being human - spring 2023

Felted art

by Kathie Young

anthroposophical society in america I anthroposophy.org I rudolfsteiner.org

preparing for the future paul nordoff, a life’s work leading through change wonders of development

the new rudolf steiner archive the re-founding in light of the fire

truth & knowledge—and life

turning past one hundred years

archetypal motifs good time

cosmic perspectives turning lead into gold

M o n e y a t w o r k i n t h e w o r l d i n

t h e s e r v i c e o f t h e c o m m o n g o o d .

W e a r e a f i d u c i a r y , e t h i c a l l y b o u n d t o a d v i s e f o r o u r c l i e n t ' s i n t e r e s t s f i r s t a n d f o r e m o s t . O u r t a s k i s t o s u p p o r t o u r c l i e n t s t o f u l f i l l t h e i r i n d i v i d u a l l i f e ' s i n t e n t i o n s t h r o u g h f i n a n c i a l p l a n n i n g a n d a s s e t m a n a g e m e n t t h a t i s c o n g r u e n t w i t h t h e i r p e r s o n a l a n d s p i r i t u a l v a l u e s a n d a s p i r a t i o n s .

O U R S E R V I C E S I N C L U D E :

F i n a n c i a l P l a n n i n g

I n v e s t m e n t C o n s u l t i n g

P o r t f o l i o D e s i g n & M a n a g e m e n t

I n s u r a n c e P l a n n i n g

E s t a t e P l a n n i n g

P h i l a n t h r o p i c P l a n n i n g

O U R T E A M :

J e r r y M S c h w a r t z , C F P ®

B e r n a r d C M u r p h y , C F P ®

K i m b e r l y M . M u l l i n , F P Q P ™

W e i n v i t e y o u t o c o n t a c t u s t o d a y !

JULY 10 – 1 4, 2023 | DENVER COLORADO

Grade-Level Preparation (ECE and Grades 1-8) for the 2023-2024 school year

Experienced Waldorf instructors at each grade level and inspiring guests from the greater community. Classes cover a variety of information designed to ready the teacher with stories, art, academics and pedagogically appropriate content for the next grade level. Recommended for all teachers working in public or independent schools inspired by Waldorf pedagogy.

Nationally Accredited Teacher Training

for Independent and Public Schools

Inspired by Waldorf Principles

NEW COHORT BEGINS SUMMER 2023

DENVER, COLORADO | June 22 – July 14

Gradalis training for Early Childhood and Grades Teachers is taught over 26 months, in seven semesters. Courses provide anthroposophical foundations, rich artistic training in visual & temporal arts, inner development, insights for child observation, and working with special needs. Plus, field mentoring, curriculum, and school culture.

A

SAVE YOUR SPOT: gradalis.edu

Includes: 3 three-week Summer Intensives; 4 Practicum Weekends; and on-line Interactive Distance Learning (7.9% of program) to support the working teacher with monthly pedagogical and main lesson support through two school years.

LEARN MORE: gradalis.edu

‘Teaching as an Art’

Designed for schools with teachers not yet Waldorf trained who need an introduction to Waldorf principles.

• Monthly Philosophy Discussions with Bonnie River

• Grade Level Mentoring w/ experienced instructors

• Subject Teacher Mentoring (foreign language; music; handwork; games)

• Art Lessons: Drawing and Watercolor Painting

• Movement lessons

• On-site mentoring for teachers in the program for schools with 5 or more teachers in the program (2 times per year)

Unite your Faculty as they gain foundational understandings of Waldorf principles. One, Two and Three Year Options available. Clock hours are accredited for CEUs when students attend the online classes.

Accredited by

Gradalis Curriculum Frameworks

Math & Literacy Standards & Benchmarks

created for Waldorf schools, public & private

A five-volume, detailed-scope sequence with scaffolded benchmarks in Math and Language Arts for Kindergarten through Grade eight. D esigned by Prairie Adams, a Waldorf teacher, eurythmist, and co-founder of the Gradalis Teacher Training. These volumes were developed over a twelve-year period with the support and guidance of educators and consultants who are experts in their fields.

The Frameworks are a resource for researching content and designing lessons. They can serve as the basis for discussion and consideration when a school is reviewing educational goals or developing rigorous academic standards while maintaining the integrity and genius of the curriculum as given to us by Rudolf Steiner. Common Core standards are designated clearly where they are met, and a matrix is provided for those who need to quickly access particular standards within the Waldorf Curriculum.

Includes both electronic and hard copy volumes.

Inspiring Education

Since 1967

Low-Residency Waldorf

Early Childhood, Elementary, and High School

Teacher Education Programs and Special Subject Intensives

SUNY MEd or MALS option available

Financial aid available, including Diversity Fund Scholarships

Apply Now To Enroll This Summer

Or register for an upcoming workshop or Summer Series 2023

Professional Development and Introductory Courses

www.sunbridge.edu

August 10–16, 2023

That Good May Become a festival of initiative

Join us for a festival in the centre of the North American continent, celebrating 100 years since the founding of the General Anthroposophical Society. Be part of Working and Creating Together Groups around themes such as spiritual agriculture, a new look at anthroposophy in the Americas, the human heart, indigenous links to anthroposophy, Waldorf education, the Parcival Project, new translations of Novalis’ work and more! Peter Selg and Constanza Kaliks from the Goetheanum will play active roles at the festival. Visit our festival website for more information: thatgoodmaybecome.ca.

Organized by the Anthroposophical Society in Canada

Connect to the Spirit-al Rhy2hms of the Year…

A sacred ser:ice.

An open esoteric secret: The Consecration of the

Human Being

A celebration of the Festivals

Renewal of the Sacraments

Ser:ices for Children

Religious Education

Summer Camps

St-dy Groups

Lect-res

The Christian Communit@ is a movement for the renewal of religion. It is centered around the seven sacraments in their renewed forE and seeks to open the path to the living, healing presence of Christ in the age of the Hee individual.

LearJ more at www.thechristiancommunit@.org

Supporting Courage Can you imagine founding a SteinerWaldorf school without assuming tuition as income? I retired to Kenya in East Africa. I found 4 schools here, one with a very different philosophy: The Rudolf Steiner School Mbagathi was the first, founded in 1989, referred to as the ‘Mother’ school of East Africa. Here training sessions are held for teachers from all Africa except South Africa. There were 80 at the last session. Most children come from desperate situations. The mood of the school is uplifting and inspiring. Can you support this courage? There is a website — steinerschoolmbagathi.co.ke — moving and inspiring! Questions not answered by the site: sarnia.guiton@gmail.com

RUDOLF STEINER SCHOOL MBAGATHI NAIROBI  KENYA

12 from the 2022-2023 Holy Nights Team

14 Book Notes: Shakespeare: Becoming Human, Rudolf Steiner; Fire Borne: Anthroposophy in America, Jean Yeager; Evolution As It Was Meant To Be, Stephen Talbott; From Mechanism to Organism, Michael Holdrege; Teaching Art History, Van James; Awakening Spirit, Hugh Renwick; Seeing Colour, Löbe, Rang, Vine; Between Form and Freedom: Raising a Teenager, Betty Staley; Christ and the Spiritual World, Rudolf Steiner; The Three Meetings: Christ, Michael and Anthroposophia, Yeshayahu Ben-Aharon

17 The New Rudolf Steiner Archive, by Dr. Christopher & Karin Wietrzykowski

Turning Past One Hundred Years, by John Bloom

New Year’s Eve, Dornach, 2022, by Ezra Sullivan 21 Cosmic Perspectives 2023, by Mary Stewart Adams

The Re-founding in Light of the Fire, by Bill Trusiewicz

by Andrew Linnell

poem by Michael Burton

On the Cover:

Artist Kathie Young passed away September 21, 2021. Born Hisung Chun in Seoul, South Korea on October 22, 1949, in 1960 the family emigrated to Canada.

by Fred Dennehy

“A Fairy Tale” and “Poetry and Painting,” poems by Andrew Hoy

The Impulse & Power of Artistic Eurythmy, by Nachshon Andrew Dzedulionis

Truth & Knowledge—and Life, by Russell Arnold, PhD

, review by Craig Holdrege

, review by Lynn Madsen, PhD MD

Plants, by Stewart Lundy

by Frank Hall

by Neill Reilly

Human Moral Development & the Future Evolution of Nature, by Andrew Luisi

Leading Through Change, by Torin M. Finser, PhD 50 Rudolf Steiner’s Calendar of the Soul 2023-2024, by Herbert O. Hagens 51 “Yo” / “I”, poem by Iris Leal, translated by Ben Reynolds

52

news for members & friends

52 Welcoming New Members

53 Awakening to Community of the Future, by Angela Foster & Tess Parker

54 Introducing Leah Walker

54 Gratitude for Deb, by Helen-Ann Ireland & John Bloom

55 Mary Stewart Adams, GC member at large

55 Welcome, Katrina Hoven!

56 Robert M. Logsdon, by Rev. Carol Kelly and by David Adams

58 Saluting Members Who Have Died

58 Hanna Maria Kress, by Margaretha Christine Kress Hertle

60 Allyn Marilyn “Alwyn” Moss

61 Peter Anthony Obuchowski, Jr.

61 Two Easter Poems, by Christina Daub

63 Epiphany Invocation, social poem by Jordan Walker

She studied at New York City’s Parsons School of Design and worked in fashion illustration and layout. In 1992, she met Larry Young in an anthroposophical biography group arranged by a mutual friend. They married and formed a creative partnership: an art school for children and families, an exhibit of art by Waldorf students in the cathedral of St. John the Divine in NYC, a film of a couple’s struggle to find each other out of true spiritual insight. Kathie and Larry moved to Canada in their later years. Her “yes” to art and to life was contagious, and the light she brought into the world will be missed. (from Rev. Kate Kennedy’s eulogy at rscc.ca/ kathie-young-1949-2021).

The Anthroposophical

from the 2022-2023 Holy Nights Team

Dear Friends,

John Bloom, General Secretary & President

Helen-Ann Ireland, Chair (at large)

David Mansur, Treasurer (at large)

Leah Walker, Secretary (at large)

Gino Ver Eecke (Eastern Region)

Christine Burke (Western Region)

Margaret Runyon (at large)

Mary Stewart Adams (at large)

Tess Parker, Director of Programs

Eddie Ledermann, Director of Finance

being human

is published by the Anthroposophical Society in America

1923 Geddes Avenue

Ann Arbor, MI 48104-1797

Tel. 734.662.9355

Past issues are online at www.issuu.com/anthrousa

Please send submissions, questions, and comments to: editor@anthroposophy.org

or to the postal address above, by 05/10/2023.

being human is sent free to ASA members (visit anthroposophy.org/join) and shared free at many branches and initiatives. To request a sample copy, write or email editor@anthroposophy.org

©2023 The Anthroposophical Society in America. Responsibility for the content of articles is the authors’.

In our work to bring relevant programs and events, we consciously strive to serve a global network of human beings seeking the spirit. At the time of writing these words, winter is still upon us in the Northern Hemisphere; by the time this reaches you, spring will be unfolding. Even we co-authors are present in very different spaces, Angela in Atlanta, Georgia, Katrina in Jaipur, India. One can be almost anywhere in the world and communicate! Our offerings are planned to incorporate friends from all continents of the world.

It is nice to imagine a world connected by sparkling lights where people are enkindled and inspired by this work. This picture felt most potent during our Attending the Fire, a New Year’s Eve vigil where almost 500 people gathered online, at midnight, Central European Time, gathered virtually alongside those in Dornach, Switzerland to mark the burning of the first Goetheanum. We came together to be present for a reading of the Foundation Stone Meditation.

We acknowledge the tragedy of the fire and also seek to transform the pain into a force available to higher purposes. Following the vigil, we decided that the Awakening to Community lectures would be a powerful way to begin the new year. In the first lecture of this series, Rudolf Steiner tells us that the first Goetheanum was built of love: love was embodied in the building itself. He goes on to say, “That same love manifested itself in renewed sacrifice during the night of the Goetheanum fire. It was spirit transformed into love that was present there.”

Spirit transformed into love.

Together we can ponder this phrase. We can ask questions about transforming into love. What would this be like? How does it feel? What does it look like? Can we depict this process artistically? How does this transformation happen? Perhaps this transformation into love does not happen in one person, alone. Could it be that transforming into love is something that must happen in community, where two or more are gathered?

Our study and reading aloud the words of Rudolf Steiner are some of the first steps we take together in building a bridge from human heart to human heart, and then from united human hearts to the spiritual world and all the good beings who seek to work with us.

As 2023 progresses, we will continue to offer opportunities to connect and weave our web of stars across the world. Join us for upcoming programs related to our ongoing themes and work, augmented by this special 100 year anniversary of the re-founding of the anthroposophical society. We can’t wait to share, learn, deepen, and grow together.

You can always email us with questions, ideas, or feedback, or feel free to add to our virtual suggestion box: anthroposophy.org/suggestions

Angela Foster & Katrina Hoven

LegacyCircle

Erika V. Asten*

Betty Baldwin

J. Leonard Benson*

Susannah Berlin*

Hiram Anthony Bingham*

Mrs. Hiram A. Bingham

Virginia Blutau*

Iana Questara Boyce*

Marion Bruce*

Robert Cornett

Helen Ann Dinklage*

Irmgard Dodegge*

Raymond Elliot*

Lotte K. Emde*

Hazel Ferguson*

Marie S. Fetzer*

Linda C. Folsom*

Gerda Gaertner*

Susanna Gaertner

Ray German

Ruth Geiger

Harriet S. Gilliam*

Chuck Ginsberg

Hazel Archer-Ginsberg

Agnes B. Granberg*

Alice Groh

Bruce L. Henry*

Ruth Heuscher*

Richard Hicks*

Christine Huston

Ernst Katz*

Cecilia Leigh Anna Lord*

Seymour Lubin*

William H. Manning

Gregg Martens*

Barbara Martin

Beverly Martin

Helvi McClelland

Robert & Ellen McDermott

Robert S. Miller*

Ralph Neuman*

Martin Novom

Carolyn Oates

Mary Lee Plumb-Mentjes

Norman Pritchard*

Paul Riesen*

Joan Roach*

Mary Rubach*

Margaret Runyon

Ray Schlieben*

Lillian C. Scott*

Fairchild Smith*

Patti Smith*

Hannah Sohnrey*

Doris E. Stitzer*

Gertrude O. Teutsch*

Katherine Thivierge

Jeannette Van Wiermeersch*

Catherina Vanden Broek*

Randall Wadsworth

Pamela Whitman

Thomas Wilkinson

Anonymous (22)

* indicates past legacy gift

Legacy giving is an excellent way to support the work of the Society far beyond a person’s current giving capacity.

There are a variety of ways to make a legacy or planned gift. If you would like to learn more please contact Deb Abrahams-Dematte at 603-801-6484 or deb@anthroposophy.org

www.anthroposophy.org/legacy

The ASA invites you to join the Michael

Support Circle

our major donor circle. THANK YOU to the 45 individual members, and to these organizations for their generous and on-going support:

Anthroposophical Society of Cape Ann Association of Waldorf Schools of North America

Bay Area Center for Waldorf Teacher Training Biodynamic Association

Camphill School – Beaver Run

Carah Medical Arts

Council of Anthroposophical Organizations

GRADALIS Waldorf Consulting & Services

Great Lakes Branch

House of Peace

Rudolf Steiner Fellowship Foundation

Michael Support Circle members pledge gifts of between $500 and $5000 per year for five or more years. They help the Society to grow in capacity and vitality—the basis for increased membership, new learning opportunities, and greater impact in the world.

To learn more about how you can support the strength and sustainability of our movement, contact Deb at deb@anthroposophy.org

Saint George Slays the Dragon, by Laura James

L eaving a L egacy of W i LL The Anthroposophical Society in America

THAN K YO U! to these members, who support the Society’s future through a bequest or planned gift

photo by Javier Allegue Barros

on-Avon, 1920–1922; Rudolf Steiner’s report on the Stratford Shakespeare Festival of 1922

From the extensive introduction by Andrew Wolpert: “Like so much of Renaissance art, Shakespeare’s work bears an open secret. The esoteric spiritual content is undisguised, though it may be unexpected and not always immediately recognized. Like all the great artistic achievements, this work remains incomplete until we recognize and respond to its open invitation that we become active participants. The love for Shakespeare and recognition I have for what he represents in our culture and in a world context arises directly out of my understanding of the whole impulse in Rudolf Steiner’s work. The significance of the circumstances we are born into, the challenges of the inherited social structures, the emancipation and sovereignty of the individual, the courage for the truth, the meaning of evil, the spiritual context of our biography, the reality of forgiveness and reconciliation, the creation of a new social order, and the

power of unconditional love, all these occur again and again in Shakespeare’s work; their beauty and truth are universally acknowledged and enjoyed. The spiritual science that arises out of Rudolf Steiner’s work allows all these soul-nourishing experiences also to become amenable to a level of conscious understanding, so that our engagement with the plays, not just as actors and directors, but also as students and members of an audience can become co-creative participation in the redemptive potential of Shakespeare’s works.”

Fire Borne: Anthroposophy in America, by Jean W. Yeager, 200 pp. (Anthroposophical Publications anthroposophicalpublications.org)

The Arsonist’s fire in 1923 intensified anthroposophical spiritualscientific insights worldwide and in America, led to a century of innovative, inspired practical initiatives in biodynamic agriculture, Waldorf education, Camphill communities, the arts, medical practices, social finance/banking, and more.

Fire Borne uses a timeline format to show the cultural, political, and economic forces active in our changing moral terrain 1886-2026. A collection of “in ourselves and in the world” stories that may be a tool to help us see more clearly into the future and allow the past to show us the way. Graphic, illustrated, with voluminous end notes, commentaries, anti-defamation reports, and even humble by-laws!

By Jean W. Yeager, former Administrative Director of the Anthroposophical Society in America (jwyeager2@gmail.com).

Evolution As It Was Meant To Be: and the Living Narratives That Tell Its Story, by Stephen L.

Talbott;

411 pp; free download at bwo.life/bk

The author’s project “Biology Worthy of Life” (discussed in our last issue) has resulted in this completed book, of which he writes: “You can consider the book ‘out for review,’ and your own review comments will be more than welcome. It is not clear when or whether there will be an updated and formally issued revision. The current version can be reviewed and freely distributed for noncommercial personal and educational purposes. Feel free to let others know about it.” There are two new chapters: “‘How the World Lends Itself to Our Knowing’ is the book’s penultimate chapter, dealing with how we are situated in the world as knowers, or: How we live within the world rather than as onlookers puzzling futilely over its alien reality. The argument runs radically counter to the prevailing Cartesian dualism that even those who most loudly bewail it cannot seem to escape. And ‘Some Principles of Biological Understanding,’ the book’s concluding chapter. It is my attempted articulation of twelve principles underlying

the entire presentation of the book. None of this is part of any contemporary biological curriculum.” Links to chapters and the full download are at bwo.life/bk

From Mechanism to Organism: Enlivening the Study of Human Biology, by Michael Holdrege, 252 pp; Waldorf Publications (www.waldorfpublications.org)

Michael Holdrege brings a fresh and insightful spark to teaching life science to adolescents. At a time when young people struggle to find meaning and significance in much of contemporary schooling, Holdrege describes in this book a pathway to engendering interest in the amazing wisdom of the human body. Starting with the inevitable preoccupation teenagers have with their own body’s changes and growth, he leads them gradually to a deeper understanding of the dynamic and interwoven processes that make up and sustain the human organism. Proceeding in this way, a kind of thinking is being schooled that is capable of dealing with the complex and multi-dimensional world that the students are growing up into. Parents may find that this book will help them understand how science can be taught in a way that fits and nurtures the kinds of thinking that are gradually emerging in young people as they move through the different phases of their development. “It is clear that young people today do not simply want to absorb values and an understanding of the world that comes from someone else or from tradition. They want to make their own judgments, based on their own experiences, and they want to give their lives direction on that basis (aka self-determination).” — From Mechanism

to Organism

Teaching Art History: Engaging the Adolescent in Art Appreciation, Cultural History and the Evolution of Consciousness , by Van James, 278 pp; Waldorf Publications (www.waldorfpublications.org)

A practical resource for teachers, artists, parents, and anyone interested in art, culture, history, education, and creativity. Historical works of art and student artistic exercises are amply provided and explained together with the story of art through history and why it is a powerfully transformative experience in adolescent development and human history.

This Waldorf high school’s art history curriculum overview concentrates on the 9th grade, supplemented with practical ideas for other grade-levels to help bring this subject to life. A collection of poems is included that can be used in the classroom, and an extensive bibliography. — Van James is an international advocate for the arts and a guest instructor at colleges and Waldorf teacher training centers throughout Asia, Oceana, and America. With forty years of experience as a Waldorf teacher, he is a mentor for Gradalis Teacher Education and the Academy of Himalayan Art and Child Development.

Awakening Spirit, Freeing the Will, by Hugh Renwick; 104 pp; Waldorf Publications (www.waldorfpublications.org)

Rudolf Steiner’s signature work, The Philosophy of Freedom, can be challenging to read. Hugh Renwick has brought the work into practical consideration in a wonderful way with this book, Awakening Spirit. He relates the truth in Steiner’s book to daily practice as a teacher, making the material accessible through understanding the teacher’s role and responsibility in leading the young to maturity. Steiner cautioned

the first teachers that it is not what we teach but who we are that is all-important in facing children in a class. The Philosophy of Freedom has the potential to transform who we are, to brighten our thinking, and to open our organs of spiritual perception. Through his practical study of direct applications from Steiner’s work, Renwick leads a path through a potentially difficult study to an opening of doors into its effectiveness for teachers – for anyone, for that matter, but especially for teachers.

Seeing Colour: A Journey Through Goethe’s World of Colour, by Nora Löbe, Matthias Rang, Troy Vine; 167 pp., (Floris Books, 2022, available from SteinerBooks); Foreword by Arthur Zajonc.

Color is everywhere. From blue skies to red sunsets, from the first flowers in spring to the blazing leaves of autumn. But what is the nature of color? Scientific books present a variety of mechanical explanations but this approach leaves color as a whole unexplained. In the nineteenth century, the German poet and scientist Johann Wolfgang von Goethe investigated a wide range of color phenomena and discovered the underlying principles that govern color itself. This lavishly illustrated book brings Goethe’s pioneering research up to date. Through descriptions of simple observations and ingenious experiments, the reader will discover a series of color phenomena that includes afterimages, colored shadows, color mixing, and prismatic and polarization colors.

