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.
FORTY-SIXTH WEEK OF THE YEAR 46. Die Welt, sie drohet zu betäuben Der Seele eingebor'ne Kraft; Nun trete du, Erinnerung, Aus Geistestiefen leuchtend auf Und stärke mir das Schauen, Das nur durch Willenskräfte Sich selbst erhalten kann. ∇∆ THE world threatens to confound the soul’s self-knowledge, to dust the recollection of herself compound; therefore, I call on thee, O memory! stand thou forth from the mind’s dark ground: arise! and with thy shining lantern held aloft promise to redeem my feeble sight with the power of thy self-sustaining light
liturgy of the seasons (46)
Does the calendar of the seasons work the same for both hemispheres?