The Twelfth Holy Night - Ram/Aries

RAM/ARIES

We have been on a long journey and we have now come to the highest and most exalted region of Ram or Aries, which one could say sits at the 'head' of all the zodiacs and which is connected with the principle of the Sun/Christ and the highest archetype of the human being - Adam Kadmon, or the redeemed physical existence of the human being - from Alpha to Omega, from Physical body to Atma - Spirit Man.

It was through the gate of Ram that the Son Logos Christ first entered from beyond the realm of the Zodiac to be born into the Spirit and soul of the Sun in order to redeem the physical body through the twelve senses (as we saw on the first night), and it was this sign which also stood in the heavens at the Baptism in the Jordan, when the Christ being descended into the Sun-soul and physical body of Jesus of Nazareth in order to perform, three years later, his fourth and most important sacrifice.

It is the constellation of Ram that is the source of Christ's spiritual influence in the cosmos and it spreads its beneficent emanations down towards the first seven of the zodiac signs to the region of the Scales. In the sphere of Virgo and Scales, the Sophia meets the being of Christ and this is where the Chymical wedding is consummated. These seven Zodiacs may be called the body of the Mystic Lamb, from Ram to Scales, and from Virgo to Pisces we have the body of the Divine Sophia.

The Hebrews recognised the connection between the Messiah and the region of Ram, and the ritual of sacrificing lambs for the sins of Israel, and at The Passover, was a preparation for the true'SacrificialLamb', Christ, Who was  destined to be led to the slaughter for the sins of the world.

John the Baptist was the foremost initiate of the Hebrews. He was the old Adam individuality, the first man to take up a physical existence on earth, and for this reason he was given the task of baptising the people in preparation for the descent of Christ, the First God to enter physical existence on earth. His task was to sort the Lambs - those ready for the new initiation, from the Vipers, those old souls incapable of the new initiation in that life.  

Christ Jesus was the archetype of the redemption of the physical body of human beings, which had fallen into disarray through the fall of Adam. The physical body, was intended to be more spiritual, less material and its 'fall' will be righted by the Resurrection which is an archetype for the rise of Adam/Kadmon - the perfect human being - in times to come. The human physical body which entered too deeply into materiality will then be as it was intended for humanity by the gods from the beginning. It is for this reason that John says to his disciples that he must decrease while Christ Jesus must increase, that is, Adam the physical man must die away in order that Adam/Kadmon the Spiritual man might be born in every human being, right down into his bones.

At the baptism in the Jordan we are given a wonderful picture: Adam stands in the glistening water, looking impossibly tall before his 'brotherly' soul, the Nathan Jesus who is kneeling. John recognises that below him is the Nathan Soul, which was that part of him separated from him before the fall. At the same time John is given the vision that above him the Dove is descending over Jesus of Nazareth, which indicates to him that the Holy Spirit is making possible the entry of the Lord, the being of Christ, the Lamb of God into the body of the Son of Man.

Later after John the Baptist's death his spirit united with Lazarus during his initiation by Christ, so that Lazarus became Lazarus/John or John the Divine. John the Divine showed his recognition of Christ as the Son Logos, the Word, in the Gospel of St John. In his Apocalypse he showed his  recognition of Christ's connection to Ram, for Christ is depicted as the heavenly Lamb who guards the Book of Seven Seals. 

So on this night, as we gaze upwards to the realm of the Ram, may we see the connection between this region and the Son Logos who descends towards earth through this gate. May we see, on earth the connection between the first Adam - John the Baptist, and the archetype of the redemption of Adam in Christ Jesus, Adam Kadmon. And may we prepare our hearts for tomorrow, when we celebrate Epiphany, the birth of the Son Logos, Christ into the physical body and soul of Jesus as an archetypal image of what must occur in our own bodies and souls, the birth of Christ in all of us and in the earth!

The Fifth Night - Scorpion/Eagle

SCORPION/EAGLE 

The region of Scorpion/Eagle is connected to the higher beings called Exusiai in Christian Esotericism, and the Spirits of Form in Spiritual Science. They 'form' the 'body' of the sun and so, light is the principle garment that they use to manifest their influence in the world, while their essence is Spiritual Light.  They are responsible for all that has self contained form on earth, therefore, they have been given the leadership of earth evolution. The Exusiai or Elohim receive their forces from the realm of the zodiac called Scorpion/Eagle.

