Hugh Jordan Courtney passed the threshold quietly in his sleep on June 15, 2020, at the noble age of 87 in Woolwine, Virginia. Hugh was a man of great feelings and high standards. He entered the world on Friday, July 8, 1932, in Cook County, IL. Little did anyone know at the time how much land this one man’s work would heal.

Hugh lived many lives. In an early version of himself, he was Lieutenant in the Navy. An intermediary form of himself manifested as a librarian. But his true vocation blossomed as a champion of the Earth and its redemption. For decades he crafted special herbal remedies to stimulate the renewal of exhausted farmland for the renewal of our common home and the furtherance of our spiritual development. He inherited his mantle from Josephine Porter who herself had received her initiation from the harbinger of biodynamics to North America, Ehrenfried Pfeiffer – an immediate student of the visionary spiritual leader, Rudolf Steiner. The strand connecting Steiner to Courtney is short and direct.

Hugh was a seasoned astronomer and astrologer as well as a member of the Anthroposophical Society in America for over 40 years.

Hugh met Josephine Porter on Sunday, August 8, 1976, during the Biodynamic Association Conference at Threefold Farm, Spring Valley, NY. One decade later Hugh founded the Josephine Porter Institute for Applied Biodynamics, (JPI), extending the legacy of his mentor. Hugh Courtney conceived of the “sequential spray” technique in 1988 for increasing rainfall on a farm. He was the author of the best selling introduction to biodynamic agriculture What is Biodynamics? (SteinerBooks 10/4/05) which integrates biodynamic agriculture within the framework of Rudolf Steiner’s greater cosmology.

In 2009 Hugh founded Earth Legacy Agriculture with his grandson Jeremiah to encourage more large-scale agriculture applications of Biodynamic Preparations to heal ever more land. He continued to research effective pest remedies for further developing the indications given by Rudolf Steiner.

During his time, Hugh mentoring provided us many more preparation makers including Lloyd Nelson, Larry Mabe, Pat Fraizer, Matias Baker, Florence Rewinski, Laura Riccardi Lyvers, Jason Harris, Bob Lehman, and Stewart Lundy, just to name a few.

Hugh is survived by his wife Elisabeth and her children as well as his Sibling: Don, Bill, & Lynn, his children: Mark, Elaine, Gwen & Blair, his Grandchildren: Shannon, Jessica, Jeremiah, Joshua, Zachariah, Juliana, & Michael and his Great Grandchildren: Zane, Tyler, Brielle, Liam, Ryder, Stella, Odin, Till, & Oaklyn.

His favorite saying was “God’s in charge.” And his work embodied this. Not only is there a plan, but he was actively participating in the divine plan and helping farmers and gardeners join in their sacred work as well.

With the discipline of a soldier, the guise of a farmer, and the fastidiousness of a librarian, Hugh established his spiritual home with practical anthroposophy. He may be gone, but his work is not finished.

The family requests no flowers. Donations can be made in the honor of Hugh Courtney by sending a check to the Christian Appalachian Project, Seed & Library Program, PO Box 55911 Lexington, Kentucky 40555-5911

Cremation and service to be announced.

Much thanks to Divine Orchestration, Elizabeth Courtney, Jeremiah Proctor, Stewart Lundy, Amy Hamilton, Lauri Wilson, Larry Mabe, Peter Blake, and Hazel Archer Ginsberg for making this obituary possible

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Part 5 in: A Summary of THE ST. JOHN IMAGINATION, from ~the Four Seasons and the Archangels, Lecture 4, by Rudolf Steiner

“…The Heights become Mysteries, the Depths become Mysteries, and man himself becomes a Mystery within the Mysteries of the Cosmos. Right into his bony system he feels the crystal-forming power. But he feels also how this same power is in cosmic union with the living power of light in the heavens above. He feels how all that comes about through humankind as morality in these Mysteries of the Heights lives and weaves in these Mysteries of the Depths, and in the conjunction between the two. He feels himself no longer sundered from the world around him, but placed within it, united above with the shining Intelligence, in which he experiences, as in the womb of worlds, his own best thoughts.

All this, too, would have to sound forth in musical tones — tones which carry these motifs on their wings and make them part of human experience. For these motifs are there. They do not have to be sought out; they can be read from the cosmic activity of Uriel. Here it is that Imagination passes over into Inspiration.

The human being, however, lives in a certain sense as an embodied Inspiration, as a being brought into existence by Inspiration, in the Mysteries of the heights and depths and in the Mysteries of their conjunction. He lives in the Mysteries to which the Spirit-Father points upward; the Mysteries to which the Spirit-Mother points downwards, the Mysteries which are united by the fact that the Christ, though the working together of the Spirit-Father and the Spirit-Mother, stands directly before the human soul as the sustaining Cosmic Spirit.

That which is woven out of all these cosmic secrets I may put before you somewhat in the following way. It is as though the human being, placed in the midst of all that goes on in high summer, were to feel something like this. The first words endeavour to represent how the gaze of Uriel concentrates itself into Inspiration, united with the Spirit-tones of the whole choir:

Schaue unser Weben
Das leuchtende Erregen
Das warmende Leben } The Heights
Lebe irdisch Erhaltendes
Und atmend Gestaltetes —
Als wesenhaft Waltendes } The Depths
Fühle dein Menschengebeine
Mit himmlischen Scheine
Im waltenden Weltenvereine } The Midst
The inner being of Man.

