Origins of the Images of the Oracle
of the Solar Crosses
By David Tresemer, Ph.D.
Here is the history of how the Images of the
Oracle of the Solar Crosses came to be. Working for
years with other Astrosophers, meaning those
concerned with Star Wisdom, I knew that the signs of
the heavens held secrets. These secrets had been
lost to the tropical astrologers whose seasonal
calendar had torn itself away from the actual beings
in the zodiac. Briefly, tropical astrology, the
conventional astrology of the West, assumes that the
Sun at spring equinox (21 March) lies at zero
degrees Aries. That was true when Ptolemy wrote it
in his astrological books in the second century CE.
But the orientation of the Earth shifts slowly, one
degree every seventy-two years. Now the degree
behind the Sun at spring equinox is five degrees of
Pisces, and slowly moving backwards towards
Aquarius. The tropical approach orients to the
seasons where the first day of spring tells us that
the weather is changing and the days will grow
longer. It is a seasonal calendar. The sidereal or
star-based approach of astrosophy orients to the
stars behind the Sun as they relate to the Earth.
We became interested in Marc Edmund Jones’ work with
Sabian symbols,
which Jones had elicited from an intuitive seer.
They included phrases and short sentences that
stimulated the imagination, which thus awakened the
soul. Such phrases include A Chinese woman
nursing a baby with a message (for 12 Cancer)
and Indians rowing a canoe and dancing a war
dance (for 5 Capricorn). When you read
these, it makes you want to know more. This
illustrates the power of Imagination – you want more
because it acts as nutrition for the soul. Jones
gave additional paragraphs of explanation after each
of the images. We knew more lives in the mansions
of the degrees of the heavens. We did not find what
we were seeking in the Sabian system. Besides, the
Sabian symbols were based on a tropical or seasonal
calendar, and did not relate to the actual zodiacal
signs, even though they used that terminology.
Then an important work by Robert Powell was
published that, when analyzed according to our
interest, gave dates to important events in every
degree of the zodiac. This was what we had been
waiting for. We had to add much to it for the Solar
Cross work, but it was the missing piece. Let’s
recount the steps taken, which begin in the 19th
century.
A Cautionary Note for Christians and Un-Christians
In my work at the StarHouse
in Boulder, Colorado, I deal with many different
faiths and have found it important to create
bridges. I work often with people who have been hurt
by Christianity and want very little to do with it.
For some, it was the Crusades killing Jews, gypsies,
and Muslims in their escapades into the Middle East,
for some the Inquisition destroying the Cathars, for
some a graphic memory of burning at the stake, for
some a nun at a Catholic school rapping their
knuckles with a ruler – they’ve had enough. I work
also with those who think they know everything about
Christianity, and they are more challenging. One
person, questioning the analysis of a Greek word,
said, holding a Bible in his hands, “If English is
good enough for Jesus, then it’s good enough for
me.” At those times patience is needed. These
sacred documents were not written in English, but
come to us from metaphoric languages where each word
has to be wrestled with. Wrestled? Even the word
Israel, which an angel gave to Jacob, means “The one
who wrestles with Divinity.” In other cultures,
whole schools have arisen where people learn to
wrestle with the Divinity in words. Let’s not
forget that in this process of the Solar Crosses.
Thus we wrestle with Divinity and acknowledge the
continuity of divine revelation from many sources.
Every tradition, religion, and system has something
to offer.
Doctrinal arguments do not
interest me, who’s right and who’s wrong, and what
terrible deed was done in the name of a particular
religion. One’s relationship to the stars stands
taller than this. The cruel misdeeds of the few
should not veil the beauty of a particular tradition
or knowledge. I have made every attempt to put this
material in terms that are universal and thus
accessible for everyone.
Perhaps this is enough to
ease people into speaking about Jesus Christ.
Powell’s work that we found so helpful was titled,
Chronicle of the Living Christ.
It was through this lens that we were able to see
what lay in the zodiac.
The word “Jesus” comes never
in the Images, rarely in the Commentaries. Jesus is
spoken of as the wise man or healer in the Images,
and in the Commentaries in terms of his role –
Teacher, Healer, or Sacrificer, paralleling his
functions in the realms of thinking, feeling, and
willing, or, using other words, cognition, emotion,
and action. The Teacher came to the Earth to model
a way of being, not to get people to join an
organization. He came to model holy energy, for
which I use the old Sanskrit word shakti,
which sounds like what it is – lightning-filled
energy. He came to receive the anointing of the
Christ-light shakti, to to model love and acceptance
of the “I AM” or divine soul within each human
being. Jesus intended that he would not be singled
out as the only individual who could act as he did.
Rather he intended that we follow, learn, and
surpass him – that we all become Christ-lighted
divine beings on Earth. He is Teacher of a way of
living, as we have had and will have other great
teachers. In the same way, Jesus is a Healer as we
have had healers in the past and into the future.
The intuitive, Anne Catherine Emmerich, about more
will be said later, mentions, for example, that the
healings performed by the Teacher’s students
surpassed those of their Teacher in drama and
miraculous cure. Finally, rarely overt yet
underlying everything that the Teacher did, he acted
as Sacrificer, showing how one can lose a life and
win a soul. Thus thinking was purified by the
Teacher, feeling purified by the Healer, and willing
purified by the Sacrificer.
