Exhale

Listen to the ‘I Think Speech’ Podcast

Greetings friends – I am continuing to polish the gems gleaned from Anthroposophy, A Summary of Twenty-one Years, Lecture 6 Respiration, warmth, & the ego, 3 Feb. 1924

We think we ‘know’ the ‘basics’ of the 4 fold-human being, but do we really practice true ‘imagination’, ‘inspiration’, & ‘intuition’ ..? Picture building has always been natural for me, but it’s in the letting go of these imaginations that allows ‘inspiration’ to waft in – to become the content that fills our emptied consciousness. At this stage we can induce a conscious condition in which the spiritual world flows into us. We can feel, an element of spiritual music, the progressive beings of the cosmos speaking ‘into’ us.

Larry Young

Steiner describes what we are doing when we sleep – that our soul & spirit, outside our body, actually takes in the carbonic acid of our exhalations – receiving the impressions made by our exhaled air! This keeps our astral connected to our body thru the air we have exhaled which offers up the secrets of our inner life. Steiner describes this exhaled air as ‘sparkling forth’ from us. ‘Sparkling out into the universe, with a sun-like appearance‘, which our soul beholds & this can become conscious when we reach the stage of ‘inspiration’. With Inspired knowledge we can perceive how the astral body is in the physical during waking life, AND how it is outside during sleep – receiving impressions.

Pierce Devon

This idea of ‘recieving impressions’ made me think of what Steiner says about the Hibernian mysteries: “When the pupils had been prepared up to the grade required they were led before two colossal statues. One statue was a male form, the other female.

Through these statues the pupils experienced the approach of the Cosmic Word. These statues were to them, the external letters by means of which they must begin to decipher the Cosmic Secret placed before men.

One of the statues, the male statue, was of wholly elastic material, compressible in every part. The pupils were made to press the statue in every part. Through this action, it revealed itself to them as hollow. It was in fact only the skin of a statue made of elastic material, so that after being pressed it regained the same shape.

Over the head of this statue which was peculiarly characteristic, over the head there was something which represented the Sun.

The whole head was such that one saw it must really be as a Soul-Eye. The head as Soul-Eye represented microcosmically the content of the whole macrocosm. This manifestation of the whole macrocosm came to expression through the Sun in this colossal head.

This statue made the impression directly upon the pupil: Here the macrocosm works through the Sun and forms the human head, which knows the impulses of the macrocosm and forms itself inwardly and outwardly according to these impulses of the macrocosm.

The other statue was such that first of all the eyes of the pupil fell on something like bodies of light raying inwards with light. And in the midst the pupil then saw a female form, standing wholly under the influence of these rays. And the feeling came to him that the head was created out of these rays. There was something indefinite about the head.

This statue was of another substance, a plastic substance, not elastic but plastic and extraordinarily soft. The pupil was made to press it also. Every pressure he made remained. Only always between one time when the pupil was tested before this statue and the next time the indentations he had made were corrected. So that whenever the pupils were led to the same ceremony before this statue the statue was always intact again. In the case of the other statue, the elastic one, the whole form recovered itself of its own accord.

The impression received in the case of the second statue was that it stood wholly under the influence of the moon-forces which permeated the organism and caused the head to grow out of the organism. An extraordinarily powerful impression was made on the pupils by what they thus experienced. They were often brought before this statue; each time they were to make indentations in the statue, which were then corrected.

They were led up to the statue by those already initiated and were then left, the door of the temple behind being shut. They were left in their solitude.

Each pupil was taken by himself and made to test the statues, to experience for himself the Elasticity of the first, and in the second case the plasticity in which the indentations he had made remained. Then he was left alone by himself with the impression, which as I have already indicated was working powerfully, most powerfully upon him. There arose in the pupil the most vivid longing when he was brought before these two statues, that what appeared to him as a great riddle should in some way or other become solved in his soul, that he should get to understand the nature of this riddle — on the one hand that he should understand the nature of this riddle, and on the other hand the problem as to what lay in the forms and in the whole manner in which he was to relate himself to them. All this worked in a deep, strangely deep way upon the pupils. And they stood before the statues in their whole soul and in their whole spirit as, I might say, a colossal question-mark. Everything in them was a question, Reason asked, the heart asked, the will asked, everything, everything asked.