Between Form and Freedom: Raising a Teenager, by Betty Staley, 368 pp. (Hawthorn Books, 2022)

“It’s a rare book about teens that becomes more and more relevant as time goes on. This is not just one of them, it is the one. Whenever I am asked by parents trying to unravel their teens behavior, ‘Is that normal?’, I recommend Between Form and Freedom with a confidence that it will give them the understanding they need, to open up a path toward deeper and enduring connection with their child.” — Kim John Payne, author of Simplicity Parenting. • Discusses how adolescents present either the

‘mask’ or the ‘volcano’ as they struggle with identity and selfesteem. • Tackles the current questions of gender fluidity, eating disorders & media addictions • Shares teenagers’ voices, stories and experiences • Opens up windows to the changing inner life of developing teenagers. • Easy to read, with nutshell summaries and questions for reflection and action • Thoroughly revised and updated edition

Christ and the Spiritual World: The Quest for the Holy Grail, by Rudolf Steiner; 176 pp., (Rudolf Steiner Press, 2023) translated by Charles Davy, revised and introduced by Frederick Amrine.

Six lectures at Leipzig, December 1913–January 1914 (CW 149)

Reassessing human history in relation to the cosmic and earthly events of Christ’s incarnation, Rudolf Steiner stresses the significance of Gnostic spirituality and legends of the Holy Grail. The Christ impulse “is not a one-time event but a continuous process, beginning well before Jesus of Nazareth walked the earth.” It is a force that gives impetus to human development, such as the extraordinary flowering of free thinking during the past two millennia. Surveying this pattern of evolving human thought, Steiner explains the roles of historical figures such as Zarathustra, Joan of Arc, and Johannes Kepler. We are shown the widespread influence of the sibyls, clairvoyant prophets of the Greco-Roman world, contrasted with the Hebrew prophets. The lectures culminate in the secret background of the Parsifal narrative. Steiner illustrates how it is possible to experience the Holy Grail by reading the starry script at Easter time. He also provides a rare personal account of the processes he uses to conduct esoteric research. This new edition features a revised translation and an introduction, appendices, and notes by Frederick Amrine.

The Three Meetings: Christ, Michael and Anthroposophia, by Yeshayahu Ben-Aharon, 148pp. (Temple Lodge, 2022)

“How can our souls unite with the etheric Christ, experienced in the etheric world since the end of the last century? What steps should we take, in the second century of the age of Michael, to unite with Him?”

At the center of human evolution stands the Mystery of Golgotha, through which the Christ impulse entered the earth. Anthroposophy, said Rudolf Steiner, was given at the beginning of the last century to prepare for the second ma-

jor Christ event—the etheric Second Coming—beginning in 1933. This event is the portal that leads to the mighty and transformative current events in the etheric world, enabling us to meet the etheric Christ, Michael, and Anthroposophia. At the heart of this book is an existential question. Early in his anthroposophic work, Ben-Aharon realized that meeting the etheric Christ without the light of spiritual science remains only a personal experience. Likewise, anthroposophy is merely a body of erudition frozen in time if no new life forces flow from the etheric Christ. But they are interdependent. How can such a mutually enlivening bridge to be built? Speaking candidly of his personal spiritual path and inner struggles of consciousness, Ben-Aharon tackles this fundamental dilemma as a prelude to the forthcoming, second edition of his book The New Experience of the Supersensible.

Love Bravely (lovebravely.substack.com, www.youtube. com/@lovebravely) cross-genre music project and creative community founded by rapper / singer-songwriter, Matre (Matt Mattre Sawaya), with a wide network of musicians, artists and creatives.

Hey family, Thank you for stopping by, and welcome to this new project… In late 2019 I left my home base in L.A. and went to spend some time in rural, upstate New York. I stepped away from projects I was working on, and stopped posting on social media. I was reaching the end of a stage of my life, and could feel I was ready for a change. The world was in a crazy place and I felt I needed to take some time to try and better understand my own path, and how I could contribute. Five months later, the pandemic started and things got even crazier. I didn’t know if I would write music or not, or if music was the direction things would take, but soon songs started to come. As they came they guided my process. Little by little they’ve helped me understand more about myself, about this moment we’re living in, about working to support change, and about the role art can play in all of this.

Love Bravely is a project I’m launching to help share these new songs and to invite conversations and connections. I think about LB as a band that’s unusually big, because it includes everyone who makes this music possible, as well as artists and collaborators working in a lot of other mediums. This work - like so much of my work over the years - is able to move forward and grow because of the support and encouragement of so many people. Thank you all! In this spirit, Love Bravely is a community supported project and we invite those who are interested to donate here, in support of our ongoing work and collaborations… Thank you for tuning in and being a part of this with us. More music, videos and all kinds of creations on the way... peace & thanks, Matt (Matre)

The New Rudolf Steiner Archive

by Dr. Christopher and Karin Wietrzykowski

In 2021, the Rudolf Steiner Archive website was transferred to a new non-profit organization, Steiner Online Library. We offer highlights from an article in the Winter-Spring 2023 issue of New View from the UK (newview.org.uk). —Editor

From a small cottage nestled between two lakes in Northern Michigan, Dr. Christopher Wietrzykowski and his wife Karin run the largest digital collection of works of Rudolf Steiner available in English: more than 3,000 of his lectures reaching approximately 6,000 unique visitors each day. Developed at the dawn of the digital age, it needs technical and functional upgrades. Much has been done already and new features are being launched in early 2023, applying Chris’ in-depth knowledge of computing and Karin’s abilities as an accomplished technology lawyer to expand their global audience.

In the late 1970s, Werner Glas and Hans Gebert were at the Rudolf Steiner Institute in Southfield, Michigan, when Jim Stewart, new to anthroposophy, made their acquaintance, often asking Steiner-related questions of them. Jim had over 15 years’ experience developing databases for the automotive industry and knew these questions might be more easily answered if Steiner’s books and lectures could be collected in a searchable database. When the internet became available in the late 1980s, he began the Rudolf Steiner Archive... Eventually, Jim found an amazing piece of software that not only allowed people to download the files but to search them as well. A network of volunteers found their way to the Archive and one of the most prolific, Dr. Christopher Wietrzykowski, also lived in Michigan and met Jim personally on many occasions. When Jim was diagnosed with lung cancer, he asked Chris if he would take over.

Chris agreed; he had been thinking about retiring from dentistry so he could dedicate his life to anthroposophy. Chris was on an equally important task—finding his spiritual partner. Chris and Karin Miller had gone to high school together and attended the same church while growing up; when her family moved away after 10th grade, he was devastated. Almost thirty-five years later, a friend of Chris’ let him know that he had found Karin. She had just written a spiritual book— Global Values: A New Paradigm for a New World . In 2018, they were married and returned to Michigan, and in early 2020 Jim began to transition the Archive to them.

(continued on page 52)

Turning Past One Hundred Years

by John Bloom

One hundred years of anthroposophy presents a significant moment for recollection, recognition, and reckoning. So much has been accomplished around the world over the hundred years since the 1923/24 Christmas Conference, the founding moment of the newly inspired Anthroposophical Society. One hundred years on, there is clearly much more to do that speaks to the future and anthroposophy’s evolution in the twenty-first century. The gift of the Foundation Stone Meditation given at the 1923 Conference was already a transformation from the Foundation Stone laid in 1913 in the first Goetheanum. This spiritual and metaphysical deed was encoded in the life of the organization in the new Society in its first statute: “The Anthroposophical Society is to be an association of people whose will it is to nurture the life of the soul, both in the individual and in human society, on the basis of a true knowledge of the spiritual world.”

When I first encountered this statute, I found a kind of destiny affirmation in it, though I could hardly foresee how it might play out in my life. It says to me that the spiritual world, and my ability to know and be guided by it, is the moral atmosphere that informs self-knowledge, and further, how I engage with others in their respective journeys. The aim of this statute is not about who has the most spiritual knowledge but rather how that knowing has encouraged and shaped work in the life of the soul in individuals and associations. The statute was essential to distinguishing the newly re-founded Anthroposophical Society from its Theosophical predecessor. It signaled a movement from individual spiritual practice into a practical social healing service to others

and the world. Part of the effort here at the hundred year turning point is to ask the question: If the intention of the first statute is true, where are we as members in relation to it as a Society in the United States and as part of the World Society?

The statute speaks of the development of consciousness and the consciousness soul and how we work with that in community over time. Yet, the economically driven ethos of our US culture doesn’t really lend itself to tending that development as individuals or as associations. As a good friend of mine commented, “Who has that kind of time and interest? I have work enough just to feed my family.” This comment is hugely important for the fu-

ture of the Society as it touches on the challenge of nurturing the life of the soul when the practices seem remote and privileged, and when the economy is structured to commoditize and dehumanize work. The call of the Foundation Stone Meditation is one of light and warmth. We have work to do that “good may become,” work that we can lead within a moral atmosphere that is selfless and concerted in association with others. In my mind and heart, I see this social call as one area that we need to tend as a Society.

Each human exists at the intersection of the spiritual and the social. The spiritual line, if I may call it that, is vertical much like the indicative letter “I”. This

The first statute in Rudolf Steiner's handwriting (above) and on the printed program of the 1923/24 Christmas Conference.

I is the incarnating individuality or self; that is, with the help of spiritual guides and self-discipline I can become an awake citizen of the earth through a path of initiation such as is indicated in How to Know Higher Worlds. The earth and its indicative horizon line is a surface we all share. This shared plane is the social ground for the agreements that we make to govern ourselves and for economic interdependence. Where I stand, engaged with the world, both the spiritual and social are co-present within me and through us. It is and can be a beautiful tension, one that unavoidably demands consciousness and devoted time. It is worthy work to cultivate an awareness that can comprehend what is alive in me, alive in the spaces between us all, and awake, and is open to this awareness in others. This social ethic is what Rudolf Steiner was asking of us as practitioners of anthroposophical inquiry or spiritual science.

The scope and scale of the unaddressed cultural, economic, and political challenges from one hundred years ago that gave rise to the First World War have continued to grow to a near intractable stage. Even back then, Rudolf Steiner was carrying and calling for a healing impulse to transform the social and spiritual damage left behind from the War. The practical fields that arose from those seeking Rudolf Steiner’s spiritual scientific insight in their respective vocations have grown too. Waldorf Education and Biodynamic Agriculture, the originations of which bracket the Christmas Conference, are known practices and the numbers of people engaged in them bear witness to the presence and influence of both in many countries and cultures. Other fields have contributed as well. Yet, they are not recognized for the healing potency they carry. Understanding this lack of recognition is the Society’s responsibility to carry in collaboration with those working directly in the fields.

The call for spiritual scientific research, which was also at the heart of the Christmas Conference through the founding of the School for Spiritual Science, was a significant part of and central to the work of the Goetheanum. And further, Rudolf Steiner brought the Class Lessons as a source of deepening and renewal for those committed to a meditative life and to representing anthroposophy in the world.

Spiritual scientific research has been carried strongly by individuals and has played an important role in the development of anthroposophical practices and organizations in the vocational fields. There is strong thought leadership coming from the vocational and practical Sec-

tions of the School for Spiritual Science at the Goetheanum. However, in the US, there is not a strong awareness of the work or the existence of those Sections, even though it is part of the Society’s responsibility to further that research. So, we have some work to do, especially as the awareness and interest in anthroposophy and its practices has diminished in the initiatives as they have extended further into the world. The challenges to and distancing from anthroposophy by individuals and some organizations have paralleled this pattern. We have to acknowledge the reasons behind and take responsibility for this shift. This current situation is a great risk for anthroposophy and for the life of the Society in the US, and we have not found an effective way to address those risks. The evolving approaches to various disciplines over the last hundred years have served well and have been rooted in a growing body of spiritual scientific research. However, without a deep connection to anthroposophical knowing as a source tempered by an abiding interest in serving the real social and ecological needs of our time, the conditions for renewal and leadership seem clouded. So this moment, the one hundred year moment, is a time for honest self-reflection and recognizing where we are and what the call for the future is, at the intersection of the spiritual and the social.

It is the time for all the bearers of the Society and the School for Spiritual Science in the US and North America to come together. It is time to rekindle the linkage of heart forces and capacities that will assure flow from the spiritual to the social and back again in a kind of reciprocal field of research and practice. This process will of necessity include conflict and forgiveness, and an ever-widening awareness of suffering in the world. It will also mean an ever-deepening quality of research that engenders applied transformative approaches to human problems while at the same time lifting the human being as a physical, social, and soul expression of spirit. Effort and focus in this direction, and with some urgency, will honor the impulse founded one hundred years ago at the Christmas Conference.

John Bloom ( john.bloom@anthroposophy.org) is General Secretary of the Anthroposophical Society in America (US). — Occasional letters from the General Secretary and related posts are online at anthroposophy.org/general-secretary

New Year’s Eve, Dornach, 2022

by Ezra Sullivan

On December 31st, I participated in the night watch of the Goetheanum. It was the 100 year anniversary of the burning of the first Goetheanum. The first Goetheanum was a jewel from the spiritual world for human beings to experience what human culture could be when we decide to endeavor our humanity. It was tragically burned down, by arson, on the night of New Years Eve 1922. It was a fire initiation for Rudolf Steiner and the Anthroposophical Society, who had spent ten years working on the building. Much more information can be found on the events elsewhere, I would like to relay my experience here.

The Goetheanum decided to hold a night watch in which free events were scheduled throughout the night and into the morning. I signed on to volunteer for the night watch, and received free entry to the Christmas Conference which occurred in the days before. My post was to help the farmer and gardener of the Goetheanum garden park tend to various fire pits which were arranged around the Goetheanum. I was given this job because I am by profession a farmer, and my lack of German language makes me an unideal candidate to interact with the mostly German speaking public.

The night began a bit spooky because of the ever present bang! and pop! of celebratory fireworks putting me on edge. It felt like a war zone, but as the crowd filled in the space the fireworks became background noise.

Next the fires flushed the atmosphere around the building in smoke, which was in a way appropriate. The elements were present. An older coworker remarked that when she first saw the smoke her heart sank as at first glance it looked like the red smoke, which reportedly was seen from the melting of the glass windows of the first Goetheanum. “Not the red smoke!”

Given the circumstances I expected a solemn event with imaginations flooding us of a community 100 years ago in absolute tragedy as they spent the night watching the smoke unfurl from the building, then fire emerge from the cupola, the columns standing amongst the fallen cupola until the last column, Jupiter, fell. But the night was really anything but solemn. It was festive and joyous! How happy we were to be together, united in anthroposophy, enjoying lectures, eurythmy, music, exhibits, food, and conversation. Standing around the fire, making new friends and watching the stars on that clear warm winter night.

Photo © by Thera Valster

Although the night was in commemoration of the first Goetheanum, it also became a celebration of the second Goetheanum. It was lit up on all sides, quite possibly for the first time ever. And I tell you, it was so beautiful. My appreciation for this building deepened tremendously. How grateful we all felt to have this building! The reverence for those founding anthroposophists who after such devastation, rebuilt again. Their deed, the inner work it must have entailed, created a force which was truly palpable that night.

A last note on the night, the sheer amount of people. It warmed our hearts and teared up many an eye to see the main hall full of people for the midnight eurythmy performance. Standing room only, and people turned away at the door. Especially after the pandemic, and almost total loss of community gathering spaces, the people filling the hall was a light that shined into infinite depths.

I was the last one to tend the fires, as the morning sun rose over the hill. I went through the entire night without sleep, no coffee as fuel but only the interest in the night watch to feed my fire. I came back the next night, to look again at the Goetheanum. The fire pit was still there. I stared into the ashes and coals of the pit, and imagined the immensity of ash that must have been produced by the burning of the first Goetheanum.

I reached into the ash and grabbed a handful of this ceremonial fire. I spread them where Rudolf Steiner’s ashes, and many other early anthroposophists, were buried. As I finished the circle of ashes around the burial site I felt a strong etheric pulsation, and I kneeled down to the earth.

Gratitude to be a ceremonial tender of this sacred space. The forces Rudolf Steiner brought are here, working, breathing, dreaming, and feeling.

Then I went back to the Goetheanum, to the fire pit, and looked back into the ashes. As I reached my hand into the ash I reached into the ashes of the first Goetheanum. Substance transformed on the most relevant level of existence. I took two handfuls, and walked spreading them in a circle around the Goetheanum.

A sheath. A beginning.

To be in this world with such love.

To serve a sacrifice so total.

I will stand in this light. I will think into these depths. I love the purification of this fire.

Ezra Sullivan (sezrasullivan@gmail.com) was born in South Central Los Angeles, California. He found anthroposophy in 2011 through using the Biodynamic planting calendar, and has spent the past twelve years immersed in the study of spiritual science, currently as a student at the Goetheanum in Dornach, Switzerland.

Cosmic Perspectives 2023

by Mary Stewart Adams

Each year eclipses of sun and moon occur with rhythmic regularity: the two great lights of our celestial environment exactly align, greeting one another at what can rightfully be described as humanity’s event horizon. There, since ancient ages, it’s as though a note is sounded, a note that calls for greater self-awareness, and a sense of our continual becoming.

Eclipses occur when the moon aligns with the sun and the earth at its nodal points. These are the points in space described by the intersection of two planes of orbit, the moon’s and the earth’s. The plane of the moon’s orbit about the earth is tilted relative to the plane of earth’s orbit of the sun by an angle of 5.15°. This means that the moon’s orbital plane intersects the earth’s at two points, going south through the plane, and then rising north. These two points are the nodes, and they move counterclockwise through the space surrounding the earth, as though

they are portals open in the moon sphere where, imagined astrologically, the forces of human destiny are activated.

When the moon is new or full close to one of its nodes, which happens at least twice every year, eclipses will occur. Eclipses belong to one another in families, called Saros cycles, which are identified by number. Each Saros cycle extends over several centuries, and is determined by where the eclipses occur. Said another way, the eclipses that occur in front of the same constellation regions in the sky belong to one another. It’s as though they are picking up the golden threads of a narrative being scripted into that region of the cosmos.

With each eclipse occurring in a Saros family, the nodal door opens onto the same region of stars where it was just over 18 years earlier. In astrological terms, this rhythm of 18+ years is referred to as the nodal return, which is the amount of time it takes for the nodes to resume the position they held at an individual’s birth. This is a time of great significance in one’s destiny.

In 2023, the onset of eclipse season begins with a solar eclipse on April 20, which marks the 99th anniversary of the first-ever eurythmy performance of the Foundation Stone Meditation. Rudolf Steiner had begun creating the form immediately following the conclusion of the Christmas Conference, at which he undertook the ceremony of laying the rhythms of the Foundation Stone Meditation into the hearts of those called to the path of anthroposophy in life.

In 1924, April 20 was Easter Sunday, and Rudolf Steiner was giving the lecture series The Easter Festival in the Evolution of the Mysteries. Already in 1922 he had described that, in our time, we no longer have the experience of the stars speaking to us, but that we must become aware of how we speak to the stars. This is a deep mystery, but he did not leave us without some indication of how such a mystery is achieved. In many different ways, Rudolf Steiner described that our deeds are inscribed into the cosmic spaces, and this is recognized as a language, as our “speaking,” by the celestial spiritual world. In this regard, then, the Foundation Stone Meditation presented through eurythmy can be imagined as a high ceremony of the word, of a true human speaking that strives for harmony within the cosmos. This deed was inscribed into a particular degree of the zodiac, where the sun stands on April 20 each year. This year, 2023, the sun will pass through eclipse at the very degree.

The solar eclipse of April 20, 2023 will be followed by a lunar eclipse the first week of May. And then six months will pass, when the eclipse cycle begins again, this time with an annular solar eclipse on October 14, 2023. An annular eclipse occurs when the moon is furthest away from earth in its orbital path, and though it moves directly in front of the sun, it doesn’t block the sun entirely. Annular eclipses are also referred to as “ring of fire” eclipses, for this reason. The April eclipse will cast its shadow over parts of the southern hemisphere; the October eclipse will find the moon as though embraced in the sun’s ring of fire, with the shadow of eclipse moving over the western edge of the United States, then traveling southeast, from Oregon to Texas, and including in its path Los Alamos in New Mexico.

The October 14, 2023 annular solar eclipse belongs to Saros #134. Solar eclipses always occur at new moon. A review of several dates in this solar eclipse Saros tells a remarkable story. This Saros of eclipses began in 1248, around the time that Albertus Magnus and Thomas Aquinas were in Cologne, their scholasticism bearing a considerable influence on western thought. Saros #134 included two significant eclipses in the 19th century: an annular solar eclipse in 1861, the year Rudolf Steiner was born; and another in 1879, a year described as the Fall of the Spirits of Darkness, at the onset of the Age of Michael.

In every Saros cycle, the eclipses recur every 18+ years. A Saros cycle of eclipses begins with a series of partial eclipses that sweep up from the southern region of the earth. Over time, the eclipses will become total, as they shift northward. Eventually, the eclipsing shadow cast by new moon will move so far north that it no longer falls on the earth, and the Saros cycle will complete.

Eclipse Saros #134 recurred again in 1915, during the First World War, as the First Goetheanum was being constructed, and then again in 1933, a year pointed to by Rudolf Steiner as early as 1910 as being uniquely related to the great mystery of our age, described as the Reappearance of the Christ in the Etheric.

The thoughts here are offered for research and contemplation, and they prompt questions:

What do we do with such knowledge? How can we participate in a way that brings harmony into the world? What have we to say to sun and moon, to earth and stars when such an alignment happens, and how do we say it?

The first step is to know.

Mary Stewart Adams is a member of the General Council of the ASA and the board of the Great Lakes Branch in Ann Arbor, MI. She travels extensively with her work as a star lore historian, and hosts the weekly public radio program “The Storyteller’s Night Sky.” A fuller biography is later in this issue. Some of her webinar work is available at www.anthroposophy.org/store — Mary wishes to acknowledge Stan Posey and Micky Leach for their shared research.

Above, the path of the eclipse Oct 14, 2023. Below, the pattern formed by a Saros cycle at solar-eclipse.info

The Re-founding in Light of the Fire

Considering the 100th anniversary of the re-founding of the Anthroposophical Society in light of the burning of the first Goetheanum.

By Bill Trusiewicz

“It will not be viable if things continue as before,” [said Rudolf Steiner], suggesting that the Society needed to be suffused with the “will to wake up... because then it can inspire an awakening of the present civilization as a whole.”1

On New Year’s Eve (1922-1923), Rudolf Steiner stood watching his architectural masterpiece, the doubledomed wooden structure of the nearly-complete center of the modern mysteries, the Goetheanum, wrapped in flames and burned to the ground. More than ten years of labor of his own along with countless others in one night was reduced to heaps of rubble and ashes. In the light of the upcoming 100th anniversary of the re-founding of the Anthroposophical Society, and the recent 100th anniversary of the burning of the first Goetheanum on New Year’s Eve, let us attempt to penetrate to the sources of wisdom that inspired Rudolf Steiner to re-found the Anthroposophical Society and to unveil the central motif of its re-founding: The Foundation Stone Meditation. But before we do so, let us reflect for a moment on our time. In 2022, we stand at a crucial juncture for humanity on a planetary scale and for the Anthroposophical Society at its near 100th anniversary. The coincidence of these events in itself is remarkable and, I believe, not insignificant. After the three times 33 years of the existence of the Anthroposophical Society a radical impulse of renewal needs to take place to preserve the spirit of the work. Such a thing is not guaranteed simply by the passing of time; it must be taken up in truth and in the reality of the spirit of the times. To implement it will require new insight and courageous action. We who bear the least understanding of the significance of the current hour in world evolution are being called upon to rise to the occasion to build a new Society and a new world. If we don’t do it there may be no one else who can. The words of Rudolf Steiner at the refounding, repeated by Peter Selg, with which I have begun this essay, speak to this very matter: “It will not be viable if things continue as before,” suggesting that the Society needed to be suffused with the “will to wake up...because

1 From Peter Selg, Rudolf Steiner’s Life and Work, Volume 6 (1923)

then it can inspire an awakening of the present civilization as a whole.”2 This is, I believe, as true now as it was at the re-founding a hundred years ago.