Though we have used dates
for other advanced beings when we know them, we have
concentrated on this Christ-on-Earth. Here the
Sun-being has come to work through a human being,
and we are very interested in what the Sun-being
does on this Earth.
Jesus is not meant to be
isolated from humanity but rather linked to
humanity. Thus these Solar Crosses are appropriate
for those in the Christian churches as well as those
who are not in those institutions.
As the great theologian of
the Catholic Church, Thomas Aquinas, said in the 14th
century: “One may never have heard the sacred word
Christ but be closer to God than a priest or nun.”
That from the core philosopher of the Catholic
Church!
I invite a completely fresh and new look at this
history, which may surprise you in its richness. I
ask that a person from any religion simply
understand the foundations here, which are meant as
an offering to all people. In other words, persevere
for a bit, and you will see how it all fits
together. The skeptics may read the “Summary” in
italics down a few pages.
Let’s begin to put the pieces of the story into
place.
Anne Catherine Emmerich
Between 1820 and 1824 a German nun named Anne
Catherine Emmerich began to have clairvoyant
visions. Though she had had visions from her youth,
much like the youngsters of Medjugore, Yugoslavia,
she began to have very specific pictures of the
daily life of Jesus Christ beginning with the
Baptism in the Jordan River to the Resurrection and
Ascension, events that I rename the Water-Initiation
and the Light-Body Substantiation, to get us into
new ways of thinking about them. Anne Catherine saw
many details about the Teacher, and also Mary
Magdalene, Mother Mary, John the Water Initiator,
and many others.
Anne Catherine Emmerich’s
highly specific visions spanned over three years.
An Italian author, Clemens Brentano, heard of her
gift, visited her, and sat at her bedside for most
of this time, with some gaps when he had to attend
to personal business, or Anne Catherine was too ill
to speak. He recorded every day what she said, and
then read over to her what she had said the previous
day, to make sure he got it right. These visions as
recorded by Brentano comprise four volumes in
English and some more material in German
manuscripts. They are a goldmine of stories and
imagery in comparison to which the four gospels
appear as summaries.
Clairvoyance varies widely
as to its accuracy and validity. Why would we
believe anything that Anne Catherine Emmerich said,
no matter how lovely? Various tests of her veracity
have been performed. For example, Anne Catherine
described the place where she intuitively observed
Mother Mary spend the last years of her life and the
house where Mary died. Anne Catherine could not
have known about this place, as she traveled no more
than twenty miles from where she was born her whole
life. Following her descriptions, Lazarite monks
found this place in the hills above Ephesus, Turkey,
renamed Selcuk. The house was exactly as she
described it. Though the walls had fallen down, it
had the same room plan. Archaeologists followed,
and now two Roman Catholic popes have visited to
affirm this as Mary’s house. This particular spot
is also special because, as the Koran accepts Mary
as the most divine of all women, Muslims and
Christians freely intermingle on that site.
Anne Catherine reported on the modes of dress and
ceremonial practices of the Romans and Jews during
that time, which have been later corroborated. She
confirmed aspects of the life and relationships
between the main characters of this story that were
corroborated by the Nag Hammadi texts written in the
second century, found in Egypt in 1945.
Some of her visions were marred by her training,
that is, her prejudices and lack of experience. She
did her best as a reporter. For example, she sees
in her vision young men around a small pool of
water, deep, with a narrow opening, lined with
stone, inside a building. They go in and out of the
water in a reverential mood. She had no idea that
she was observing the micvah, a common Jewish
practice then and now for ritual purification
through water. Anne Catherine had no experience of
this in her Catholic town in Germany. This
illustrates her reporting. You have to know more
than she did about the history of the time to
understand what she’s describing.
Of course, we always must ask what powers the
Illusionist – the powers of deception that would
lure us away from the truth – exerted over her.
That’s a fair question to hold when examining her
visions or anyone’s visions. As with every human
realization, they are indications and lights on a
path, but not the end of the path. They point in a
direction that we must take. As pointers, they are
very helpful.
Little has been done with
this resource except Mel Gibson’s popular movie,
The Passion of Christ, based on her
descriptions. That movie has sold many millions of
copies. People are eager to learn the “truth” about
what happened. Unfortunately that movie emphasizes
the harsh details of what Anne Catherine added to
the Gospels while underplaying the resplendent and
positive. However, it is the most visible outward
sign of the acceptance of Anne Catherine’s visions.
Robert Powell
In the late 1980’s, Robert
Powell, an English mathematician, astrologer, and
Ph.D. from the Polish Academy of Sciences, was moved
by Anne Catherine’s account. From his intimate
understanding of the Roman and Jewish calendars from
two thousand years ago, he could locate in time Anne
Catherine’s references to Sabbaths and to festivals,
both Roman and Jewish. He put actual dates to the
events that she described. He published this as
Chronicle of the Living Christ in 1996.
Here we find brief summaries of the daily activities
of Christ Jesus for the last three and a half years
of his ministry, as well as very careful working out
of the birth and death dates of the major actors in
this great drama.
