mute; but their leaders full of anxiety speak volumes; their fears produce the hatred that fuels their attack, which they have been stoking for some time. Every hostile group in the powerful elite sends out assailants. One after the other they accost Him with their questions meant to trap & condemn him. What would otherwise be a blow in the face or a dragger-thrust takes the guise of questioning.

Jesus and taxes: Rendering to Caesar | Free Is Beautiful

First of all the members of the Jewish Sanhedrin approach- the High Priests, Scribes & Elders; asking Jesus what authority He has for His actions. They push Him to legalize Himself with the letter of the law, not understanding the spirit behind it all. Then come the Pharisees who put the insidious question: “Is it lawful to give tribute unto Caesar?” Others try to pin Him down by asking His opinion concerning the resurrection of the dead. Finally, a single question, intending to expose Him before all the people, asks which commandment He considers the most important of all.

Light Painting History | Light Painting Photography

These attacks, marking the outbreak of hostilities, are the proof of how strongly the Being of Christ was making itself felt – Stirring to the surface the darkness with his light. Just as dogs bark & bite only when they are afraid, so these alleged questions, which are arrows of hate, are the outcome of fear.

Sonhos, decepções e a força do amor de Deus - Congregação Missionária de  Santo Inácio de Antioquia

Jesus answers each of the four questions. (Interesting to see the parallel to the 4 questions asked at the Seder table today) But Christ Jesus doesn’t want to just dodge the blows aimed at Him; He accepts battle & fights back with weapons of the spirit. During the three previous years He has spoken to the people in poetic parables, & to the disciples in pictures of deep mystery. To His opponents He now speaks moral tales of conflict. He tells the Parable of the growers of the vineyard entrusted to them by the landowner; & how they refuse to surrender the harvest, instead they slay the owner’s messengers, & even his son. The elite opponents realize that they themselves are being called out. In fact, Jesus is spelling it all out that His enemies will indeed slay Him. His parable is a last endeavor to reach the souls of His enemies, to awaken them from their unconscious fear which causes them to have such hatred for what they do not know. A hope that they could be shocked into self-knowledge.

Light Vs Dark Painting by Szabolcs Bodo
Szabolcs Bodo

The pictures of the Tuesday of Holy Week, are relevant to every battle of light verses darkness. Goethe’s statement that world history is nothing but a continuous fight of fear against hope, touches the truth of this day. All opposition to the true Being of Christ, which is a hostility to the Spirit, has its root in deeply hidden weakness & fear. To approach the mystery of Love takes courage & strength. The battle is not only fought in the outer world. It must be met within ourselves. In each human soul, fear & courage, are mingled. ~from Luke 21: 5-38 & indications from Emil Bock

So interesting that this year Rudolf Steiner’s Deathday occurs on Holy Tuesday.

You are welcome to Join together on Zoom (link below) TODAY at 12pm PT/1 pm MT/ 2pm CT/ 3pm ET for a 30 minute Celebration of Life for Dr. Rudolf Joseph Lorenz Steiner (25 February 1861 – 30 March 1925)

During the call:

*  Welcome by Angela Foster. Bring a candle to light together if you will.

* Hazel Archer Ginsberg: Recollections from Wilhem Zeylmans van Emmichoven and Thoughts on The Representative of Humanity

* Timothy Kennedy: “Some of the Gifts of Rudolf Steiner’s Death”

*  Closing verse by Angela Foster

The ARC is inviting you to a scheduled Zoom meeting. Topic: March 30 Celebration for Rudolf Steiner Time: Tues March 30, 12pm PT/1 pm MT/ 2pm CT/ 3pm ET

Join Zoom Meeting – https://us02web.zoom.us/j/81463338523?pwd=UUdBUVBJeFh6eitoWURibzNIREVwQT09 – Meeting ID: 814 6333 8523 – Passcode: FSM

One tap mobile – Meeting ID: 814 6333 8523 – Passcode: 286512 – Find your local number: https://us02web.zoom.us/u/kctvcCLHg3

You will find the recordings of The 8-Fold Path to Easter Here

Please join us for the rest of the Journey

Em Síntese, em Si. | Um Sol Coração


The 8-Fold Path to Easter

Holy Week 2021 (March 28 – April 4): Starting on Palm Sunday & every morning of Holy Week, at 8 am PT / 9 am MT/ 10 am CT / 11 am ET / 3 pm UT / 4 pm CET for 30 minutes, including Easter Sunday, we will gather on zoom & endeavor 1st of all, to take turns sharing indications from Holy Week, the 7 rhythms of the Foundation Stone Meditation & Rudolf Steiner/The Buddha’s 8 –fold Path, known as the ‘Weekday Exercises’  (15-20 min) HOLY WEEK CHART

~hag

Zoom Host Lisa Dalton (President of the National Michael Chekhov Association)

28 March Palm SUNDAY – with Hazel Archer & Lisa Dalton
Resolves or ‘RIGHT JUDGMENT.’ having been formed independently of sympathies and antipathies.

29 March Holy MONDAY – with Speech Artist Christine Burke
Talking – ‘RIGHT WORD.’

30 March Holy TUESDAY – Rudolf Steiner’s Deathday – with Deborah Rogers
External actions- ‘RIGHT DEED.’

Also at 12pm PT/1 pm MT/ 2pm CT/ 3pm ET All are invited to join a 30 minute Festive Vigil for Rudolf Steiner In honor of the anniversary of his Birth into the Spiritual World 30 March 1925 (This is a separate zoom link from the one for Holy Week) Join Zoom Meeting
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/81463338523?pwd=UUdBUVBJeFh6eitoWURibzNIREVwQT09
Meeting ID: 814 6333 8523 – Passcode: FSM

31 March Holy WEDNESDAY – with Hazel Archer
The ordering of life. – ‘RIGHT STANDPOINT.’

1 April Maundy THURSDAY – with Lelan Harris
Human Endeavour. – ‘TO LET ALL THE EXERCISES BECOME A HABIT.

2 April Good FRIDAY – with Sally Greenberg
The endeavor to learn as much as possible from life. – ‘RIGHT MEMORY.’ (Remembering what has been learned from experiences).

3 March Holy SATURDAY – with Nancy Poer
To pay attention to one’s ideas. – ‘RIGHT OPINION.’

The octave of the New Sun
4 April EASTER SUNDAY – with Luicien Dante Lazar
To turn one’s gaze inwards – ‘RIGHT EXAMINATION.’

Whoever is holding the leading thoughts for that day will tie it into some artistic exercise based on the indications (15-20 min)

Group sharing (5 min)

Then you are welcome to join in to co-create a Thought–Seed with Hazel Archer – A group Thought-Form, a positive egregore, created by our Willed Visualization. We will use this Herbert Hahn verse as an anchor:

When I think light, my soul shines,
When my soul shines, the earth is a star,
When the earth is a star, then I am, a true human being

Group sharing (5 min)

We close with the ‘reversed’ Hahn verse.
I am a true human being
For the Earth is a star
The Earth is a star
When my soul shines
My soul shines
When I think light

Yes freinds, it’s a 30 minute Holy Week Touch in.