Now let us seek to penetrate to the sources of wisdom that inspired Rudolf Steiner to re-found the Anthroposophical Society and to unveil the central motif of its refounding, The Foundation Stone Meditation, as an aid to our own renewal efforts after nearly 100 years.

To do so, let us ask ourselves: Standing before the flames that enveloped the double-domed, wooden, first Goetheanum, what was going through the mind of Rudolf Steiner and what was he, as an initiate, able to bring away from that experience? Like finding the diamond that is created out of coal, let us attempt, in a humble way, to find our way into the dark core of this event to the spiritual flame of illumination at its heart. Was the fire that burnt the first Goetheanum the catalyst for the monumental changes that Rudolf Steiner initiated in the few remaining years of his life that were so amazingly productive? I believe the answer is yes. With this in mind, let us further ask ourselves: What might be the significance of the burning of the Goetheanum for the 100th anniversary of the re-founding of the Anthroposophical Society?

To penetrate the spiritual darkness surrounding the event of the fire I would like my readers to consider the idea that Rudolf Steiner confronted an almost identical situation as Hiram 3 of Tyre, as we can discern in the Temple Legend. Hiram confronted an exploding fire that had been contrived by his enemies to destroy his masterpiece, the bronze casting of a “molten sea,” as it was being celebrated as the culmination of the nearly-complete building of the renowned Temple of Solomon. He entered the fire and descended to the center of the Earth, to a region of pristine golden divinity and returned with three gifts: a Mystic Hammer, a Golden Triangle and the Lost Word—to restore the molten sea, and which initiated him into the deepest mysteries of uniting fire with water. The spiritual interpretation of the mystery of mixing fire and water, concealed in the creation of the molten sea, has to do with the uniting of the streams of Cain and Abel. The fact that Hiram worked with Solomon was quite significant since Hiram and Solomon were lofty representatives of these two streams who did not, as a rule, work

2 Ibid

3 A earlier incarnation of Christian Rosenkreutz and Lazarus John.

together. The Molten Sea can be seen as a sort of seal on the collaborative efforts of the streams of Cain and Abel heralding a new era of cooperation meant to be symbolized in the bronze durability of uniting the cool water of detached wisdom and the fire of enthusiasm for the good, which might be seen as the key to building all future temples for humanity.4

Rudolf Steiner came back from the Goetheanum fire with the same three gifts, the evidence of which can clearly be seen in the Foundation Stone Meditation which I will sketch very briefly below and which is elucidated in more detail in another essay entitled: The Foundation Stone Meditation as The Golden Triangle, the Mystic Hammer and the Lost Word: Some Results from Working with the Foundation Stone.5

The “golden triangle” represents the three higher members of the human being—spirit-self, life-spirit and spirit-man. The future of humanity is tied to the development of these three higher members. The key to their development lies in the first three stanzas of the Foundation Stone, which outline the method of their development by uniting the microcosm of the human being with its cosmic counterpart through three directives: “practice spirit recollection,” “practice spirit presence” and “practice spirit beholding.”

The “mystic hammer” is found in “grasping” the three directives “in the middle” as any carpenter who holds a hammer does—“practicing spirit presence.” A firm grip on the present is our “handle” on time: the past, present and future (the etheric), indicated by “spirit recollection,” (of the past), “spirit presence,” and “spirit beholding” (the future). The first three stanzas represent the teaching of the mysteries, the accumulated knowledge of tradition.

The final stanza of the Foundation Stone Meditation represents a “turning point” where the old mystery wisdom receives its full significance. It is turned from the horizontal to the vertical like the head of a hammer, in action. And its weight, its significance compared to the three preceding stanzas, is emphasized by the fact that Rudolf Steiner did not speak of this last stanza until the 7th day of his unveiling of this central motif of the refounding, on the morning of December 30th. He did so with the following weighty words:

4 It is symbolic also of uniting the seven metals found in the earth (according to Steiner, the molten sea consisted of the seven metals), which represent the seven planetary spirits and correspond to seven organs in the human body.

5 Available at https://www.academia.edu/9891731

“Today, my dear friends, let us bring together what can speak in the human being in three ways: [he writes on the blackboard] Practice-Spirit Recalling, Practice Spirit-Awareness, Practice Spirit-Beholding. This will properly be brought together in the heart of man only by that which actually made its appearance at the turning point of time and in whose spirit we now work here and intend to work on in the future.” 6

We can feel the force and cadence of hammer blows in this “turning point” stanza. The beginning (or upper section) refers to the “Light Divine” the “Sun of Christ,” as if lifted upward. Then uniting in the center section “in human hearts,” and descending (incarnating), ending finally, with forceful blows—“That Good may become/ What from our hearts WE found/ And our heads direct/ With single will.”

An all-important “we” occurs here (“What from our hearts WE found”) making the personal imperatives, which are addressed to the individual “Human Soul” in the first three stanzas, into a social imperative demanding a unifying “ethical individualism” from “universal human beings,” in the final stanza. Building a temple for humanity with the tools of a master builder would need to be founded on a social imperative—an imperative that requires joinery driven home by the blows of a faithful hammer inspired by initiation wisdom.

The “Lost Word” is the power to speak the unspeakable, to render alive, active, and visible the invisible. This is done by creating a language of spirit to communicate the powers that ordinarily lie mute across the threshold, that are usually inaccessible—to make the inaccessible accessible. This is to enliven the word, to render it a tool of spiritual powers that must be active in the world to build the temple of humanity. (Steiner preferred to call the Goetheanum, “The House of the Word.”) This is a capacity with language that Rudolf Steiner demonstrated to a high degree throughout his life in giving the spirit a voice through his making available a spiritual, scientific terminology, giving clothing—a tangible vesture—to the spirit of the time. But beyond all that, it was the inspiration for the Foundation Stone Meditation that appeared after the fire had burned away the chaff to reveal the seedthought of the future of the mysteries. This seed-thought was expressed in mantric verse uniting cadence, tone, and concept (will, feeling, and idea) giving a voice to the good, the beautiful, and the true at once through the Founda6

Rudolf Steiner, The Christmas Conference, pp. 193-4, Anthroposophic Press, 1990.

tion Stone—giving further evidence of Steiner’s recovery of the Masonic “Lost Word.”

Having come this far, casting a dim light on the diamond that was created out of coal, out of the ashes of the burned Goetheanum, let us return to the question: What is the significance of the burning of the Goetheanum for the 100th anniversary of the re-founding of the Anthroposophical Society?

Change seldom comes easily. In order to win the inspiration that Rudolf Steiner attained gazing into the flames, an inspiration that initiated a period of unprecedented productivity, we need to confront, like Rudolf Steiner, an impenetrable darkness. How did he achieve the surpassing inspiration for the Foundation Stone and the re-founding of the Society? How did he rise to even greater heights after more than sixty years of developing his initiate consciousness?

In the fire, Rudolf Steiner saw two conflicts raging in the spiritual world. One was an external enemy, the enemy that actually lit the fire. Certain inflammatory statements that were heard publicly from a pulpit 7 could easily be seen as inciting the heinous act, if it were not actually ordered in secret chambers. The other enemy was internal: passivity, thoughtlessness, and more assertive forms of egotism within the Anthroposophical Society. In the fire, Steiner saw both of these conflicts raging against the spirit. But he saw what was earthly and weak in the Anthroposophical Society 8 being consumed; he saw the anti-social forces consumed; he saw the egotism that persisted in the Society as fuel for the fire; he saw the failures of the members and took them upon himself, saying something like this: “I have failed. What can I do? I have tried my best. My best is not good enough. I must have more. I must rise above myself and give birth to a higher I, lest the whole world go down in flames. I am powerless to do better without the help of a higher grace from the spiritual world.” He prayed from the depths what can be granted in the heights. He knew that he must experience the death of the impulse he brought into being, an impulse that had, in its failures, he felt, called forth the Goetheanum fire. He saw the fire as burning up the chaff of anthroposophy, the unrefined 7 And were also found in a Masonic journal. The words of Father Kully: “Many spiritual sparks have flown against anthroposophy and its creator. It is therefore high time that an actual spark does away with this scourge on the hill of Dornach.” p. 722, S. O. Prokofieff, May Human Beings Hear It, Temple Lodge, 2004

8 Steiner speaks of this: “And in spirit we see that in fact these flames glow over much of what we have been building up during the last twenty years.” The Christmas Conference, p.44

efforts of an earthly society. He must experience its death; he must follow the flames from the heap of rubble and grey-white ashes of the his beloved Goetheanum, like a Phoenix—to resurrection.

This is what a Christian initiate does. He drinks the bitter cup to its dregs. Brothers and sisters, higher inspiration is born out of weakness. The higher I is born out of our death. The way forward is not through our strength (we fail in our strength) but in our powerlessness, our powerlessness followed by resurrection. I believe this is how Rudolf Steiner received the inspiration for the Foundation Stone and the direction for re-founding of the Society. This is the secret of the unprecedented, spiritually productive activity of his last years.

Listen to what Rudolf Steiner says in his lecture “How Do I Find the Christ,”

...when we can experience powerlessness and recovery from it, the benediction of actual relationship with Christ Jesus is vouchsafed to us....Seek within yourselves and you will discover the powerlessness! Seek, and you will find, after the experience of powerlessness, the redemption from it, the resurrection of the soul to the spirit.

As we approach the 100th anniversary of the refounding of the Anthroposophical Society, it is imperative that we take this great work we have been blessed with to a new level. I believe it must be reborn—to “inspire an awakening of the present civilization as a whole.” 9

We must be willing, like Rudolf Steiner, to drink the bitter cup to its dregs. We must own our individual and community weaknesses and failures. And we must strive with all our might until we feel powerless; when we reach our limit we must go further; we must die that we might live—in resurrection. And let what lives in resurrection be dedicated to this Great Work we are called to. “That Good may become/ what from our hearts WE found/ and our heads direct/ with single will.”

Bill Trusiewicz is an inveterate student with wide interests. A love of beauty and experience and observation of life have been his primary teachers. On this basis he writes articles on spiritual topics, with an emphasis on the experiential, often related to language, anthroposophy, Rosicrucianism, esoteric Christianity, Sophiology and the Divine Feminine. His goal is to create a body of writing that is initiatory—that allows readers to grow beyond themselves.

9 Selg, Rudolf Steiner’s Life and Work, Volume 6

Preparing for the Future

The Need for Counterbalances for Living in Our Technological Age

by Andrew Linnell

Like most of my boyhood friends, I joined and thoroughly enjoyed Boy Scouts. Our troop leader drilled into us the Boy Scout motto: Be Prepared! I carried this motto into my professional career and it served me well. Later, when I met anthroposophy, I found this motto applied again but at a much deeper level. For Rudolf Steiner implored us to not only be prepared for the future, but to be actively involved in bringing about a future that serves human evolution.

How do we know what future we should be preparing? Does reincarnation fit into this question? Does some higher being govern human evolution? Has the one in charge of evolution changed over time as Zeus took the throne from his father Cronos who had taken it from his father Uranus? Or might it be a committee of Elohim? Is it only humans who evolve? Do our angels also evolve? What about all the beings of the heavenly host?1

Rudolf Steiner does answer these questions. Yes, reincarnation is fundamental to this concept of evolution. Yes, higher beings did govern our evolution, but in order for us to develop freedom they have had to step back and merely guide. There are seven members of the Exusiai (Elohim in Hebrew) whose role it is to plan and guide human evolution. And all beings are also evolving including angels and the rest of the heavenly host.

Not all beings attain their evolutionary goal. The wisdom of the Godhead finds suitable tasks for all beings in each cosmic staging of evolution. Just as the Physics branch of Metallicity 2 describes how there must have been three prior solar systems, Steiner also, through reading the Akashic Record, described three prior cosmic conditions that have the esoteric names of Saturn, Sun, and Moon. After Earth, there will be three more that have the names Jupiter, Venus, and Vulcan. You might notice that the sequence is the same as the days of the 1 Steiner often used the Latin names from Dionysius the Aeropagite for the nine levels (Seraphim, Cherubim, Thrones, Kyriotetes, Dynamis, Exusiai, Archai, Archangeloi, Angeloi)

2 See Metallicity - Wikipedia, “the majority of elements heavier than hydrogen and helium in the Universe (metals, hereafter) are formed in the cores of stars as they evolve. Over time, stellar winds and supernovae deposit the metals into the surrounding environment.”

week with Earth consisting of Mars and Mercury. The Mars period was up to the crucifixion upon Golgotha, while the Mercury period, that we are in now, continues through the rest of Earthly evolution. Each prior cosmic condition was totally different from the current one but in each a class of beings had their “human stage” while other beings supported this evolution and evolved themselves through their support. Similarly, there will be beings at the “human stage” upon Jupiter, Venus, and Vulcan. The goal for us is that we become the Tenth Hierarchy and thus can support those “humans” of Jupiter similarly to how angels support us during Earth evolution.

As mentioned, in earlier times, higher beings directly guided our evolution. Since the fifteenth century, the reins of evolution have been turned over to humanity. Thus, what should come gradually in the future must be prepared today. This role, according to Steiner, belongs with anthroposophy. So, let’s get started!

What pictures do you have of the next 4000 years? Peace, love, and harmony lead most lists. The attainment of Heaven on Earth. But few of us are aware of what

Steiner labelled as “iron necessity” for our future. This list of “iron necessity” includes:

» By the year 5700, sexual procreation will have ended.

» A separation of humanity3 will already be underway by 5700 with some able to ascend to a new life existence without a physical body while others remain convinced that the physical is the only reality.

» Before the year 8000, the “war of all against all” will be waged.

» As this war is waged, “The Second Fall” will have begun.

» Immediately following this war will be the return of

3 Matthew 25 calls this the separation of the sheep and goats.

the moon when all life in the physical realm will end.

» After the moon returns, we will enter the Sixth Epoch (about the year 8000 AD) in a new existence without physical bodies, where our lowest bodily member will be our etheric body.

Why can’t we fix civilization in order to live and evolve in the physical? Because those guiding beings intended for physical to be a realm wherein we could develop freedom. They did not intend for us to remain in the physical. The physical provided an environment where every being has its own separate space. We came to experience reality as me inside my body and everything else is “out there.” This sojourn in the physical was meant to be only so long as it took humanity to develop freedom. Evolution must lead on to our goal of agape-love4 offered out of this freedom. Our desires for comforts have largely been attained. We like it here. Even more so, we love it here. And so, we begin to forget that we are cosmic beings who have come to our human stage for our evolution. So, just as the civilization of Atlantis had to be destroyed, so must our Post-Atlantean Epoch’s civilization come to a destructive end.

“Indeed, the materialistic tendency of our age and the insistence to accept only the physical world as real are connected with humanity’s further descent into the physical. However, things must not remain like this. We must ascend again into the spiritual world, bearing with us the attainments and fruits we have acquired in the physical world. It is the task of anthroposophy to offer people the possibility of ascending once again into the spiritual world.”5

Thus, the goal of human evolution is not to remain in the physical but to progress to where the physical can be left behind. The period of time for humanity to evolve within physical bodies was meant to be temporary. It must come to an end. That coming ascension foretold in Matthew 25 will be heralded in by the Maitreya Buddha. Ascension begins in about 3000 years and will last a bit over 2000 years. It will be a time when some are able to cast aside their physical body like a snake casting aside its old skin and thus begin a new existence with their etheric body as their lowest bodily member. Preparations for this must begin now. What? Prepare for the end of sexual procreation? Prepare for a War of All Against All? How can we prepare for this? Doesn’t this imply that transhuman-

4 Agape-love is mentioned multiple times in the Gospel of John meaning a deeper, spiritual love meant in Christ’s words to “love one another as I have loved you.” [John 13:34]

5 Rudolf Steiner, The Universal Human, lecture 1, 4Dec1909, GA 117

ism will have a role in this future?

Only with the assurance of the presence of Christ within one’s inner core, within one’s I-Am, can one participate in such preparations with confidence. Only when we are informed by a spiritual science can we adequately face such a “terrible truth,”6 accept it, and work towards its enactment out of love. Steiner urged us to factor such pictures of the future into the work we do today. Although this picture may seem grim from today’s perspective , it will prove to serve human evolution.

A natural reaction of many who read this passage is to say to themselves, such things are of the far future and don’t concern me. I am only concerned with the present, the here and now. To this common attitude, Steiner offered these words, “Looking for an easy way out, people might say: All right, I won’t take the tram. It might even go so far—though even members of the Anthroposophical Society are unlikely to take things this far—that people will not go on trains, and so on. This would be complete nonsense, of course. It is not a matter of avoiding things but of getting a clear picture, real insight into the iron necessities of human evolution.” 7

Rudolf Steiner frequently spoke about the necessity of preparing for a future that is consistent with the divine goals of human evolution. He said that such preparations must begin now and continue through the remaining cultural ages of this Fifth Epoch. It is the task of anthroposophy to be the preparer of a future that aligns with the goals of those divine beings who have guided our evolution. As such, we need to find counterbalances for each new wave of technology.

The great problem of our time is that people slide into the ahrimanic8 sphere without having the support of the Christ force. … We can only become sure of ourselves as human beings if we walk the road created by the whole of technology, but do not let our lives be governed by the products of technology and grow to become able to behold the Christ-power that can become part of us to enable us to inwardly overcome

6 See Rudolf Steiner, The Fall of the Spirits of Darkness, lecture 4: The Elemental Spirits of Birth and Death, 6Oct1917, GA 177

7 The same.

8 In Steiner’s pneumatology, two beings are mentioned that are involved as hindrances for human evolution. These two have the names Lucifer, meaning the light bearer, and Ahriman as the prince of darkness and lord of death. We hear their voices from the two crucified with Christ. Lucifer recognizes Christ while Ahriman mocks him. The field of technology is largely a penetration into the realm of Ahriman.

those products of technology.9

In our times, this Christ-force is the key to all balancing and all transformations.

Steiner’s Representative of Man expresses how mankind, and each individual, can bring the polarities of Lucifer and Ahriman into balance.10 Lucifer seeks to lead us into the bliss of the spiritual world too soon, before our maturation within the physical realm is complete. Ahriman aims to keep humanity dependent upon the physical realm as our only sense of reality. But this cannot be a static balance for it must exist within the march of time, within the course of our lives and within the course of evolution. Lucifer has had his incarnation about 3000 BCE when he gave humanity much wisdom. Christ, we know, has had his incarnation. Now the time has come when Ahriman must have his incarnation in the flesh.11 His incarnation should not be opposed as it, like Lucifer’s, will serve human evolution. Thus, a Dancing with Polarities would be apt expression for this balancing act needed during our times. To maintain this balance while proceeding towards Ahriman’s incarnation in the flesh, we need to develop counterbalances for each of the further stages of technology’s destiny. It is not for us to become neo-Amish nor to bemoan modern life.

“Everybody is obliged to undergo the battle; in its effects it is experienced by everybody. There would be

9 Rudolf Steiner, Polarities in the Evolution of Mankind, 14Nov1920, GA 197

10 See The Representative of Humanity between Lucifer and Ahriman, by Judith von Halle and John Wilkes, Sophia Books, 2010.

11 This author places this event soon after the archangel Oriphiel becomes the next Time Spirit, succeeding Michael, around 2230.

no greater fallacy than to say: We must rebel against what technical science has brought to us in modern life, we must protect ourselves from Ahriman, we must withdraw from this modern life. In a certain respect, such an attitude would be an indication of spiritual cowardice. The real remedy lies, not in allowing the forces of the soul to weaken and to withdraw from modern life, but in so strengthening these forces that its pandemonium can be endured. World-karma demands a courageous attitude to modern life, and that is why genuine Spiritual Science calls at the very outset for effort, really strenuous effort on the part of the human soul.”12

It is a Rosicrucian gesture to live in the environment of one’s times. To do so, we must find appropriate counterbalances. I will highlight some important counterbalances that apply to you as an individual but also to humanity in general.

Christ

Consciousness becomes one’s archetype. Christ consciousness within is the key to constantly refinding the balance and for all transformations.

Spiritual Science

is itself a primary counterbalance. For example, as we venture into sub-nature, so

must we balance this by ascending into super-nature.

Modern Life Practices:

Practice spirit awareness.

Eurythmy where in the movement we experience the etheric.

Daily one-hour walk outdoors (not on a tread mill).

12 Rudolf Steiner, Technology and Art: Their Bearing on Modern Culture, 28Dec1914, GA 275

Singing as in a choir or speech formation.

Gardening – more than merely looking at nature, get your hands dirty.

Outdoor play (children need at least 2 hours/day) especially in the winter months.

20-20-20 rule. If you are often working in front of a computer screen, then, for your eyes, every 20 minutes, look out a window at nature that is at least 20 meters away and look for at least 20 seconds before returning to your screen.

Refined Breathing

—an as-yet undeveloped counterbalance that uses the breathing of the four ethers analogously to how yoga practices breathe air.

The undeveloped counterbalance for the future was called by Rudolf Steiner Refined Breathing. There exists a relationship of thinking with breathing that is expressed in these words from Steiner: “The lung is an organ that also has forces of head formation within it, though to a lesser degree. The whole human organism has everywhere these same forces, but in varying intensities. … The head is an advanced respiratory organ. Having moved beyond the lung stage, it represses air-breathing and, instead of taking in air, takes in etheric forces through the senses.”13

During the course of our evolution, the substance of our breathing has changed with changes in our bodily makeup. On Old Moon, we breathed fire instead of air. Just as we breathe oxygen in and carbon dioxide out, so they breathed fire in and cold out. “Just as no human today breathes fire, so future men will no longer inhale air. It will be Light.14 The development of Refined Breathing help to prepare this for the sake of our evolution. Today, Refined Breathing is only an indication by Steiner. It needs a lot of work from us to bring it to the state of truly being the New Yoga.

Today, we exhale vapor which our inner being has permeated. What is present in what we exhale is the spirit we’ve built up by our thoughts. This watery element has been placed there by one’s etheric body. Why this is so important? Because the sum of our moral-imbued exhalations becomes the foundation materials for the forming of the environment and bodies of the beings upon the human-stage of Jupiter. A clairvoyant can see in one’s ex-

13 Rudolf Steiner, Anthroposophical Spiritual Science and Medical Therapy, Lecture VI, 16Apr1921, GA 313

14 Rudolf Steiner, Esoteric Lessons, 6 May 1906, GA 266a, p. 151

halation the morality present within that person. What we exhale today contains the result of our inner work. In the future, all will be able to see another’s morality in their breath. Unconsciously, we are already at work in the preparation of Jupiter. More and more, we need to make this conscious.