This book included dating of echoes of the daily
events, mapped from the years 29-33 onto the years
1996 to 1999 as the 60th repetition of
the life events. Astrologers would understand this
as a parallel to a Saturn return. When Saturn
returns to the same place that it had at our birth,
then we feel that we can revisit and renegotiate the
issues that Saturn imprinted into our being when we
took our first breath. Likewise, if we can see in
the life of Christ Jesus a perfect unit of 33 and
one-third years, then we can relive the daily events
mapped out onto present time. Robert Schiappacasse,
William Bento, and I went over and over this
material, the first time from February of 1996 to
September of 1999, matching day for day the
described activities.
When you have actual dates
for events you can make astrological charts, though
you need a special astrological program to go back
two thousand years. My colleagues and I looked at
the planetary configurations for many of the events
in the life of Christ Jesus.
Rudolf Steiner
To the material from Anne
Catherine Emmerich, Robert Powell added the insights
of another clairvoyant, Rudolf Steiner. Powell
integrated these insights into what he saw in Anne
Catherine’s visions.
One of Steiner’s great
contributions was to alert us to the idea that the
Christian story is more complicated than previously
expected. You can find out more about, dealing with
the two Jesus children, in the next section.
The Sun and the Planets
After years of the study of
Anne Catherine Emmerich as enlightened by Rudolf
Steiner’s spiritual observations, I was overwhelmed
with the amount of complexity spinning around each
event. When you read an astrological chart, there
is so much going on, so many interrelationships
between starry worlds and planets! I had to step
back. I decided to look only at the Sun. When you
are born and take your first breath, into your being
comes an impulse from the Sun. From the planets
come various conditionings and qualities. The Sun,
however, brings pure impulse from the cosmos. Thus
I left planets to the side, and concentrated on the
Sun as the laser focused light coming from an exact
position in the zodiac.
After working with Powell’s
dating of Emmerich’s observations, and including
Steiner’s insights, I asked what is common in Christ
Jesus’ work on each day that the Sun is in one
place, that is, on one Solar Day. For example, what
happens every time the Sun lies at five degrees of
Taurus, no matter what the year. I put together the
daily activities of the same day for every year –
the years 29, 30, 31, 32, and 33 – for which I had
information. There were gaps for some stretches of
days when Anne Catherine was too ill or too blissed
to speak.
When I put the same days
together from different years, I found astounding
similarities in theme and also in geographical
place. What was taught was often the same. The
geographical location of the Teacher was often the
same. The Teacher traveled widely, and visited many
places important to the spiritual history of
humanity. I have termed this geographical memory,
meaning the use of place to access what has happened
there and the people who acted there. For most
people the reactivation of geographical memory is
called pilgrimage, and they visit a place to receive
its essence and vibration into their own being. The
Teacher took other steps: Before receiving, he
activated the place, activated its memory. Then he
built it up through his own words and activity and
sent it as a message into the cosmos, imprinting it
there to be accessed again by humans in the future.
The Teacher traveled a
zig-zag path through the lands of the Middle East,
visiting many places of historical importance. I
treat this as an activation of that place and the
people involved and what happened there, as if the
event of the past were fresh to the moment of the
visit, sometimes hundreds of years later. In the
last year before the Sacrifice, the visits to the
land of Egypt (thus activating the previous cultural
epoch) and Persia (thus activating the cultural
epoch previous to that) take on special importance
from this point of view. “The paths of Jesus in
Palestine were the paths of the Sun-force that had
come down to the Earth.”
“[Archangels] are Space-spirits in the sense that
they endow space with moral quality. True spiritual
geography consists in the knowledge of the
activities of Archangels, and the boundaries in
space of these activities. The spiritual map of the
Earth is quite different from the political or
national map.”
Thus the attention placed in the Oracle of the Solar
Crosses on geographical memory and place.
The many correspondences
over different years in the same Solar Day justified
for me the combination of the material from
different years. Thus, all the fifths of May, for
example, were together, and all the sevenths of
June. For some Solar Days we have information for
two years, sometimes three, and on a few occasions
four years.
Thus I laid before myself
everything that Anne Catherine Emmerich saw on a
particular day in each of the years for which I had
material from her. Thus, the activities of every
day that the Sun lay before the 10th
degree of Gemini, no matter what the year, was put
on the table. Then it began to grow. If she said
that the Teacher spoke from Isaiah, chapter 56, I
brought that out. If she said that the Teacher
spoke about Joseph, son of Jacob, I brought in
everything known about Joseph in the Hebrew Bible as
well as in Rudolf Steiner’s writings, in Biblical
commentaries, in the Jewish midrashim, in
mythology, and so forth. If the Teacher came to a
certain geographical place, all the history and
legendary activities of that place were added to the
material of that day. I brought in etymology of
Greek, Hebrew, and Aramaic words spoken. I brought
in gematria, the science of sacred numbers
formed from the number values of the letters of the
Hebrew words. If Anne Catherine told a story from
another century in the context of that day, I added
the content of that story as part of the day, with
the assumption that she was resonating with the
shakti of that Solar Day. Only once did she speak
about the birth of Moses, for example. I considered
the possibility that this speaking belonged to the
day in which she couched the story. This was a
hypothesis that, through resonance, she intuited a
connection of this particular day with the birth of
Moses. Thus I brought in the whole story of Moses’
birth, including all the commentaries about what
“really” happened, and who Moses “really” was. Anne
Catherine often spoke about Roman festivals and
celebrations in some detail. She spoke about the
lives and lifestyle of the Three Kings of Babylon in
great detail. All these were added.