*Dear friends, we will open the zoom room at 9:50 am for social time & to give everyone a chance to get settled in so we can begin promptly at 10 am
Topic: The 8-Fold Path thru Holy Week 2021
Time: Starting on Palm Sunday Mar 28 – thru Easter Morning, 2021 10 AM Central Time (US and Canada)
Every day, 8 occurrence(s)
Mar 28, 2021 10AM
Mar 29, 2021 10AM
Mar 30, 2021 10AM
Mar 31, 2021 10AM
Apr 1, 2021 10AM
Apr 2, 2021 10M
Apr 3, 2021 10AM
Apr 4, 2021 10AM

Daily: https://zoom.us/meeting/tJErdOqsqj8iGNzL8iNTwKUXyrvmVGSSXqaW/ics?icsToken=98tyKuCtqDgpHtCRuBuPRowMBIjCb-jwiClHjY1HsEfsLRRESTbOL_BUP4RYI-vo

Join Zoom Meeting https://zoom.us/j/95633444828?pwd=Wk56K08vK2dNQUhhK0Q2S09zQWJrQT09 Meeting ID: 956 3344 4828 – Passcode: bee

Dial by your location Find your local number: https://zoom.us/u/aX8X3nrr3 Meeting ID: 956 3344 4828 – Passcode: 425730

The mystery of icon-preserving bees

“Human Bee-ing at Easter Time”

Easter Sunday 4 April 2021, at 12 pm PT/1 pm MT/ 2 pm CT/ 3pm ET / 7 UT / 8 pm CET
in person at the Rudolf Steiner Branch Chicago & online

Keynote with Ines Katharina Kinchen* – What can the bees teach us about consciously engaging with the Earth and deepening our inner festival life? And how does this inner festival life affect the beings all around us?

Let us discover the tasks of our time and journey with the Bee into her connection to the Earth, the Cosmos, and the Human Soul… during the Easter expansion.

This small ceremony will include artistic and meditative activity. Please have ready: some real honey and a spoon, a beeswax candle and matches, paper and colored pencils.

Zoom Host – Lisa Dalton

Group Eurythmy with Mary Ruud

Dottie Zold – On the Buddha’s 8-Fold Path

Logo for the Emerald Ark Sanctuary

Ines Katharina Kinchen makes her home at the Emerald Ark Sanctuary, a small biodynamic initiative nestled in the in the Appalachian Mountains of eastern Tennessee, surrounded by the Cherokee National Forest. Here she lives with her son Marquise, tends to the bees, the animals and the land, and facilitates workshops. Ines is a Resonance Medicine practitioner, a kindergarten teacher at the Asheville Waldorf School, and the founder of the Honeybee Habitat Project.

We close with the ‘Rock Spring Wonder’ in story & Eurythmy with Mary Ruud

Potluck Social Time in the Schreinerei – Please bring food & drink to share

$10 Suggested Donation (can’t make it? or joining us online? please consider supporting this event, Thank you)

Hazel Archer is inviting you to a scheduled Zoom meeting.

Topic: Easter Festival

Time: Apr 4, 2021 02:00 PM Central Time (US and Canada)

Join Zoom Meeting https://zoom.us/j/7052931041?pwd=Z0ZmT05FdDZIclE4RFBLZWNwWXJ5QT09 
Meeting ID: 705 293 1041 – Passcode: Easter

Dial by your location – Meeting ID: 705 293 1041 – Passcode: 776400 – Find your local number: https://zoom.us/u/a961qZZhF

For more info. Festivals Coordinator Hazel Archer

Events & Festivals Committee of the Rudolf Steiner Branch

of The Anthroposophical Society, 4249 North Lincoln Ave.
Chicago, IL 60618 (map
https://donate.rschicago.org/ 

A Letter to Kore from Demeter –

Demeter and Persephone | Etsy

Listen on ‘I Think Speech’ to Demeter’s Letter to Kore

Dear daughter – Yes, the dark red pomegranate seeds have made you more than Maiden. A dusky stain of transformation marks you with a new tattoo – a karmic calling card for your own re-birth. Mother to yourself.

The Daily Oracle: Friday April 12th – Joanna-Kate Grant

In this stark emergent great time of turning, Persephone – your new name – is your teacher. She who is ever seeking wholeness from out the belly of the Underworld; willingly suffering its trials & lessons, to test, & come to know Herself – to emerge in the fullness of true Being.

Persephone, Queen of the Underworld | Smite Amino
Janaina Mederious

By dark travails, the light is honed. You return to life, sleepy maiden no longer, but Goddess & Queen in your own right – able to discern & strategize destinies web.

PERSEPHONE RETURNS Oil Painting By Dana Zivanovits | absolutearts.com
Dana Zivanovits

You must find the full range of your nature, both the shadow & light – the horror & beauty. As you emerge from this cyclic trek into the Underworld of your karmic shadow-side, you follow Persephone’s example – You become powerful & wise -ready to embrace the full scope of your humanity, adding to your life experiences; & in doing so, you are a child no more, but a sovereign human being. In charge of knowing when to wield the sword – either for benediction or slaughter as the case may be – Ready to receive the consequences & divine messages from every action & reaction, every non-action which pricks you into fuller consciousness.  By your trials & lessons your fruit ripens & matures in its season – able to bear the burden you have wrought – with forgiveness & mercy.

Persephone Paintings | Fine Art America
Kerry Smithe

Whatever Joy or pain you feel, or burden or responsibility you carry, from your ever sprouting fate-full life-story, know that it conveys you to another evolutionary cusp, ever higher, ever awakening. You need not be trapped by a forgetful, carefree slumber that no longer serves; instead you can use the twists & turns of woke dreaming – to graduate from naiveté, thru stark reality, to a willed destiny of your own making.  An organic fuel made from a compost that you consciously regulate for your journey of soul, to help you step with grace from phase to phase, rising & falling & ever emerging into a Spring of fresh new beginnings, a Summer of purpose & action; an Autumn of applied plenty, fortifying you for a regal Winter.

loumargi | Hekate, Goddess of the underworld, Hecate

As Mother & Crone I release the fruited seeds of experience to let them fly into the future as they will. Humanity’s long Winter of soul must end. The ancestors’ stories must become the descendant’s wisdom. What comes next will be of your own choosing & making.

Persephone - Original Oil Painting — Kristina Carroll Art
Kristena Carrol

Let your sufferings be the fertilizer that feeds your new growth, & let your joy draw your hungry limbs upward to embrace life. Trust yourself. Trust each other. Begin again, & again & ever again…

Demeter welcomes Persephone's Return - Painting Dreams
Wendy Andrews

Love is who you are – Go be you –

Xox ~mom

24 March 2021 – “Speaking with the Stars”: The bright gibbous Moon shines upper right of Leo’s Sickle asterism in early evening.