We are called upon to be pioneers, to be the preparers of the future. Ahriman and technology have roles that provide the resistance for us to build strength for our coming cosmic tasks. Bemoaning technology comes from spiritual weakness. Rather, we need to face Ahriman and technology with soul strength and find the appropriate counterbalances.

Andrew Linnell (jandrewlinnell@yahoo.com), has served as president of the Anthroposophical Society in Greater Boston and is a member of the steering group for the Natural Science Section of the School for Spiritual Science in North America. He is a forty-year veteran of the field of computers and related technologies.

When the storm comes

The plants are not troubled when we rage around them. What is real in them is far from here. We need not be concerned that we disturb their sleep. Learn from the plants the path to purity, that the human turbulence, which rises in you, dissipate slowly till you stand in peace.

Then, when the storms come, you will have the task –when the great storm comes, which has long been predicted –to lead many others into the bunker that you’ve built.

When the great storm rages, it attacks all that we see, and many things that we thought were real are swept away – are lost forever.

Then those who’ve already crossed the threshold of worlds will not be troubled. They will stand secure.

Michael Burton

Michael Burton has worked with artistic speech and drama for over forty years as a writer, speech performer, actor, speech therapist and voice teacher. His In the Light of a Child , Steiner’s Soul Calendar turned into poems for children, is used by many Steiner teachers and parents. He has written and performed one-man-plays about Rembrandt, Beethoven, Dag Hammarskjold, and others.

Paul Nordoff, A Life’s Work

Christi Pierce Nordoff

The Library of Congress acquires the collection of a prominent composer, music therapist, and anthroposophist

Did you know that one of the most respected and internationally recognized music therapy trainings in the world was started by an anthroposophist? And did you know that this anthroposophist was an American composer who was hailed as a “boy wonder” pianist at the age of 12, awarded two Guggenheim travel fellowships, a Pulitzer Traveling Scholarship, and the coveted Bearns prize from Columbia University? This multi-faceted artist not only wrote symphonies, operas, music for Broadway plays and ballets for modern dance pioneer Martha Graham, he also composed music for eurythmy, acted in Steiner’s Mystery Dramas, and composed and played for the dedication of the Threefold Auditorium in Spring Valley, NY. Some of the most influential artists of the time (e.e. cummings, Thornton Wilder, Aaron Copland, Benjamin Britten) and European royalty such as the Grand Duke of Hesse and his family, were counted among his friends. 1 This remarkable man was Paul Nordoff.

Paul Nordoff began his life in a working-class suburb of Philadelphia. Born to a Vaudeville family in 1909, he became a brilliant pianist and composer, eventually land-

of his own compositions, and the poet e.e. cummings, who called Nordoff “the only composer who has set poems of mine to music which I not merely like but love…” 3

Nordoff, who became a member of the Anthroposophical Society at the age of 34, described himself as indebted to and inspired by the work of Rudolf Steiner. Steiner’s influence is clearly expressed in an article Nordoff wrote for the Philadelphia Conservatory yearbook: The materialistic age in which we live has cast its dark shadow over music, the most spiritual of the arts. A musical career today is seldom a dedication —more often a neurotic exhibitionism depending for its success on personality, pull, and publicity… Let us seek consciously to permeate music with the spirit to save it from becoming a dead and lifeless art. 4

At the age of 49 Nordoff took a semester off from teaching at Bard College, traveling to Europe to audition his opera and secure performances for his various music compositions. While in London he attended a lecture by Karl Koenig, founder of the Camphill Movement of communities for people with special needs, on how music can be used therapeutically. Inspired, he visited the Sunfield Children’s Home for special needs children and was moved by what he witnessed there.5 On another occasion, in Germany, he observed a 12-year-old girl who ordinarily never spoke but who was able to repeat the music therapist’s words if she plucked strings on a small instrument while uttering the syllables. This moment was pivotal for Nordoff, who wrote:

As I watched this, it occurred to me that what he was doing with this child was so much more important than any performance of any work of mine that it made me feel that all I was doing to secure performances was senseless. On my return to America I could think of nothing but the children I had seen and the work that was being done with them…Then I began to read all I could lay my hands on about music therapy and visited several institutions… I resigned my job from Bard College, cut myself off from the past, and started this new career from scratch… I felt that I was doing what I had been born to do…and I dimly perceived that there might be tremendous possibilities not yet explored in the art of music as therapy.6

ing a full scholarship to Juilliard. 2 He received high praise from renowned artists who recognized his gifts, including famed cellist Pablo Casals, who listened to him play one

Nordoff moved to England to work at Sunfield Children’s Home. There he met the teacher Clive Robbins with whom—along with Director of Research Herbert

Left to right: Paul Nordoff, Thornton Wilder, Marion MacDowell, Nikolai Lopatnikoff, and Margaret Widdemer, at the MacDowell Colony

Geuter, M.D.—he made an in-depth study of Steiner’s music and curative education lectures. Colin Andrew Lee in his book, Paul Nordoff: Composer and Music Therapist, called this “the beginning of what was to become the celebrated Nordoff-Robbins approach to music therapy.” 7

Aided by Robbins who knew the children well, Nordoff began to work with the Sunfield students. Encouraged by the immediate results they observed, Nordoff wrote:

I can already see the real possibilities for a therapy that will involve healing. This means a specific therapy, and it involves all the scales, in their spiritual relationships to man in his evolution, as well as intense study of man himself, as a being of soul and spirit.8

This became Paul Nordoff’s abiding passion: Finding ways to help special needs children through working with music out of an anthroposophical understanding of the human being. Over the next decades, Nordoff and Robbins combined international travel, teaching and demonstrating their techniques, with writing books.9

The Nordoff-Robbins Music Therapy Centre in London was founded, the Department of Education and Science approved a graduate course, and the BBC made two films featuring their work. The Centre has been generously supported by the music industry and endorsed by the likes of Elton John, Paul McCartney, Robert Plant, Rod Stewart, Sting, and Pharrell Williams among others. Nordoff-Robbins music therapists practice worldwide and have graduated from training programs around the world, including the Nordoff-Robbins Center for Music Therapy at New York University.

Dr. Konrad Schily, neurologist and cofounder of the Witten/Herdecke University in Germany, invited Nordoff to start an anthroposophical music therapy training there. Nordoff did offer some lectures, but was too ill to develop a full training course; diagnosed with prostate cancer, he died at Herdecke Hospital on January 18, 1977.10

His London Times obituary reads:

Paul Nordoff held a unique position in the world of music therapy for handicapped children. Believing deeply in the inner life of each child and the uniqueness of every individual, however disadvantaged, he concentrated his acute perception and musical creativity to the task of finding a means to motivate these children.11

In December of 2021 the Library of Congress acquired the musical compositions, journals, papers and correspondence of Paul Nordoff. These rich materials provide new opportunities for further research into the life and work of this Twentieth Century American pioneer of anthroposophically inspired music and its therapeutic possibilities.

Christi Pierce Nordoff lives in Great Barrington, MA, and is a member of the Anthroposophical Society. Paul Nordoff was her father-in-law.

For an article on Paul Nordoff’s settings of e.e. cummings visit www.thefreelibrary.com and search for “a sun among men”.

Endnotes

1 The Grand Duke of Hesse and by Rhine, Ernest Louis, was the grandson of Queen Victoria and the elder brother of Empress Alexandra of Russia. Throughout his life he was a patron of the arts, and he founded the Darmstadt Artist’s Colony.

2 Nordoff lived with his grandfather, Lawrence Huntington, who was called “The Grand Old Trouper” and had a Vaudeville act involving the whole family.

3 Letter of September 18, 1949, from E.E. Cummings to Hildegarde Watson, in Selected Letters of E.E. Cummings (1972) edited by F.W. Dupee and George Stade, published by Andre Deutsch Limited, London.

4 As quoted by Andrea Olmstead in Vincent Persichetti: Grazioso, Grit and Gold , Rowman & Littlefield (2018), Chapter Seven entitled “Paul Nordoff”.

5 Sunfield is a British independent special school, Children’s Home and charity founded in 1930 for children with a variety of social, emotional, physical, and learning difficulties, including autism and visual impairment.

6 Letter to Dr. Henry Katz, personal correspondence in Paul Nordoff Collection at Library of Congress.

7 Colin Andrew Lee, Paul Nordoff: Composer and Music Therapist , Barcelona Publishers (2014), page 217.

8 Letter to composer Romeo Cascarino, personal correspondence in Paul Nordoff Collection at Library of Congress.

9 Books by Nordoff and Robbins include: Therapy in Music for Handicapped Children , Music Therapy in Special Education , and Creative Music Therapy.

10 Audio Recordings of lecture/demonstrations given in German, in Paul Nordoff Collection at Library of Congress.

11 Obituary for Paul Nordoff in the London Times, January 24, 1977.

Paul Nordoff in music therapy sessions with special needs children

Archetypal Motifs in Art History

by Peter Stebbing

We are at a point in the fifth post-Atlantean age when current views must be directed to spiritual forms in art.

— Rudolf

Steiner, Dornach, 31st August 1918, GA 183

In both Western and Eastern European art the subject of the “Madonna and Child” occurs most often. ”The Crucifixion,” “Saint George and the Dragon,” the “Archangel Michaël” and motifs of the Old and New Testaments are similarly to be accounted as being of a higher, transcendental or archetypal nature. Of the same order are representations of the upper and lower gods of archaic and classical Greek sculpture, such as Artemis, Apollo, Zeus, Aphrodite, Dionysus, Hermes, Poseidon, or Athene. Looking further back, to ancient Egypt, we find depictions of Isis and Osiris, of Horus, Hathor, Anubis, Nephthys, Nut and other deities, along with their earthly representatives, the pharaohs or priestkings and priest-queens.

With regard to our own time, the sublime element in the art of the past would seem as though reduced to insignificance in the various “isms” of Modern Art. The current art of our time, even if justified in its own way, appears for the most part fragmented and without connection to a higher state of being –to the supersensible.

A widely held conception of art in our time is that it is concerned with “self-expression.” Properly understood, however, authentic artistic activity, of whatever kind, presupposes the ability on the part of artists to transpose themselves into something “other,” and to identify fully with it. In effect, the artist says to himself, “I am that.” In the case of painting, this means immersing oneself in a particular

color. – Hence, an element of selflessness can be said to be an inherent part of all genuine creativity, leading to a truer sense of selfhood, to greater self-knowledge.

The renewal of the arts inaugurated a hundred years ago by Rudolf Steiner—with the architecture, sculpture, and painting of the first Goetheanum, and with the series of 23 motif sketches and 5 large watercolors given to Henni Geck for a new painting training—has become an ever more crucial need of the times we live in. Here it is a matter of a higher order of motifs, capable of unlimited further development.

We have the pioneer painter Henni Geck to thank for making the original watercolors of Rudolf Steiner possible. After the destruction by fire of the first Goetheanum on New Year’s Eve 1922–23, it had become her greatest wish that Rudolf Steiner might find the time, despite an intensive schedule, to paint once again. She kept everything constantly ready for this purpose and he complied gladly with her request. In this way, in the limited time available, five large watercolors arose from his hand:

The Moon Rider (Dream Song of Olaf Åsteson): 17-19 Jan 1924 ; New Life (Mother and Child): 1529 Feb 1924 ; Easter (Three Crosses): 7-19 April 1924 ; The Archetypal Plant: 21-22 May, 5 June 1924 ; Archetypal Human or Archetypal Animal: 9-11 July, 5-8 Aug 1924.

The last of these was concluded only weeks prior to Rudolf Steiner’s sickbed confinement of the final six months. Following the loss of the cupola paintings of the first Goetheanum, these are the only actual paintings by Rudolf Steiner that have come down to us. Their importance can hardly be overstated.

Rudolf Steiner’s “New Life (Mother and Child)” stands in

Gerard Wagner: New Life (Mother and Child). Plant colors, 67 x 49 cm

Gerard Wagner: Easter (Three Crosses). Plant colors, 67 x 49 cm

self-evident, reciprocal relation to “Easter (Three Crosses),“ while “The Archetypal Plant” has its counterpart in the “Archetypal Human Being / Archetypal Animal.” Here Goethe’s morphological discoveries are the underlying starting point. As archetypal motifs originating in our time, they are without antecedents in the history of art.

A lecture on Raphael (Jan 30, 1913, Berlin) can be regarded as an important key to understanding the concluding phase of Rudolf Steiner’s work in painting. This lecture points to an ever greater inwardness or “internalizing” of the human soul in the future development of humanity—clearly evident in the works of Raphael. Steiner’s large-format watercolors are an unmistakable further expression of this, as are the genial works of the painter Gerard Wagner in recreating these motifs. Though it may seem improbable at first to link Raphael’s works so directly with the painting impulse of Rudolf Steiner, separated as they are by four hundred years, an underlying relation becomes apparent, nonetheless, despite the manifest contrast. The Madonnas of Raphael will selfevidently never be surpassed. Yet, the future development of art, always “a daughter of the divine,” implies, in Rudolf Steiner’s sense, an ongoing spiritualization.

With Gerard Wagner’s paintings in elaboration of Steiner’s motifs, it is a matter of pictures arising out of direct color experience that possess imaginative character. As archetypal motifs they prove to be of significant pedagogical and artistic value. A number of examples of Gerard Wagner’s paintings concerned with the above mentioned watercolor motifs are published in Gerhard Wagner: Four

Large Watercolor Motifs of Rudolf Steiner, conceived as a sequel to The Art of Colour and the Human Form , both available from SteinerBooks. – The former includes possible “color buildups” for each of the latter four archetypal motifs, indicating in this way, how form can arise out of color.

“The art of the future will be an art of inner maturity. What leads to artistic activity will be sensed only at a relatively advanced age in life. It will no longer be assumed that one cannot have the necessary youth forces for artistic creation in later years—as is still often asserted today. It will be found that only by way of inner deepening augmented by spiritual scientific insight are the forces released that lead to artistic creation.” —Rudolf Steiner, Dornach, February 7, 1915

Peter Stebbing, born in Copenhagen in 1941, studied art in Brighton and London and emigrated to the USA in 1966, earning the MFA at Cornell University. While teaching design and color courses at the City University of New York, he began a practical exploration of the scientific color phenomena set forth by Goethe. This led eventually to the crucial question of finding a correspondingly lawful approach to color in painting. The new and wholly different training in color experience begun in 1976 with the painter Gerard Wagner on the basis of Rudolf Steiner’s motif sketches, resolved fundamental artistic questions with a coherent and systematic approach fully in accord with Goethe’s discoveries and method. Peter subsequently established a painting school at Threefold Educational Foundation, teaching there 1983–1990. Since 1992 he has been director of the Arteum Painting School (www.arteum-malschule.de) in Dornach, Switzerland. He is editor and translator of The Goetheanum Cupola Motifs of Rudolf Steiner, by Gerard Wagner, and Conversations about Painting with Rudolf Steiner: Recollections of Five Pioneers of the New Art Impulse .

Gerard Wagner: Archetypal Human/Archetypal Animal (above), 49 x 67 cm; Archetypal Plant (below), 67 x 49 cm; both: plant colors

Good Time review

by Fred Dennehy

Good Time, by Philip Thatcher (Perceval Books 2022, order at percevalbooks2001@gmail.com); 178 pages.

This is the work of a lifetime. With very few exceptions, the poems in Philip Thatcher’s masterful collection Good Time were written after its author had turned eighty. Almost immediately after the completion of his previous (and previously reviewed) volume, Fine Matter, Mr. Thatcher entered “a whole new stream” of cognitive feeling. Good Time is the rich deposit of that stream, and its poems speak the gathered heart wisdom of a fully-lived life.

Good Time is in three parts: “Day by Day”; “ Nuances of North”; and “Still, Very Still ” “ Day by Day,” as Mr. Thatcher characterizes it elsewhere, is a personal “journal of the Covid time” in Canada, chronicling its maskings and unmaskings, and showing its edges between solitude and generosity. While the poems are not overtly political, they often trace the reverberations of larger events, including the geographic movement of communities and the unattended destruction of persons and places amid the passage of civilization.

Time is never far from his focus—in the seasonal and liturgical turns of the year, in anniversaries, commemorations, and the reappraisals they provoke. Mr. Thatcher is a contemplative, and happily a slow, writer. The considered second looks he gives to his subjects inspire a confidence and a trust in his readers, and make room for the genial fun that keeps turning up.

The focus is often minute and particular, but what is first met as small can crack open to deeper suggestions— the karmic turnings of lives or the destinies of peoples. And there is no tightly held litany of answers. His voice can speak in a gentle undertone that shifts the reader’s attention to “something far more deeply interfused.”

In other poems the scope is wider, opening up like a vast tundra and sounding low and deep like the friction of tectonic plates. Many of them foreground the planets—the dance of Venus around the sun, and the intricate meetings and partings of Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn over a two year period. While there is no archetypal unpacking, we see in these grand movements signs both of exigent moral crisis and a near hope of transformation. They urge us, as Mr. Thatcher crafts it, to “let love release your thinking sunward.” Still other poems—“Simon of Cyrene,” “Reading the Gospel of Mark,” “Reading the

First Letter of John”—take us back to the New Testament, offering a second look that sharpens our attention and invites us to wonder in a new way.

So much of Mr. Thatcher’s poetry seems to arise from edges and borders, always suggesting the emergence of something new. His own inner place is one of equanimity, able to bear unlimited nuance with the grace of acceptance or play. And his sense for the moment always remains impeccable. Here is “At the Checkout Stand:”

I stand in line as she places the last item in the bag before mine her eyes averted from a direct gaze at the one she is serving From somewhere else once –I guess the continent, but not the country, now left behind bombed out from under her or too rife with chaos for a life to be lived, a homeland shot to pieces. She ventures a smile at the one walking away the smile still testing this new homeland, the loss in her eyes asking what it will take for her to belong here or so I conjecture. He turns to me, takes my bag and begins to add up what will fill it and I look for the story in his eyes, want to ask a question but I hold back know how a question in search of a story can go aslant, can trouble waters he tries to calm

Yet I want to say to him, I love to hear stories, value each telling and at times tell one of my own from waters not always calm but I simply thank him and go as he turns away from me his story to live, hers to know not my story to tell.

The idea of ‘North,’ so pertinent to Canadian identity, is as elusive as it is alluring. Its images in art, literature, and legend, swirl around solitude, emptiness, and stillness, and it tends to unfold in narratives of clear or subtle

dangers, with a radical openness to what is unknown. The second part of Good Time, “ Nuances of North,” consists of five poems tracing episodes from the life of Samuel Hearne, the eighteenth century British explorer of northern Canada, alternating with five invoking musicians and composers of the North: Sami singer/chanter Mari Boine, Norwegian jazz pianist Tord Gustavsen, and composers Sofia Gubaidulina, Arvo Pärt, and Anna Thorvaldsdottir, from Russia, Estonia and Iceland respectively.

Those readers familiar with Mr. Thatcher’s 2020 collection, Fine Matter, may recall “Hudson Bay: July 1, 1767,” which introduced Samuel Hearne at age 22, etching his name into a blue rock slab, determined upon a life of discovery. Hearne is an endlessly intriguing figure of the second scientific revolution, that new age of wonder which looked upon Nature not as a repository of predictive certainty, but as a mysterious being waiting to be coaxed into revealing her living enigmas.

In Good Time we see Hearne, still in his twenties, gazing into the emptiness of the North and impatient to fill his blank map with its revelations. The poems trace his three major exploratory journeys, where he traversed and surveyed more than fifty six hundred kilometers of northern Canada. “Nuances” imagines Hearne gradually beginning to shed his Western presuppositions and habits, and to learn the life of the land from his First Nations guides. It lays bare his fierce intimacies and betrayals, and, movingly, his helplessness as he witnesses the massacre of twenty Inuit settlers at Bloody Falls in Nunavut. Last, it conjures up his meeting, near the end of his life at Christ’s Hospital in London, with a nineteen year old Samuel Taylor Coleridge, who would later take Hearne as the inspiration for “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner.”

The inner surfaces of “North” appear through imaginations of music, whose sounds issue out of themselves in contrasts and rhythms that evoke austere and reticent terrain and skies. Spirit and sense come together.

In “Listening to Sofia Gubaidulina,” the bowing of the cello in the composer’s “Canticle of the Sun” echoes the yearly movement of the sun toward and away from the Arctic circle, and the rhythmic recurrences of lasting day and lasting night:

….A deep breath as the sun goes beneath the earth beneath the sea ice water gone to earth

Into the silence of

ice the sun goes and rests the monastery bells until from below the sun sounds the ice strokes light through the ice from below long strokes of light along the underside of ice ice trembling with light groaning with the light sun probing ice from below as the aurora shimmers above below deep strokes of light above aurora shimmers ripple of light as the dead begin their chant

From a depth of irradiated ice the dead begin to chant chant rising as the bowing of the sun rises from depth of ice rises to stroke the Arctic Circle the bells the bells as the rising light along the Arctic Circle raises the chant of the dead into morning life….

The poems in “Still, Very Still,” the third section of Good Time, seem to have already understood what Simone Weil said that “very few spirits discover”: things and beings exist.1 There is something rather than nothing, and that is simply astounding. We can have delight in that realization, and it prompts a kind of glad sharing. Mr. Thatcher often seems to be speaking confidentially to us about this, and it feels good to be his friend.

One of my favorites is “A Day in New York City,” where an out of town family climbs out of the stink of the stairs of the Port Authority Terminal to face the city on a humid summer morning:

1 Quoted in Michael Lipson, Be: An Alphabet of Astonishment, available at Amazon.com.

.…the first of the day’s epiphanies the man suddenly beside us, saying You are looking for somewhere to have breakfast, and pointing down the street into the next block. In the restaurant the elderly waiter, a Latino immigrant, dropped the syrup bottle. The owner bent down beside him, her hand on his shoulder and whispered it’s all right, Señor, it’s all right At noon I stood at the Greek food bar ready to eat and run, the owner beamed at my tray, at me. You have bought a wonderful lunch. Enjoy it!

At the South Street Seaport wharf, midafternoon, a young African-American did his acrobatic moves along the railing of his boat, free of the weight of any world. And the Vietnamese taxi driver easing through traffic, pressing the horn almost gently, just enough to move things along -- each life saying I love this city and I will keep it….