Over the years that I have
been working with this material, I have developed
the distinct impression that the Teacher went
deliberately to certain places on this earth and
said certain things out loud so that these would
impress themselves through the Sun into the Akashic
Record. If the activities reported involved
primarily others close to the Teacher, such as John
the Water Initiator or Mary Magdalene or Mother
Mary, I concentrated on what they were sending
forth. They trusted that their legacy would be
discovered by someone who could see and hear from
the Akashic Record itself. Often times, they would
come to a place of great importance for one day
only, a place greatly significant in the crosses.
Of course, everything known
about Mary Magdalene, the Essenes, the Egyptians,
the newest archaeological discoveries such as John
the Water Initiator’s cave, and so forth – all this
was added in. The main references are given at the
end of this book, and many more were used only once
or twice that I mention only at the commentaries for
a particular degree.
Furthermore, the insights of
Rudolf Steiner into many stories in the Christian
gospels, as well as his insights even into the
ancient Kings of Persia such as Djemschid, and so
forth – all this was added to the table.
I also began to add in other
events known from history. I added to the table
some of the great deeds of extraordinary human
beings from all religions, those who had attained a
high level of development. Thus what was laid on
the table for a single degree, one degree of 360,
included all traditions.
Summary of Resources
Thus active reference was made to
the traditions of the Christian, Hebrew,, Egyptian,
Persian, ancient Indian, including Sanskrit and
Shaivism, pagan (Roman, Greek, and Celtic), as well
as the Trans-Himalayan Wisdom teaching, the
Perennial Wisdom, Theosophy, Anthroposophy, as well
as brief uses of other traditions. Though the core
reporter was a Catholic Christian nun, all these
traditions have found a place in this Oracle.
All this, from the same position of the Sun, the
same Solar Day, I laid before myself. All these
materials added up to several dozen pages, and
sometimes a hundred, from widespread sources. Then
I pondered. Through meditation and patience,
invariably a single unified Image would arise, as a
punctum, declaring itself from this material
as the essence of the day as stored in the zodiac.
Let me explain the punctum.
Roland Barthes
In his writings as an art critic, Roland Barthes
developed the idea of the studium and the
punctum, particularly relevant in viewing
photographs. When you look at a picture, perhaps
you notice what the picture is supposed to be
about. We see a family posed for a portrait, for
example. The studium, the studied or formal
purpose, is a record of the family, meant for the
family album, to remind everyone that they existed,
that they smiled, proving that they were happy and
enjoyed their life together. However, Barthes said
that always in a photograph something will jump out
at you, ignoring the studium – something
compelling and interesting, something not intended,
hitting you like a dart, the punctum. You
notice, for example, the extremely long delicate
white fingers of the young boy in front of a family
of simple farmers, whose hands are stubby and dark.
Or you notice the particular tilt in the head of a
new wife, a subtle gesture that says she’s asking
herself about her decision. A friend once took a
photo of his girlfriend after a hike in the
mountains, with the mountains in the background,
meant to record the fact that he had been there with
his fiancé, and that she was happy. Later on he
found in the photo the head of a mountain lion
peering out from behind a nearby tree. The
studium – the smiling girlfriend on an outing,
meant for the family album – had no notion of this!
The punctum revealed what was living more
deeply in the story. Viewing the image of the
photograph, the punctum darts out at you. It
is the underlying and perhaps truer story behind the
studied purpose of the photo.
Watch for the punctum
– that’s where the soul speaks past the conscious
and planned intentions, past the stage set that most
photographers attempt. The punctum speaks
straight to you from soul to soul. The studium
is always a little dead, predetermined, the party
line. The punctum shouts out, always alive
and changing. By this method we redirect our
attention from the studied casual to the unstudied
causal. The studium tends to conceptual – as
in someone putting on a smile and saying, “Peace and
Love!,” for the documentation of the moment, when
you know he or she is actually struggling with their
job or marriage. Where is the truth? What can take
you past the veneer and give you something real to
hold on to, to grasp? The punctum gives you
something to ponder and ruminate, something that,
like a mountain lion behind you, wakes you up to the
story behind the story.
I laid out all the material
for this one degree of 360, this one slice of
zodiacal time. I did not bring in at this point the
births and deaths of historical personalities, kings
and queens and artists, and so forth. I was
interested in how the stars were speaking into the
earth, as revealed by actions in the world by
powerful people whom we might call “tuned in” to the
cosmos.
Lurking over the whole enterprise was the hypothesis
that the heavens are speaking here, that the stars
are speaking through the deeds of humanity,
especially through the activities of the enlightened
beings whom I was tracking. I permitted an Image to
arise, often a single Image, and sometimes an Image
with parts. Sometimes this took days for it to
arise. I would read and reread the material, expand
upon it if necessary, bring in more and more. Then
I would patiently meditate on this, and ask for a
single Image to reveal itself. Invariably it did
so, with some taking longer than others.
