Sage Amelia

Living Anthroposophy

Have No Fear

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Michael in Scorpio by David Newbatt

Michael in Scorpio by David Newbatt

 

We must eradicate from the soul

All fear and terror

Of what comes to meet the human being

From out of the future.

We must acquire serenity In all feelings and sensations about the future.

And, we must think only:

That whatever may come Is given to us by a world direction full of wisdom.

It is part of what we must learn in this age;

Namely, to love out of pure trust,

Without any security in outward existence.

Trust in the ever-present help of the supersensible worlds,

Truly, nothing else will do if our courage is not to fail us.

Let us discipline our will

And let us seek the awakening

From within ourselves

Every morning and every evening.

~Rudolf Steiner

On Disasters

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minu-tenerifecrash7-l

It is easy to feel powerless in the face of much of what happens in life, such as all the recent human and natural disasters.

Are we really powerless against what confronts us in life? Steiner asks this question in Lecture 3 of Man as a Being of Sense and Perception. He says life is a battle against natural necessity. Man is free in the life of ideas (which we have access to through the death forces working in us). He states that human becoming counteracts natural causality. What we make with our freedom, what we create with our ideas, expresses our power in the world. It is because of natural causality that we are free. With our freedom, we have the power to create a moral world.

Here’s a snippet from the end of the lecture:

But whence comes the impotence which results in such a tragic attitude to life! It comes from the fact that civilised humanity has for centuries allowed itself to become entangled in certain abstractions, in intellectualism. The most this intellectualism can say is that natural necessity deludes us by strange methods with a feeling of freedom, but that there is no freedom. It exists only in our ideas. We are powerless in the face of necessity. Then comes the important question ? is that truest? And now you see that the lectures I have been giving for weeks actually all lead up to the question: “Are we really powerless? Are we really so impotent in the face of this contradiction?” Remember how I said that we have in our lives not only an ascending development, but a declining one; that our intellectual life is not bound up with the forces of growth, but with the forces of death, the forces of decay; that in order to develop intelligence we need to die. You will remember how I showed here several weeks ago the significance of the fact that certain elements with specific affinities and valencies ? carbon, oxygen, hydrogen, nitrogen, sulphur ? combine to form protein. They do so not by ordinary chemical combination, but on the, contrary by becoming utterly chaotic. You will then see that all these studies are leading up to this ? to make it clear to you that what I have told you is not just a theoretical contradiction, but an actual process in human nature. We are not here merely in order, through living, to sense this contradiction, but our inner life is a continual process of destruction of what develops as causality in outer nature. We men really dissolve natural causality within ourselves. What outside is physical process, chemical process, is developed within us in a reverse direction, towards the other side. Of course we shall see this clearly only if we take into consideration the upper and the lower man, if we grasp by means of the upper man what emerges from metabolism by way of contra-mechanisation, contra-physicalisation, contra-chemicalisation. If we try to grasp the contra-materialisation in the human being, then we do not have merely a logical, theoretical contradiction in ourselves, but we have the real process ? we have the process of human development, of human becoming, as the thing in us that itself counteracts natural causality, and human life as consisting in a battle against it. And the expression of this struggle, which goes on all the while to dissolve the physical synthesis, the chemical synthesis, to analyse it again? The expression of this analytic life in us is summed up in the awareness: “I am free.” What I have just put before you in a few words ? the study of the human process of becoming as a process of combat against natural causality, as a reversal of natural causality ? we shall make the subject of forthcoming lectures.

–Rudolf Steiner, Man as a Being of Sense and Perception

Destructive Forces in the I

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forging steel

Excerpts from: Evil and the Power of Thought At the Center of Man’s Being: I

A Lecture By Rudolf Steiner, Dornach, September 23, 1921, GA 207

http://wn.rsarchive.org/Lectures/EviPow_index.html.

In the West, men have a blood, a lymph, that is saturated by an egohood tempered in the inner evil. In the East men have a blood, a lymph, in which lives an echo of the longing for Nirvana.