Philip is right about New York. There is no conclusion to “Still, Very Still,” of course, no take away. But if there is a leave-taking, it’s the feeling that the ordinary and the extraordinary can come together so very gracefully:

There Are Flowers

There are flowers that are simply flowers full of colour in a space just an open space not a wayside oasis or the ending of a quest There is a day that is just a day on which nothing important happens which doesn’t make history yet is grateful for having lived There is a story that is simply a story with no drama in evidence or climax that takes the breath away, a story going its own path keeping its end close to itself saying, step inside stand still, stand very still

The Star Tales of Mother Goose

The Star Tales of Mother Goose, by Mary Stewart Adams, iIllustrated by Patricia DeLisa (2021)

reviewed by Alice Groh

As the true fairy tales collected by the Brothers Grimm reflect human soul/spiritual strivings, so too does The Star Tales of Mother Goose reveal the layers of meaning in what we have come to regard as simple children’s verses. Out of her deep knowledge and observation of the stars, Mary Stewart Adams has made the correlation between our favorite Mother Goose rhymes and the constellations appearing in the sky during the revolving months of the year. The charming illustrations add to the delight

and together they offer readers of all ages the incentive to look up, with an easy way to remember what to look for and altogether a confirmation that our imaginative world of myth and story is indeed a true bridge between the human soul and the outer, visible world. Imagine, that

Hey Diddle Diddle, The cat and the fiddle

The cow jumped over the Moon,

The little dog laughed

To see such a sport

And the dish ran away with the spoon. truly describes what one sees in the sky: looking up at the Big Dipper as the focal point (the spoon), with the dish as the Milky Way below it, the cat (the constella-

Frederick Dennehy is associate editor of being human, a retired lawyer and active thespian, and a class holder of the School for Spiritual Science of the Anthroposophical Society.

tion Leo) and the fiddle (the constellation Lyra) to one side and the cow (the constellation Taurus) and the little dog (Canus Minor) to the other side! (We would hope the moon would oblige by placing herself in Taurus so that the cow could jump over her.) All of this is wonderfully illustrated on pages 10 and 11 of the book and then expounded upon with stellar map again on pages 50 and 51. Or that in the May evening sky we can observe Little Bo Peep (the constellation Boötes) looking for her sheep (the Big and Little Dippers):

Little Bo Peep has lost her sheep and can’t tell where to find them.

Leave them alone, and they’ll come home, Wagging their tails behind them.

Little Bo Peep fell fast asleep, and dreamt she heard them bleating, But when she awoke, she found it a joke, for they still were all fleeting. Then up she took her little crook, determin’d for to find them; She found them indeed, but it made her heart bleed, for they’d left all their tails behind them.

The verses on pages 12 and 13 are wonderfully explained and complimented by the star maps on pages 55 and 56 where you discover the names of all the stars and constellations and where to look for them.

In between nursery rhymes and stellar maps lies a wonderful interlude tale concerning Mother Goose herself, Bertrada of Laon, “Goosefoot Bertha” due to a webbed foot, mother to the Emperor Charlemagne and the purveyor of instructive folktales to the populace, inspired from spiritually-cultivated sources.

This book is so beautifully done and instructs on so many different levels that it is easy to imagine it being a fantastic gift for families and friends of all ages. One hopes that it will also entice us sufficiently to go out and “make friends” with our starry neighbors, who patiently wait for us to notice and to love them.

Alice Grow lives in New Hampshire and handles communications for anthroposophical activities in that region.

A Fairy Tale

Once upon a length of the horizon there stood a rainbow house; open to the wind, the rain and the dark clouds; for birds to fly in and out, and open to every conceivable story for its appearance was as of itself and yet it was quite timeless.

Once upon a stretch of the imagination there was a story told that seemed open to all that dwells in the human soul; for thoughts and feelings to wander in and out and for moods of every color of the rainbow, for this was in the moment of creating, a creation that would breathe with images.

Once, upon a pause in a conversation, a child that is asleep in us – of knowing who we are, will be born of simple qualities that are open to the wind and the rain and the dark clouds, for while this child will appear quite suddenly it will find the world awaiting for its coming and its life will become our everlasting story.

Andrew Hoy

Poetry and Painting

at one point above the tree line – far ahead turkey vultures are sewing the sky on to a horizon – a cosmos of blue and clouds on to our earthly habitation and in a way familiar to the artist with his brush they simply circle with each stitch until their canvas is united – never to be torn apart in spite of the ever-changing character of clouds and trees, or paint upon canvas and even between night and day when the taste of food –and the nourishment of prayer become our companions in combining realms that seem to us to be – so far apart.

Andrew Hoy

Andrew Hoy is one of the Camphill pioneers in the US, arriving in 1960 helping with the founding of the children’s village at Beaver Run and then at Kimberton Hills. He spent two years in Carinthia, Austria and ten years in Leningrad Oblast, Russia.

The Impulse and Power of Artistic Eurythmy

by Nachshon Andrew Dzedulionis

I have been reflecting about what’s going on in the world and here in America. How are we dealing and coping with the epidemic, war, political, racial extremes, hate, judgement, discrimination of all forms, division? And how it all affects us, children and adults we work with in eurythmy? How the art of eurythmy can be and is a healing force in these times, in particular right now?

As artists we have the skills, craft, and freedom of expressing ourselves through art forms—dance, expressive movement, a musical piece, poem, song, painting, photograph, flower arrangement, makeup, origami, delicious cooked meal, tailored garment, etc. These are manifestations of art each in its own way. Educators are artists of their crafts as well.

All arts are powerful entities of healing, as long as they come from the heart and spiritual inspiration. The epidemic and its worldwide impact on the arts is monumental damage, destruction to humanity, and to the spiritual world. With the war we see arts as a powerful tool for giving hope, strength to live for to the victims and the survivors. Suddenly out of nowhere I felt I was one with millions of others going through it all. I felt and lived their pain so strongly. It is hard to put that feeling, emotional condition into words.

This is our opportunity as eurythmists to heal the world, heal ourselves with eurythmy.

In my adult eurythmy class after welcoming and greeting the participants, I start with Haleluiah. I ask everyone to think about the current destructive events in the world and take into each gesture of Haleluiah the victims of the tragedy, the suffering ones, as well as the ones who causing it. They are also victims of authority, of power over them. We look into both polarities, the Luciferic and Ahrimanic forces. Afterward I read this meditation given by Dr. Rudolf Steiner in Summer of 1924:

I seek within me

The Strength of Creative Working, The Power of Creative Life.

It tells me

The heavy weight of Earth

Through the Word of my Feet, It tells me

Ich suche im Innern Der schaffenden Kräfte Wirken, Der schaffenden Mächte Leben.

Es sagt mir

Der Erde Schweremacht Durch meiner Füße Wort, Es sagt mir

The forming power of the Air Through the Singing of my hands, It tells me

The strength of Heaven`s Light Through the Thinking of my Head, So, the World in Man Speaks, sings, thinks.

Der Lüfte Formgewalt Durch meiner Hände Singen, Es sagt mir

Des Himmels Lichteskraft

Durch meines Hauptes Sinnen, Wie die Welt im Menschen Spricht, singt, sinnt.

I want to share how I apply this meditation in my teaching.

» “I seek within me ” This strongly speaks to me as I A O exercise, and this is the I part, where I have to find and connect within myself with myself, to have the will forces to experience I through my physical body and reach into the Higher I, into the Cosmos.

» “The Strength of Creative Working, The Power of Creative Life.” Here I feel and experience the A part, where I reach into the Cosmos, the spiritual world with I, now I tap into the gifts I bear in me given me by the spiritual world and Creator.

This next part resonates in me with threefold of Willing, Thinking, Feeling forces:

» “The heavy weight of Earth Through the Word of my Feet.” This part resonates with the will forces in us. In order to do the first I, I need the will forces to lift up and straighten up my body into the I Gestalt. I have to have the spiritual impulse where it all begins, and then I need my will powers to complete the task with my physical body.

» “The forming power of the Air Through the Singing of my hands.” Dr. Steiner said, “every gesture begins from the heart (chest region) and ends in the heart (chest region)”. Once again, I have to look back into the very first I and through A into will forces and now in to the feeling realm of my being.

» “The strength of Heaven`s Light Through the Thinking of my Head.” Thinking has to do so much with the past. I reflect all that I have stored in me and resonate through the process of thinking in the present time. All the qualities, entities I bear in me, are resonating through me and the process of active thinking in present time events.

» “So, the World in Man Speaks, sings, thinks.” The meditation concludes in O. I take it all in, from the very first impulse and inspiration thought, to the transitional “It tells me” and on to a renewed quality and experience of IAO and Willing, Feeling, Thinking.

Me standing in the middle of the lemniscate before I make one step forwards: I look where I am going to (1 Future) back to (2 Present) me, then to where I came from (3 Past), and then I do the actual step forwards. 1 = 3. Physical, Etheric, Astral and the actual step forwards manifesting through the higher I. This leads me further, into the ninefold nature from The Inner Nature of Music and the Experience of Tone by Rudolf Steiner.

If today’s music were not a part of the materialistic age, if all that man experiences today did not contaminate the musical element, then, based on what man possesses today in the musical element—which in itself. has attained world-historical heights—he could not but be an anthroposophist. If you wish to experience the musical element consciously, you cannot but experience it anthroposophically. If you take these things as they are, you can ponder, for example, over the following point: everywhere in ancient traditions concerning spiritual life, mention is made of man’s sevenfold nature.

The Theosophical movement also adopted this view of the sevenfold nature of the human being. When I wrote my Theosophy, I had to speak of a ninefold nature, further dividing the three individual members. I arrived at the sevenfold from a ninefold organization.

9 (spirit man)

8 (life man)

7 (spirit self)

3 (astral or sentient body)

2 (etheric body)

1 (physical body)

6 (consciousness soul)

5 (intellectual soul)

4 (sentient soul)

Since three and four overlap, as do six and seven, I, too, arrive at the sevenfold human being in Theosophy

These are the Etheric forces that flow and work in me before each gesture I create and do in speech, tone eurythmy and project into the world, spiritual world and to all students I work with during eurythmy class. As well as in my artistic eurythmy performances.

Connecting through nature, the pure sound and time,

translating into eurythmy. Working with these forces in me consciously I am not only working on my Karma and future but as well I heal and work on the present of humanity and the world, I manifest today as an eurythmist and as an individual. My faith is always one of the driving forces and inspiration to all I do, in my life and eurythmy.

One of many wonderful aspects of eurythmy I value so much is that what we create as eurythmist resonates and reflects in a Spiritual World as well as on each human being on the earth. This powerful gift of eurythmy comes with a greater responsibility for the world we live in and human evolution in general. To be able to create the art of eurythmy, live in a present moment with the knowledge and foundation of the past. Create and let it go without selfish egoistic attaching ourselves to what we created on the stage. Let it go and start creating again and again something new, a never ending spiral circle of life as an artist.

In eurythmy we are able, apart from the conventional thought element that must be present in everyday speech, to eliminate thought entirely and to derive movement directly from the whole human being, from the human will. We have, therefore, an immediate experience for which the artistic medium is man himself, and in which the impression is of man himself. Although dance-like in physical form, eurythmy did not grow out of the modern dance movement, but rather from the spiritually inclined artistic impulses. ( An Introduction to Eurythmy, 1913-1924 )

Eurythmy is art of the future with the roots of creation in expressive movement art that comes from love. I’m exploring new horizons as an artist, as a person, as me with art of eurythmy as my creative force and tool in today’s materialistic world! Eurythmy enables us to reach the unreachable, to tap into the Spiritual World through our own growth as individuals, as artists, as eurythmist.

This is a glimpse into my thoughts, experience and process through eurythmy during 2020/22 teaching online and in person, being able to perform once again after almost two years pause.

Nachshon Andrew Dzedulionis learned about the art of eurythmy in January 1999 and received his Bachelor’s Degree in Music Education and Performing Arts in Vienna. Currently he lives and works in Los Angeles, where he gets to appreciate both the beauty of the ocean as well as the mountains, and offers classes and workshops for all age groups. Website: adzedu.wixsite.com/lartiste and YouTube channel: www.youtube.com/@resonanceofspace8639

Truth & Knowledge — and Life

by Russell Arnold, PhD

“Irrespective of whether the content of … a proposition contains elements which guarantee its absolute validity, or whether it is certain for other reasons, the fact remains that we cannot make it our own unless at some stage it becomes experience for us.”

—Rudolf Steiner, Truth and Knowledge

I encountered Rudolf Steiner’s Truth and Knowledge when I was nineteen and a half, at a pivot point in my life. My relationship to sensory life had slipped. It began the previous year when I was faced with themes of life and death, learning that my mom was going to have open-heart surgery. This sparked questions about the significance of being human—or lack thereof, as I started from as a teen steeped in materialistic ideas—and where we come from. I searched in many diverse conceptual directions, from popular physics and cosmology to Jungian psychology and even astrology. The most fruitful component of this pursuit however, was my personal experiences. And no drugs were involved in anything I’m talking about here.

I spent the summer I turned nineteen in small-town Wisconsin near Lake Michigan. One night I went out alone around 2 a.m. into the bay by which I was staying. I lay naked on the sandy bottom in the shallows, looking up at the stars with longing, and sensing the longing of the lukewarm night water. I perceived unambiguously a presence stretched out above me, that I was seen by the congregation of celestial lights, and even recognized. It became clear that my consciousness belonged to the far reaches of the universe.

As beautiful as the above experience sounds, and was, what followed was the unbearable sense that my skull was a prison from which I desperately wanted to escape—to expand into a rarified space, on a scale befitting my nature, several orders of magnitude larger than my head. (At this time I had not read The Virgin of the World or been exposed to Hermetic ideas, beyond the psychological subjectivism of Jung.) I began to get increasingly sluggish and ill, recalling a sensation of lake water in the night. At times I experienced something like a metal balloon expanding in my head, and at others that my consciousness escaped my embattled head—which became numb like an arm which has been “laid on funny” and gone to sleep— only to be turned back at the boundary of my extremities. Nothing of the concepts I was familiar with helped, so I

sought answers in pagan groups and philosophy, especially that of Leibniz, who identified reality as being comprised of “monads”: fundamental units of consciousness which evolve, beyond individual lives, through varying degrees of “apperception” or perception of perception.

How I ended up Google-searching Rudolf Steiner and finding Truth and Knowledge remains murky in my memory, though it was a distinct reversal of my pre-teen rebellion against the Waldorf education I had received. The insights obtained therein as to the nature of knowledge and its limitlessness allowed me to objectively evaluate the depths of my own experiences, and opened me to human knowledge from different ages and forms of consciousness than I was used to, like the Pentateuch (Torah), which I had previously dismissed as being outmoded, of sociological and historical interest only.

Nevertheless, it would require a very one-sided and even fanatical embrace of strength, beauty, and health in the sensory world via discipleship of Friedrich Nietzsche before I could re-approach the original question, and ultimately to look towards the mysterious infusion of spiritual rejuvenation in the death phase of the cycles of life, as discussed, for example, in Steiner’s Knowledge of Higher Worlds and its Attainment and Outline of Esoteric Science, or indicated in Wagner’s Parsifal , or the Christian mystery in general.

Further steps in my seeking over the past nine years have seen me through many experiences, concepts, and struggles of spiritual and interpersonal significance. Many spiritual friendships and mentorships have come and gone according to what I needed or was ready for. In parallel, I have completed doctoral studies in mathematics which is converging with my spiritual pursuits via a job I am starting at the Math and Astronomy Section at the Goetheanum. I believe that what has been, and can be, achieved in the domain of projective geometry within the anthroposophical movement is understated; it is seen as too technical for the average “spiritual person,” and too spiritual for the average “technical person.” Therefore I aim in this coming geometric work to contribute creatively to spiritual-human self understanding, as well as scientific innovation, from a corner that most new-age and learned people, respectively, aren’t expecting.

Russell Arnold (russfromstates@gmail.com) received his PhD in 2022 from the University of North Carolina.

Wonders of Development in Plants, People, & Projects

by Jan Diek van Mansvelt; Adonis Press (2022), 127 pages; available from SteinerBooks

review by Craig Holdrege

The topic of development could hardly be more important today. Don’t we see everywhere the need for change? But just doing things differently doesn’t mean that we will do things better. One predicament of our modern ways of thinking and acting has to do with the attitude of identifying “the problems” to which we want to find “the solutions” so that we can leave the problems behind. We isolate a particular state of things out of a complex web of relations and strive to make, as if from the outside, changes. This is not a developmental approach.

When we consider development, we enter the realm of time and transformation. This means to look at processes and, importantly, to consider ourselves as part of the processes. When we begin this journey, we soon realize the deeply intertwined nature of things. This can be almost overwhelming: How is it possible to navigate in such a complex and fluid world? In experiencing this uncertainty, we can find motivation to develop new capacities. The question arises: Are there guides?

society and nature. And this includes nature in the broadest sense: agriculture, landscaping, conservation, care for the environment, food, and health.

This statement makes clear that van Mansvelt’s intent is not only that the reader learn about the many wonders of development that he describes. The book wants to be an aid to developing one’s own living sensibilities. It is elegantly designed and contains many color photographs and illustrations that accompany and enhance the text, and is a joy to take in hand. It is meant for the general reader and does not presuppose any technical knowledge.

One such guide can be developmental processes in the world around us. In his new book, Dutch biologist Jan Diek van Mansvelt wants to facilitate the process of learning from development. The book is the fruit of many years of studying and teaching about living processes. At the end of the book, Van Mansvelt describes what this undertaking has meant for him:

It gave me an awareness of the intrinsic, essential kinship of human beings and nature, and enthusiasm for further development of my human capacities, and in particular, a sense of responsibility for what I contribute out of these abilities to the future development of

As the subtitle suggests, the book has three sections. The first, on plants, spans over half of the book. In a easily accessible manner, van Mansvelt leads the reader through the development of flowering plants as it presents itself in seeds, germination, growth of stem and foliage leaves, flowers, and fruits. His emphasis is always on transformation, and the photographs and illustrations are a great help in picturing the processes. Working within the Goethean tradition, van Mansvelt’s concern is with “entering into the language of the phenomena themselves and allowing them to speak to us, and then allowing ourselves to be surprised by ideas or unexpected insights.” This presentation of plant transformation leads into a dynamic world; it helps one to move out of static conceptions.

The book then shifts to a consideration of various facets of human development—embryonic and early childhood development, biography, and even a foray into the question of life after death. Van Mansvelt uses the learning gained by studying plants as a kind of lens that, on

the one hand, shows the differences between plant and human developmental processes and, on the other hand, reveals intriguing aspects of transformative processes in humans.

The final part of the book deals with the unfolding of ideas and plans that become a project in human social life. Van Mansvelt describes project-creation as a differentiated, eight-phase process. He gives a picture of how a project can be consciously and productively guided without suggesting that there is a recipe for how to do things. The flexibility of mind one can gain through the study of organic development provides a basis for dealing with the less predictable and open-ended nature of human projects.

This book is written with a deep love for nature’s creations, and wants to stimulate a way of human knowing and acting that grows in its wisdom. We encounter developmental processes as wonderful teachers, and as a field of fruitful ongoing exploration in human activity.

Craig Holdrege, PhD (craig@natureinstitute.org) is The Nature Institute’s director and senior researcher, and spearheaded its founding in 1998 (see: nwww.natureinstitute.org). He is deeply interested in the interconnected nature of things and how we can understand life in truly living ways as a basis for responsible human action. His passion is to develop what Goethe called “delicate empiricism” — an approach that learns from nature how to understand nature and is infused with a cautious and critical awareness of how intentions and habits of mind affect human understanding.

Gemstones and Earth’s History

review by Lynn Madsen, PhD MD

Written in the nineteen-fifties by Walther Cloos, Gemstones and Earth’s History is now available in English translation by Jannebeth Roell and James Lee, so we have expanded access to this remarkable book. Cloos not only provides vivid descriptions of gems, he chronicles where they can be found, how they are embedded or related to their environment, and what time period of earth’s history they arrived. Honestly, more than several moments of awe occurred while reading.

This book is the primer that would have prepared me, would have given this earth-context for all the earth science courses of my education. Chemistry, experienced as merely factual and headache-inducing, was transformed into surprise as I looked up the chemical structure of each gem while reading, eager to perceive the formerly tired chemical figures with fresh eyes. The term “enlivened” is apt. This book enlivens gems along with the reader, science, history, and wonder of our earth.

Cloos clearly lays out the diversity of gemstones, and relates their uniqueness to the earth’s evolution: a different time and phase manifests as different substance. In addition, someone familiar with a particular gem’s

geometric growth pattern can place where on the earth it comes from. This importance of place, this diversity, reflects how each and every location on earth is unique; each plot of ground beneath our feet, how a plant grows in one place is different to another, and on and on. A diamond is not just a diamond.

I am a “plant person” who readily gets to know a new environment from that kingdom’s perspective. Cloos has expanded my sense of nature to not only focus on plants, but how the earth and cosmos dance together to bring about all growth and evolution, plant, animal, and mineral. They intertwine and overlap. He describes plant-like growth patterns of gemstones, “…crystal formations that are otherwise only known in the rhythmic and spiral formation tendencies of plant growth.”

In the study of anthroposophic medicine, I learned about processes. In conventional medicine, we call a process a disease; one can surgically remove a tumor, but the process may not be removed at that time. A virus or bacteria is involved with infection, but the process of illness and healing goes beyond them. This background helped me grasp Cloos’ descriptions of how animal and plant “processes” exist within the mineral realm; his words have provided understanding of the earth’s evolution. I can now read about old Saturn, old Sun, old Moon, and ancient earth with more clear imagination— how we currently define a plant with its capacity to photosynthesize is specific to this current earth. In the far distant past, the shape of a tree trunk observed in a particular mineral reflects a similar process. Same forming forces evoke similar appearances from different substances—the origin of the form is not just physical chemical makeup.

These perceptions offer intangible clues to why chrysolith is known as a healing force for the eyes, for example.

Cloos describes the arrival of chrysolith during the old Sun phase, the same time-frame as diamonds. Cloos quotes Goethe, “If the eye was not sun-like, it could never see the sun.” Cloos states “the eye is born entirely of the sun’s activity.” In my former prescribing of chrysolith for detached retinas, I just knew it worked.

Cloos provides other examples of various gems and their relationships to the senses; in the big picture, these relationships lead to further comprehension of the etheric realm. The four different ethers are referenced in Cloos’ history of the earth and the origin of gems. Not just high heat or pressure is involved with gem origins, but light, moisture, and where they are embedded on our earth are components of each gem’s story—his description of a light-filled earth that contributed to the moonstone family during its arrival, for example.

My personal confusion about the association of gems with wealth and power is now transformed to wonder of gems—their beauties are sacred and unique; their roles in the earth’s well-being as well as forces for healing cannot be manufactured. Those prior gifts of pearls, turquoise, diamonds, and emeralds—I did not hang onto them given my lack of attachment to wearing them, and I have the unfortunate tendency to lose jewelry. With this newfound reverence, I wish I had held onto them not as investments, but to honor their special natures and to know them better.

Some books warrant an immediate second read; this one did. During the first go-through, I focused on the

basics, including vocabulary—rock, mineral, ore, metal. The second time through, I began to grasp the earth’s history and its transformation over time. What we now witness as solid rock formations were huge gelatinous masses that eventually solidified and differentiated, sometimes into crystals, sometimes not—and each gem had its own arrival within this evolution. The mystery of one gemstone completely enclosed within another, however, remains a mystery...