In the Commentaries to the
Images I explain many of the words and phrases of
the Image, their historical, archaeological, and
mythological origins. But the Image is the
compressed key. The hypothesis is that the Image is
a small part of the truths lying in that zodiacal
degree, indeed that it can be used as a key to open
up far vaster treasures that live there. The best
people to use this key are those who have been born
into this degree, for they have an intrinsic memory
of its wonders – yes, sometimes its great
challenges, and its wonders.
What is the Truth?
After I have given this
explanation, some people ask, “But where did the
Images come from?” I thought I had already told
them. I have come to realize that the subtext of
their question is: “What ancient and holy scripture
that I didn’t know about are you quoting?” To
reiterate then, I’m not quoting anything. The
ancient and holy scriptures have helped as a
foundation but are not the source. They have helped
me find the source. Aided by the many resources
that I have named, I have wrestled and I have formed
these words out of my own self. It has been an
experience closely akin to what Rudolf Steiner calls
spiritual science. There is research and
study – the studium – and there is the
light-filled sense of the punctum. What
comes as a result are light-filled words as gems,
each one polished to reveal a sparkle of a
magnificent sparkling being of the heavens.
Is there a danger of
arrogance in this kind of work? Of illusion? Of
distortion because of my specific life experiences?
Yes, certainly. Let us address this more
specifically, beginning with the concept of
validity.
Validity – Internal and External
Trained in statistics and
experimental design, I have been very aware of the
question, “How can you prove any of this?” This is
a fair question. There are two forms of validity of
a new system or a new measure of something, internal
validity and external validity.
The internal validity ascertains how all the data
coordinates inside the system, how all the parts
agree with each other. As I said before, I was
quite surprised by the number of times that, at the
same zodiacal degree, the Teacher was in the same
geographical place, literally the same spot on
earth, sometimes two or three years apart, yet on
the same Solar Day. Or that the same theme would be
spoken about on that Solar Day in different years.
This encouraged me to continue with this approach.
Also, in the four positions of the cross, for
example, 12 degrees of all the fixed signs (Taurus,
Scorpio, Leo, and Aquarius), I found similar
connections between geographical locations and
themes.
Of course, we would neither
expect nor desire that every time that we came to 12
degrees of Taurus that the Teacher would be in the
same place, like clockwork. It might please an
experimental designer, but it would not please the
soul of a human being, which needs its freedom.
However, this happened enough times to convince me
that one of the Teacher’s activities included
geographical memory – relating certain places on the
Earth with a thin slice of the heavens, what lay
behind the Sun in the zodiac on that Solar Day – and
thematic issues that, I hypothesized, lay behind the
Sun in the being that dwells in that degree.
External validity means that
the system works in the big world, with historical
personalities, with modern individuals, and with
clients. As we are working actively with about two
thousand people for whom we have good biographies,
and looking at both their births and their deaths,
this will take time to work through completely. I
have given readings to many people at this point,
for whom I have brought out the historical
personalities related to them. Over and over again,
revealing the historical personality of someone
related to the person’s Gate Image, Earth Image, or
Horizon Images has brought out an “Aha! I knew it!,”
and a wistful look on the face. The whole face
becomes soft, and I know that an elder Star Brother
or elder Star Sister has been affirmed. The person
knows the connection already, in the bones. The
Solar Cross work confirms it and encourages him or
her to investigate more thoroughly.
Likewise, the Images, when
they work, go deeply into the client, and are worked
with actively. How do you “prove” something that
speaks stars-to-soul? Using modern methods of
statistical demonstration, requiring double-blind
studies and random assignment, you don’t. Yet, to
toss it off as “only an art,” thus being
unscientific, would be unfair. This study should
not encourage a relaxing of acuity, but rather
requires the same kind of lucid discernment as does
true science, as well as an openness to the nuances
of an alive and active feeling life.
Ways of Knowing
We have been trained in our
Age of Science to seek only the objective – the
great verities – suspecting the bias of the
subjective and personal. Modern philosophers,
including philosopher-scientists such as Werner
Heisenberg, have taken pains to demonstrate that
objective without subjective is not possible. In
fact, one without the other is not desirable.
Asking for the objective without the subjective asks
for spirit without personality – and without soul.
The “I AM” of the soul commingles the impressions of
the senses conditioned by upbringing, that is, the
personality, with the “ALL IS” of the spirit.
I emphasize this because too
often people quote a pithy passage of “objective
truth” and gain nothing from it except the
reassurance that God is on their side. You hear the
objective truth and wonder, “So what?” In this
squeaky clean rejection of anything personal and
messy, you find that there hasn’t been any learning.
I recommend the process
whereby these Images were created as a process
wherein you can make these your own, transforming
them, as your soul is sure to do. The mind-mapping
exercises are intended to do just that. By this
means, terrific insights will be gained by your
interaction with the material.
A risk has been taken to
publish these Images as words. Overwhelmed by
printed media, people skim, trying to get the
information or the stimulation quickly. An Image
that relates to the foundations of your life’s
purpose should not be skimmed. Every attempt has
been made in this book to move slowly, to take the
Images of Rudolf Steiner’s life seriously, and to
permit them to transform in your own soul life.
