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| Napier Waller |
If a man strives for sublimely great ideals, it is because they are the content of his own being, and their realization will bring him a joy compared to which the pleasure that a limited outlook gets from the gratification of commonplace desires is a mere triviality. Idealists revel, spiritually, in the translation of their ideals into reality.
Anyone who would eradicate the pleasure brought by the fulfillment of human desires will first have to make man a slave who acts not because he wants to but only because he must. For the achievement of what one wanted to do gives pleasure.
What we call good is not what a man must do but what he will want to do if he develops the true nature of man to the full. Anyone who does not acknowledge this must first drive out of man all that man himself wants to do, and then, from outside, prescribe the content he is to give to his will.
Man values the fulfillment of a desire because the desire springs from his own being. What is achieved has its value because it has been wanted. If we deny any value to what man himself wants, then aims that do have value will have to be found in something that man does not want.
- Rudolf Steiner – GA 4
There are people who are, by nature, magnetic healers — certainly there are. But the important thing is this, that the faculty is, as a rule, of limited duration. The natural magnetic healers have this magnetism, as it is called. When they begin to apply it, it may work very well; after a time it begins to wane, and later on it often happens that magnetic healers, after this faculty has died down in them, go on acting as if they still had it, and then charlatanism begins.
This is the precarious element when magnetic healing becomes a profession. This kind of healing really cannot be made into a profession. That is what must be said about it. The process of magnetic healing — when a person has the faculty for it — is only unconditionally effective when it is carried out with genuine compassion for the patient, a compassion that goes right down into one's organism. If you practice magnetic healing with a real love for the patient, then it cannot be done as a profession. If real love exists it will always be able to lead to something good, if no trouble arises from another side. But it can only be done on occasions, when karma leads us to a person whom we are able, out of love, to help; then the outer sign may be a laying on of the hand, or a stroking and then what is happening is that the astral body is passing on its forces to the etheric body which then works upon the ether body of the other person.
Something must still be said from another aspect about what goes on here. The healing always proceeds from the astral body, either from the patient's own astral body or from the astral body of the magnetizer. The reverse is the case in therapy where medicaments are used. When you give medicaments you introduce into the physical body substances which then work partly upon the inner forces and partly upon the rhythm of the physical body in such a way that the etheric body of the patient is influenced. The healing always proceeds from the etheric body. If you influence the etheric body from the astral body — which is a psychical healing — this lies in the realm of magnetic healing and is somewhat problematic, having a humanitarian, social element in it, something to do with the relations of one human being to another.
Rational therapy must proceed from intervention by means of medicaments which proceed from the physical body and pass into to the etheric body. Always, however, the healing proceeds from the etheric body. It is a complete illusion that the physical body, when it has become ill, can itself bring about any healing. The physical body has, precisely, the basis of illness within it, and the cause of healing must always come from the etheric body.
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| Antonio Ciseri |
The saga of the Trojan War is a representation of the spread of Hellenism; it is the mythical presentation of an esoteric truth: the efflorescence of the fourth sub-race of the fifth root-race, and the replacement of the priestly rulership, now in its last stage, by the purely worldly rulership.
That is very subtly indicated at the beginning of the Trojan saga. You probably know that matter is always represented by water. I need only call attention to the familiar Nicene Creed, which says “suffered under Pontius Pilate”.
As the esotericist knows, this is an incorrect rendering. What it really says is “suffered in pontoi pilatoi”, which means merely “in compressed water” and signifies “descended in order to suffer in matter.” This sentence in the Creed which is said all over Christendom has come about through the word “pontoi” having become “Pontius.”
When Thales states that everything has originated from water, he is referring to the comprehensive physical matter of which alone we can treat when we would speak of physical things. He is using the term ‘water’ for physical matter. Physical matter is to be the all-important thing for those who now take over guidance. The predominance of physical matter then led to there being worldly kings.
Previously there had only been kings who stood in relationship with the Divine. Peleus is the king who is to rule on the physical plane, deriving his strength from the physical plane. This is represented by his marriage with the goddess Thetis — the marriage of the leader of mankind with the matter of the physical plane, with the goddess of water, the goddess of the sea.
And from this union sprang Achilles. He is the first initiate of this kind. Hence he is invulnerable except in the heel. All those who were initiated in the fourth sub-race were vulnerable in some spot. It is only in the fifth sub-race that there will be initiates so advanced as not to be vulnerable anywhere. Achilles is plunged into the Styx. That means to be dead to the earthly and withdrawn to a higher plane of vision.
-Rudolf Steiner, Berlin, October 28, 1904:
Greek and Germanic Mythology in the Light of Esotericism, Lecture 4
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| Jules Chéret |
Someone who takes great pleasure in nightly visits to the girlie shows or enjoys downing his eight glasses of beer, may encounter people who take joy in something of a higher level and remark how they punish themselves. What he does not realise is that their true punishment would be to sit with him in the music hall. Whoever enjoys the girlie shows and such belongs there, and it would be absurd to deprive him of the enjoyment. It is healthy only to take away his taste for it.