Persephone / Persephone, Feb 2021 | Susquehanna Art Museum
 Elody Gyekis

Rudolf Steiner’s Lectures on this day

ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY

Angels and Annunciation Paintings and Art
Edward Burne-Jones

Steiner’s Calendar of the Soul names this day as the Feast of the Archangel Gabriel, opening the way for the Annunciation of the Blessed Virgin Mary tomorrow 25 March.

These days around the Vernal Equinox are quite powerful. We can find many potent souls who choose this time of year to either enter the portal of birth or cross the threshold into death. Here is simply a list from the Calendar of the Soul for you to contemplate:

19 March:

  • Feast Day of Joseph, husband of the Luke Mary
  • Birthday of Mary of Bethany, also called Mary Madgdala, sister of Lazarus in the Gospel of St. John
  • Deathday of Sophie von Kuhn, bride of Novalis

20 March:

  • Birthday of the Roman Poet Ovid, best known for ‘Metamorphoses’, a mythological narrative written in the meter of epic.
  • Birthday of Holderlin. Steiner speaks of him as a pupil of Plato
  • Henrik Ibsen. Steiner calls him a 4th Century initiate
  • Deathday of Joachim of Fiore, abbot & mystic
  • Deathday of Hermann von Salza, Grand Master of the Teutonic Knights

21 March:

  • Feast Day (also the birth & deathday) of St. Nicholas of Flue, who foresaw his baptism in the womb.
  • Birthday of Johann Sabastian Bach
  • Birthday of Eugen Kolisko, Anthroposophical Doctor & teacher
  • Deathday of St. Benedict of Nursia
  • Deathday of Theosophist Willian Quan Judge

22 March:

  • Birthday of Fercher von Steinwand, who Steiner talks about in his autobiography as helping revel karmic connections; ie. Dionysius Areopagita
  • Deathday of Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, sculptor, poet, scientist, who Steiner called a follower of Plato & gave indications that he was connected to Moses.

23 March

  • Mabel Collins Spring Festival: I See Death, is performed in ceremony
  • Birthday of Georg Friedrich Handel, comper
  • The birth of the Swiss Federal Constitution
  • Deathday of Friedrich Rittelmeyer

24 March

  • Feast day of Archangel Gabriel
  • Deathday of Caliph of Baghdad Harun al-Rashid, the successors of Gondhishapur, who possessed the remnants of brilliance, found their way to his great court in the 9th century. According to Rudolf Steiner, Harun al-Rashid incarnated again as Francis Bacon of Verulam in England & became the great inspirer & popularizer of materialistic science. One of Bacon’s important achievements was the invention of binary code now used in computers-an inspiration from the Sorat -an early step to the World Wide Web, that if not used consciously, is meant to entangle & enslave us…
  • Deathday of Queen Elizabeth
  • Deathday of Jules Vern

25 March

  • The Annunciation of the BVM
  • Deathday of Novalis
  • Deathday of Debussy

***

8 Rights: The Noble Eightfold Path — the Heart of the Buddha's Teaching -  Buddha Weekly: Buddhist Practices, Mindfulness, Meditation

Dear Friends – 28 March is Palm Sunday which begins Holy Week 2021. I invite your particapation in our journey to Easter. If you would like to help hold one of the days of the week, to offer up an artistic activity aligned with one of the virtues of the day, Please contact me.

Daniel Ospina


The 8-Fold Path to the Easter Elementals

Holy Week 2021 (March 28 – April 4): Starting next week on Palm Sunday & every morning of Holy Week, for 30 minutes, including Easter Sunday, we will gather on zoom & endeavor 1st of all, to take up the 10:10 practice of building up positive imaginations on the inner planes as a counterforce to the adversarial energies working in the world – To co-create, what Dion Fortune named as a “key-call” to the Spiritual Powers, like Raphael, The Healing Archangel of Spring, to enlist their aid. We will use a verse by Herbert Hahn as an anchor for a group Thought-Form, a positive egregore, created by our Willed Visualization– to be conceived each day at 10:10 AM Central Time:

When I think light, my soul shines,
When my soul shines, the earth is a star,
When the earth is a star, then I am, a true human being

Our Good Will becomes a cosmic energy field for healing – We will plant Seed ideas in the group mind of humanity, to co-create our highest intentions for cosmic & human evolution– that the Earth may become a Sacred Planet – a Sun – & every Human Being a Star. What is sown in our shining thoughts will grow & bear seed

& then we will take turns sharing the indications for that day from ‘The Buddha’s Noble 8–fold Path, as given by Rudolf Steiner – known as the ‘Weekday Exercises’ this CHART brings the indications from Holy Week, the 7 rhythms of the Foundation Stone Meditation & the weekday exercises together. Whoever is holding the leading thoughts for that day can if they wish, tie it into some 5-10 min. artistic exercise based on the indications.

Let me know if you would like to lead one of the days?

28 March Palm SUNDAY
Resolves or ‘RIGHT JUDGMENT.’ having been formed independently of sympathies and antipathies.

29 March Holy MONDAY
Talking – ‘RIGHT WORD.’

30 March Holy TUESDAY – Rudolf Steiner’s Deathday*
External actions- ‘RIGHT DEED.’

*Also at 12pm PT/1 pm MT/ 2pm CT/ 3pm ET All are invited to join a 30 minute Festive Vigil for Rudolf Steiner In honor of the anniversary of his Birth into the Spiritual World 30 March 1925 – Details coming soon

(Here is the separate zoom link ) Join Zoom Meeting
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/81463338523?pwd=UUdBUVBJeFh6eitoWURibzNIREVwQT09
Meeting ID: 814 6333 8523 – Passcode: FSM

31 March Holy WEDNESDAY
The ordering of life. – ‘RIGHT STANDPOINT.’

1 April Maundy THURSDAY
Human Endeavour. – ‘TO LET ALL THE EXERCISES BECOME A HABIT.

2 April Good FRIDAY
The endeavor to learn as much as possible from life. – ‘RIGHT MEMORY.’ (Remembering what has been learned from experiences).

3 March Holy SATURDAY
To pay attention to one’s ideas. – ‘RIGHT OPINION.’

The octave of the New Sun
4 April EASTER SUNDAY
To turn one’s gaze inwards – ‘RIGHT EXAMINATION.’