Historical Personalities and Events
After the Images were set, I began to look at
historical personalities to find out how the Images
played out in another person’s life. These can be
very helpful to illustrate how an Image is breathed
with a person’s first breath and often becomes a
major theme of his or her life. At a person’s
death, he or she unites his or her life’s harvest
with a Solar Degree, and one can see how the fruits
of a life can be taken up in a theme consonant with
that life. Work with historical personalities has
depended upon the very fine work done by Robert
Powell in researching dates for births and deaths of
known personalities.
I have also used the 30,000 records of the
AstroDataBase, begun by Lois Rodden. Unfortunately,
they do not value records of death very highly,
which we value very much.
I have doubled Powell’s database, adding many
artists, poets, composers, characters from different
cultures. I have also added many historical events,
under the theory that potent events imprint
themselves back through the Sun into a zodiacal
degree. What lives in a zodiacal degree into which
you were born can thus condition your birth (or your
conception if this can be determined).
From inventions to calamities, these can be helpful
to know about.
In all of these additions, it is the Image that
focuses one’s attention on what meaning an event can
have. A prominent person’s birth or death, a great
invention, a huge natural disaster – these can all
be understood and made sense of in terms of the
Image.
Some people have asked what the criterion is for
choosing a historical personality, and why can’t we
have some simple people. Why Winston Churchill and
not Jane Smith? When we know that a good biography
exists about the details of someone’s life, so that
we and the client can learn about how they dealt
with the same Gate Image, for example, then we are
happy to include less well known people. Without
the biography, or some way of knowing about them, we
can’t bring that person’s example to bear on the
client’s life.
It’s interesting when clients are certain that a
particular person will be related to their birth
Solar Cross. Sometimes this happens, but often
there is another kind of relationship, often exposed
through an astrological analysis.
**
As with all works of scriptures and
spiritual commentary, these Images have to be taken
as hypotheses, something to be tested in one’s own
experience. I offer these insights as routes to the
heavens, and you will have to try them out for
yourself, which means making them your own, to test
their verity.
The Story of the Holy Family
Here is a story from Rudolf
Steiner that you may need to know to understand some
of the commentaries to the Solar Images. It is a
beautiful story, brilliant, shocking to some,
revealing to others. In this book, it becomes
particularly important at the Death Image.
This story presents a very
different way of understanding the being of Christ
Jesus, and those around him. Every effort has been
made to extract the wisdom of the events of the
Teacher so that the Images can be met without
doctrine, dogma, or sectarian reactions. That is,
one need not join one of the myriad of Christian
churches in order to appreciate this story. Indeed,
when you apprehend this story and begin to find it
useful, it may become more difficult to join one of
the Christian denominations.
Here we enter the dangerous territory of “Spirit and
Nature, dancing together.”
Shall we simply jump in? How is it that two very
different accounts occur in the gospels of Matthew
and Luke about the birth of the Teacher? One is
born in a house, one in a cave or manger. One is
visited by kings, the other by shepherds. One has
brothers; the other is an only child. Even the
genealogies are different. Does this all come from
confusion or sloppy reporting? Couldn’t they get
their stories straight? The philosopher and
clairvoyant Rudolf Steiner penetrated spiritually
into the facts, and announced that there were two
Jesuses, indeed two Marys and two Josephs too. This
upsets most people at the beginning but becomes very
interesting to investigate more closely.
For a much more thorough demonstration
and proof of this hypothesis, I refer you to the
wonderful introduction and summary by Robert
McDermott to Rudolf Steiner’s lecture cycle,
According to Luke, as well as to the lectures
themselves, also to Edward Reaugh Smith’s books,
especially The Burning Bush, and also to
Robert Powell’s Chronicle of the Living Christ.
I leave the demonstrations and proofs to them and
simply tell you the story. If the references to
spirits and reincarnation streams seems fantastical,
this is because modern human beings have lost their
clairvoyance, their ability to see into spirit
realms readily. Materialism has stunted these
supersensible capacities. “Just the facts, ma’am,”
means only the grossest physical substances are
accepted as real. We all know that there is more to
life than that, but distrust anything unseen because
it might be illusion. The caution is fair, and I am
asking that you hold these ideas as a grand
hypothesis, and see how it works out in this study
(and in your particular Solar Cross).
First the story from the
Gospel of Matthew, with additional features,
including actual dates. In 6 BC, a wealthy couple
named Joseph and Mary gave birth to a special child
who they named Jesus, pronounced Yeshua, a common
name, the same as Joshua.
The parents had other children too who would later
become students of the Teacher. The parents had
prepared diligently. The birth was virginal,
meaning that the mother was pure in her astral
body. Indeed, Mary had been born in the same way,
from a mother who was virginal. As the Matthew
gospel traces the ancestors of Jesus to King
Solomon, son of David, we call these characters the
Solomon Mary and the Solomon Jesus.
The stargazing priest-kings
in the desert, near the old cities of Babylon and
Ur, had observed in the heavens the coming of the
Solomon Mary and later the coming of her son. They
could see pictures in the stars that told them of
these events. Then they traveled two months through
the deserts to visit this extraordinary infant.