The man of today can still learn from these things, which were brought perceptibly before the mind in former ages; the modern student must go through the same scale of sensations, must struggle in himself through these sensations in inner meditative experience…”

Andy Singleton

With ‘inspired’ consciousness we perceive the circulatory process, just as we perceive Nature during waking life. And then we can contemplate the warmth-process that takes place with the I forces, & how that affects the airy element of the etheric body in motion. And we start to see the big picture of the grand spiritual processes at work – which conceals many secrets – but also reveals that the real driving power at work within the human being is not our present ego at all – It is the ego of our past lives on earth which are active in us! The warmth-processes help us perceive our real ego, working from times long past.

Geopoliticus Child Watching the Birth of the New Man - Wikipedia
Dali

Between death and a new birth this ego has undergone an evolution in time; it now works in an entirely spiritual way – We perceive all our metabolic processes, as the expression of powerful spiritual beings working in our true Ego.

So with ‘inspiration’ we come to know the astral body thru our ego’s gift of ‘intuition’, And this ‘intuition’ takes us back to our previous life on earth.

William Oxer

Sleep is really a return in time. Every sleep is a return to the regions traversed before birth, or to former incarnations. And so I was also wondering: Can we also get glimpses into our future lives?

And when we die (unless we are an initiate) the cosmos takes all our memories & experiences – the impressions rolled up in our etheric body -the cosmos takes them back, (enriched hopefully) thru our human soul forces – I always like to say: ‘May I be a fit food for the gods’. This gives us the perspective that we are not just here on earth for our own spiritual development, we are here for the advancement of the universe. The universe needs us, because thru us, it ‘fullfills’ itself — fills itself again & again with its own content that has been filtered thru our thinking, feeling & willing – an interchange, between the universe & the human being. Anthroposophia helps us to become true human beings if we make this experience conscious & practical.

~hag

Dell Mextrone

RUDOLF STEINER’S CALENDAR OF THE SOUL
translated (with added titles) by Roy Sadler
TRINITY III
Midsummer Wisdom

v11
It rests this sun’s high hour with you
to recognise the call of wisdom:
‘In you, absorbed in worlds where beauty lies,
through all your feeling realise:
the human I can lose itself
and find itself within the Cosmic I’.

Julie Baxter

Greetings friends –
The summertime union between the Sun & Earth is a re-union between the spiritual beings of the Sun & their human offspring. Through ‘the great window of heaven’ we experience this interaction which helps us develop an awareness of our ego. We can contemplate this dynamic & bring it to life in our soul most strongly at this time of year. Here are some ways to celebrate & connect:

~hag Powerpoint collage

Sunday 20 June 2021 – Summer Solstice / Father’s Day
Bon-Fire & Prep-Stir Social Gathering
6 pm CT Pot-Luck Dinner at the Home of Hazel Archer & Chuck Ginsberg
Please Bring Food & Drink, a song, poem or Question to Share in Community

This is an offical Merry Prepstir synchronized application,
linking us to Biodynamic workers around the world,
so that ‘The Earth May Be Healed’.
We will be working with BD 500 Horn Manure. 

RSVP by 19 June 2021 for address & directions

‘Preparing the Way’ an experiential St. John’s-Tide Festival
23 June 2021, Doors open at 5:30 pm with a Potluck 
Program from  7 – 8:30 pm
In-person at the Rudolf Steiner Branch 4248 N. Lincoln Ave. Chicago, 60618

Singing – Elizabeth Kelly
Group discussion – Hazel Archer
Spatial Dynamics – Deborah Rogers
Art – Mary Spalding

For more info. contact Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator Hazel Archer
 

~rs

St. John the Baptist and Uriel the Archangel of Summer –

An Experiential online Festival with Geoff Norris, Elizabeth Carlson, Lisa Dalton, Lucien Dante Lazar, Hazel Archer

Sunday 27 June 2021 on Zoom:
Noon – 1:30 pm PT / 1 – 2:30 pm MT / 2 pm – 3:30 pm CT / 3 – 4:30 pm ET /
8 – 9:30 pm London Time / 9 – 10:30 pm CET

Metanoia –  Can you hear the voice of conscience? – Make straight the path, for at the fullness of Summer, the light is so bright that it leaves no room for the shadow, a time to remember what St. John said “Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”

Musicial Performance by Lucien Dante Lazar

Speech – Geoffrey Norris

Eurythmy- Elizabeth Carlson

Living into St. John’s-Tide – Lisa Dalton

Leading Thoughts – Hazel Archer

Hazel Archer is inviting you to a scheduled Zoom meeting.