Whoever is holding the leading thoughts for that day will tie it into some 5-10 min. artistic exercise based on the indications

Group sharing (5 min)

We close with the ‘reversed’ Hahn verse.
I am a True Human Being
For the Earth is a Star
The Earth is a Star
When I Think Light
When I think Light
My Soul Shines

So it’s a Short & Sweet – 30 minute Holy Week touch in. And Yes, Rudolf Steiner’s Deathday falls on Holy Tuesday this year so we will have a separate short vigil celebrating his birth into the spiritual world at 2 pm Central time (details coming soon)

*Dear friends, please join the call at 10:05 am to get settled in so we can begin the Thought-Seed promptly at 10:10 am
Topic: The 8-Fold Path thru Holy Week 2021
Time: Starting on Palm Sunday Mar 28 – thru Easter Morning, 2021 10:10 AM Central Time (US and Canada)
Every day, 8 occurrence(s)
Mar 28, 2021 10:10 AM
Mar 29, 2021 10:10 AM
Mar 30, 2021 10:10 AM
Mar 31, 2021 10:10 AM
Apr 1, 2021 10:10 AM
Apr 2, 2021 10:10 AM
Apr 3, 2021 10:10 AM
Apr 4, 2021 10:10 AM

Daily: https://zoom.us/meeting/tJErdOqsqj8iGNzL8iNTwKUXyrvmVGSSXqaW/ics?icsToken=98tyKuCtqDgpHtCRuBuPRowMBIjCb-jwiClHjY1HsEfsLRRESTbOL_BUP4RYI-vo

Join Zoom Meeting https://zoom.us/j/95633444828?pwd=Wk56K08vK2dNQUhhK0Q2S09zQWJrQT09 Meeting ID: 956 3344 4828 – Passcode: bee

Dial by your location Find your local number: https://zoom.us/u/aX8X3nrr3 Meeting ID: 956 3344 4828 – Passcode: 425730

Festival: Easter Elementals – 4 April 2021, at 12pm PT/1 pm MT/ 2pm CT/ 3pm ET
in person at the Rudolf Steiner Branch Chicago & online

Group Eurythmy with Mary Ruud

Dottie Zold – On the Buddha’s 8-Fold Path

Keynote with Ines Katharina Kinchen, Bee Guardian, Emerald Ark Biodynamic Sanctuary 

We close with singing & Eurythmy

Potluck Social Time in the Schreinerei – Please bring food & drink to share

$10 Suggested Donation (can’t make it? or joining us online? please consider supporting this event, Thank you)

Hazel Archer is inviting you to a scheduled Zoom meeting.

Topic: Easter Festival for the Elementals

Time: Apr 4, 2021 02:00 PM Central Time (US and Canada)

Join Zoom Meeting https://zoom.us/j/7052931041?pwd=Z0ZmT05FdDZIclE4RFBLZWNwWXJ5QT09 
Meeting ID: 705 293 1041 – Passcode: Easter

Dial by your location – Meeting ID: 705 293 1041 – Passcode: 776400 – Find your local number: https://zoom.us/u/a961qZZhF

For more info. or to volunteer to host one of the days contact Hazel Archer

Events & Festivals Committee of the Rudolf Steiner Branch

of The Anthroposophical Society, 4249 North Lincoln Ave.
Chicago, IL 60618 (map
https://donate.rschicago.org/ 

Tall Tale

License plate Paul Bunyan and Babe the... - Art of Noah Sanders | Facebook
Noah Sanders

A Tall Tale on the ‘I Think Speech’ podcast – Greetings friends on this eve of St. Patrick’s Day, Today for ‘Tune-in Tuesday’ – my weekly musing for our Practice Group working with the 6Basic, Essential, Protective exercises, given to us by Rudolf Steiner, in honor of the 5th exercise of Open-mindedness, I thought to share a ‘Tall Tale’ revised by me for us today, but originally told 6 years ago when my daughter was still at the Chicago Waldorf School, by master teacher Carol Triggiano, known far & wide as a fabulous storyteller – Open-mindedness asks us to consider that anything is possible. So here is a wonderful Paul Bunyan Tall Tale.

The crescent Moon A 12-percent-lit Moon hangs in the sky the evening of March 16, showing off Mare Crisium on its eastern side. NASA’s Scientific Visualization Studio

16 March 2021 – “Speaking with the Stars”: Bella Luna passes south of Uranus at 9 pm CST. Our satellite, less than four days old & only 12 percent lit an hour after sunset, currently straddles the border between Cetus & Aries. Just visible along the lit lunar edge is Mare Crisium, the Sea of Crises. On its western side are two small craters: Pierce to the south & Swift to the north. And north of the mare’s rim is the large crater Cleomedes, which stands out in stark relief now but will begin to disappear as the Moon grows closer to Full, losing contrast along the way.

Gerard Wagner | Art, Painting, Wagner
Gerald Wagner

Rudolf Steiner’s Lectures on this day

ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY

10 Cathars ideas | cathar, albigensian crusade, pure ones

1244 – Over 200 Cathars who refuse to recant are burned to death after the Fall of Montségur.

Image result for Johanna von Keyserlingk

1966 – Death Day of Countess Johanna von Keyserlingk

Johanna von Keyserlingk: Vessel for the Etheric Christ | Christian  communities, Rudolf steiner, Rudolf
Johanna von Keyserlingk: Vessel for the Etheric Christ

Humanity is ripe for ‘the Christ experience’ such as Paul had in Damascus. Johanna von Keyserlingk, the hostess of the conference in Koberwitz in 1924 where biodynamic agriculture was born, was one such person. Inwardly she was also the hostess of powerful spiritual observations. She shared these insights in books such ‘Gralburg’ (Grail Castle, about the Hermitage near the Goetheanum in Bern Switzerland) ‘Twelve days around Rudolf Steiner’ (about her time with Rudolf Steiner during the Agriculture course on her estate) her insights into The mystery of Kaspar Hauser & Lord Stanhope, & power of the Palladium. The trip to Byzantium – The Palladium of Victory. But mostly her life was very  secret, & she endured a lot of suffering.

As an 8-year-old girl of noble birth, while walking with her governess in the Vienna Woods in 1887, meets a thin, 26-year-old man, with dark hair & powerful eyes, who looks at her with a penetrating gaze. This meeting lives & works in her until, as the 39-year-old countess, she meets a 56-year-old man towards the end of the 1st World War. She had already attended 2 of his lectures & read some of his books. After this meeting she is able to speak with him in private. He asks her where she was at the age of 8. After some thought, she comes to nothing but the place – Breslau, where she lived then. But he shakes his head, apparently he means something else with his question. Johanna has more conversations with him & six months later he repeats the question. Then she suddenly remembers the young man in the Vienna Woods who had looked at her with wonderful eyes. This man was, of course, Rudolf Steiner.

On March 26, 1879, on the threshold of the beginning of the new Michael era, Johanna was born in Brno. Her father, which she described as a true despot, was the son of Scottish nobility -Karl von Skene. He eneded up in Silesia via Austria & married her future mother, Klara Schoeller, who came from a family of industrialists. Together with 3 brothers (Karl, Philipp & Robert) she lived near her father’s estates.

Her clairvoyant powers were revealed early on, which was not unusual in her father’s Celtic line. These experiences made her both lonely & independent at an early age. Not understood by people in her environment, she often sought comfort in nature, in the park near ancient trees, & there she had contact with elemental spirits.

About this period she wrote: “I remember very well that as a small child I could look at the window between the bars of my bed and see the sun rise in the morning and that I experienced the sun as what other children see as their mother and father. I know also, that the other children I played with often chased me    when I correctly predicted the death of an adult as if it were self-evident. However, when I noticed that not even my mother saw what I perceived spiritually in my environment, I kept silent.”  