In Genesis, the leading 6 Exusiai on the sun are called 'God'.  'Father God'  refers to the entirety of the six Elohim together with the seventh who is called Jehova. Jehova is the god who sacrificed his abode on the sun to become the regent of the Moon, so as to be closer to human beings. Through the co-operation of the entire circle of 7 Elohim the human being was able to receive the 'provisional' ego - the breath of life.  The Elohim accomplished this deed because they were able to connect to the sphere of the Holy Spirit through Elohim Jehova on the Moon. The reflected Holy Spirit in turn enabled the descent of Christ into the 'body' of the sun.  

The double image of Scorpion Eagle, as we have noted before, illustrates the peculiarity of the ego. 

The bible tells us that in receiving the ego from the Father God, the human being was exposed to Luciferic temptation. The human being ate from the apple of good and evil, that is, he/she grew conscious of the world and of the inner self and in so doing also began to lose his/her connection to the gods. 

The Scorpion is that aspect of the ego that seeks only the darkness of earthly things. It is the base, selfish aspect in all of us; the aspect that denies the light of the spirit. On earth Judas is a representative of Scorpio.

The Eagle on the other hand, soars aloft in the heavenly spaces and represents the ideal human being, the one that is 'Christ-like' or has the Light of Christ shinning into his Ego - or to put it practically, his blood, because blood is the physical expression of the Ego. In the drama of the life of Christ Jesus on earth the light aspect of this Zodiac, Eagle, is represented by Lazarus/John, the writer of the Gospel of John and Apocalypse.

This region is also connected to speech as only ego-bearing beings can speak and this leads us to how this Zodiac relates to the descent of Christ. 

In an earlier earthly, evolutionary stage (Atlantis), the human being faced a temptation that was connected to his seven organs. Selfishness of the seven principle organs would have led to illness without resolve. Rudolf Steiner gives us indications that  unbridled desires would have been the result of a distortion of human language because language would have expressed only the inner subjective experience of pain or pleasure of the individual organs and would not have related a human relationship to the outside world. Had human beings succumbed to this temptation we would never have been able to work creatively through the word.

In order to harmonise these Etheric forces of the human organs Christ had to sacrifice his perfected Etheric body, or Budhi by descending to that sphere where our organs receive their enlivening: the region where resides the spiritual archetypes for our physical body, the Sun as it appears as a focus of the Planetary Sphere (lower Devachan) or the sphere of Exusiai, who are said to safeguard our language. Once again the Nathan Soul who incarnates later as Jesus Christ's vehicle for this.  On earth this sacrificial manifestation of Christ is seen by initiates in the mysteries. They called this manifestation, Krishna. In the Bhagavad-Gita Krishna is the teacher of morality, of overcoming temperament, slavery to impermanence and habit through the power of an Ego that has taken into itself the Word, the Law, and Devotion.

We see this connection to the word characterised in St John's (Eagle) Gospel: 'In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and God was the Word.' He was able to write this because he was  taught the mystery of the Word by an initiate of Ephesus when he was only a child. Afterwards he was initiated by Christ who was the 'word' incarnated in the body of a human being. Later John journeyed to Ephesus, to the old mystery centre that was closely connected to speech, in order to Christianise the initiation of the 'Word'.

At the last supper we see a picture of what every human being must accomplish in order to unite their egos with Christ: they must replace the lower ego (intellect) with the higher ego, that is, with the Holy Spirit, or Higher Self (Spirit Self), just as Judas was replaced by John the Evangelist in Christ's circle.

An important reincarnation of St John the Divine was that of the enigmatic Christian Rosencreutz. In the future, Rudolf Steiner tells us, he will take up the task of transforming the lower ego into the higher ego and will undergo a great sacrifice because of it. He will take into his karma, the karma of all who do not, of their own accord, rise to the higher ego consciousness of Christ.

So when we look up to the region of Scorpion/Eagle on this Fifth Night, may we observe there the connection of the Elohim with Christ and Krishna (the Nathan soul) in the heavens and see on earth the double edged sword of the dark aspect of Scorpio and the light aspect of the Eagle represented by Judas and John - two aspects that live in our own souls side by side. 

May the Eagle of St John in us overcome the Scorpio of Judas and may we unite with Christ through the esoteric wisdom of Christian Rosencreutz!