Topic: St. John’s
Time: Jun 27, 2021 02:00 PM Central Time (US and Canada)

Join Zoom Meeting
https://zoom.us/j/7052931041?pwd=TkMwcGVVdk5GTVJmVzVJS2s5YVFtQT09

Meeting ID: 705 293 1041
Passcode: Uriel


Find your local number: https://zoom.us/u/a961qZZhF

For more info. contact Cultural Events & Festivals Coordinator Hazel Archer Hazel@reverseritual.com

22 thoughts on “Exhale

  1. Hazel, chapter 12, that’s the one that describes what is contained in the 5th Occult Seal Picture, and wherein Michael’s War in Heaven is also indicated. Yes, I feel that this is the place where our own time is being shown. Since 1879, this has been unfolding. Chapter 13 describes the outcome of the fallen dark spirits for the 20th century. Historical figures like Theodore Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson can be adduced when one reads between and behind the lines. We see the beast from out of the sea, and the even more deadly beast from out of the earth, who serves it.

  2. “World History” was the very first lecture-course I studied back in 1987. I had only heard Rudolf Steiner’s name for the first time the year before. It wouldn’t be for another 12 years, until 1999, that I realized that it was the course given at the time of the Christmas Conference of 1923. So, indeed, it has its place in the remembrance of the centennial event coming up.

    When I was a little boy of 10, I came down with something called mononucleosis, and missed ten straight days of school in the fifth grade. I remember experiencing in a state of delirium the alternation between summer and winter landscapes. As well, these 10 days seemed more like 40 days. Such becomes the torpidity of a kind of hibernian experience. Just ask the bears! I used to remind my mother, “don’t you remember when I missed 40 days of school?” Then, about nine years ago, I opened a box of memorabilia which contained my fifth grade report card, and I saw where it was only the ten days missed. An intuition arose which encouraged me to go over to my bookshelf and pick up GA 232, and read the three lectures on the Hibernian Mysteries. This was in November of 2012.

    When I got to the place where Steiner describes the ordeal of the Hibernian initiate in experiencing the summer landscape and then the winter landscape, I immediately remembered how my affliction involved alternating experiences of fever and then chills. I was taken back to when I was ten years old. I eventually recovered from mononucleosis, but not before nearly drowning in a classmates’s backyard swimming pool at the event of her 11th birthday. A fellow Boy Scout fished me out and saved my life. Yet, I had the uncanny experience of perceiving a kind of living 23rd Psalm of David, and long before knowing it in writing.

    As well, my attention has recently been drawn to the Apocalypse of St. John, where in the second letter to the community in Smyrna, it says:

    Message to Smyrna

    8 “And to the angel of the church in Smyrna write:

    The first and the last, who was dead, and has come to life, says this:

    9 ‘I know your tribulation and your poverty (but you are rich), and the blasphemy by those who say they are Jews and are not, but are a synagogue of Satan. 10 Do not fear what you are about to suffer. Behold, the devil is about to cast some of you into prison, so that you will be tested, and you will have tribulation for ten days. Be faithful until death, and I will give you the crown of life. 11 He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. He who overcomes will not be hurt by the second death.’

    1. Wow! Yes, Thank you – Such it is that illness & near death can bring about these initiatory experiences. And then to recapitulate them as the cycle comes around again – this is an important unfolding that you are allowing to take you more consciously into these milestones.

      Interesting that you should share this second letter to the community in Smyrna, from the Apocalypse of St. John, I had a dream last night where I was to be taken prisoner. I lived in a huge ‘house’ that was the whole world, & I knew ‘they’ were coming to cast us into some hellish prison. Many were taken. I debated whether I should hide, knowing that if I did I would be imprisoning myself, kind of like what Anne Frank lived thru. I had an attic apartment that I was thinking I could seal off somehow, but then the soldiers came & were rounding people up. Folks were trying to help hide me, they rolled me up in the bottom of a huge set of curtains. So in the dream I was experiencing being covered & cocooned. I was aware of my back & legs hurting from having to lay for so long without moving. I woke up several times during the dream to toss & turn in the bed, only to resume the dream again & again. Sometimes my perspective was of being under the curtain & other times it was as if I were seeing myself from outside looking down to observe myself in the folds – Was I covered, could they see me?