At the end of her teens, she became involved with Kant’s philosophy, with Angelus Silesius & with the poet Hölderlin. In 1899 she was 21 years old, she married Count Carl Wilhelm von Keyserlingk, & had 3 boys: Wolfgang (1900), & a boy (1902) who soon died & Adalbert (1905). They went to live in Klettendorff, not far from Breslau. Later this became the castle Koberwitz (1920), partly on the advice of Steiner.

Because of her devoted son Adalbert, most of the memoirs & notes were made public, but only after Johanna died at the age of 87 (March 16, 1966 in Bad Teinach). With intimate friends such as Rudolf Meyer (who lived in Koberwitz for 3 years), Emil Bock, Friedrich Rittelmeyer, Eliza von Moltke, Margarita Woloschina & Monica von Miltitz, she already shared her experiences & her confidential conversations with Steiner during her life.

When she was 28, Johanna went thru a painful phase in her life. She was sick in bed due to an entopic pregnancy, which almost killed her. What she experienced was that some sort of strange individuality wanted to incarnate in her.

“When I had been given up by the doctors and felt that my life force was leaving me, I suddenly saw a shining figure next to the bed, from which a penetrating force emanated.”

And the first words she was able to speak after this experience were:

“Me and my house want to serve the Lord; for I have experienced what the captain of Capernaum experienced.” (And when Jesus entered Capernaum, a centurion came to Him, imploring Him, 6and saying, “Lord, my servant is lying paralyzed at home, fearfully tormented.” 7Jesus said to him, “I will come and heal him.” 8But the centurion said, “Lord, I am not worthy for You to come under my roof, but just say the word, and my servant will be healed. 9“For I also am a man under authority, with soldiers under me; and I say to this one, ‘Go!’ and he goes, and to another, ‘Come!’ and he comes, and to my slave, ‘Do this!’ and he does it.” 10Now when Jesus heard this, He marveled and said to those who were following, “Truly I say to you, I have not found such great faith with anyone in Israel. 11“I say to you that many will come from east and west, and recline at the table with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven; 12but the sons of the kingdom will be cast out into the outer darkness; in that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.” 13And Jesus said to the centurion, “Go; it shall be done for you as you have believed.” And the servant was healed that very moment. ~ Matthew 8:5-10)

“When I heard from the doctors that there was no more salvation for me, which I had already experienced myself, I knew: now I will reach the goal of my life, the Christ. Either in death or in the spirit world. White starlight was around me, and I was thinking of the fevered son of Capernaum’s chieftain. Science dawned on me: when you now see the Christ, he can also restore earth life to you. There were energies buzzing next to me and a fire figure appeared next to my bed. Such strength emanated from him that I believed I could not bear it. It was like over-tensioning the atmosphere because of the pressing of the ether. I felt as if that would tear me apart and heard the words: Go, your faith has helped you …

It was a very white silence around me, and glittering life entered me from there. The pains were gone. The doctor came and assumed that this condition was agony. But life continued to shine, and when my husband asked what had happened, I could only say that in the New Testament he had to seek out the healing of Capernaum. As of this hour, there was only a common solution for us. Me and my house want to serve the Lord. My illness was gone and life took a different direction. But as bright was the light that I had seen, so dark was the time I had to live in the following years. It was like I was going to die. For years now I had experienced the terrible of death in all phases.”

Her brow bone, which was just above the root of the nose, literally shattered. Years later, bone splinters that had grown out had to be removed using tweezers. With the forehead chakra released in this radical way, her clairvoyant experiences increased in number & intensity.

What is expressed in this event? Perhaps people who are associated with Christ on earth had a role to play in preparing for His return in the etheric starting in the 20th century; a karmic bond that is revealed in this time of the Second Coming. Rudolf Steiner talked about the youth of Nain, who was raised from the dead by Christ & so was initiated into a task for the future of humanity. Steiner also pointed out the connection between the resurrected Lazarus John & the teacher of humanity, Christian Rosenkreutz. This is also the time when Steiner describes Christ becoming the Lord of karma.

At the ‘Turning Point of Time’ the apostles gathered by Christ were the 1st to be inaugurated in this new impulse, there must be anthroposophers starting in the 30’s & into our time now that are able to receive the inspiration of Christ, now as Lord of Karma. Anthroposophy wants to be a movement of people who work to restore their karma. Steiner tells us: Spiritual science “imposes enormous responsibility upon us, for it prepares for the concrete event of the reappearance of Christ.”

It is known that Steiner took actual people as examples for some of the characters in his mystery dramas. Perhaps Johanna was the model for Theodora?

According to Steiner, Johanna had an awakened consciousness that would become normal perhaps a 1000 years in the future! Perhaps this ‘premature birth’ was what caused her much pain in her life…? And yet, Steiner called the figure next to the sick bed of Johanna the Christ power.

In one of the conversations with Steiner, he also warned that Johanna was facing great Luciferic dangers, but that she had special qualities  – the iron of Mars, that could protect her from this. He called her ‘the Iron Countess’.

In 1915, Johanna started to write down a series of imaginations  that she received. This lead to a book that describes the fortunes of a grail knight going through a mental training: the book Gralburg. In the preface she writes the following about it:

In these imaginations my own experience in full reality passes by. It is lived more real than earthly events are experienced. As the images are there, that’s how I experienced them. Often the images and words sounded strange and inexplicable, I did not understand them and I do not understand much of them nowadays, but I could not change anything, because I wanted to stay with the truth. Often the end of an image was added as an explanation only after years. Real spirit beings met the spirit student, and they addressed him in real words. These spiritual words have actually been spoken to him.

As far as I can judge, these things have lived in the astral. The astral, however, takes place in the interior of the earth in the direction of midnight. This astral is invisible in itself and fine visible form force expresses itself in the periphery of the earth, in the ether world. That which happens invisibly in the depths, is imprinted in the ether and comes to visibility, and what I saw there I wrote down.

This book cannot be judged by a literary standard. I wrote it down for myself and I don’t feel the need for others to read it. If it were just me, I would put it in a desk drawer; and then it can be read after my death or not. And when I am asked now, yes, why do you spend it anyway, then I can only answer – not for my sake, but so that the others hear of the figure so lovingly striding through the hall.

Imagine a fine brilliance of tender sunlight
flowing from his soul
Imagine a pair of warm eyes, so full of love
that you start to glow, and you kneel
Imagine a mouth from which truth springs
as if from a deep source the deity itself arises,
it sounds so beautiful, that forever
you would like to listen to this voice in reverence.

Imagine his hands caressing your hair
with a gesture that heals all suffering.
Yes, under their light springs the new life we seek!
Imagine a ruler striding like this
and highest heavenly threads are for him
and where his foot goes is light
that shows us the right way.
Do you see his garment shining from afar
then the fire starts to burn in your heart,
it is so beautiful that you cannot comprehend it.

And he sees your suffering
and he approaches you
which makes your heart completely still.
And gently, like the song of angelic children,
the air that blows towards you is so lovely.

