“The members of the Manichean Order are already learning how to transform quite radically those who by nature are wholly evil. And then the transformed evil will become a quite special good. The power to effect this change will bring about a condition of moral holiness on Earth. But this can be achieved only if the evil has first come into existence; then the power needed to overcome the evil will yield a power that can reach the heights of holiness. A field has to be treated with manure and the manure has to ferment in the soil; similarly, humanity needs the manure of evil in order to attain to the highest holiness. And herein lies the mission of evil. A man’s muscles get strong by use; and equally, if good is to rise to the heights of holiness, it must first overcome the evil which opposes it. The task of evil is to promote the ascent of man. Things such as this give us a glimpse into the secret of life”. ~Rudolf Steiner, At the Gates of Spiritual Science, Lecture 8.
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18 November 2020 – “Speaking with the Stars”: The waxing crescent Moon hangs out with Jupiter & Saturn TONIGHT & tomorrow evening.
Meanwhile Altair, the bright eye of Aquila, the Eagle, shines high to the upper right, of the Benevolent King & The Ruler of Time, about halfway up the sky just after dark: halfway from the horizon to the zenith.
Rudolf Steiner’s Lectures on this day
ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY
~TODAY I AM
A dusky grape
Ripening in the oblique angle
of the westering Daystar…
~hag
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1923 – The founding of the Dutch Anthroposophical Society. Willem Zeylmans van Emmichhoven becomes its General Secretary.
1961- Deathday of Willem Zeylmans van Emmichhoven, a Dutch psychiatrist and anthroposophist. From 1923 until his death in 1961 he was chairman of the Dutch Anthroposophical Society. He was a familiar figure in public life & had a considerable influence on the Anthroposophic movement, particularly through his numerous lectures & his work as an author, which included the first biography of Rudolf Steiner.
Zeylmans was the son of a Dutch chocolate manufacturer. His mother came from Germany. In childhood he was often troubled by visions of color & emotional turmoil that later stimulated his preoccupation with what would later be called synesthesia: a condition when you hear a sound & automatically see a color. After recovering from an attack of typhoid, he entered medical school at eighteen, specializing in psychiatry. His interest in color, inspired by the painter Jacoba van Heemskerck & her friend & patron Marie Tak van Poortvliet, led him to research more about the effects of colors. He continued his medical studies in Leipzig under Wilhelm Wundt in 1919, where he became a member of the Anthroposophical Society. After meeting with Rudolf Steiner, he was encouraged to continue his research into the effect of colors & in his dissertation he wrote on “The effect of colors on the life of feeling.’’ On 27 September 1921 he was married to Ingeborg Droogleever Fortuyn, whom he had met for the first time many years earlier. Their first son was born in 1926.
At the age of 28, Zeylmans began lecturing on Anthroposophy to an enthusiastic public, as well as academic colleagues. He helped establish the first Waldorf School in The Hague, where he also founded a small psychiatric hospital, which soon moved into its own building (now the Rudolf Steiner Zorg). When the Anthroposophical Society was founded in the Netherlands, Rudolf Steiner appointed him as its first General Secretary. In addition to his psychiatric work Zeylmans undertook worldwide lecture tours. He spoke often about the effect of color on humans & gave advice to paint manufacturers, architects, directors of museums & artists.
Zeylman’s primary concerns were the rapprochement & understanding between the different nations & peoples, as well as a furtherance of cosmopolitanism. His attempt to found the global schools association suggested by Rudolf Steiner (a ‘”Weltschulverein”), to promote the dissemination & funding for free school education, failed due to resistance from anthroposophic circles against fostering broader public awareness.
In the face of increasing political fanaticism, another initiative Zeylmans took was to further interest for anthroposophy in European youth. In the summer of 1930 he organized a youth camp on the Stakenberg near Nunspeet in the Veluwe. More than a thousand participants gathered in working groups & heard lectures by leading anthroposophists like Eugen Kolisko, Walter Johannes Stein, Elisabeth Vreede & Ita Wegman on their thoughts to the situation of the time.
His work, however, was increasingly restricted by political developments. His involvement with the administration of the General Anthroposophical Society in Dornach Switzerland also met with increasing disapproval. The internal disputes since the death of Rudolf Steiner & his close collaboration with the physician Ita Wegman in 1935 led to his exclusion & that of the majority of the Dutch members.
After the war Zeylmans took up once again his international lecturing work. In 1954 he embarked on a global tour for nine months. Encouraged by Bernard Lievegoed, in 1960 he sought a mandate from the members of the Anthroposophical Society in the Netherlands to reunite it once more, after 25 years of separation, with the General Anthroposophical Society at the Goetheanum in Switzerland. He undertook a second journey through South Africa in 1961, visiting the newly established Waldorf schools & other institutions to give advice & hold lectures. During this trip, he died unexpectedly in Cape Town.
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Wed. 2 December 2020 – 7:15 pm – 8:30 pm CT The Karma Project
The Karma Project
Manifestations of Karma Study Group
December 2, 2020 – 7:15 pm Central (8:15 pm Eastern)
“… We have now learned that it is possible to seek out accidents or other causes of illness due to karmic effects. In due course we will deal with the details of such processes, such as the way in which the forces in deeper levels of consciousness work within the human being, or to what extent our ordinary consciousness may avoid such accidents. We can understand that someone who goes to a place where he may succumb to an infection will have been driven there under the influence of a certain level of consciousness; in like manner we must be able to understand how it is that human beings take certain measures to render such infections less and less effective; in other words, that through our ordinary consciousness we are able to avert certain consequences by means of hygiene.“
~Rudolf Steiner, Manifestations of Karma, Chapter 6, “Karma in Relation to Accidents”, Hamburg, 21 May, 1910 … focus of the December 2 meeting.