    2. “11 He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. He who overcomes will not be hurt by the second death.’”

      What a powerful statement. Many indications lead back to the Apocalypse of St John.

      1. Hi Kyle,

        This book is a book of Initiation Science. It represents the pinnacle of the Bible, and why it is the very last book. If you read it with the right attitude, for example, the seven letters to the churches, you will find yourself in each letter. Thus, each letter represents a period that we have lived through. In this very life that we are living now, a reflection exists of Ephesus, Smyrna, Pergamum, Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia, and Laodicea.

        Rudolf Steiner’s very last lecture-course, GA 346, was designed to make this very plain, and why he gave the assignment to the Christian Community to develop into a Fourth Mystery Epoch of our time. Just five days later he collapsed.

        1. Yes, this is the macro- micro – The letters represent our 7 stages of evolution from Saturn to Vulcun.
          Sardis is the 5th post-Atlanian epoch in which we are living now. We are working with the Book of Revelation now as our study after services at the Christain Community every Thursday. Facinating stuff.

          We are working with Chapter 12 now, my fav.

        2. These are incredible affirmations here, Steve and Hazel. Steve, as you know I’ve mentioned Philip K Dick to you already, but I’d like to bring it out on the table here as well. In regards to the Seals of the Apocalypse, it was just by merely looking at the Ichthys (Jesus ‘fish symbol’) symbol on a necklace of a woman who brought him pain meds – while he was experiencing a debilitating migraine of sorts – that gave him [Philip K Dick] a revelation of a which sent him into a stream of consciousness, writing well over 1000 pages or more (if I remember how the story went). This, ultimately was edited into the book known as ‘The Exegesis of PKD.’ I still have yet to read it, but apparently it’s difficult to follow, especially if you are unfamiliar with his works.

          A book of Initiation Science (Apocalypse of St. John, that is) seems all to fitting!

          1. Kyle – I have every book PKD ever wrote…His worldview of reality is so deep, I don’t even know where to begin…
            One thing that comes to mind in this moment, is what he describes as the construct of space/time, & how it overlays reality.
            He talks about how we are under the illusion that we are in the present time, but that there are false demi-gods who are enslaving us in a Romanesque reality where the state controls everything, & we as consumers just think we are free…

          2. Indeed, Hazel, his worldview of reality really is deep! It wold be quite the undertaking to see this individual, as a soul, in an Anthroposophical perspective. Not only he understands Ahrimanic impulses, but can see the trajectory of said impulses, and on top of that, acknowledges the limitations of the intellectual mind alone with the rejection of Christ. In his words (referring to a character in his last novel):

            “What I have shown The Transmigration of Timothy Archer is what the best intellectual mind – as correctly represented by a young Berkeley intellectual woman – can do and cannot do; it can go so far… but it can go no farther – as represented by her rejection of Christ (yes, Christ!) at the end: she walks away.”

  3. This is a very interesting point about the ‘breath’ or ‘exhaled air.’ I had an experience when I was in Australia, I had an oracle card reading done by a Samoan woman. Before the reading, she asked permission to read my ‘breath.’ I can’t remember her exact wordings, but said something to the effect that it was the way in which ‘one communicates with one’s spirit (by way of the breath,’ and reffered to one’s ‘mana.’ Mana, even today, is very common knowledge, and fact, with the people of the South Pacific islands.

      1. It was insightful! This was back in 2017. She knew I travelled a bit, and she said that at some point I would stay stationary at some point in order to truly “heal” myself. At that point, I would be able to share with others more fully, and openly. So, I think she pointed to where I’m at now. And as strange as it sounds, when she had said that, my imagination kind of pointed me around the area I am now. And here we are talking about the breath. Full circle.

        1. The magic circle swirls & spins & bursts open into a ladder, which morphs into a helix & spirls up again into a circle ever turning
          inside & out…

  4. Hi Hazel,

    Steiner’s lectures here on the summary of the first 21 years are not to be missed. He wants it known that he had been giving this out since 1902, and why in 1923, with the burning, it became a paramount consideration. So, he is saying now that the future is ours. He wants the next 21 years to unfold based on his indications.

    Yet, by 1944, we know what it meant. It meant Hitler, and Marie can never escape what she allowed to happen. Remember what occurred in 1935. She effected the purge within the GAS, and caused the separation of the British and Dutch members.