You can put your head on his knee in quiet humility
and deep peace comes into you.
The sun radiates from his holy body
and sun flows over your mind,
and you see jubilantly in the golden distance,
your homeland, where he draws you.

Later she adds to this hymn : “At the sight of the Nazarene standing before me, written down in a short moment”.

Through the book: Koberwitz 1924, Geburtsstunde einer neuen Landwirtschaft, “moment of birth of a new agriculture”, many people learn the name of the Keyserlingk family. At the time, Koberwitz was an estate owned by the family, near Breslau.

At Pentecost in 1924, a gathering took place here in the penultimate year before Rudolf Steiner’s untimely death, to which many attendees have fond memories. From the descriptions of the different souls you can get the feeling that there was a true cosmopolitan Pentecostal Spirit. As the title of the book indicates, this was also the time and place where the birth of biodynamic agriculture can be situated.

But more happened there in the days of June 7-17, 1924. For example, it was the first time the Johani Epistle was pronounced at the altar, during the Christian Consecration Service (established 2 years earlier). The impression arises that in Koberwitz a successful meeting between the royal & the priestly streams took place. In total there were 120 people, many with an agricultural background, but also many who attended, for example, the evening lectures on karma or the Eurythmy performances, such as Eliza von Moltke, Rittelmeyer, Bock, Wachsmuth, Koschützki, Marie Steiner, Vreede & many others. So these days were busy with all kinds of activities. It was later discovered that at night Steiner wrote whole parts of his autobiography, which appeared shortly afterwards in the weekly Das Goetheanum & were later compiled into My Way of Life, he also received & answered countless mail correspondences.

In addition to a number of eurhythmy performances & esoteric hours, karma lectures were also held in Breslau in the evening. In addition, a large number of people had personal conversations with Steiner. It is therefore surprising to hear that Steiner, who made an extremely tired impression on arrival, gradually became more vital. From those 12 special days around Rudolf Steiner arose many personal memories of a number of participants.

Here’s a good example of ‘how karma works’. In principle, the course was only intended for people with an agricultural background. Young Wilhelm Rath, as one of the initiators of the youth movement, passed by Koberwitz alone to deliver a package to Steiner, some notes by Walter Johannes Stein, in which he describes his own spiritual experiences for Rudolf Steiner. The state post is not the appropriate means for distributing such documents so WJ Stein asked Rath to hand them over personally. Because of this, Rath was then allowed to attend the entire Steiner course, although Wachsmuth wanted to deny him that at first. This later turns out to be an important turning point in his professional work,

The book Koberwitz 1924 not only gives a nice impression of the conference but also of Johanna herself. We read that she played a harmonium for the guests, that she & her husband were the perfect hosts & that she personally took care of the flowers & plants in the castle park. The Staff loved her. A chambermaid, who also wrote a contribution in the book singing her praises.

A life motto for the count’s couple was: Founding places of love and peace, where the Christ can be resurrected – this was engraved on a memorial for Steiner after he died.

The image of a fairytale-like white mosque with a minaret appeared before Johanna’s eye, & she heard the word Bosphorus. According to her, this was the answer to a question she had been dealing with for a long time. It was 1925 & Rudolf Steiner had already died. Later on Christmas 1925, she was with severe pneumonia in Sonnenhof in Arlesheim, where Ita Wegman nursed her. There, Mieta Waller asked her if she could use her clairvoyance to help find the Palladium in Constantinople. After all, legend tells that Emperor Constantine buried the Palladium under a large column. This question was the start of a long search that would be continued by her son Adalbert.

The Palladium has been called the greatest solar gem on Earth by Steiner, & world development depends on whether this underground sun-sanctuary is illuminated by “the sun of the west” – the new light of human thought. A truly cryptic description! Especially since Steiner also indicated that it would be an object buried somewhere. The comparison can then be made between the physically present cup of the last supper & the transcendental grail.

She made a trip to Constantinople, to Hagia Sophia & experienced all kinds of things that are described in a diary, including that she had seen this mosque in the image of the ghost. Physical indications & images not yet understood alternated. However, the Palladium was not found. It is questionable whether the Palladium might have been found spiritually. However, she said, this cannot be discussed it is “a question for the future”.

In the Achmedie Imperial Palace, she received gruesome images inscribed in the ether of the Council of Constantinople in 869 AD. She recognized ahrimanic inspirations. Steiner often spoke of this council where the “spirit” of the human being was abolished. She experienced what Steiner called a second Golgotha ​​& the moment when the karma of the people began to become disordered.

In Hagia Sophia, however, she experienced the luminous presence of Christ & of of Michael, as the sunrise of a new dawn.

It is a risk when people make statements about what they consider to be their previous incarnations. Because the chance of mistakes & projection of wishes is high & the reader may be led astray by such incorrect information. It was therefore not Johanna’s aim that the relevant notes of her own research in her diaries would be made public during her lifetime. She did, however, discuss it with Steiner & her son Adalbert. He decided to publish the notes after her death, fully aware of the problems that this could entail.

In 1922 she visited a forest in Rawitz where she had been as a child. “When I arrived, the spirits of the trees and shrubs on this familiar road back started to speak to me, to my surprise. But what they told me this time was not pleasant to me. They told me: “You are free now, you have to deliver us, we are bound to these trees.” And they added, I had tied them to this place myself in a past life. I said to them, “Your trees are not old at all, how can I have met you before?” But they answer: Our fathers were already here, and in them our spirits have inherited themselves. – You shouldn’t leave until you deliver us”.

It is then explained to her how she could accomplish this salvation by making 3 crosses on the trunk while invoking the Father, Son & Holy Spirit. So she does this & from each one a strip of light is released, which then, according to her observation, dissolves in the light of Christ.

Shortly before, she had had “images” in the same environment of a man who lived several hundred years ago, who loved to be in nature & had conversations with nature spirits. She had the impression that the man was also involved in magic. He spoke to her : “I am glad that you are here, I have also come to see you. You must carry on with the work that I have begun. I will show you what happened here, and you must then free what I have banned. “

It is characteristic of Johanna that she told Steiner this kind of experience. She was not yet sure about the meaning. Steiner confirmed that this man with faustic traits was a previous incarnation of hers. He had banished the elemental beings in the trees. That is why she now had to free them herself.

In an earlier conversation where Eliza von Moltke was also present, Steiner had said, “The countess once experienced that earth life is spiritual death.” Without Steiner’s help, she probably wouldn’t have come to these insights.

A central theme with Johanna that she always discussed with Steiner (she has had about twenty-eight apprenticeships with him) is Shamballah or the golden land, as she calls it. She related that to the moment when the blood of Christ flowed into the earth initiating a new solar globe. She saw out of the earth’s core, a golden fire in the earth’s depth. Like Ptolemy she called this the primal sun. This connected her with Empedocles who plunged into the fire of Mount Etna.