Let us picture to center of ourselves the center of destruction in man’s inner being. It extends over the whole human organism. If it were to spread out over the whole world, what would then live in the world through man? Evil. Evil is nothing else but the chaos thrust outside, the chaos which is necessary in man’s inner being. And in this necessary chaos, this necessary center of evil in man, the human ego must be forged. This human egohood cannot live beyond the sphere of the human senses in the outer world. That is why the ego-consciousness disappears in sleep, and when it figures in dreams it is often as though estranged or weakened.

This center which is isolated in man, and should work only within him, at the one single spot within, where matter is thrown back into chaos, now breaks out and penetrates into human instincts.

It is a fury of destruction thrust out of the inner being of man into the outer world; and in the future man will be able to find his bearings in regard to what thus penetrates into his instincts only when a true knowledge of the human being once again prevails, when we become aware once more of this human center of destruction within ? a center, however, which must be there for the sake of the development of human thought. For this strength of thought that man needs in order that he may have a world-conception in keeping with our time ? this strength of thought, which must be there in front of the memory-mirror, brings about the continuation of thought into the etheric body. And the etheric body thus permeated by thought works destructively upon the physical body. This center of destruction within modern Western man is a fact, and knowledge merely draws attention to it. If the center of destruction is there without any awareness of it, this is much worse than if man takes full cognizance of it, and from this conscious standpoint enters into the development of modern civilization.

For this reason, whoever has had to learn of the presence of this center of destruction in the inner being of man must take an interest in the development of the spirit. With all intensity he must be able to say to himself: Spirit must exist, and for the sake of the maintenance of the spirit matter may be extinguished.

Enclosed within him he has a fiery center of destruction, and in truth the forces of decline can be transformed into forces of ascent only if he becomes conscious of this fact.

Because if one sought to pierce beyond the sense-perceptions with one’s ordinary human ego, one might be harmed. The ego, as experienced in ordinary life, must be given up, if one wants to penetrate beyond the sense-perceptions. How does this ego originate? It is brought into existence by man’s capacity to plunge into the chaos of destruction. This ego must be tempered and hardened in that realm which lies within man as a center of destruction. And with this ego one cannot live on the far side of the outer sense-world.

—  Rudolf Steiner

We must learn to know this center of destruction within us. We must not allow it to extrude itself into outer civilization, causing evil and chaos.

We must learn to understand, even to love, this force of destruction within us. For without it, we would not be developing our “I,” and thus would never attain consciousness in spiritual worlds. There is a paradox Steiner presents. The ego must be forged out of these forces of destruction, yet this ego cannot enter spiritual realms. It must be completely sacrificed. Only the ego permeated with love is able to live in spiritual realities. Yet only that which has been carefully built up is worthy of sacrifice. Thus, we must with great effort build up a strong vessel out of the forces of destruction, then completely empty out this vessel, and offer up the vessel in love to the spiritual world. This is true spiritual alchemy.

Steiner also refers to a great mystery: “Spirit must exist, and for the sake of the maintenance of the spirit matter may be extinguished.” I believe this can also be taken on a very literal level. Matter exists as a realm for beings to evolve and develop; it exists as an arena for humans to develop their “I.” There is a very palpable sense of resistance in the very nature of the material world. Yet materialism must be overcome if we are to ascend to spiritual worlds. Matter may be extinguished for the preservation of spirit, quite literally. I believe that the human being contains within his developing ego the power of nuclear fission, the power to obliterate matter (and along with this, the power of creation). This power will become readily available within individual human beings only in the very far distant future, yet the forces of destruction already have the upper hand in earthly evolution, and will continue to increase. In order to ensure that these forces can lead humanity to ascent, we must fully develop the forces of love. We must consciously dedicate as much energy to building up moral forces as we do to building up consciousness itself; each act of cognition must become an act of love.

A time will come in the far distant future when the earth as we know it will require dissolution. We will participate in the destruction of our universe as we know it. Yet this destruction is necessary for a new form of existence which will allow future evolution and progress. Powers of destruction are just as important as powers of growth and life. Without the obliteration of the past in every moment, the future could not come into being in the present.