Here in these nine lines are the Mysteries of the Heights, the Mysteries of the Depths, and the Mysteries of the Midst, which are also those of the inner being of man. And then we have the whole gathered up as a cosmic statement of these Mysteries of the Heights, the Depths and the Midst, sounding out as though with organ and trumpet tones:

Es werden Stoffe verdichtet
Es werden Fehler gerichtet
Es werden Herzen gesichtet.

Here you have that which can permeate the human being at midsummer, supporting him, exalting him, confirming him — the St. John Imagination filled with Inspiration, the St. John Inspiration filled with Imagination — in these words:

Schaue unser Weben
Das leuchtende Erregen
Das warmende Leben } The Heights
Lebe irdisch Erhaltendes
Und atmend Gestaltetes —
Als wesenhaft Waltendes } The Depths
Fühle dein Menschengebeine
Mit himmlischen Scheine
Im waltenden Weltenvereine } The Midst
The inner being of Man.
Es werden Stoffe verdichtet
Es werden Fehler gerichtet
Es werden Herzen gesichtet.

Behold our weaving, the kindling radiance, the warming life.
Live in the earth’s sustaining, and in the form-giving breathing,
with the power of true being.
Feel the limbs of man, from the heavens illuminated,
in the strength of worlds united.
Substances are densified, errors are judged and rectified,
hearts are sifted”. ~Rudolf Steiner

Mysteries of the Height
The Behold of our weaving,
Te kindling radiance,
The warming life.

Mysteries of the depth
Live in the earth’s sustaining,
And in the form-giving breathing,
With the power of true being.

The mysteries of the Midst, (or of the inner being of man)
Feel the limbs of the human being,
From the heavens illuminated,
In the strength of worlds united.

Like a cosmic statement of these Mysteries of the Heights, the Depths and the Midst, sounding Out as though with organ and trumpet tones:
Substances are densified,
Errors are judged and rectified,
Hearts are sifted. (sifted or viewed)

~Translation from Robert Herold

Tomorrow: A look into the Will
Until soon
Blessings and Peace ~Hazel Archer Ginsberg

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Dear Friends – I am making an attempt to bring some of my recent presentations together. You can view them here. (If anyone has any tech advise I could sure use it, Thanks)

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Friday 19 June 2020 – Front Range Anthroposophical Café presents:

‘RING of FIRE’ with Hazel Archer-Ginsberg 

• What is the Spiritual Significance of a Solar Eclipse on Summer Solstice?
• How do we stand wakefully within the sublime mysteries of the Summer-Tide, to consciously embody ‘the spiritual wisdom of the gods’?

We look forward to seeing you on Friday 19 June 2020 shortly before 6 pm (Pacific), 7 PM (Mountain) 8 pm (Central), 9 pm (Eastern).

Here is the link to our Anthroposophical Café and all you need to do to join us is click on it: https://zoom.us/j/294724669.

Warmly, Karen vann Vuuren, Tom Altgelt, Jamie York, and our growing circle of Café Friends – It’s better to light a candle than to curse the darkness.

*** 



 7 pm Summer Solstice 20 June 2020 Bio-Dynamic Prep-Stir

The Merry Prep-Stirs of Chicago invite you to work with us just a few hours before the Solar eclipse on the longest day.

Bring whatever you want to eat & drink.For more info. contact Hazel Archer-Ginsberg

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Rudolf Steiner’s Lectures on this day

ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY

15 June 2020 – “Speaking with the Stars”: Comet PanSTARRS has passed out of the Big Dipper’s bowl to flirt with some stunning deep-sky objects. 

303 – St. Vitus Day. In the late Middle Ages, people in Germany & countries such as Latvia celebrated the feast of Vitus by dancing before his statue. This dancing became popular & the name “Saint Vitus Dance” was given to the neurological disorder Sydenham’s chorea. It also led to Vitus being considered the patron saint of dancers, actors, comedians, & epileptics. He is also said to protect against lightning strikes, animal attacks & oversleeping

763 BC – Assyrians record a solar eclipse that is later used to fix the chronology of Mesopotamian history

991 – Deathday of Theophanu, Byzantine Empress of the Holy Roman Empire

1215 –Magna Carta sealed by King John of England & barons. First drafted by the Archbishop of Canterbury to make peace between the unpopular King & a group of rebel barons, it promised the protection of church rights, protection for the barons from illegal imprisonment, access to swift justice, & limitations on feudal payments to the Crown, to be implemented through a council of 25 barons.

1648 – Margaret Jones is hanged in Boston for witchcraft

1667 – The first human blood transfusion is administered by Dr. Jean-Baptiste Denys

1752 – Benjamin Franklin proves that lightning is electricity

1775 –George Washington is appointed commander-in-chief of the Continental Army

1816 – At the Villa Diodati in the village of Cologny, Switzerland, Lord Byron reads Fantasmagoriana to his four house guests — Percy Shelley, Mary Shelley, Claire Clairmont, & John Polidori — & challenges each guest to write a ghost story, which culminates in Mary Shelley writing the novel Frankenstein, John Polidori The Vampyre, & Byron the poem Darkness.

1896 – The deadliest tsunami in Japan’s history kills more than 22,000 people

1904 – A fire aboard the steamboat SS General Slocum in New York City’s East River kills 1,000

1985 – Rembrandt’s painting Danaë is attacked by Bronius Maigys, a Soviet national, later judged insane, who throws sulfuric acid on the canvas & cuts it twice with a knife

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HAIKU
Cool against my lips
on a midsummer morning:
the stone Virgin’s cheek