Cloos points out how gems’ properties defy the usual perceptions of the mineral world; they are transparent yet dense which makes them entirely different from metals (how did I miss that?). That distinction alone is worthy of attention, especially in the context of medicine and the use of gems as remedies.

Cloos’ love of minerals and our earth expressed in this book is palpable. Though this book does not have a medical focus, Cloos applied that love to his alchemical work as he developed many of my beloved remedies for Weleda as one of its first pharmacists; those remedies are still available. My understanding of how they are formulated and how they work in the human being is greatly enhanced after reading this book. And, his knowledge and understanding of the earth’s history in relation to healing forces present not just in remedies, but in all of nature and our relationship to it, provide a sage perspective on the use of all medicines. Cloos provides confidence that nature itself is a remedy. And how a remedy is received in order to be effective is as vital as the remedy itself.

If I had another fifty years, I would want to become a pharmacist like Walther Cloos, to continue his healing alchemical work with this deep knowledge about and wisdom of our earth. Instead, I will revisit various locations with new vision—like Rockhound State Park in New Mexico. This time, I will not just hike and camp, but will dig in. And I will read his other books available in English, The Living Earth and The Living Origin of Rocks and Minerals. His inspiration to love and cherish our earth— what better way to bring goodness to the world?

Lynn Madsen PhD MD is author of a medical trilogy, beginning with Medicine Dreams: A Healer Tries to Become A Doctor: forty-six years old, wife and mother of three small children and holistically inclined, Madsen successfully attends medical school. The second, Lovely Medicine: From Residency to Paracelsus, encompasses residency and then discovering lovely medicine. The third and last memoir of her conventional medical career is titled, Guilty by Degree: If You’re Being Investigated by the Feds, Be Sure to Wear Fun Clothes. Learn more about her online at www.lynnmadsenmd.com

Quartz: Spiritual Ancestor to Plants

Bring light into the plant’s forms with its primordial predecessor...

by Stewart Lundy, JPI

In the prehistory of the earth, the planet was too hot for current carbon-based compounds to exist. Lava flowed across the surface of our sphere the way that streams flow now. In this inhospitable climate, the first intimations towards growth forms arose.

opment, increasing root surface area. The 501 horn silica increases the amount of sugars sent into the rhizosphere, which is the basis of carbon sequestration and soil life. These two preparations are meant to work together.

Ehrenfried Pfeiffer found that horn manure increased the size of nitrogen-fixing nodules in legume cover crops. He found that climates with more rainfall had less available silicic acid than others. For those of us in the Eastern USA, silicic acid tends to wash out of the soil with rainfall. We must make a point to replenish this. The more rainfall there is, the more we will likely need to rely on horn silica

Stewart Lundy, along with his partner and wife, Natalie, farms 50 acres of land on a tiny peninsula in rural Virginia. For the past decade he has practiced biodynamics, and for the past eight years he has made and applied the biodynamic preparations. In his free time he is an active esoteric researcher, amateur alchemist, and practicing herbalist, experimenting with a wide range of innovations on the farm.

Admittedly, these novel forms did not look much like plants, but they were the first crystallization of the upward cosmic stream in translucent structures. It is true they had no leaves, and strove to return to the cosmos, and were permeable to light. These new forms coalesced out of the primordial chaos of the earth.

Consider a plant. Plants arise out of the chaotic blend of materials of the earthy humus. Plants grow upwards towards the universe. And light permeates plants. Though not literal descendants, these are analogous processes and real inner relationships.

Quartz crystal, buried over summer, is the first tendency of plant-like growth to emerge out of the chaos of the soil. Horn silica is a concentrated power to draw the plant up and out of the formlessness of humus and into specialized plant forms.

As Ruskin writes in Proserpina, “Crystals are to minerals what flowers are to plants.” A crystal is like a tendency towards flowering within the mineral world itself. Steiner notes in Theosophy that crystals are a transitional stage between pure formlessness and the dynamic living forms of plants. The silica preparation is often misunderstood, but it should be used at least in proportion to 500 horn manure. The horn manure enhances root hair devel-

© 2023 Josephine Porter Institute. Visit jpibiodynamics.org for more information and to order biodynamic preparations. — Founded in 1985, JPI is a national producer and distributor of biodynamic preparations – the enlivening forces that work dynamically within the soil, compost, and plants to ultimately provide us with healthier foods, healthier bodies, and a healthier planet. The JPI farm and biodynamic preparation facilities are located on a beautiful 25-acre farm in Floyd County, Virginia.

Light of Spring Today

Let there be Light of spring

Today, when green buds

Expand into red blossoms

Not by zoom but by open air

When star and moon and sun

Non-sequenced add up to clarity, Inalienably in a blend beyond Mental formulation’s grasp, One Light of spring’s creation, Nothing to stress and strain, Circle of spring flower’s Light.

Frank Hall

Frank Hall has taught humanities at the Detroit and Washington Waldorf Schools, and is a member of the ASA and School of Spiritual Science. He enjoys hiking, birdwatching, and stargazing.

Turning Lead into Gold

review by Neill Reilly

Turning Lead into Gold: The Transformative Alchemy of Waldorf Teaching, by Jack

Petrash; Bell Pond Books (2022) 216 pp.

Turning Lead into Gold by Jack Petrash is a book for Waldorf teachers, parents and educators. The theme of the book is Jack’s endless enthusiasm for telling a story, which is what he does when he teaches or writes a book. He loves to learn and loves to share his love of learning with his students. His alchemical persona allows him to follow his students from the first grade to the eighth grade. Jack taught first to eighth grades four times! Think of each year starting a new curriculum for each group of distinct individuals. I have not met any other person who has done this four times. That is an astounding accomplishment! In sports this would be the equivalent of going to four separate Olympic games.

How to teach each grade from the first to the fifth to the eighth puts distinct demands on a teacher. Each year has its unique evolutionary development. As his students evolve as individuals, Jack evolves with them going from an artistic teacher for the first grade and then growing to an academic teacher in the seventh and eighth grades. Dr. Steiner’s curriculum is aimed at addressing the growing child with stories in the first grade and evolving to the Greek culture in fifth grade and on to modern times in the eighth grade.

Each child is treated as a developing individual with unique gifts and needs. The key is to listen to the child right in front of you and also listen to the spiritual guides that are all around you. Jack emphasizes the “surround” by which he means that you create a loving, supportive environment which allows the child to mature in a safe place. Since children love to imitate, Jack understands the critical importance of the surround demonstrating the True, the Beautiful and the Good.

This is a book of experiences. Jack has experienced that you are never alone as a teacher, even in your darkest moments. The children want you to succeed as does the spiritual world. Your fellow teachers, the children’s parents, all want you to succeed as a teacher. No one wants a bad teacher. We all want good teachers. We have but to

ask for grace and listen.

I have a positive bias towards Jack. I went to the Waldorf Institute with him in 1972-73. Don’t be fooled by that kind demeanor. He was clearly a Queens guy who knew how to use his elbows in a basketball game. “No blood, no foul.” Jack took that enthusiasm and intensity and aimed it at learning how to learn and then how to teach. Jack observed master teachers and would absorb their craft. Jack’s love of learning is infectious.

Jack always concentrates on the present day and learns from his mistakes. This is the artistic approach blended with the scientific process. His students have learned from his soul mood to be calm in learning, but also explode with joy and wonder when appropriate. Jack takes discipline and turns it into joy. What is learning without discipline and joy?

Jack even discusses what we might call failures and turns them into learning situations. He is humble enough to admit that some failures are beyond our modest abilities and discusses the difficult time he had trying to apply Waldorf pedagogy in a public school. There were wins with some students, losses with others and bureaucratic inanities that bedevil our public schools. Jack does not lose hope and continues to shine a light on the wonders of teaching via his Nova Institute.

Neill Reilly (neilldreilly@gmail.com) is the author of The Marian Way of Heart Knowledge: From Mary through St. John’s Gospel to Rudolf Steiner’s Philosophy of Freedom

Nova Institute is online at www.novainstitute.org and includes a TedX talk by Jack Petrash, “Educating Children for the Journey.”

Human Moral Development and the Future Evolution of Nature

By Andrew Luisi

In the times when an intuitive feeling was present that afforded our ancestors the ability to live in nature and feel what it needed to progress, moral development was not actualized, but rather felt. In terms of anthroposophical study, returning to these old instincts is no longer necessary; we must now develop a spiritual understanding of ourselves and how we develop as moral human beings in relation to nature. We must utilize a deeper spiritual insight to discover why these increasingly unreliable instincts are presently unable to be accessed and to go beyond them to grow as individuals and as a society.

A spiritually awakened humanity must seek these insights because nature is in a process of dying and the forces of nature are withdrawing themselves from their previous roles. The only way to awaken nature is if we awaken ourselves. For the future evolution of nature, we must continue to develop morally, and the time is at hand.

It is becoming increasingly difficult for us to realize our tasks in the natural world because of our emancipation from the cosmos; plants and animals, however, are still very much dependent on their earthly surroundings. To live in this world is to come to the awareness that what is taking place on the earth is a reflection of what is taking place in the cosmos. Nature is a macrocosm that is united with forces working from all sides. Science in our present age focuses on the microcosm: By carefully putting something in a little glass plate and peering at it through a microscope, the macrocosm is unaccounted for.1 Drawing conclusions of the small-scale activities of life utterly ignores the total scope. If intellect has exterminated instincts, then the age of materialism has made us very clever, but we now lack true wisdom. Looking at the macrocosm, the broadest dimensions of nature begin to be understood, and this is a tremendous task of spiritual science today.

Rudolf Steiner poses two kinds of investigations into nature: first, that human beings may remain “mere observers of the material phenomena that comes toward them”; second, that we can “digest our impressions spiritually by thinking about them, by forming concepts about underlying spiritual foundations of the world.”2

We must not simply gaze at nature, but muse over

1 Steiner, Rudolf. Spiritual Foundations for the Renewal of Agriculture, 129.

2 Klünker, Wolf-Ulrich. Introduction to Nature Spirits by Rudolf Steiner, 3.

nature; in doing so, we may feel the beauty in all things, and this enables our impressions. This is no ordinary perception, but intentionally thinking on morality. By doing so, we learn to develop a moral disposition that recognizes the unity and value between our nature and the natural world. This moral disposition, coming out of a philosophy of German Idealism, is being lucidly concentrated on the potentials for the future development of humanity; we are incessantly drawing out of ourselves this will, and we must try determinedly to uphold it. It is not enough to grasp the world with the intellect, but strive to understand it artistically, for outer nature always tallies to what is within.

Steiner advises that we must study the entire being in relation to our innermost nature, in order to apprehend what is lively and operating in the cosmos. “To find and know yourself, look all around you in the world. To find and know the world, look into all the depths within yourself.”3 Mutual understanding for humanity and nature is a true source of morality and spirituality in the most intimate chasms of the human being. Steiner uses language such as “what is behind” and “awakening” to reorient the human being to what was forgotten 4 At the age of seven, he began to have inner questions on spiritual experiences and began to realize what lives behind nature.5 Johannes Scotus Erigena, 1st century Irish theologian, Neoplatonist, and poet, postulated two realms of nature: the region above and the region below. The region above is characterized by a true knowledge, understanding, and moral conduct. The region below is characterized by vanities, false imaginings, and moral errors and mistakes. In order to re-orient the human being to what was once known but is no longer instinctual, and more importantly to take this knowledge and expand on it, moral development must be accomplished with enthusiasm, for great things can be accomplished with enthusiasm.

Erigena defined nature by composition of what is and what is not become. Nature is most commonly perceived through the senses, in the products and results of what is tangible. But nature also has potential aspects to evolve through our soulful and spiritual organs of perception.

3 Steiner, Rudolf. Harmony of the Creative Word, 180.

4 Lindenberg. Rudolf Steiner – A Biography, 7.

5 The landscape of his home in Pottschach revealed not only the true disposition of nature, but what lives behind nature that speaks to the soul. Here is where a life within the soul was starting to become realized for Steiner.

These are not physical organs that are inside the human, but rather the set of organs that can only be worked through moral development. In this sense, “moral” is defined as spiritual determination, the idea of ethics in German Idealistic Philosophy, that humanity can take its development further when it reaches out beyond natural and biographical aims toward spiritual aims. Through these spiritual aims, which could also be described as becoming free, the evolution of nature is also furthered. In discussing the mystery of Golgotha, Steiner explains that “when one can look back and perceive what once occurred naturally, which now needs to occur morally” is to understand what it means to be free, and the future evolution of nature depends on humanity becoming free.6

Humanity must acquire knowledge by setting its thought processes free from its breathing processes. Thought processes, here, are not described as “ordinary thinking” or past, dead thoughts, but as “living thinking” or “before thinking becomes thoughts – thinking without an object of ‘attention.’” 7 When we can achieve living or creative thinking, the thought processes then enter and live within a rhythm of nature, for the true being of humankind lies hidden and, by strengthening moral forces, these thoughts become so mobile that they can access the hidden worlds around them, thus growing them. There must be a change from analysis to synthesis.8

This is truly the beautiful dichotomy of what was earlier noted: going out-side to go in-side, and vice-versa. Ultimately, we must mature our moral character in order to set and further the evolutionary course of nature: May nature destroy every day what we are building, so that every day we may look forward to joyfully create anew – we don’t want to owe anything to nature, but everything to ourselves.9

Becoming free becomes of absolute importance when considering Goethe’s fundamental rule of life: that if we do not gain mastery over ourselves, the freeing of the spirit will become harmful. The first of his three motivating principles in organic nature, which Steiner referred to

6 Steiner, Rudolf. Man in the Past, Present and Future, 43.

7 Steiner, Rudolf. Start Now! A Book of Soul and Spiritual Exercises, 61.

8 Steiner considered psychoanalysis dilettantish because it is only descriptive and analytical. There must be a constructive psychology that is creative and should generate the Soul. Psychosynthesis believes that a direct experience and pure self-awareness of the Self is true; it studies the person as both personality and Soul. In Psychosynthesis Roberto Assagioli states that the spiritual goals of Self-realization need social integration: “the harmonious integration of the individual into ever larger groups up to the ‘one humanity.’”

9 Steiner, Rudolf, and delle Grazie, Marie Eugenie. “Nature and Our Ideals.”

as the “three Goethean laws,” is that of metamorphosis or constant change of form. This refers to two types of knowing: ordinary consciousness, which is sense perception where perception is abstracted into an object. The second, and the more favorable, is to avoid the object entirely and to focus on the continual process of metamorphosis. The first will shoot the object down, so to speak, while the second flies with it. The second becomes a transition of physical realty; it is an ensuing transformation into soul existence, which raises itself into spirit. One must view Goethe’s rules through a spiritual lens: It is to understand that corporealities do not have a form perceptible to the senses. Creative thinking must be applied.

Goethe’s second motivating principle is that of polarity: that everything in nature itself is composed of opposites. His third is that there is a specific climactic development in organic nature, otherwise known as enhancement. From an alchemic perspective, this enhancement is toward a moral and spiritual rebirth of human kind. In the words of Mary Anne Atwood, a 19th century English writer on hermeticism and spiritual alchemy, the goal of alchemy is to ferment “the human vital spirit in order to purify it, to dissolve it, so that the essence can be reconstructed through a regeneration or transmutation.” This is summed up quite beautifully by Schiller:

One can say that every individual human being, according to his original disposition and ultimate purpose, bears within him a pure Ideal Man; to accord with this abiding unity, through all the changes of his life, is the great task of his existence.10

Schiller wanted to build a bridge from everyday reality to the ideal human being, as a task to free oneself.

Both sensual and rational impulses, if developed in a one-sided fashion, hinder human nature from becoming free and morally developed. If the sensual is more dominant, a human being is conquered by drives and desires. And when the rational impulse is prevailing, drives and desires are suppressed and commit an abstract necessity.

Human beings are subject to compulsion in both cases: in the one their sensuality enslaves the spiritual in them, and in the other, the spiritual enslaves their sensuality.11

It is only when both impulses are in harmony that freedom is achieved. Schiller’s “Aesthetic Letters” significantly inspired Goethe—so much so that thoughts arose in him that fashioned his Conversations of German

10 Schiller, Friedrich. On the Aesthetic Education of Man. Notes.

11 Allen, Paul Marshall and Joan DeRis. The Time is at Hand, 159.

Emigrants. In this fairy tale, two central conceptions are formulated: “Conceptions which lead to belief that there is a connection between events of life that cannot be explained by laws of the visible world” and “conceptions with human morality.”12 The second infers that we do not draw our impulses from the discernible world, but from motivations that elevate our impulses beyond what the sensible brings forth in them.

It is no surprise that the concept of Nietzsche’s “Übermensch” is also deeply rooted in the ideas of becoming morally free. French Philosopher Henri Bergson in his Superhuman and Creative Evolution, while not using the term “Übermensch,” discourses on the “superman” ascending from the human, much as the human has arisen out of the animal. In Steiner’s own research on the evolution of consciousness and becoming free, he discussed both theories.

Nietzsche’s notion of the superman was paraphrased by Steiner as: “The animal bore man in itself; must not man bear within himself a higher being, the superman?”13 In this light, real self-knowledge is not circumscribed in one’s past, but in the soul’s future. The human being reaches the limits of knowledge through the senses; a bird cannot submerge itself in the water and live forever in the ocean for it lacks the physical and aquatic organs, Steiner said. The human being, when reaching the limit of knowledge, must realize his spiritual organs, “where the soul can live in an element that goes beyond the horizon of the senses.”14

This is an important factor in our moral development and the future evolution of nature. In Steiner’s Anthroposophical Leading Thoughts, he develops an influential apprehension that humanity, beginning in the middle of the nineteenth century, has sunk into the lowest realms of nature; technology, thus, becomes a sub-nature. We “must find the strength, the inner force of knowledge” to overcome how far humanity has sunk below in technology. “The age requires a knowledge transcending nature” which will enable humanity to climb as far as spiritual knowledge—to what is beyond earth and above nature.15

Beyond earth and above nature

In climbing to what is beyond earth and above nature, we must discuss the three overriding aspects of nature: past, present, and future. Past nature can be seen as

12 Ibid, 160.

13 Gidley, Jennifer M., The Future, 108.

14 Steiner. Anthroposophical Leading Thoughts, 14.

15 Ibid, 218.

the physical, which appears to sense perception and has concluded its development. Present nature, or the etheric, continues to develop and continues to pass into past nature. However, a future nature is a morality which human beings are creating now.

Its form will depend upon the moral evolution of mankind and will become the nature that will have been created by human beings themselves.16

This is the future nature that Steiner referred to as rising as far as into super-nature. Thus, humanity’s task is to develop particular attitudes towards the world: an attitude of mind, soul, life, and a religious attitude. The last produces a quality missing in nature, and is not an inner reaction, as are the first three; it is not merely observing outer phenomena but rather bringing forth intentional inner activity. Goethe discusses that everything in nature lives by giving and taking. Plants give and live by giving off air and warmth, and animals take and live by taking in earth and water. While plants give and take, animals take and hold. But human beings have the ability to not only do both, but to also nurture and further develop themselves and nature.

“If man is to be rightly man on earth, earth cannot be rightly earth because of man.”17 Human beings and earth are mutually inclusive, but cannot mutually support each other. We need to rise above our own moral development in order to lead nature’s future evolution. We reach this realization not merely through sense perceptions, but through a moral disposition that does not take into account only the physical—because then one studies only corpses—but the soul-spiritual. Goethe often describes how we live in nature but are strangers to her. Our aim, therefore, is to strive to mend the split, for doing so frees the human being and evolves nature.

Thinking unites us with the world, feeling brings us back into ourselves and makes us individuals. An awakened humanity participates consciously in its own development and the future evolution of nature, as free agents to create a world of our choosing. We are on a level of spiritual existence that is incomplete and imperfect, but we can be in the process of being led to a stage of completion that will determine the future evolution of nature. The development of our consciousness lies at the heart of this changed perception.

Citations

Assagioli, Roberto. Psychosynthesis. Aquarian/Thorsons, 1993. Gidley, Jennifer M. The Future: A Very Short Introduction . Oxford UP, 2017.

16 Klünker, Wolf-Ulrich. Introduction to Nature Spirits by Rudolf Steiner, 15. 17 Steiner, Rudolf. Harmony of the Creative Word, 51

Lindenberg, Christoph. Rudolf Steiner: A Biography. Trans. Jon McAlice. Great Barrington, MA: SteinerBooks, 2012.

Schiller, Johann Christoph Friedrich von. On the Aesthetic Education of Man Trans. Reginald Snell. Angelico, 2015.

Steiner, Rudolf. Anthroposophical Leading Thoughts. Trans. George Adams and Mary Adams. London: Rudolf Steiner Press, 1999.

Harmony of the Creative Word: The Human Being and the Elemental, Animal, Plant and Mineral Kingdoms. Trans. Matthew Barton. London: Rudolf Steiner, 2001.

Man in the Past, Present and the Future. Rudolf Steiner Press, 1982.

– and Marie Eugenie Delle Grazie. Nature and Our Ideals. Mercury, 1983. Nature Spirits: Selected Lectures. Ed. Wolf-Ulrich Klünker. Comp. WolfUlrich Klünker. London: Rudolf Steiner, 1995.

Start Now!: A Book of Soul and Spiritual Exercises. SteinerBooks, 2004.

Spiritual Foundations for the Renewal of Agriculture. Trans. Creeger and Gardner. Kimberton, PA: Biodynamic Association, 1993.

Andrew Luisi (andrew.e.luisi@gmail.com) in an American living in Germany. He studied at the Alanus Hochschule under Prof. Dr. Wolf-Ulrich Klünker, the first professor of anthroposophy, researching “The Philosophical Justification of Anthroposophy and Its Spiritual Dimensions.” He is interested in how community building, centered on biodynamic agriculture and sustainability, may alleviate various natural and spiritual ailments, and how anthroposophy must be integrated into the modern age of pluralism.

Leading Through Change

by Torin M. Finser, PhD

The last few years have brought unprecedented challenges to schools, especially to teachers and administrators. Layered over long-standing issues of low pay, long hours, helicopter parents, shared governance (and confusion over roles and authority), schools have had to navigate a third year of COVID while enhancing Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion activities and working with new financial constraints. At the cross-roads of these pressing issues stand our valiant school administrators and pedagogical leaders. As we enter 2023, they will need to be asking of their communities some serious questions:

» How can we preserve the rich culture of Waldorf education, developed over the past 103 years, while practicing radical innovation?

» Is the governance of our schools “personality based” or does it arise from a shared understanding of the core values of Waldorf and clear agreements among board, faculty, college, administrators, and parents?

» What does a collaborative culture look like, and how can we evolve our schools so they serve as examples to all those longing for a new experience of community?

» How do we address fatigue and low morale among faculty and staff?

» How can our school leaders help us lift our gaze to the horizon and re-envision the ideals that led us to Waldorf education in the first place?

» Rather than just “managing” the many daily needs of our schools, can we cultivate “growing edge” leadership to help move us forward with new vision and enthusiasm?

