research & reviews
Swan’s Wings Swan’s Wings: A Spiritual Autobiography; Part I, Childhood and Youth; by Judith von Halle (not yet translated from the German)
Review by Michael Vode
Margarita Woloschin, The Resurrected”
How the Last Supper leads to the eventual transformation of the Earth to Sun through the mystery of bread and the juice of the vine in connection with the path of the Holy Body and Sacred Blood. (Chapter 2, “The Sun Mystery of the Last Supper”) Before closing, it should be mentioned that the book contains many wonderful full color reproductions of Christian and anthroposophic art, which serve the presentation of ideas very well. The frontispiece, for example, is Margarita Woloschin’s The Resurrected (above). As stated at the beginning, reading this work was truly transformative for me, and I commend it most highly. Stephen E. Usher, PhD (seusher@sbcglobal.net) is an an economist with expertise in money, banking, and financial markets. He was for eight years managing director of Anthroposophic Press, and has lectured and written widely on anthroposophical topics.
44 • being human
During Passiontide of 2005, Judith von Halle received the stigmata and has since composed approximately twenty meditative texts, many devolving on previously unresearched, Christ-ensouled, historical phenomena. Since she has revealed very little of her private life, this book comes as a surprise. The experiences cover an inner and outer life, and despite trials and tribulations, they reveal glimpses into a continuously ardent and searching soul-life, except for two painful periods of interruption. Her honesty and powers of discernment convey spiritual subtleties and distinctions that invite extended contemplation on the part of the reader. The discrete sections, not divided into chapters, interweave to convey the continuity of a lifespan. This preview of a four-hundred-page book will offer a decidedly partial overview of Judith von Halle’s experiences and insights. The book opens dramatically. While at her grandparent’s house, the two-year-old is startled when a man bursts into the house to tell of raging fire across town. The shock awakens her not only to her earthly personality, but to the reality of a higher I-consciousness. She recognizes that the fire that distresses her is not the present one, and she also recognizes that her higher consciousness has the knowledge that she currently cannot access. This early experience begins her quest to answer this burning question. As a young girl, Judith already perceived the etheric in the plant world as well as the etheric and astral bodies of humans. As a child she coined the word “Lebens zauberkraft” for the etheric, a word which evoked the divine power of the emanation she perceived. When in her twenties she came across Rudolf Steiner’s Theosophy, she realized that his term “etheric body” corresponded to her coined word. She felt nourished by the pure beauty of this kingdom—in contrast to so much of the artificial, man-made world around her. She was disturbed by the monstrous astral apparition that accompanied a loss of temper, but uplifted by the beauteous aura of an adult she sometimes beheld who cultivated a life of restraint and