One should work to ennoble one’s pleasures, one’s gratifications in life. It is not so that anthroposophists come together because they suffer when talking about higher worlds, but rather because it is their heart’s deepest enjoyment. It would be the most terrible deprivation for them to sit down and play poker. They are completely full of the joy of life in every fiber of their beings.
- Rudolf Steiner, Munich, 5th December 1907
Globally there are tensions everywhere. These tensions currently are not the usual 'hold in place', 'in relation to' tensions, they are the kind which act as precursors to change. Some people are sensitive to the enormity of their influence about us, and it can be psychically painful to feel this 'building up' occurring all around us. Although folk express this in terms of physical cataclysms, it comes primarily out from the wrestling influences straining our spiritual environments moreover. We may translate this into an idea that a volcano will erupt or an earthquake split the earth, but it is indicative of much more than just evacuative responses. This is a time of confrontation, of choice, and of definite decision.
Gates open and gates close. Men are offered gifts, and some will have them. This is an exciting period, but one which requires a wakefulness, an earnestness, a virility and an intent. The next four centuries to come are going to ingest every soul who has ever incarnated formerly within mainstream humanity. The traffic therefore will be much greater than is usual (approximately seven times in number) (this also is accounting for the souls which are held back and those which rarely incarnate as well). It also means that there may be a concurrence of brief spans (born and dying again - only capable of shorter lives).
Those of you who have connected directly with us at present will probably not be called back again during this crucial time. The definitive decision shall be made this lifetime and will carry you on from that. Others who are vague or inconstant may represent themselves again in the next four hundred-year session, however very soon (within the next twenty years) [2020] this opportunity for return shall not be open. So for many, the quality of their spiritual lives and commitment to humanity is vital at this point from now on.
What of this decision to which we refer? The decision is a formal statement of soul that will qualify the individual for future residence amongst his global community. Literally speaking it is the decision to receive Christ (and therefore receive the whole world) into their being, wholeheartedly, unreservedly and with dedication. (Dedicating your life back to Father God requires that you acknowledge that it is His Life in you, firstly.)
Preparing for this decision has taken most all of their known humanhood. The acceleration of time as it presses upon the individuals, is awkward because there are those who are not ready. On the other hand there are associated beings (from the animal kingdom and devic kingdom) who already are given to this love and work for the world and have won their Christhood thereby. It is not a matter of brightness, naming Christ by name (rather naming Him in heart), or of evolutionary development alone ... there are magicians on the dark path who have advanced to extraordinary lengths but know not the qualifying humors to bring them into the next Round ... for these times ahead are now to be selective, and communities will be divided therefrom.
So this is the 'busy time' for our detail, and we are too occupied to be awash with a sentimental melancholy for those who will depart from us ... instead we choose to project an optimistic gravity amongst our greatest of concerns.
We work in many ways with as many styles as there are available (providing they are useful of course) and privately address people all over. We have never viewed our criteria to be made generalized, i.e. given to public comment or display, yet fully support the individuals whose given work has been to do so. (Yes, my Dear, there are borders to Faerie Land.)
No, we do not assume the role of stewards on the Titanic as far as this forthcoming apocalypse implies! For when viewed in the spiritual context, of its true reality within these tensions and changes, men are becoming opened to virtue like never before. The past is moving out. The former self strains but will not resist the glorifying presence which it will become.
The 'clearing reaction' which will take place within the world is really very important to the souls who will remain. It is necessary that for a time (a very long time actually), that one community may advance out without the waylaying of the other. This significant period of review shall occur over one hundred and forty-four thousand revolutions ... 144,000 days and nights for the influx and uptake of every soul to be received (approximately the four centuries just up ahead of us, as aforementioned). There are four divisions to this time period, each consisting of thirty-six thousand days collectively (three lots of 12,000, times 4) in which representatives of humanity from all four sectors will be given their respective times for appeal.
All of the 'tribes' (signatories to particular ages) are thus sealed into this number and recalled into incarnation. They denote men from various evolutionary beginnings, whose predominant characteristics still caveat them. In a roundabout way this can be interpreted in degrees upon the Zodiac in its complete aspect traveled also. After the last day a new era upon this Earth shall then begin.
There are one hundred and forty-four thousand Bodhisattvas who stand guardian over each day and each night (one a piece), who have been luminaries for that sector of souls past-karmicly. Watchers and contributors to the evolution of Man, they now welcome each in with their presence hugging close to the Globe, and being apparently accessible for the length of the incarnation throughout. As the choir of Bodhisattvas assembles, until the culmination of the last and final elated luminary, there amassed amongst the peoples is also our Christ most fully adorned.
This spectacular may be viewed by any man from wherever he is in the Cosmos. As the Great Ones gather and the nebulae of joy accumulates in the Shining Ones, men will be drawn in heart and in consciousness to their World with its grand assembly.
Although this reply appears to have little or no bearing on the question just asked, it is considerable to the activities in which we are involved in. Any collection of men who would work for the betterment of the spiritual condition of Mankind, without pride or favor, are immediately in resonance with the elders of their humanity. The network lives from heart to heart, conjoining each dear soul within the Great Heart from which all Life streams forth and indwells eternally.
The inner creed to love one another is supportive to each who subscribe. Each, who consciously admit the Light of the World within themselves have championed a place within that world to come.
-The Brothers