    I think that Steiner would want this to be the first factual in any notion of bringing GA 234 back on front stage. And so it goes. Hazel’s retreat.

    1. Yes, I think a lot about that connection to the the Society under Stefen & Marie not wanting to make waves with the natzi’s & the split. I worry that the current corona crisis is a repeat of that – trying to divide the society again…

  5. Some precious gems you’re polishing there Hazel. What spoke to me today was your excerpt from the Hibernian Mysteries, with the two statues.

    I suppose it’d mean different things to each person, as it did in those days of initiation. It reminded me of when woman was taken out of man. Michael Debus speaks powerfully about this separation in his book Mary and Sophia (I especially enjoyed chapter 2); Michael is a Christian Community priest and professor serving somewhere in Germany, can’t recall where. He says something to the effect that the combined earthy being was having some issues – not only was he/she lonely, but was having difficulty understanding purpose. When she became a separate being, he suddenly had a “mirror” by which to understand, saying “This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh”. In other words, “Now I understand what I am, and what I’m here for.” Remember, this was before mirrors, and the being wasn’t looking at self from outside – it wasn’t till after the “fall” that the realization came of nakedness. Anyways, the head of the second statue with the light rays reminded me of this “mirror” effect that she had on him.

    Has me wondering though – does it portray that he by himself is hollow, and does her ability to retain the impressions made signify something about women’s emotions and memory? As Steiner says, it’ll mean different things to each, but this is the impression and question I was left with.

    1. O thank you Maverick, I am experiencing goosebumps (a demonstration of the etheric body in action). A friend had just mentioned that book by Michael Debus in our Sophia conference planning meeting the other day, so I took that as a clue to order it myself!

      I love your impressions (ha pardon the pun;) of those Hibernian mysteries. That rite has always fascinated me & I debated including it since it is too long for most folks, but I really felt like it is a gateway to understanding powerful forces that long to be recognized. I brought it up to the General Council during our meeting but it didn’t seem like anyone could relate…anyway, I really appreciate you digging into it & sharing your insights…

      1. Another important consideration about the two statues is that elasticity and plasticity are needed at the same time in order for evolution to have the proper speed. This is what Gilgamesh learned when he found that latter-day Hibernian Mystery near where Rudolf Steiner went to school as a boy.

        1. Can you say more about this: This is what Gilgamesh learned when he found that latter-day Hibernian Mystery near where Rudolf Steiner went to school as a boy.

          1. Yes. In the course following GA 232, Steiner goes into detail about the quest of Gilgamesh and Eabani in seeking the secret of the immortality of the soul. They are drawn westward by some mysterious force from their location in Uruk of Assyria, c. 2700 BC, to the eventual place where this late Irish mystery of Atlantis had a cult. Traveling for a long period on the north side of the Danube River, they finally came to the district known today as the Burgenland of Austria.

            https://wn.rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA233/English/RSP1977/WldHis_index.html

            Rudolf Steiner crossed the frontier, marked by the Leytha River, every day from 1872 to 1879 when he went from Neudorfl, Hungary, where he lived, to Wiener Neustadt, Austria, in order to attend the Real Schule. This is the Burgenland. The distance was about three and a half miles. He walked home every day for seven years, rain or shine. The winters were brutal.

            1. I love these lectures, very important. I am recommending them for th 100 year anniversary
              World History in the light of Anthroposophy and as a Foundation of the Human Spirit, By Rudolf Steiner

              Humanity now stands in the presence of the guardian of the threshold who challenges us to take a step into a new sphere of activity, into the spiritual world. In these lectures, given concurrently with the Christmas Foundation Meeting, Steiner presents a comprehensive survey of the history of the ancient mysteries and the spiritual guidance of humanity. This prepared and strengthened the founding assembly for his courageous, decisive act of establishing the new mysteries during the Christmas Foundation Meeting.

              These nine lectures, translated from the German by George and Mary Adams (the last lecture being translated by Dorothy Osmond), were given in Dornach from December 23rd 1923 to January 1st 1924, during the Foundation Meeting of the General Anthroposophical Society. In the collected edition of Rudolf Steiner’s works, the volume containing the German texts is entitled: Die Weltgeschichte in Anthroposophischer Beleuchtung und als Grundlage der Erkenntnis des Menschengeistes. (vol. 233 in the Bibliographic Survey).

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