» What could networking and collaboration among independent and public Waldorf schools look like going forward?

» How do we best prepare and mentor future teachers?

» How well are our school administrators and leaders being supported in relation to the tasks before us?

» How can the insights and practices embedded in anthroposophy help us release human capacities not only of our students but also in our teachers, administrators, pedagogical leaders, and parents? And how can these released capacities help initiate wider social change?

Most of all, we need to share our questions, discuss them with open-mindedness, and find the common language to help us work together more productively. Each of us has a part to play. Any adult who takes responsibility for a task is a leader. Our schools need servant leadership as never before.

Torin Finser is director of the Waldorf Leadership Program and a former General Secretary of the ASA.

The Center for Anthroposophy begins a new cycle of Waldorf Leadership Development March 11 for those new to Waldorf education and anthroposophy (option A), May 20 for those with previous background (option B). Details of this low-residency/live online program are laid out here: centerforanthroposophy.org/programs/waldorf-administration-andleadership-development-program/

Rudolf Steiner’s Calendar of the Soul

Dates from Easter 2023 to Easter 2024

April 9, 2023: #1 Easter Mood

April 16: #2

April 23: #3

April 30: #4

May 7: #5 Light from Spirit Depths

May 14: #6

May 21: #7 Luciferic Temptation

May 28: #8 Whitsun

June 4: #9

June 11: #10

June 18: #11/12

June 25: #12 St. John’s Mood

July 2: #13

July 9: #14

July 16: #15

July 23: #16

July 30: #17

Aug 6: #18

Aug 13: #19

Aug 20: #20 Overcoming Lucifer

Aug 27: #21

Sept 3: #22

Sept 10: #23

Sept 17: #24

Sept 24: #25 Michaelmas Mood

Oct 1: #26

Oct 8: #27

Oct 15: #28

Oct 22: #29

Oct 29: #30

Light from Spirit Depths: Nov 5: #31

Nov 12: #32

Nov 19: #33: Overcoming Ahriman

Nov 26: #34

Dec 3: #35: 1st Advent

Dec 10: #36

Dec 17: #37

#38 Christmas Mood: Dec 24

Dec 31: #39

Jan 7: #40/41: Epiphany 2024

Jan 14: #42

Jan 21: #43

Jan 28: #44

Feb 4: #45

Feb 11: #46: Ahrimanic Deception

Feb 14 Ash Wednesday

Feb 18: #47

Feb 25: #48

Mar 3: #49

Mar 10: #50

Mar 17: #51

Mar 24: #52

Mar 31: #1: Easter Mood

Note: Rudolf Steiner first published the 52 mantric verses we know as the “Calendar of the Soul” in 1912 and again in 1918. We begin with verse #1 on Easter Sunday and continue through the following Easter. Since the observance of Easter shifts cosmically every year, an adjustment becomes appropriate. The dates are based on the practice of meditating a new verse each week, Sunday through Saturday. This formula was also followed in the original 1912 edition. The idea is to work with the verses in harmony with the seven day astral rhythm of the soul from one Easter (April 9, 2023) to the next Easter (March 31, 2024).

We also want to keep in sync with the Easter, Whitsun, St. John’s, Michaelmas and Christmas festivals, including the observance of Advent and Lent.

Rudolf Steiner composed 52 verses, but there are only 51 weeks between the next two Easters. The proposed adjustments occur at St. John’s and Epiphany.

The “Calendar of the Soul” incorporates the annual cycles of nature, the activity of the senses, the influence of Lucifer and Ahriman, the cultivation of one’s inner life, and much more. The verses are also meant to be studied in relation to the planets and zodiac. It is especially fruitful to explore the polarities as well, starting with the dramatic shift from verse 52 to verse 1, and continuing with 2/51, 3/50, etc. The result is that we come to treasure this anthroposophical Calendar as a tool for nurturing the life of the soul on our pathway to self-knowledge.

Herbert O. Hagens , Princeton, NJ hohagens@aol.com

Iris Leal is the pen name of Heidi Reynolds, a Waldorf kindergarten teacher from Chile living in Golden, CO since 2018. Her husband Ben, a teacher at the Denver Waldorf School, does the English translations.

Toca el sol recoge sus rayos contén su brillo aclara como el alba la obscuridad del alma.

Guía los pasos hacia la cima de la voz, como las aves donan el canto al amanecer. Asciende en el universo de uno mismo posando la calma mirada en las constantes olas del sentir.

Ve, si, ve avanza firmemente en el esfuerzo uniendo eslabón tras eslabón al sincero sentido del latido descubre y atiende, como los astros la noche implacable.

Entrelaza la real circunstancia y el poder único de la acción a la esencia humilde de la bondad, al igual que la rosa de espinas hecha se abre paso por la obscura tierra irguiendo su tallo y coronando el día con suma belleza silenciosa.

Aprehende la vida en su eterna llama acogiéndola en tu regazo amparando su verdad uniéndola al destino y crea, como crea el tiempo sentido primordial, como crea el día caminos, como crea la naturaleza semilla, fruto y equilibrio.

Perfecciona el propio ser esculpiendo la roca que cada uno es liberando con el cincel de la conciencia la forma que aguarda, como labra el otro en la ardua tarea del encuentro.

Toca el sol recoge sus rayos contén su brillo aclara como el alba la obscuridad del alma recibiendo su magnánimo calor.

Iris Leal

ITouch the sun, collect its rays, hold its brightness, like the dawn, lighten up the darkness of the soul. Guide the way to the summit of voice, like the birds donate their song to the sunrise. Ascend in the universe of yourself, resting a calm gaze on the constant waves of feeling. Go, yes, go, move steadily forward within effort, uniting it, link after link, with the sincere sense of the heartbeat, discovering and attending to, like the stars, the implacable night.

Intertwine the reality of circumstance and the unique power of action, with the humble essence of goodness, just like the rose made of thorns makes its way through the dark earth, raising its stem and crowning the day with grand, silent beauty.

Apprehend life in its eternal flame, hold her in your lap, protecting the truth, uniting her with fate, and create, just as time creates primordial meaning, just as the day creates paths, just as nature creates seed, fruit, and balance.

Perfect yourself, sculpting the stone that each one of us is, freeing with the chisel of conscience the shape that awaits within, just as the other labors on the arduous task of the encounter. Touch the sun, collect its rays, hold its brightness, like the dawn, lighten up the darkness of the soul, receiving its magnanimous warmth.

Iris Leal, translation by Ben Reynolds

The New Rudolf Steiner Archive (continued from page 17)

Chris began studying computer system administration and website technologies intensively. Karin was wrapping up her career as a lawyer and set up the new non-profit corporation, Steiner Online Library, and systems for the administration of the new organization.

In late 2021 Chris had to rewrite nearly all the computer programming code, software packages, and computers—all amidst global turmoil over Covid. Chris and Karin felt a real sense that they were on a mission.

By Spring 2022, the website had become more stable and faster than it had ever been. Chris and Karin painstakingly reformatted over 3,000 documents to ensure they would display correctly in the new system. After extensive research, Chris produced a new search facility customized specifically for searching Steiner’s work, and is rebuilding the entire database of Steiner’s works. Modern websites need to be readable on all devices that access the Internet.

Last autumn, Chris and Karin created a new site steinerlibrary.org as a trial run, and they are now in process of updating the Rudolf Steiner Archive with the structure and flexibility of the demo website. This will allow phone and tablet users always to see an appropriately sized pages.

The ultimate mission of SOL is to expand the audience of Rudolf Steiner’s work, to ensure a new generation of spiritual seekers can carry the impulses introduced by Steiner into the future of human evolution.

How You Can Help: Connect. A newsletter signup form will be added to the website soon. Until then, email us at the address below, and share our website and goals with your own communities and study groups. Click the “donate” button on our website or visit our “Help Out” link at the top of the homepage: rsarchive.org or email us at admin@steinerlibrary.org

Welcoming New Members

Kathryn A Adamski, Truckee CA

Andrea Akmenkalns, Petaluma CA

Sherone Alleyne, Decatur GA

Rebecca Arnold, Lafayette CO

Megan Ashford, Santa Fe NM

Karin L Bertelsen, Woodland WA

Ramona Biondi, North Haven CT

Maria J. Botelho, Amherst MA

Patricia Brown, Los Angeles CA

Jared Nathaniel Burke, San Francisco CA

Jeffrey H Cann, Grosse Pointe Park MI

Michael Anthony Carranza, Greenacres FL

Isabel Castillo, Bethesda MD

Deborah Cautela, Camden ME

Kaye P Clinch, Longview WA

Emma Collett, Copake Falls NY

Teresa Cone, Sacramento CA

Leila Conners, East Chatham NY

Anthony Coughlan, Levittown PA

Chris R Crawford, Fort Collins CO

Charles S Cross, San Antonio TX

Gillian Cross, Chestnut Ridge NY

Paul Denham, Mount Pleasant SC

Dianna G Ducote-Sabey, Agate CO

Nima A. Duncan, College Place WA

Rod Endacott, Portland OR

Veronica J Gadbois, Westford MA

Lonny Marie García Hernández, Carolina PR

David Geonetta, Tempe AZ

Claire Gerber, Myrtle Beach SC

Marcelle E Gilkerson, Columbus OH

Katherine S Gimber, Haughton LA

Leigh Glenn, Pinellas Park FL

Benjamin Gustafstrom, Detroit MI

Emily Gustafstrom, Detroit MI

Judy Halprin, West Bloomfield MI

Emlynn Hamlin, East Aurora NY

Avalon Harris, Ladera Ranch CA

Carey R Hoeft, Eau Claire WI

Corinne Horan, Atlanta GA

Melody Irle, Warrensburg MO

Wendy Jackson, Bethesda MD

Danielle James, Santa Monica CA

Tobias H Jelinek, Pasadena CA

Gayla D Jewell, Ann Arbor MI

Aaron Kahlow, Petaluma CA

Leyla Konuralp, San Rafael CA

Julian Lauzzana, South Haven MI

Denise Claire Laverty, Paonia CO

Beth A Mahaffey, New York NY

Jason H. Martini, Candler NC

Andreas Meier, Marblehead MA

Raeana Mikel, Portland OR

Angela M. T. Mirtzke, Santa Barbara CA

Igor Nazarov, Medford OR

Kellee Danielle O’Shea, Keene NH

Heidi M Odegard, Ridgeville SC

James Olivella, Lutherville MD

Chiara Opiparo, Topanga CA

Ni Luh Putu Satyaning

Pradnya Paramita, Raleigh NC

Joseph Pavicic, Reston VA

Wendy Polich, Littleton CO

Joseph Price, San Jose CA

Chris J Reynolds, Chimacum WA

Lydia Rodriguez, Denver CO

Venessa Rodriguez, Chicago IL

Adele Santana, Santa Rosa CA

Jeff Schreiber, Campbellsport WI

Alek Shekoyan, Los Angeles CA

Eugene Slutskiy, Phoenix AZ

Callie J Smith, Lansing MI

Snowma Smith, Guerneville CA

Tracey Somers, Montague MA

Shelley Steier, Los Angeles CA

Fee Marie Steinvorth, Los Angeles CA

Yuka Taylor, Washington DC

Emily Trenholm, Rosemount MN

Vanessa Valdez Ramírez, Ghent NY

John H Walker, Abingdon VA

Stephanie Warner, Carbondale CO

Michael T Whitehead, Rex GA

Joe Williams, Erie CO

Karmin Williams, San Francisco CA

Katharine Winans, Nottingham NH

news for members & friends of the Anthroposophical

Society in America

Awakening to Community of the Future with

Angela Foster and Tess Parker

Have you ever been in a circle and wanted to share, but then thought: “Maybe I shouldn’t speak up, someone else will say something more intelligent or more relevant—so I will just hold back.” What would happen if you changed this thought pattern? Could you be part of building a more inclusive anthroposophical community for the future? We say yes!

We want to encourage everyone to feel that we all have an equal place in this web of connection. We want to build a network that reflects the living experience that every voice and contribution matters to the whole.

Yet the one has no meaning without the many who live around him. Slender indeed are the roots that bind man to physical existence, without the others around him. — “Truth Beauty and Goodness,” Rudolf Steiner, GA 220, January 19,1923, Dornach

How can we host this collective and inclusive conversation? A conversation held by each participant so presently, so authentically, that what is spoken and thought by one person does not belong to the individual alone but to the whole organism. This wholeness does not mean that everyone is the same, but that there is a coherent space in the circle for each individual.

It also does not suppose that there is one expert, or authority on any given subject. In holding this and transforming the tension of expert/non-expert, something can begin to break open. Can we start to see the value of every individual’s perspective—as shaped and forged by each unique biography?

We are the ones we’ve been waiting for. This phrase, often attributed to the Hopi Elders’ Prophecy, speaks volumes to a kind of folk revival needed for the anthroposophical movement. We may sometimes defer our will to another, thinking they know best. But there is no one else but you, no time else but now.

We all have something of value to add to the ongoing conversation. We all have something to contribute to the renewal and recommitment to a living anthroposophy.

At our recent Annual Conference in Washington, DC, we gathered under the heading of “Enkindling Connections: And the Heart Rose.” One of our most potent activities was an hour when we heard from twelve different individuals who hosted the question: “What does anthro-

posophy need for the future, and how will I contribute?”

The twelve voices sounded from twelve individual perspectives and were heard by many receptive hearts. We are grateful to the twelve souls who so bravely shared their voices and points of view. You can watch the recordings on our YouTube channel (anthroposophy.org/youtube) and we hope you will consider how you would answer the same question.

In addition to voicing our perspective, we can reflect on what others share, allow it to weave into our own being, and then reflect it back again artistically. The following is one example of this process; a poem created by Angela Foster from words heard in these twelve presentations.

Essentials from a Constellation of Twelve Voices

What does Anthroposophy need to thrive for the next 100 years? Enthusiasm

What does Anthroposophy need to thrive for the next 100 years? Truth

What does Anthroposophy need to thrive for the next 100 years? Vulnerability

We are the ones we have been waiting for. Be awake to NOW. The answer is HERE. Open to the Other.

Live in the polarities, the in-between, the middle Answer the knock on your heart… so that… We can build a science of LOVE (not power).

Can we Open the door for the Other BEFORE it is even knocked on?

Friends, with Participation and Facilitation and the help of Time, Space, and Matter: we will Rise Above the Noise.

In shaping events and programs for the Anthroposophical Society in America, it is our mission to create opportunities that inspire participation, truth, vulnerability—enkindling both connections and enthusiasm.

We are blessed by many who have done deep work and research. As we highlight the words of those who are carrying this work very deeply, thoughtfully, and lovingly, it is our hope to spark that commitment wherever anthroposophy is living. Ask yourself, what is it you wish to bring forward into the future? And, what are you waiting for?

Introducing Leah Walker

A member at large and Secretary of the ASA General Council

Leah Walker has a deep interest in human development and earth evolution, particularly as described by Rudolf Steiner. She is a biography worker, licensed professional counselor, and certified homeopath, currently in private practice.

Early on, Leah took a traditional route, acquiring a master’s degree in educational psychology from the University of Texas at Austin and, after earning her license, working for many years with those recovering from addiction and then with detained and incarcerated teens. She found the work of Rudolf Steiner as a young parent at the Austin Waldorf School and began training in biography work at age 37.

Leah feels extraordinarily fortunate to have learned from Maria de Zwaan, an art therapist who lives in Zeist, Holland. Maria’s wisdom shared so many years ago still guides Leah, nearly daily. In 2011, Leah began to teach in the program offered by the Center for Biography and Social Art, initially following in Maria’s footsteps, leading a study of the “life trees.” Leah soon became part of the Center’s faculty and enjoyed growing in that role for ten years.

Leah has traveled abroad many times to participate

in the Worldwide Biography Conference, and in 2017 was part of a team that imagined a new form and way of working, grounded in threefold principles, that continues to provide strength and continuity to the conference.

Last year, Leah was especially honored to work with the biography workers of North America in holding a conference here, the first to be convened, created, and conducted by those who attended in colleagueship, in association with one another. For Leah, this conference approached the ideal of “autonomy in association,” which is coined from a lecture by Rudolf Steiner:

When societies arise, this should come about according to the purpose of the fifth post-Atlantean period, in such a way that the human beings who are united in these societies are the main thing, with the purpose of achieving what can follow from the dealings of these actual people with one another. … The important thing must be the individual life together, what follows from these actual people. Mutual understanding is the decisive thing (Zürich, October 10, 1916).

“… the individual life together” — autonomy in association

Leah has been a First Class member since 2004. She lives in Wayne, Illinois, and has a grown daughter who is also a dear friend, which is no small thing.

Gratitude for Deb

It is with a huge amount of gratitude for dedication to the Society that we announce that our Director of Development, Deb AbrahamsDematte accepted a new position elsewhere at the end of October. Deb has been the Director of Development and a member of the Leadership Team of the Society since 2014. She has been part of a team that ably led the Society from a very challenging financial situation to the thriving and sustainable organization we are today. This is all because of her joyous enthusiasm, dedication to the mission of anthroposophy, and ability to make friends and connections within the membership. She has supported the Society and also her colleagues on the Leadership Team with her knowledge and expertise on fund and friend raising.

Deb leaves us with a well-established legacy gift-giving program, a healthy annual appeal rhythm, an extensive database with an accurate membership list that supports our fundraising and general communications, and a heightened awareness of the value of collaborating across anthroposophical organizations. She has walked more than a mile in the shoes of the APO program, and is a tireless innovator and relationship builder. While we will miss her immensely, we also wish her well in her new endeavors. — Helen-Ann Ireland, Council Chair, John Bloom, General Secretary

From Deb: I feel so very blessed and grateful for the opportunities I’ve had serving the ASA over the past 9 years.

Deb Abrahams-Dematte (left) with family in Berlin, summer 2022

The beauty and power of the mission of anthroposophy in the world was critical when Rudolf Steiner founded the GAS, and it remains so now, after nearly 100 years. As I step back from my position, I want thank you for your interest and your wonderful support.

The people who share anthroposophical awareness and intention (all of you!) are my heroes. It’s not always an easy path to find, explain, or practice. Yet the truth and potential of anthroposophy for profound inner development and meaningful social change seem more powerful and essential than ever. I am so grateful to be on this journey together with all of you. And what a journey it has been.

My early goals were to build structure, infrastructure, and culture around philanthropy and giving, in support of the mission of our organization. Along with

my talented and hardworking colleagues – past and present – we have evolved to a place of connected community, financial health, and profound potential. As the Society looks forward to the next 100 years, I know that the human relationships we share, the vision that we aspire to, and the will for the good that we all continue to practice will bear fruit in the coming years. I remain a committed member of the ASA, active Class member, and practitioner of anthroposophy in the world.

I have recently accepted a position as director of development with an independent, progressive, and pioneering school serving grades 5 – PG. You can reach me at deb.abrahamsdematte@gmail.com if you’d like to stay in touch. Thank you for your help, interest, generosity, curiosity, willingness, and friendship.

Mary Stewart Adams, GC member at large

Mary Stewart Adams joined the ASA General Council in 2022 as a member at large. She is a Star Lore Historian and independent contractor working out of the initiative to safeguard the human imagination by protecting our access to the night sky and its stories. For the last ten years, Mary has hosted the weekly public radio program “The Storyteller’s Night Sky,” and for the last 20+ years has traveled extensively raising awareness about the effects of light pollution on habitat, cultural consciousness, and energy resources.

Welcome, Katrina Hoven!

Katrina Hoven joined the ASA’s programs and communications teams last fall. Katrina is a world-traveling artist, teacher, and supporter of the anthroposophical movement at-large. She has been active in youth work for over ten years after participating in YIP in 2009/2010. After living and working in Camphills on the east coast for several years, Katrina pursued her master's in Waldorf education in Germany and went on to work as a Waldorf teacher there and in the Netherlands. Along with her work with the ASA, Katrina also supports Waldorf schools in her community whenever she has the chance, and enjoys illustration projects. With her writing partner, she just released her first children’s book.

In 2011, Mary led the team that established the ninth International Dark Sky Park in the world, which work was instrumental in the legislation passed by the state of Michigan to protect over 30,000 acres of land for its natural darkness. She is a sought-after public speaker on the stories in the stars, and has received numerous honors for her work, including Environmentalist of the Year, the Pure Michigan campaign’s Pure Award, and in 2017, she led her team to the International Dark-Sky Association’s first-ever awarded Dark Sky Park of the Year Award.

Mary combines her degree in literature from the University of Michigan with a lifetime of study and research in anthroposophy to create a human-centered approach to understanding our relationship to the stars in contemporary culture, drawing on the ancient wisdom of astrology, the findings of astronomy, and the insights of astrosophy.

For several years she published the Fairy Tale Moons calendars, and in 2021 published her first book The Star Tales of Mother Goose ~ “For those who seek the secret language of the stars,” richly illustrated by her sister and long-time collaborator, artist Patricia DeLisa [reviewed in this issue]. Throughout the summer months you can find her narrating the starry skies over the Straits of Mackinac in Northern Michigan.

Robert M. Logsdon

April 29, 1948 - January 22, 2023

by Rev. Carol Kelly (edited for space)

“The purest and most thoughtful minds are those which love color the most.” – John

Ruskin

Color is all around us, all the time, yet we easily pass by it. Sometimes extraordinary circumstances lead us to notice a fiery red pre-dawn sky or turquoise water. Usually, we walk through color all day long without taking it in.

What kind of a human being brings color alive again? Who takes “dead space” on a wall and causes it to breathe with living color? What kind of a life mission is that? Robert Logsdon was one of the pure and thoughtful kind, who took it up, took it in, then sought to enliven it, even on walls and spaces, so that others might also notice what was always there, hidden in plain sight.

Robert came to earth in Kentucky, on April 29, 1948. He had one brother, Larry, and three sisters, Jean, Bonnie, and Connie. They grew up on a farm at first but the farm proved to be unsustainable and they moved to low-income housing in the city of Louisville. Robert “survived” high school. For a soft-hearted, soft-spoken, sensitive young man, this is not easy! Once when he was walking through a rough neighborhood, having visited his high school sweetheart, Vikki, he was attacked by a gang. He took the blows, defending himself as best he could, but with a few lacerations which required stitches. He went with Vikki to the emergency room and there ran into a few of the guys who had beat him up. He ended up apologizing to them for the altercation! This was a non-violent human being.

A teacher in high school noticed his artistic ability and advised him to apply to the Cincinnati Art Academy where he earned a full scholarship. During this time a friend invited him to an anthroposophical study group. This was a bolt of lightning—where had been all his life! The draft was still in place at that time and as a CO he did a year of service work at Camphill Copake.

At the wedding of Douglas and Sharon Schmolze Robert met Heather Ross, a fellow seeker on a Christian path, both involved with anthroposophy and sharing a

love of color and the arts. They had a “recognition” of one another from a former life. The two of them studied at Emerson College in England and continued their relationship. They were married at The Christian Community in Shalesbrook by Adam Bittleston. For a honeymoon, they visited Robert’s childhood friend, Richard Neal, working in a home for handicapped children in Lautenbak, Germany.