We must learn to love evil, for it creates the ground upon which we launch consciously into other realms. Only through transforming evil do we attain the power of creating good.

Call upon Beings in our Meetings

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angels3b

Call upon Beings in our Meetings

Rudolf Steiner spoke the following words at the end of a speech consecrating the working of a new Anthroposophical group.

May we, in our group meetings, consciously call upon those beings who inspire us and live in the work of the group, including

The Spirit of our Group,

Anthroposophia,

Michael, and

Christ!

 

I call down upon the labors of this group, the power and the grace and the love of those masters of wisdom who guide and direct the work we perform in brotherhood within such groups. I call down the grace and the power and the love of the masters of wisdom who are directly connected with the forces of the higher hierarchies. May there be with this group the spirit of good that is in you, great masters of wisdom, and may there also prevail and work in this group the true spirit of the Movement!”

….

At the opening of one of our groups, this is the dedicatory thought we will receive into ourselves. Hereby we consecrate a group at its founding. Community and quickening life! We seek for community above us, the living Christ in us, the Christ Who needs no document nor has first to be authenticated because we experience Him within ourselves. At the foundation of a group we will take this as our motto of consecration: Community above us; Christ in us. We know furthermore that if two, or three, or seven, or many are united in this sense in the Name of Christ, the Christ lives in them in very truth. All those who in this sense acknowledge Christ as their Brother, are themselves sisters and brothers. The Christ will recognize as His brother that man who recognizes other men as brothers.

If we are able to receive such words of consecration and carry on our work in accordance with them, the true spirit of our Movement will hold sway in whatever we do.

Rudolf Steiner

Original lecture here.

Are We Welcoming the Vulcan Beings?

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fiery seraphim being

 

A Picture of Earth-Evolution in the Future

Rudolf Steiner

A Lecture given at Dornach on May 13, 1921

This quickening to life of the shadow-pictures of the intellect is not only a human but a cosmic event. You will remember the passage in the book Occult Science dealing with the time when the human souls ascended to the planets and afterwards descended once more to earth-existence. I spoke of how the Mars-men, the Jupiter-men and the others descended again to earth. Now an event of great significance came to pass at the end of the seventies of last century. It is an event that can be described only in the light of facts which are revealed to us in the spiritual world. Whereas in the days of old Atlantis human beings came down to the earth from Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, and so on — that is to say, beings of soul were drawn into the realm of earth-existence — since the end of the seventies of last century, other Beings — not of the human order — have been descending to the earth for the purposes of their further development. From cosmic realms beyond the earth they come down to the earth and enter into a definite relationship with human beings. Since the eighties of the nineteenth century, super-earthly Beings have been seeking to enter the sphere of earth-existence. Just as the Vulcan-men were the last to come down to the earth so now Vulcan Beings are actually coming into the realm of earthly existence. Super-earthly Beings are already here, and the fact that we are able to have a connected body of Spiritual Science at all today is due to the circumstance that Beings from beyond the earth are bringing the messages from the spiritual world down into earth-existence. But, speaking generally, what is the attitude adopted by the human race? The human race is behaving, if I may put it so very shabbily to these Beings who are appearing from the cosmos and coming down — slowly and by degrees, it is true — to the earth. The human race does not concern itself with them; it ignores their existence. And it is this which will plunge the earth into tragic conditions, for in the course of the next centuries more and more Spiritual Beings will be among us — Beings whose language we ought to understand. And this is possible only if we try to grasp what comes from them: namely, the substance and content of Spiritual Science. They want to give it to us and they want us to act in the sense of Spiritual Science. Their desire is that Spiritual Science shall be translated into social behavior and action on the earth. I repeat, then, that since the last third of the nineteenth century Spiritual Beings from the cosmos have been coming into our own sphere of existence. Their home is the sphere lying between the moon and Mercury, but they are already pressing forward into the realm of earth-existence and seeking to gain a foothold there. And they will be able to find it if human beings are imbued with the thought of their existence. This can also be expressed as I expressed it just now, by saying that our shadowy intellect must be quickened to life by the pictures of Spiritual Science. We are speaking of concrete fact when we say: Spiritual Beings are seeking to come down into earth-existence and ought to be willingly received. Catastrophe after catastrophe must ensue, and earthly life will fall at length into social chaos, if opposition is maintained in human existence to the advent of these Beings. They desire nothing else than to be the advance-guards of what will happen to earth-existence when the moon is once again united with the earth. Today people may consider it comparatively harmless to elaborate only those automatic, lifeless thoughts which arise in connection with the mineral world and the mineral nature of plant, animal and man. Materialists revel in such.