She described it in the following way in a question to Steiner: “…originally there was the fire and the light. These lived together in a deep harmony. Then the light rejected the power of the fire, and the smoke, which could no longer rise in the light, returned and covered the fire, and so the primeval fire was covered with a layer of ash. This axis is the mineral of the Earth. At first people saw through it to their primal home, the primal sun, but the earth became more and more dense and the smoke darkened more and more. Man seemed to be separated from the primeval sun (which is paradise) by the mineral layer. With this primeval sun which has been revived by the Christ, man must try to unite again.”

Steiner confirmed to her that this primordial sun is also the land of Shamballah, where the initiates of all time took their inspiration and what will become visible to all people in the future. It is closely related to the etheric second coming of the Christ & His work on a new heaven & a new earth in which people can play an active role.

Steiner spoke repeatedly of the Iron Count & Countess, not only because the Koberwitz land which was iron rich. He wanted Johanna to conquer & free her clairvoyance with her iron will, which was linked to her innate clairvoyance, & also from her dependence on Steiner’s influence. Before she met Steiner, Johanna had a life where everything came to her. Spiritual guidance had provided for her fortunes. This would change soon.

They were able to remain in Koberwitz for  4years after 1924. A movement started immediately on several fronts, reinforced after Steiner’s death in 1925, that came to destroy the new biodynamic impulse. The fertilizer industry, including IG Farben, felt threatened by this new impulse. They wanted to buy a booklet describing the agricultural course for a large sum of money. But Carl declined, partly because it was decided to test it in practice before the course content is published. In the company where Carl worked with several co-owners, tensions grew & he had to leave the field in 1928. They also left Koberwitz. Shortly after, he died en route to Dornach. According to Johanna because of a broken heart.

Not much is known about her life after that, except that it was difficult. In 1941 she was captured by the Gestapo, who interrogated her for days. She saw a figure next to the German officer who was closely following what was being said. But she was not tempted to give in to this demonic being. Unfortunately it is not known how Johanna experienced the years 1933-1945.

After 1945 she could no longer stay in Poland & fled to the west where she ended up in Stuttgart, completely destitute & incognito. In 1949 the book Koberwitz was published as a private edition. In the years before her death she went blind.

Just before this book went to press, I learned that a group of people is publishing At this time she wrote about Kaspar Hauser. She also wrote about her relationship with Steiner after his death: “While during the life of Rudolf Steiner one could still live in the sphere of his personal closeness without great effort, it was no longer possible after his death. After the death hour of 1925, there were still encounters in the astral for me. But I think that this is happening more and more at a distance. Was the atmosphere of the earth obscured by what was preparing for threats there in Germany? We were alone, as if deserted. It was as if there was an impenetrable dark night in the otherwise bright atmosphere”.

This shows how difficult it was to hold the Pentecostal substance of Koberwitz in the dark period now dawning.

“It was on the morning of Rudolf Steiner’s cremation, which I did not go to. The teacher’s body was still laid out in his studio, where the aura of the beloved teacher appeared next to me. I was told to write. I took paper and pen and the following words came from his presence. Often I could not write quickly enough, then paused and waited until I was back, as Rudolf Steiner used to do when he dictated to me.

“My job has ended….What I could give the people who were ready for it, I gave them…I am going, because I found no ears that could hear the spiritual word behind the word…I am going, because I found no eyes that could see the ghosts behind the earth images….I go because I found no people who could realize my will… The mysteries remain hidden until I come back. I will come back and reveal the mysteries when I have succeeded in creating an altar, a cultic place for human souls, in spirit worlds. Then I’ll come back. Then I will continue to reveal the mysteries.”

“Those are to blame for my death, which have held back the culture of the heart. Had people pushed through their hearts into the depths, they would have found the strength for the challenges of this time.”

There are those who do not consider these statements to come from Steiner but rather as projections from Johanna herself, or from the adversarial forces speaking. It is left to the reader to judge.

We do know that Rudolf Steiner is able to teach his students in the spirit body, as indicated in the mystery dramas.

A short conversation with Steiner in 1924, before his death, will conclude this biography for now.

Johanna: “Mankind is spoiled anyway [miscarriages]“. Steiner: “Yes, you can say that.” Johanna: “But what will happen at the end of the century?” Steiner in despair: “I don’t know either – but Ahriman is also part of Christ.”

***

R. Steiner, in:The Gospel of Matthew(Zeist 2003, GA 123), lecture, Sept. 10. 1910

M. von Miltitz, in Foreword by J. von Keyserlingk,Die Reise nach Byzanz-Das Palladium des Sieges(Basel 1991)

Erlöste Elemente(Stuttgart 1991)

Palladiump. 16

Adalbert (died 23-10-1993), besides an enthusiastic promoter of biodynamic agriculture, also a doctor and researcher of ancient mystery places, wroteVergessene Kulturen im Monte Gargano(Nürnberg 1968) andUnd sie erstarrten in Stein(Basel 1983).

Die Reise nach Byzanz-Das Palladium des Sieges,p. 16. InIn the Gospels there are several references to Capernaum and a healing of a sick person through Christ. Johanna talks about a chief and his sick son. Matthew 8 speaks of a chief of Capernaum and his sick servant; in Luke 7 about a chief and his sick slave ; in John 4 about a courtier and his sick son.

Koberwitz 1924, Geburtsstunde einer neuen Landwirtschaft(Privatdruck 1985) p. 25f

InIJsselaarde. Magazine to deepen the relationship with the living environment(Sept. 1999)

Wiedergerufen vom Herrn des Schicksals and Falter und Bluete (with poems) (Dornach 1998)

KC Markides, The magician of Strovolos (Deventer 1995), see also the article by G. Zwahlen about Daskalos inDas Goetheanum,number 34, Dec. 3. 1995

GA 118, Jan 25. 1910

The Gospel according to Matthew(Zeist 2003, GA 123), lecture 10 Sept. 1910

Gralburg(Stuttgart 1968, antiquarian still available sporadically). It was thrown into the lap many years ago through a book flea market. That eventually led to this article. Steiner already thought that the book should be made public because it demonstrates how an individual path of development can proceed.

H. Giersch (ed.)Das Ätherische Christus-Wirken. Rudolf Steiner über die Wiederkunft Christivan Harold Giersch (Dornach 1991)

G. Hillerdal and B. Gustafsson,Christ experiences today(Bergen op Zoom 2002); HW. Schroeder, On the second coming of Christ (Zeist 2000); HP van Moons,Coming and Second Coming – About the second coming of Christ and the coming of anti-christ(Zeist 1999); G. Bossis,My shadow, that is your neighbor(Zeist 2001); G. Goelzer and M. Friederich,Falter und Bluete – Christuswort und Christerkenntnis(Dornach 1994); Wiedergerufen vom Herrn des Schicksals, A1 Die Samariterin am Brunnen(Dornach 1998)

Fertile agriculture(Zeist 1992,GA 327)

The Aya (or: Hagia) Sophia, completed in 537 on the site where a church was built in 360, became a mosque in 1453 and has been a museum since 1932.

