IN the 1920s, Rudolf Steiner created a sort of liturgy of the natural and spiritual year in the form of fifty-two short verses. Experience—my own and others—testifies to the powerful effect that a short meditation on the relevant verse throughout the course of the year can have in respect to awakening and sensitizing the soul to each season’s unique quality and gesture.
Below is Dr. Steiner’s original Seelenkalender, or “Calendar of the Soul” verse for this week followed by my translation into English. I have opted to follow, whenever a conflict arose, the spirit over the letter in my translation efforts, attempting to convey the “mood” before the propositional content.
THIRTY-NINTH WEEK OF THE YEAR 39. An Geistesoffenbarung hingegeben Gewinne ich des Weltenwesens Licht. Gedankenkraft, sie wächst Sich klärend mir mich selbst zu geben, Und weckend löst sich mir Aus Denkermacht das Selbstgefühl. ∇∆ SURRENDERED to the Spirit’s revelation I receive the firstborn gift of Light. the power of thought within me wakes and waxes my self prepared for an oblation, now from clouds of self-willed thinking, a condensation: the I that knows itself