This quickening to life of the shadow-pictures of the intellect is not only a human but a cosmic event. You will remember the passage in the book Occult Science dealing with the time when the human souls ascended to the planets and afterwards descended once more to earth-existence. I spoke of how the Mars-men, the Jupiter-men and the others descended again to earth. Now an event of great significance came to pass at the end of the seventies of last century. It is an event that can be described only in the light of facts which are revealed to us in the spiritual world. Whereas in the days of old Atlantis human beings came down to the earth from Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, and so on — that is to say, beings of soul were drawn into the realm of earth-existence — since the end of the seventies of last century, other Beings — not of the human order — have been descending to the earth for the purposes of their further development. From cosmic realms beyond the earth they come down to the earth and enter into a definite relationship with human beings. Since the eighties of the nineteenth century, super-earthly Beings have been seeking to enter the sphere of earth-existence. Just as the Vulcan-men were the last to come down to the earth so now Vulcan Beings are actually coming into the realm of earthly existence. Super-earthly Beings are already here, and the fact that we are able to have a connected body of Spiritual Science at all today is due to the circumstance that Beings from beyond the earth are bringing the messages from the spiritual world down into earth-existence. But, speaking generally, what is the attitude adopted by the human race? The human race is behaving, if I may put it so very shabbily to these Beings who are appearing from the cosmos and coming down — slowly and by degrees, it is true — to the earth. The human race does not concern itself with them; it ignores their existence. And it is this which will plunge the earth into tragic conditions, for in the course of the next centuries more and more Spiritual Beings will be among us — Beings whose language we ought to understand. And this is possible only if we try to grasp what comes from them: namely, the substance and content of Spiritual Science. They want to give it to us and they want us to act in the sense of Spiritual Science. Their desire is that Spiritual Science shall be translated into social behavior and action on the earth. I repeat, then, that since the last third of the nineteenth century Spiritual Beings from the cosmos have been coming into our own sphere of existence. Their home is the sphere lying between the moon and Mercury, but they are already pressing forward into the realm of earth-existence and seeking to gain a foothold there. And they will be able to find it if human beings are imbued with the thought of their existence. This can also be expressed as I expressed it just now, by saying that our shadowy intellect must be quickened to life by the pictures of Spiritual Science. We are speaking of concrete fact when we say: Spiritual Beings are seeking to come down into earth-existence and ought to be willingly received. Catastrophe after catastrophe must ensue, and earthly life will fall at length into social chaos, if opposition is maintained in human existence to the advent of these Beings. They desire nothing else than to be the advance-guards of what will happen to earth-existence when the moon is once again united with the earth. Today people may consider it comparatively harmless to elaborate only those automatic, lifeless thoughts which arise in connection with the mineral world and the mineral nature of plant, animal and man. Materialists revel in such thoughts which are — well — thoughts and nothing more. But try to imagine what will happen if men go on unfolding no other kinds of thoughts until the time is reached in the eighth millennium for the moon-existence to unite again with the earth. These Beings of whom I have spoken will gradually come down to the earth. Vulcan Beings, ‘Supermen’ of Vulcan, ‘Supermen’ of Venus, of Mercury, of the Sun, will unite with this earth-existence. But if human beings persist in nothing but opposition to them, earth-existence will pass over into chaos in the course of the next few thousand years. It will be quite possible for the men of earth, if they so wish, to develop a more and more automatic form of intellect — but that can also happen amid conditions of barbarism. Full and complete manhood, however, cannot come to expression in such a form of intellect, and men will have no relationship to the Beings who would fain come towards them in