The lecture can be found online at the RS Archive (eLib) by clicking this link: https://wn.rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA120/English/RSP1984/19100521p01.html
The Central Regional Council of the Anthroposophical Society in America invites you to join our ongoing study conversation. The study has been divided among four volunteers who will summarize their section to rebuild it as a foundation for our conversation. Please familiarize yourself with the lecture if possible so you will feel comfortable sharing your reflections and thoughts with the group.
This collection of lectures has been republished by Rudolf Steiner Press under the title: “Manifestations of Karma.” This book is a translation from German of Die Offenbarung des Karma (Ga 120), published in English by Rudolf Steiner Press in 1996.
This will be a “Zoom” conference call allowing us an opportunity to see one another while conversing (or audio only if you prefer). To connect to the audio/video-conference:
Video Conference Details:
Join Zoom Meeting https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82715186258
Meeting ID: 827 1518 6258
Find your local number: https://us02web.zoom.us/u/kclU2SSTF
If you have questions, please contact Alberto Loya aloyavaca@utexas.edu
Agenda for our Study Call
7:15 Welcome and Introductions
7:18 Verse
7:25 Study led by five volunteers
Note: CRC team will ID volunteers
Laura – pg. 106 to 110
Ana – pg. 111 to 115
Camille – pg. 116 to 120
Alberto – pg. 121 to end
8:05 Conversation
8:28 Close with verse
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Holy Nights 2020-21 “A Rose By Any Other Name” The many faces of The Sophia
24 December 2020 – 5 January 2021 (with NYE as the Hidden Holy Night)
Hosted by Laura Scappaticci & Tess Parker, featuring the Sophia Working Group
Everyday 9 am – 9:30 am ET, 10 am – 10:30 am MT, 11 am – 11:30 am CT, 12 pm – 12:30 pm ET
International online gathering on the Theme of the Divine Feminine.
stay tuned for details
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Our Annual Conscious NYE gathering 8 pm 1 am
In-Person at Elderberries Bio-dynamic Outpost & Cultural Hub & The Rudolf Steiner Branch Chicago 4249-51 N. Lincoln Ave. 60613
This Years Theme is a Masked Ball –
Live Music, Folk Dancing, Potluck, Mask making with Lucien Dante Lazar, more TBA
$20 per person
Stay tuned for details
***
Epiphany 6 January 2021 What Joan of Arc Calls for Today 7 pm – 9 pm CT
In-person at Elderberries Chicago & online
Today on the Birthday of Joan of Arc we will explore ‘The Destinies of Individuals and of Nations, Lecture 5, The Nature of the Christ Impulse and the Michaelic Sprit Serving It by Rudolf Steiner with Leading Thoughts by Hazel Archer-Ginsberg
Social Sculpture: “The Passage” with Luicen Dante Lazar – Eurythmy
Singing & Eurythmy
Join Zoom Meeting
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“The task of evil is to promote the ascent of man”. ref., At the Gates of Spiritual Science, lecture 8. Thanks, Hazel for this important excerpt. I have been inspired by a current posting from Jeremy Smith’s Anthropopper blog to further explore the necessity that evil exist in the world as our lot in life, and found another one here that also invokes the Manichees, who seem to have known for nearly two thousand years that we would need to face evil head-on in order to rise above.
“You must not think that evil has no part in the plan of creation. It is there in order that through it may come the greater good. Those who are being prepared in their souls by such teachings, so that in the future they will be able to accomplish this great task of education, are the pupils of the Manichaean School. The Manichaean teaching is generally misunderstood. When you hear anything or read something about it, you find merely phrases. You may read that the Manichees believed that from the very beginning of the world there have been two principles: good and evil. This is not so, the teaching of the Manichees is what we have just explained. By the name “Manichaeism” should be understood the above teaching and its development in the future, and the pupils who are so led that they can accomplish such a task in future incarnations.”
https://wn.rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA104/English/APC1958/19080625p01.html
Also interesting to consider is that Manes , the founder of Manichaeism, is said to be one of those that reincarnates readily in order to further the cause of spiritual evolution. One of these incarnations was to initiate Christian Rosenkreutz in 1459, according to Dr. Steiner.
Hazel, have you heard of the supposed drawing that Rudolf Steiner drew for Ita Wegman when she asked about who he was? He drew two figures, one wearing a red stola, and the other a blue stola, and labeled them, Master Jesus , (red), and Christian Rosenkreutz (blue). Rudolf Steiner infers himself in the middle between these two figures, and the meaning of this remains a mystery to this very day. What if it could be solved?
As I get older, I marvel at how often I named the well from which I would not drink: As a child I recoiled at the Christian path with all it’s talk of death, Blood & sacrifice. And as I got older & learned more about the Manichean path, I also got shivers thinking how could anyone take evil into themselves willingly…
The Hindu texts talk about how antipathy is a sign that we are supposed to go toward that which repels us
a real lesson that the things which hold a charge can be a sign post to our initiation.
I pray everyday to purify & transform what ever is in me that needs to get out of the way so I can manifest the love that the Christ impulse brings
I have worked with this imagination of the great initiates working with Michael & the Christ as part of the with the Rose Cross Meditation.
BTW: You got the colors reversed. The mystery is simple. It shows these great initiates working to bring the Christ Impulse to humanity, each in their own way. CR, (Lazarus John the 1st Christian Initiate) holding the red pillar of Joachin & Master Jesus (the continuation of the individuality we know as Zarathustra) holding the Blue Boaz pillar. Both these Masters work in the background with those worthy to be their students. RS is the public figure bringing it all to us. I have created a collage of this that I will try to post in RR blog.