In 1975, Robert was asked to be the artist in residence at the Rudolf Steiner Institute of the Great Lakes in Michigan. He offered painting classes there and at the Detroit Waldorf School, and formed a team of lazure painters at this time. When the “wind of anthroposophy” met the consciousness of the young people in the 60’s and 70’s, a tremendous enthusiasm sprung forth for the work of the Spirit. Around Robert and Heather at the time were Art and Heidi Zajonc, Rachel Ross, and Michael Howard. It was an exciting, inspiring time.

Gabrielle was born February 6, 1976, and Jacob on May 30, 1978. The family moved to Harlemville around 1980, a community with a biodynamic farm, anthroposophic doctor, Waldorf school, and more. Robert built up lazure, and worked with stained glass at the Lamb studio. The family moved to the land trust in South Egremont and then to Great Barrington. Robert and Heather shared a love of truth and the study of anthroposophy. They found the practical sides of life challenging.

Gradually, destiny turned them in separate directions. Heather moved to Cape Cod and Robert remained in Great Barrington. Separation was painful and challenging for all concerned. Robert was a devoted father and longed to live with his children again. During this time he lived with Wanda Lee and her daughter Sophie.

In 1988, Gabrielle and Jacob came to live with Robert and attended the GB Rudolf Steiner School. Jacob and Sophie Lee were both in Carol Kelly’s class. By that time Robert had reunited with his high school sweetheart, Vikki True, and the family lived together in Monterey.

A pioneer of lazure in the US, Robert established “ColorSpace” with Chuck Andrade and John Stolfo. He was a good team leader. While he had very high standards, he was kind and considerate of his workers.

In 1999, Robert and Vikki bought the house in Lee,

MA. Vikki was a professional jazz singer and Robert was totally supportive of her singing. He also loved music. Robert loved nature, his BD garden, the creek by his house, and the wildlife. From his hospital bed, he would ask: “Did I fill the bird feeder?” Robert was a kind, compassionate person. He frequently put others’ needs before his own. One could hear his soul quality in his beautiful speaking voice. He had impeccable integrity. His challenges arose in the practical aspects of life. He was not a good self-promoter or money-maker. But he had a passion for creating beautiful spaces with living color.

“In each project, he strove to make the invisible visible in the play of color and contrasts, to awaken the soul, to let sing in a space, unhampered.” – Heather Ross

We live in a time of extremes, of exaggerated polarities, and division. In considering Robert’s legacy, consider:

“Where light meets darkness, colors flash into existence. Colors are, therefore, the offspring of the greatest polarity our universe can offer.

In Goethe’s language, ‘Colors are the deeds and sufferings of the light.’ The deeds and suffering of light as it meets the darkness.” (Catching the Light, Arthur Zajonc)

by David Adams

Born in Shelbyville, Kentucky, Robert studied art from 1966 to 1971 at the Cincinnati Art Academy (winning first prize in the 1970 All Ohio Painting and Sculpture Exhibition) and from 1972-73 and 1974-75 at Emerson College, UK, painting with Anne Stockton. In 1973 he learned lazure wall painting with Fritz Fuchs in Ekkharthof, Switzerland. He taught at the Cincinnati Art Academy, the Detroit Waldorf School, numerous conferences, and while artist-in-residence at the Rudolf Steiner Institute of the Great Lakes, Ann Arbor, MI, 1975 to 1979.

Starting in 1973 for almost fifty years until his death

he practiced lazure wall painting commercially and as a team leader and teacher for his own business, Color Space Painting, started in 1977, including numerous commissions, also for murals, all over the United States.

Most lazure painters in North America learned their techniques from Robert. When I first met this kind and humble human being at a conference in Colorado in 1974, where he assisted Anne Stockton with a watercolor painting workshop, he was also leading daily practice in Bothmer Gymnastics, another art he learned at Emerson College. In 1981 for the first national conference of the Anthroposophical Society in America in Spring Valley, Robert along with Michael Howard created a large, transparent color artwork (below) out of colored tissue papers in the upper window behind the stage in the gymnasium of the Green Meadow Waldorf School. He was active in the Visual Arts Section in North America from its beginning in 1994 and in early Youth Section conferences and events in North America, including the first national youth conference in Spring Valley in 1970.1

1Robert’s art is at www.logsdonlazure.com and was featured in being human online at issuu.com/anthrousa/docs/bh16-final-web-pages/s/11169807

Robert Logsdon, Four Landscapes

Logdson & Howard, window treatment for first national ASA conference, 1981

Ronald Breland West Nyack NY joined 04/09/1974 died 09/08/2022

Susan W. Cudnohufsky Ashfield MA joined 09/29/1986 died 03/02/2022

Michael Katz Temple NH joined 06/15/1978 died 01/01/2023

Jerry Leach Spencertown NY joined 12/01/1978 died 11/05/2022

Adam LeGrant Brooklyn NY joined 06/14/1999 died 07/01/2021

Hanna Maria Kress

Saluting Members Who Have Died

Robert Logsdon Lee MA joined 08/10/1976 died 01/25/2023

Alan V Lombardi Mill River MA joined 04/13/2001 died 08/12/2022

Karl T. Mahle Louisville CO joined 05/08/1980 died 06/30/2022

JoAnne M. McAllister Placentia CA joined 10/30/1985 died 01/01/2023

Tybel Miller Chestnut Ridge NY joined 12/23/1993 died 04/07/2022

November 30, 1935 – March 27, 2021

Margaretha Christine Kress Hertle

adapted from Rev Carol Kelly’s eulogy

Gabriela S Muresan Decatur GA joined 07/24/2020 died 03/17/2022

Peter Obuchowski Mount Pleasant MI joined 12/30/1995 died 10/25/2022

Dorothy Ogle Houston TX joined 03/04/1974 died 08/08/2020

Marsha Kaye Post Philmont NY joined 10/15/1983 died 07/07/2022

David Randolph San Rafael CA joined 12/10/1976 died 10/25/2022

Daniel E. Reynolds Palm Springs CA joined 10/10/1989 died 02/12/2022

Paul van Schilfgaarde Granada Hills CA joined 11/15/1986 died 07/02/2022

Marian Ileen Shearer Forsyth GA joined 05/04/2007 died 08/13/2022

David J. Steege Bellingham WA joined 12/22/1998 died 01/05/2023

Larry E. Temple Petaluma CA joined 10/26/1976 died 08/10/2022

Henriette van Hees Edmonton AB joined 11/26/2021 died 11/16/2022

Benjamin Williams Monahans TX joined 01/19/2017 died 03/31/2022

Helen Zipperlen Kimberton PA joined 02/16/1967 died 07/02/2022

Hanna was born in Heidenheim, Germany, to Maria Margarete (Waibel) and Alfred Georg Köppel. On Hanna’s mantelpiece stood a tall candlestick of wrought iron roses made by her grandfather, Georg Köppel. Both of her grandfathers were master iron-smiths, and she carried that strength (and talent) deep in her core throughout her life. Hanna hardly knew her father who went to war just before her brother Rudolf was born in 1940. She saw him twice when he came home on furlough. In 1944, near the end of the war, her mother received word that her husband was missing-in-action in Russia, the only time Hanna saw her mother cry (quietly, in the kitchen). Later, her mother confided to her granddaughter that she would find a rose to meditate on whenever life seemed too hard, and that would bring peace.

Hanna, brother Rudolf, and an uncle, Hans, a year older than she, were raised in her grandfather Johannes’ house, obtained after their original home containing the anthroposophical library was ransacked by the Gestapo and the books burned. They made their new home next to a forest on a hill that the shepherd went up and down with his flock of sheep. The children collected droppings, which the family burnt to stay warm. Johannes was an avid gardener using biodynamic preparations, and the backyard was an amazing vegetable garden. Hanna’s

mother, who dreamed of being a eurythmist, resigned herself to raising a family on her own, working part-time at Voith Industries, and making do in a difficult world. She took over the garden, helping feed them all for years. Hanna remembered stirring preparations for hours when she was little. She cultivated her own garden to the end of her life and was deeply gratified when youngest daughter Christa and son-in-law took up gardening as their life task.

Hanna attended Waldorf school in Heidenheim beginning in fifth grade; Fentress Gardner, then in Stuttgart, facilitated early opening of Waldorf schools after the war. A strong, vibrant choleric, Hanna graduated from high school longing for adventure! She went to London in 1953 and camped out on the street for a whole day to see Queen Elizabeth II drive by after her coronation. She went to French-speaking Switzerland with friends, but her mother did not approve and brought her back.

An aunt was established in New Jersey. Hanna lived with Tante Lotte and Onkel Emil and traveled regularly into New York City for work in the garment industry, to take a course in shorthand, and to attend branch meetings. At 18, her aunt took her to a conference in Spring Valley where Hanna met Renate Piening (later Pank);

they became like sisters, a friendship for the rest of her life. Through the Pienings Hanna met her future husband, Robert Kress.

One evening, after attending a lecture, Hanna realized that she should become a eurythmist. She went to Dornach after promising her good friend and eurythmy teacher Kari van Oordt that she would return. She graduated with diplomas in eurythmy and eurythmy therapy. She did not end up practicing eurythmy therapy, but as more and more children needed extra care, she was able to incorporate some of it into her teaching methods. She was able also to support her eldest daughter Margaretha’s interest in anthroposophical therapies and medicine.

Hanna returned to a teaching position at the Rudolf Steiner School, but she soon began an eight-year hiatus. Hanna married Robert Kress in January 1963. Margaretha was born later that year, and Erich and Christa followed. A loving husband and father, Bob had done Waldorf teacher training at Michael Hall in England, but settled into computer programming and data processing. They raised their children in Englewood, NJ, commuting over the George Washington Bridge for school and to the Christian Community on Sundays, and driving north to Spring Valley frequently for eurythmy and other events.

Hanna was a full-time mother of three, full-time teacher, and part-time performing eurythmist. She baked her own bread, grew her own vegetables, sewed her own and her children’s clothes, created festivals at home and at school, played Crispin in the Oberufer Nativity Play (Robert was Joseph or a shepherd), drove to Spring Valley to practice and perform with a eurythmy group, and even became politically active locally. She never complained that she had too great a load to carry, and never shared with her children the inner workings of faculty meetings, or the politics or frustrations of any of her endeavors.

In the mid-70s, the family began to consider moving upstate to the country. Rudolf Copple (originally Köppel), a close friend and NYC colleague, moved to teach in the Hawthorne Valley School. He provided a summer residence for Hanna and her family in his apartment on Windy Hill (then belonging to Fentress Gardner) for several years while he spent summers with a friend in France. Anthroposophical initiatives were growing fast. Many other friends were moving to the area, in vibrant new communities around Harlemville and Great Barrington.

Then followed many wonderful years – designing and building a house, planting gardens, teaching eurythmy at the Hawthorne Valley, Hartsbrook, and Great Barrington Rudolf Steiner schools, raising the children. Hanna was a good teacher of little children because she was strict but lively and fun. More importantly, she could reach the teenagers. She was active, energetic, practical,

“down to earth,” and knew how to keep everyone in line. Her students loved her and loved doing eurythmy with her. Parents enjoyed her engaging presentations.

Hanna taught for 36 years before “retiring” at the age of 71 (+10 thereafter). Dorothy Haller wrote music for many of Hanna’s school production including a particularly beautiful production of Odysseus. After retiring in 2006, Hanna began to teach a group of homeschool children (including many of her own grandchildren) because, she said, “They needed it!” And Dorothy was still there as an accompanist. During this time she also carried her husband Robert through years of dementia, with strength and equanimity. He crossed the threshold in 2014.

Hanna was always engaged, socially active and supportive, keeping the circles turning smoothly with all the social graces she learned from Tante Lotte and family matriarchs along the way. She had many wonderful friends and colleagues over the years, and some of the closest are still in our midst including Renate (Piening) Pank, Almuth (Piening) Kretz, Gertrude Madey, Patrice Maynard, and Dorothy Haller.

Hanna Maria Kress was a person on a mission. Her life unfolded as if she had been given instructions. There were no years of wandering, confusion, depression, or anxiety. When things didn’t go as she had planned, she took what life presented with the best she had to offer. Decisions did not take her long, she did not complain or falter. She took up in freedom the work placed before her. Once she saw what was needed, she jumped in energetically. When it was clear her lungs and the rest of this earthly body would not serve her any longer, she was ready to move on. Refusing to be isolated in the hospital, she brought her three children, fourteen grandchildren, and many friends together to care for her during that final month.

Her awareness of the spiritual world and her connection to those who have died increased as she grew older. She was an active member of the School of Spiritual Science since 1975 and a class holder herself for many years. She was in a small group of dedicated teachers that taught religious instruction and held the school version of the children’s Sunday Service for years at Hawthorne Valley School. She was aware of and in communication with elemental beings around her; she lived with one part of her being in the spiritual world while remaining solidly grounded in her earthly life. She was aware of the counter forces, which she met with her own powers of meditative strength and light—a true Michaelic spirit!

Hanna, we are humbled by your life and grateful for the gifts you gave, the seeds that you planted in young souls, for your inspiration, your example, steadfastness, artistic talent, humor, and kindness, and for what you continue to support from the other side of the threshold.

Allyn Marilyn “Alwyn” Moss

November 3, 1926 – April 21, 2022

On the day before Earth Day, 2022, at the age of 95, Alwyn Moss left this life and the Earth she loved so deeply. She leaves behind several cousins and a multitude of friends who cherished and loved her including members of the Quaker community of the Blacksburg, Virginia, Friends Meeting, and neighbors at Warm Hearth Village.

Alwyn had a long, rich, and interesting life—as a writer, artist, teacher, and activist. She was born and grew up in New York City. She graduated from Antioch College having majored in English and Theater, then studied anthropology at UCLA. Back in New York, she worked as a staff writer for Mademoiselle and freelanced for other magazines as well. She was married briefly.

When she was around 30 she went to live in Italy— to write and to study art. She published her first book at age 36— Shaping a New World, a Biography of Margaret Mead . She also lived in England for a time, where she worked at the London Zoo next to the wolf enclosure. She also trained in the Waldorf method of education, which stresses art and nature in educating young children. After having been away for 11 years, she returned to the US, and embarked on a new journey. She was now a Quaker, an artist, and a kindergarten teacher. She became a founding teacher of the Blue Mountain School in Floyd, VA, and one of the first people to bring Waldorf education to the area. She also became a tireless crusader for environmental and animal rights.

After she moved to Blacksburg in 1987, she quickly became involved in local environmental and peace issues. And she began writing her famous commentaries for The Roanoke Times and other papers. One of her most important accomplishments was forming the Friends of the Brown Farm group, which resulted in the preservation of a large acreage of farm land which became Heritage Park. Over the years she took on many issues, such as the protection of old stately trees, beavers, song birds, and public transportation; and the opposition to hunting, cruelty to animals, war, and waste. One of her great loves was cats—especially feral cats, whom she fiercely protected, defended, fed, and wrote about.

Alwyn used her writing skills to champion the earth and its non-human inhabitants throughout a good part of her adult life. She was particularly prolific in her 80s, despite struggling with health issues. Her booklet To Love the Earth: A New Way of Being Human on This Planet

From Never Love a Feral Cat: A Tale of Compassion and Coexistence, by Alwyn Moss

As in a growing number of locales around human development, the rural retirement settlement I moved into hosted a large colony of feral cats. Many residents found this situation distasteful, but I saw it as a challenge and believed there was plenty of room and good reasons for us all to live together in peace. What was needed was a modus vivendi—a manner of coexisting with these mostly beautiful animals and whatever aspects of wildness they carried with them. How this vision came to pass over many years of commitment and hard work by myself and others is the substance of the chapters ahead. Discovering and learning how to create a multi-species community became an opportunity for change. ...

Though we are at the top of the heap as a species in terms of innovation and adaptation, our limited perspectives may endanger us more than we realize. Nature, in all its aspects, including the animal kingdom, is seen today as primarily for human use or profit. Superior species though we appear to be, our connectedness to those other lives is in great need of healing, lest we find ourselves on a planet bare of their diversity, magnificence, and a form of companionship that has nourished the human spirit and creativity since our beginnings. We have a choice. By developing our latent capacities for compassion and wisdom, coexistence with other forms of creation can become an enriching reality. Such a transformation for us all is the hope and motivation of this book.

came out when she was 82, followed by Remembering their Names, a collection of nature poems. She contributed to

several newsletters. Even as she became less able to manage the technology involved with writing, she continued publishing commentaries until she was 90. Many of these have been gathered into a binder as part of her legacy.

At 90, Alwyn published her notable book Never Love a Feral Cat: A Tale of Compassion & Coexistence —a subject particularly dear to her heart.

Alwyn was a true original. Everyone who came in contact with her immediately recognized this. It showed in her way of dressing. Her way of speaking. Even in her handwriting and the way she communicated with friends. She would send interesting notes and cards, often embellished with little watercolor paintings—the messages always grateful, original, and beautiful.

Alwyn did things on her own terms. She even died according to her principles, at home, in her own bed. She was buried, un-embalmed, in a cardboard box, so she could be close to the earth. Alwyn was a wonderful example of authentic living. Of having purpose. Of aging with dignity. And of contributing what you can up to the very end. Now Alwyn is returned to the Earth she loved so well. We will miss her. Donations may be made in Alwyn’s honor at maraelephantproject.org; the Mara Elephant Project was Alwyn’s most recent cause.

Peter Anthony Obuchowski Jr.

February 5, 1935–October 25, 2022

Pete was born in Saginaw, Michigan, to Peter, Sr., and Cora Pearl (Smith) Obuchowski. He was educated at Holy Family High School in Saginaw and served in the US Army as a draftsman from 1953 to 1956. He attended Bay City Junior College, Central Michigan University, and the University of Michigan. He taught at Port Huron Community College, the University of Michigan, and Central Michigan University, from which he retired in 2000. He is survived by his wife, Mary Cynthia (DeJong) Obuchowski, sons Timothy Russell Obuchowski and John Peter Obuchowski, cherished grandchildren, and many in-laws. — Pete’s field of study was American literature, especially the American Renaissance. His book Emerson and Science: Goethe, Monism, and the Search for Unity was published in 2005 by Lindisfarne Books and is available on Amazon.

TWO EASTER POEMS

Last Snow

You want it to be over until it dawns it’s the last one, last chance to wake up in the drift before Spring pokes through. You have slept too much or not enough, have bumbled all winter in a glass house of your private devotions? chalk dust on a blank slate? where you wait for first tracks: the hoof-dashed path, paw prints wreathing the car’s hood, and high in the bare branches leaning over your roof, wing-shiver, falling. Are you ready now having rested all winter, to shoot through the dark crust into new air? Will you stand straight as crocus, as hyacinth, maples with their sap rising, for is it not, finally, always about the rising, what we give up and what we give into, and how the sun always illuminates more than sky.

Hibernal

An age old tale of quiet feathery snow, its sylvan melt and drip into the flow from glittery skies of slick ice-gloved limbs that teach every lily and each leafy hymn what winter’s breath fogs with its hovering frost so that the harvest’s seeds seem all but lost, is buried deep inside the moonless iron earth like slumbering bears before the spring’s March birth: that rising light, ascending from the thawing grave, until released, the ancient boulder rolled away, and now the greening and now the newborn lamb, the catkin, willow branch and sacred man unfurled from stored up light so deep within, a spark of sun inside a crystal flake, aortic flint, must be a miracle belonging to a saint or some divine hand with a brush to paint the thirty hues between that white and green which transform life to death to life again.

Christina Daub

Christina Daub co-founded The Plum Review, a national-awardwinning poetry journal, started The Plum Writers Retreats and The Plum Reading Series which featured Joseph Brodsky, Carolyn Forché, Mark Strand and many others. She teaches creative writing and poetry and is widely published—see www.christinadaub.com

THE COLLECTED WORKS OF RUDOLF STEINER

New Books

The Anthroposophic Movement

An Encouragement for Self-Examination (CW 258)

isbn 9781855846036, 202 pp, pb, $28

Christ and the Spiritual World

The Quest for the Holy Grail (CW 149)

isbn 9781855846050, 176 pp, pb, $27

The Driving Force of Spiritual Powers in World Evolution (CW 222)

isbn 9781621483168, 168 pp, pb, $20

The Fall of the Spirits of Darkness

The Spiritual Background to the Outer World (CW 177)

isbn 9781855846067, 324 pp, pb, $30

The Gospel of John (CW 103)

isbn 9781621482703, 252 pp, pb, $30

The Karma of Materialism

Aspects of Human Evolution (CW 176)

isbn 9781621483120, 384 pp, pb, $38

The Mission of Folk Souls (CW 121)

isbn 9781621482680, 264 pp, pb, $28

The Occult Truths of Myths and Legends

Greek and Germanic Mythology: Richard Wagner in the Light of Spiritual Science (CW 92)

isbn 9781855846043, 214 pp, pb, $28

Universe, Earth, Human Being

Their Relationship to Egyptian Myths and Modern Civilization (CW 105)

order p hone : 703-661-1594

www.steiner books.org

isbn 9781855846029, 212 pp, pb, $28

Epiphany Invocation

A Social Poem compiled by Jordan Walker with words from Orland Bishop and responses from Holy Nights Participants.

Infinite space set before us, we welcome:

Light

Love Life

Be in our effort. Imbue us unto the world.

Strengthen our will that we may overcome the temptation to withhold our love. Help us meet the task of trust. Help us witness what is, has been, and is to come. May this great work unite us. May the sacrament of opening our imaginations to higher worlds enter us as love for each other. May it enter us and become real.

Amen!

Joy through connection.

Creativity’s dew.

Trust in the sacred variety of warmth.

The three perfect gifts. The challenge of human becoming.

Mystery heals. Only listen!

Heart to heart

step by step trust the struggle. Encounter Anthroposophia.

Look at each other. This global community, a softness to give fearlessly.

Dissolution. Reconstitution.

Substance flowing through substance

Ko au te awa Ko te awe ko au (I am the river the river is me)

Sacralize this sounding. Resolve these new forms. Work with Grace and Faith. Read the Philosophy of Freedom. Trust Transformation.

A memory of selflessness. Selflessness in service to remembering. Breathing. Becoming.

Gifts maturing in the hearts of others: Light Love Life

Speaking to the Future

Anthroposophical Society in America Centenary

The Christmas Conference Closing on January 1, 1924

Rudolf Steiner

And so, my dear friends, bear out with you into the world your warm hearts in whose soil you have laid the Foundation Stone for the Anthroposophical Society, bear out with you your warm hearts in order to do work in the world that is strong in healing. Help will come to you because your heads will be enlightened by what you all now want to be able to direct in conscious willing. Let us today make this resolve with all our strength. And we shall see that if we show ourselves to be worthy, then a good star will shine over that which is willed from here. My dear friends, follow this good star. We shall see whither the gods shall lead us through the light of this star.