They brought gold, myrrh, and frankincense as well
as many other gifts. Why did they travel this far
to see a baby? Because the heavens had revealed to
them that the great teacher of their lineage,
Zarathustra, had been reborn, as he had promised
five hundred years previously. Zarathustra, which
means golden star, had, in distant ancient times
thousands of years ago, mastered in seven lives the
seven major spiritual traditions.
He then inaugurated the ancient Persian
civilization, imparting his wisdom to Hermes
Trismegistus, who took this wisdom as the seed of
the next civilization, the Egyptian. Zarathustra
had then incarnated in Babylon, where he taught
Pythagoras, the prophet Daniel, Cyrus the Great,
king of Persia at that time, and others, in the arts
of astronomy and astrology. He said he would return
in five hundred years. Generation after generation,
the stargazing priest-kings watched for signs of his
return.
Here again was their
founder, their master, the wisest human being on
earth – the Solomon Jesus.
Sensing their excitement,
King Herod ordered that all the infants of the realm
be killed. But, led by a dream, the Solomon Joseph
had already led the Solomon Mary and the Solomon
Jesus away from the land, to Egypt, where they would
stay for some years, until they returned to Judea.
Then at a particular
Passover celebration in Jerusalem, the Solomon
Jesus, at age 17, gifted his entire Zarathustra
nature to another, and soon after that died. Who
was this other? It was the Nathan Jesus, the one
described in the Gospel of Luke in very different
terms.
The Nathan Jesus was born to very simple and poor
parents, in simple circumstances, according to Anne
Catherine Emmerich, in a cave that had also been
used to shelter farm animals from the winter cold,
thus what came to be known as the manger. Shepherds
were awakened by angels proclaiming the victory of
this Sun-Being coming to earth. The Luke Gospel
traces his earthly genealogy to Nathan, the prophet,
also son of David. In the Nathan Jesus was born the
simplicity of what is called the sister soul of
Adam, that is, the part of Adam, the primal human,
that had not yet incarnated.
In the Nathan Jesus could be found the profound love
and power of Krishna, overseen by the spiritual body
of the Buddha. All these spirits may be confusing
to some, and I give them to introduce you to what
esotericists talk about and work to understand. It
brings up a question – what spirits are in the
atmosphere around you right now?
At the age of 12, this very simple, not very
intelligent, wide-eyed, and loving Nathan Jesus, a
true Nature Boy, visited the Temple in Jerusalem for
the Passover ceremony. There the Solomon Jesus
passed his essential wisdom, indeed his entire
being, to the innocent Nathan Jesus, who thereupon
mounted the teacher’s chair in the Temple, the
highest pulpit in the land, and began to dispute
with the learned lawyers and theologians, astounding
them with his knowledge and penetrating insight. Of
course, this was a complete turnaround for the
simple wide-eyed Nathan Jesus, and thus it was
remarked in the Luke Gospel.
Now for some changes, summarized rapidly. The
Solomon Jesus died, leaving his brilliance in the
Nathan Jesus. The Solomon Joseph died, as did the
Nathan Mary. The Solomon Mary then married the
Nathan Joseph, who himself died some months before
the Water Initiation (or Baptism) of the Nathan
Jesus. The one we call Mother Mary is the Solomon
Mary, who was not the biological mother of the
Nathan Jesus, but had adopted the young Nathan
Jesus, and accompanied him through his ministry and
trials.
At the Water Initiation (or Baptism), the Adam and
also the Zarathustra natures of the Teacher stepped
aside so that the Nathan Jesus was empty, ready to
receive the divine Christos, the Sun-being, into his
human body.
At the Water Initiation, and also at the Sacrifice,
the Nathan Mary united with the Solomon Mary, and
both united with the great Sophia, divinity of
wisdom. There is a great story of the women,
including Mary Magdalene, that has not been told.
Many more hints than can be found in the Bible come
out in the Solar Crosses.
If you are confused, you might make a chart for
yourself. This might not be necessary, as the point
is that two streams came into the being of Jesus,
assisted by two sons, two mothers, and two fathers.
Each had a role to play. Each had a birth and a
death, all of which are important in the Solar
Crosses. We don’t know the birth and death dates
for the Josephs, so these aren’t included, but
Powell has worked out the birth and death dates for
the Marys and Jesuses. Indeed, he has worked out
the conception dates too, based on the Rule of
Hermes.
Here’s an easy way to remember much of this. You
can connect the Matthew Gospel with the Solomon
Jesus, who is the carrier of Zarathustra, the King
Stream. You can connect the Luke Gospel with the
Nathan Jesus, who is the carrier of Adam and
Krishna, the Shepherd Stream. The individuality
whom we follow after the Water Initiation combines
qualities of all these, organized by the powerful
light-radiating crown and fiery heart of the Christ.
These are people who live in human bodies, meet the
daily challenges of bodily cares, and have networks
of relationships with other people. They are human
beings in a more intimate connection with divine
realities. Their deeds, feelings, and thoughts have
been imprinted into the akashic record and are then
available as a resource to us.
Ongoing Star Wisdom Research
The original form of the
Solar Cross work came as two compact discs (CDs),
one with introductory material, and one with the
Images and Commentaries related to that degree.