H. Oehms,Know your karma – Karma insight and self-development(Zeist 2000); F. Berger,fellow sufferers, coherence between different lives on the track(Zeist 2000); J. Saether,Wandeln unter unsichtbaren Menschen(Stuttgart 1999). About learning to look at people in order to place them in a spiritual context, without speaking directly about previous incarnations, see: A. Koopmans,Kijk op karma(Zeist 2002) andPractical human science(Zutphen 2004)

J.Ben Aharon,The spiritual event of the 20th century. An imagination. The occult dimension of the years 1933-1945(Zeist 1996)

R. Steiner (GA 118) nomination Munich March 15, 1910

The years 1933-1945 could have been illuminated by her from her clairvoyant fireplaces. You can suspect that J. Ben Aharon experienced this lack as well and that is why he connects with Johanna in his book about those years.

In various terms this theme is mentioned “altar in the spiritual world”, as is also the case in the speech for the youth in Koberwitz:“spiritual light will only come in this century, if Michael succeeds in the way in the astral light to the altar where the flame burns that Ahriman fears. ” Also inHelmuth von Moltke 1848-1916. Dokumente zu seinem Wirken(Basel 1993) March 27, 1919

In:Koberwitz 1924, p. 177

These statements (as well as the following) make it clear that Steiner saw a bright future for mankind looming. In lectures (GA 346) for the priests of the Christian Community he mentioned the year 1933 in which the apocalyptic beast would stir again. –

This Friday, March 19th at 6 pm PT, 7 pm MT, 8 pm CT, 9 pm ET
we will be speaking with Hazel Archer-Ginsberg

Click to Join the Café

“Holding the Chalice of Balance with Archangel Raphael –
An exploration of the Vernal Equinox” with Hazel Archer-Ginsberg

At the time of the Spring Equinox, Raphael, Archangel of the East & the Element of Air, is active as the great Cosmic Physician. The Easter-Tide works on us thru the spiritual healing of inspiration, provided by Raphael who is now in the etheric heights, waving a helix of shining vitality. Raphael uses the caduceus as a wand, to mingle air & fire, water & earth, transmuting them into healing forces; working & weaving in the cosmos, & entering into our conscious inspiration of light. Yes this is a goal of our human evolution, to be able to breathe light. Spiritual Science calls it ‘moral breathing’ – to ‘inhale evil & exhale the good’. Could the Corona crisis be calling us to this task? We have a powerful ally to assist us every year at this special time of balance. 

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 of the Chicago Rudolf Steiner Branch, The Traveling Speakers Program, & the Central Regional Council of the Anthroposophical Society. Past Video Recordings

For more info. contact Front Range Anthroposophical Cafe – Tom Altgelt altgelt@indra.com

***

Daniel Ospina


The 8-Fold Path to the Easter Elementals

Holy Week 2021 (March 28 – April 4): Starting on Palm Sunday then thru-out Holy Week including Easter Morning, we will meet every day on Zoom at 10:10 am (Central Time) to create together a Thought-Seed Egregore based on the Herbert Hahn Verse

When I think light, my soul shines,
When my soul shines, the earth is a star,
When the earth is a star, then I am, a true human being

Sophie Takata

& then we will take turns sharing the indications for that day from Rudolf Steiner / The Buddha’s 8 –fold Path, known as the ‘Weekday Exercises’ (let me know if you would like to lead one of the days? (5 min) HOLY WEEK CHART

Palm SUNDAY
Resolves or ‘RIGHT JUDGMENT.’ having been formed independently of sympathies and antipathies.

Holy MONDAY
Talking – ‘RIGHT WORD.’

Holy TUESDAY
External actions- ‘RIGHT DEED.’

Holy WEDNESDAY
The ordering of life. – ‘RIGHT STANDPOINT.’

Maundy THURSDAY
Human Endeavour. – ‘TO LET ALL THE EXERCISES BECOME A HABIT.

Good FRIDAY
The endeavor to learn as much as possible from life. – ‘RIGHT MEMORY.’ (Remembering what has been learned from experiences).

Holy SATURDAY
To pay attention to one’s ideas. – ‘RIGHT OPINION.’

The octave of the New Sun
EASTER SUNDAY
To turn one’s gaze inwards –
RIGHT EXAMINATION.’

Whoever is holding the leading thoughts for that day will tie it into some 5-10 min. artistic exercise based on the indications

Group sharing (5 min)

We close with the ‘reversed’ Hahn verse.
I am a True Human Being
For the Earth is a Star
The Earth is a Star
When I Think Light
When I think Light
My Soul Shines

*Dear friends, please join the call at 10:05 am to get settled in so we can begin the Thought-Seed promptly at 10:10 am
Topic: The 8-Fold Path thru Holy Week 2021
Time: Starting on Palm Sunday Mar 28 – thru Easter Morning, 2021 10:10 AM Central Time (US and Canada)
Every day, 8 occurrence(s)
Mar 28, 2021 10:10 AM
Mar 29, 2021 10:10 AM
Mar 30, 2021 10:10 AM
Mar 31, 2021 10:10 AM
Apr 1, 2021 10:10 AM
Apr 2, 2021 10:10 AM
Apr 3, 2021 10:10 AM
Apr 4, 2021 10:10 AM

Daily: https://zoom.us/meeting/tJErdOqsqj8iGNzL8iNTwKUXyrvmVGSSXqaW/ics?icsToken=98tyKuCtqDgpHtCRuBuPRowMBIjCb-jwiClHjY1HsEfsLRRESTbOL_BUP4RYI-vo

Join Zoom Meeting https://zoom.us/j/95633444828?pwd=Wk56K08vK2dNQUhhK0Q2S09zQWJrQT09 Meeting ID: 956 3344 4828 – Passcode: bee

Dial by your location Find your local number: https://zoom.us/u/aX8X3nrr3 Meeting ID: 956 3344 4828 – Passcode: 425730

Easter Sunday – 4 April 2021, in person at the Rudolf Steiner Branch Chicago & online 2 pm – 4 pm Central Time.

Group Eurythmy with Mary Ruud

Dottie Zold – On the Buddha’s 8-Fold Path

Keynote with Ines Katharina (Bee Keeper, Founder of the Biodynamic Emerald Honeybee Sanctuary

We close with singing ‘Now the green Blade Riseth’

Potluck Social Time in the Schreinerei – Please bring food & drink to share

$10 Suggested Donation (can’t make it? or joining us online? please consider supporting this event, Thank you)

Hazel Archer is inviting you to a scheduled Zoom meeting.

Topic: Easter Festival for the Elementals

Time: Apr 4, 2021 02:00 PM Central Time (US and Canada)

Join Zoom Meeting https://zoom.us/j/7052931041?pwd=Z0ZmT05FdDZIclE4RFBLZWNwWXJ5QT09 Meeting ID: 705 293 1041 – Passcode: Easter

Dial by your location – Meeting ID: 705 293 1041 – Passcode: 776400 – Find your local number: https://zoom.us/u/a961qZZhF

Events & Festivals Committee of the Rudolf Steiner Branch
of The Anthroposophical Society, 4249 North Lincoln Ave.
Chicago, IL 60618 (maphttps://donate.rschicago.org/