by Rev. Michaël Merle

In Chapter 21 of The Revelation to John (The Book of the Apocalypse: Revelation) we read part of the description of the New Jerusalem, a picture of a mighty vision experienced by John in the Spiritual World: “The city has a great and high wall and twelve gates. And on the gates twelve angels, and names were written on them: the names of the twelve tribes of the sons of Israel.” (verse 12)
 
This year we hope to uncover an understanding of the twelve ways in which we can enter the New Jerusalem.

 The way of Zebulun 

Zebulun is a merchant: a trader and businessperson, whose work generates economic growth – a growing commonwealth of enterprise and initiative. His role is to enter the marketplace and redeem the Divine sparks within the material world. This task is described in Deuteronomy as making manifest “the affluence of the seas and the hidden treasures of the sand.”

Zebulun, as one of the twelve, is closely associated with his brother Issachar. Issachar and Zebulun are the last two sons of Leah (Jacob’s first wife). These two sons were born after she had consumed mandrakes from the field to make herself fertile to bear Jacob more sons. From this fertility came two brothers who remained connected and close. Zebulun complements Issachar: they forge a partnership. Zebulun supports the scholar, he funds houses of scholarship, which earns him a right to partake in the reward of Issachar’s studies. This picture well captures the principle that should work in society: the fruit of the fraternal work of the economic sphere should fund the work of study undertaken freely in the sphere of our human liberty. The first Waldorf school was founded on this model. Emil Molt, out of his business enterprise, funded the school for free thinking and future entrepreneurship. This made it possible for everyone who desired such an education to receive it without costs being a barrier. This remarkable connection of the spheres of fraternity and liberty is captured in the archetypal partnership of Zebulun and Issachar.

Report by John-Peter Gernaat
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Stephanie Georgieff presented a talk on Friday 8 September 2023 on the etheric geography of Africa. Stephanie was visiting Johannesburg in transit to Namibia where she was to hold a two-week workshop and safari on the topic of the search for the Sacred Origins of Africa.

Stephanie pointed to the work of Rudolf Steiner on the understanding that the seven planets, as we here in Johannesburg know well, were recognised by the Ancient Sumerians – the Sun, Moon, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn, gifted the earth with the seven base metals. This is an understanding that originated in the ancient world for which Rudolf Steiner presented an imagination of the formative processes. The sun gifted the earth with gold. There are ancient African traditions that connect the story of creation to the influence of the sun. Stephanie draws a correlation with the abundance of gold in southern Africa to the ancient wisdom of the sun connection to Africa.

Stephanie draws on the research and writings of Dean Liprini (https://sacredsitesfoundation.co.za/) who proposes that ancient peoples in the western Cape created a very large network of rock artifacts that align with the light of the rising and setting sun of the Solstices and the Equinoxes. Through this Stephanie proposes a further connection of the ancient African peoples to the sun and an understanding of the movements of the heavens above them.

Stephanie draws on the work by Robert Powell (Robert A. Powell, PhD, is an internationally known lecturer, author, eurythmist, and movement therapist) who connects the seven planets to the seven continents and assigns Jerusalem and Golgotha to the be the heart of the world. If one assigns chakra points to the earth, then Golgotha would be the heart chakra of the earth. Powell connects Golgotha with Africa and this makes Africa the heart chakra of the earth. The sun as the centre of the solar system can be connected with the heart chakra. Africa receives the most amount of sunshine hours of all the continents. The lion is connected with heart and with the spirituality of Africa.

Through these associations Stephanie refers to Africa as the Golden Heart of the world.

What arises for me is the question that, if the picture presented by Stephanie is true about the etheric geography of Africa, how does this work into the soul life of the inhabitants of Africa and how can we, as The Christian Community in Africa, connect with these Golden Heart soul forces to present ourselves as the movement in the renewal of religion for those whose religious connection is with these Golden Heart soul forces?

​Reported by John-Peter Gernaat
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On Saturday afternoon Stephanie presented this talk for the Anthroposophical Society in Johannesburg at the Steiner Centre at the Michael Mount Waldorf School. Stephanie offered a 24-page paper to those who attended the talk in which she details fully the thoughts that she shared in the talk. This is the briefest summary of the talk Stephanie presented.