earth-existence. And all those Beings of whom men have such an erroneous conception because the shadowy intellect can only grasp the mineral nature, the crudely material nature in the minerals, plants and animals, nay even in the human kingdom itself — all these thoughts which have no reality will in a trice become substantial realities when the moon unites again with the earth. And from the earth there will spring forth a terrible brood of beings, a brood of automata of an order of existence lying between the mineral and the plant kingdoms, and possessed of an overwhelming power of intellect. This swarm will seize upon the earth, will spread over the earth like a network of ghastly, spider-like creatures, of an order lower than that of plant-existence, but possessed of overpowering wisdom. These spidery creatures will be all interlocked with one another, and in their outward movements they will imitate the thoughts that men have spun out of the shadowy intellect that has not allowed itself to be quickened by the new form of Imaginative Knowledge by Spiritual Science. All the thoughts that lack substance and reality will then be endowed with being. The earth will be surrounded — as it is now with air and as it sometimes is with swarms of locusts — with a brood of terrible spider-like creatures, half-mineral, half-plant, interweaving with masterly intelligence, it is true, but with intensely evil intent. And in so far as man has not allowed his shadowy intellectual concepts to be quickened to life, his existence will be united not with the Beings who have been trying to descend since the last third of the nineteenth century, but with this ghastly brood of half-mineral, half-plantlike creatures. He will have to live together with these spider-like creatures and to continue his cosmic existence within the order of evolutiothoughts which are — well — thoughts and nothing more. But try to imagine what will happen if men go on unfolding no other kinds of thoughts until the time is reached in the eighth millennium for the moon-existence to unite again with the earth. These Beings of whom I have spoken will gradually come down to the earth. Vulcan Beings, ‘Supermen’ of Vulcan, ‘Supermen’ of Venus, of Mercury, of the Sun, will unite with this earth-existence. But if human beings persist in nothing but opposition to them, earth-existence will pass over into chaos in the course of the next few thousand years. It will be quite possible for the men of earth, if they so wish, to develop a more and more automatic form of intellect — but that can also happen amid conditions of barbarism. Full and complete manhood, however, cannot come to expression in such a form of intellect, and men will have no relationship to the Beings who would fain come towards them in earth-existence. And all those Beings of whom men have such an erroneous conception because the shadowy intellect can only grasp the mineral nature, the crudely material nature in the minerals, plants and animals, nay even in the human kingdom itself — all these thoughts which have no reality will in a trice become substantial realities when the moon unites again with the earth. And from the earth there will spring forth a terrible brood of beings, a brood of automata of an order of existence lying between the mineral and the plant kingdoms, and possessed of an overwhelming power of intellect. This swarm will seize upon the earth, will spread over the earth like a network of ghastly, spider-like creatures, of an order lower than that of plant-existence, but possessed of overpowering wisdom. These spidery creatures will be all interlocked with one another, and in their outward movements they will imitate the thoughts that men have spun out of the shadowy intellect that has not allowed itself to be quickened by the new form of Imaginative Knowledge by Spiritual Science. All the thoughts that lack substance and reality will then be endowed with being. The earth will be surrounded — as it is now with air and as it sometimes is with swarms of locusts — with a brood of terrible spider-like creatures, half-mineral, half-plant, interweaving with masterly intelligence, it is true, but with intensely evil intent. And in so far as man has not allowed his shadowy intellectual concepts to be quickened to life, his existence will be united not with the Beings who have been trying to descend since the last third of the nineteenth century, but with this ghastly brood of half-mineral, half-plantlike creatures. He will have to live together with these spider-like creatures and to continue his cosmic existence within the order of evolution into which this brood will then enter.