This method was chosen because the best transfer for
imaginal content is listening, as one would hear
stories around the campfire. This is the healthiest
way for the imagination to grow. Reading engages a
different part of the brain, and a movie definitely
defeats the point as it often overwhelms the
senses. Listening, the old style of learning, comes
back again. The client becomes the audience – from
audio meaning hearing – of one.
Since then Readers in Star
Wisdom have been trained who work with clients on
their Solar Cross Images. We speak the Images, a
few times, to the client, who can then take them in
slowly. As the Readers in Star Wisdom are trained
in the Oracle of the Solar Cross, and can work
through all the details with the client, this is the
best way to encounter this content.
Ongoing research into Star Wisdom can be found at
www.StarWisdom.org. One can order a Solar Cross
reading from this resource center as well.
Reference Works Used Frequently
Many other works have been consulted, and
are not mentioned here if used three times or less
in the bulk of the Oracle of the Solar Crosses. We
give here the abbreviations that we may use in this
book.
ACE
– An abbreviation for Anne Catherine Emmerich,
specifically references the four volumes of The
Life of Jesus Christ and Biblical Revelations: From
the Visions of the Venerable Anne Catherine Emmerich
as recorded in the journals of Clemens Brentano
(Rockford, IL: Tan Books, 1986).
Book with Fourteen Seals – The Book with Fourteen Seals: The Prophet Zarathustra
and the Christ-Revelation, by Andrew Welburn
(Sussex: Rudolf Steiner Press, 1991).
Chronicle
– Chronicle of the Living Christ: The Life &
Ministry of Jesus Christ: Foundations of Cosmic
Christianity, by Robert Powell (Hudson, NY:
Anthroposophic Press, 1996).
Lawlor Voices
– Voices of the First Day: Aboriginal Dreamtime
(Rochester, Vermont: Inner Traditions International,
1991).
Marvels Miracles
– Mysteries Marvels Miracles in the Lives of the
Saints, by Joan Carroll Cruz (Rockford,
Illinois: Tan Books and Publishers, 1997).
Our Heritage – The Book of Our Heritage: The Jewish Year and its Days of
Significance, three volumes, by Eliyahu Kitov (New
York & Jerusalem: Feldheim, revised and expanded
edition, 1997).
Prayers of the Cosmos – Prayers of the Cosmos: Meditations on the Aramaic Words
of Jesus, by Neil Douglas-Klotz (New York:
Harper, 1990).
Prokofieff Encounter
– The Encounter with Evil, and its Overcoming
through Spiritual Science, with Essays on The
Foundation Stone, by Sergei O. Prokofieff
(London: Temple Lodge, 1999).
Seasons of our Joy – Seasons of Our Joy: A Modern Guide to the Jewish Holidays, by
Arthur Waskow (Boston: Beacon, 1982).
Signs in the Heavens
– Signs in the Heavens: A Message for Our Time,
by William Bento, Robert Schiappacasse, and David
Tresemer (Hygiene, Colorado: Sunshine Press, 2000,
now available from
www.StarWisdom.org).
Steiner John
– The Gospel of St. John (Spring Valley, New
York: Anthroposophic Press, 1962, original lectures
1908 in Hamburg).
Steiner Luke
– According to Luke: The Gospel of Compassion and
Love Revealed, by Rudolf Steiner (Great
Barrington, MA: Anthroposophic Press, 2001, original
lectures 1909). This edition has much to recommend
it, including the fine material by Robert McDermott
both before and after the lectures.
Steiner Mark
– Background to the Gospel of St. Mark, by
Rudolf Steiner (London: Rudolf Steiner Press and
Hudson, NY: Anthroposophic Press, 1968, original
lectures 1910-1911).
Steiner Matthew
– Gospel of St. Matthew, by Rudolf Steiner
(London and New York: Rudolf Steiner Publishing and
Anthroposophic Press, 1946, original lectures
1910). As this edition has been superceded by
others, references are made to lecture numbers
rather than page numbers.
Steiner Revelations
– The Book of Revelation and the Work of the
Priest by Rudolf Steiner (London: Rudolf Steiner
Press, 1998). Eighteen lectures from 5 to 20
September 1924.
References to the Christian Bible
For references to Amos, Revelations,
Zechariah, Matthew, and so forth, refer to “books”
of the Hebrew Bible (Old Testament) and the New
Testament.
References that have assisted this research
include: The Harper Collins Study Bible: New
Revised Standard Version: A New Annotated Edition by
the Society of Biblical Literature (New York:
HarperCollins, 1989); The New Oxford Annotated
Bible (Oxford: University Press, 2001, third
edition); Zondervan Handbook to the Bible
(Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan Publishing, third
edition, 1999); The Nag Hammadi Library,
edited by James M. Robinson (San Francisco: Harpers,
1988); Dictionary of Biblical Imagery, edited
by Leland Ryken and others (Downers Grove, Illinois:
InterVarsity Press, 1998); The Interlinear
Hebrew-English Old Testament, three volumes,
edited by Jay P. Green (Lafayette, IN: Sovereign
Grace, 2000); Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance of
the Bible, by James Strong (New York: Abingdon,
1890).
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