There are three motivators for Stephanie to the activities we should develop for the Apocalypse. Firstly, as she explains in the book she has written on The Virgin of Guadalupe, the statement the Virgin makes in her apparitions, that is “Where are you going?”. Secondly, the lockdown during the 2020 pandemic. Lastly, a comment at a Waldorf conference where a speaker answered a question that there were so many people on earth at the present time because something important must be happening.

The word Apocalypse has been taken by modern society as relating to ‘the end’ or the ‘end times’. In fact, the meaning of the word is ‘revelation’, something is being revealed.

Stephanie referred to the development of the human being that is occurring as a result of the human being “eating of the fruit of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil” too early in our journey into physical matter. This required a different path for the developing human being. In understanding the human being Stephanie referenced the fourfold, sevenfold and ninefold human being as described by Rudolf Steiner. The process of developing these various constituents of the Future Human Being is the process of healing the sickness introduced into humanity through The Fall.

Humanity develops through the seven Post-Atlantean Epochs. Through each epoch we develop a new aspect of the Future Human Being. We can understand something of this development through the letters written by the Angel to the Seven Churches in the second and third chapters of the Book of Revelation. Each Church represents a different epoch of the Post Atlantean times. In the talk, Stephanie touched briefly on the last three of the seven letters that represent our current epoch and the two epochs to follow. In her paper she expounded a little more on these letters and their significance.

The Mystery of Golgotha occurred in the Fourth Post-Atlantean Epoch, at the time of the development of the Intellectual or Mind Soul. The Fifth Post-Atlantean Epoch is the time during which humanity develops the Consciousness Soul and we are in the early stages of this development.

In the period between the Crucifixion and the Resurrection we learn through Rudolf Steiner that Christ penetrated to the core of the earth laying ‘seeds’ for the future healing transformation of the earth. Robert Powell (referred to in the talk on the Golden Heart of Africa) considers that in the appearance of Christ in the Etheric, the Etheric Christ has been penetrating the layers of the earth. He pictures this as having begun with the bombing of Hiroshima and, in a cycle of twelve years, the Etheric Christ has penetrated successive layers so that now he is at the layer that Rudolf Steiner refers to as “The Divisive Layer”. The Etheric Christ is asking for humanity to accompany Him in a collaboration to transform and heal the earth layer by layer. The beings that are collaborating with the Etheric Christ are Michael and Sophia and this forms part of our task in this time, as one of the activities of the Apocalypse.

As we work towards the future where we will transform the Astral Body, the Etheric Body and the Physical Body into the higher transformed aspects of the Future Human Being we are to “engage in forgiveness, deep, true, profound and healing forgiveness” to quote Stephanie. We are to “fill our thoughts with spiritual pursuits, artistic activities and the like” and we should “act morally and lovingly towards other”. “We are to develop our faith, love and hope … to meet our destiny as the tenth hierarchy in order to facilitate the transformation of the Cosmos of Wisdom into the Cosmos of Love.” “The spiritual world has invested deeply in us, is there to assist us, but we must out of our own wills, our own moral imagination and our own hearts, consciously and freely choose to meet the Cosmic Christ for that ultimate supper of destiny.” In these activities we actively participate in the Apocalypse.

​Reported by John-Peter Gernaat
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Stephanie presented a talk on the Evangelist Mark on Sunday 10 September. As with her other talks she has accompanied the talk with a paper sent to those who attended the talk.

In her paper, Stephanie goes to some lengths in describing the source material she has read for this talk and her perspective on Mark the Evangelist. She relies heavily on the work by Rev. Hermann Beckh, one of the founding priests of The Christian Community, on Mark. “Beckh shows how each story and event in the Gospel of Mark happened during a particular aspect of the Zodiac and is illustrative of the initiation of the Disciples who in turn would pass on these mysteries to humanity” is a direct quote from Stephanie’s paper. “… throughout the Gospel, Mark was constructing a cosmic tableau, documenting the events of three Solar Cycles, which the Ministry of Christ as we know is Three Years, illustrating the entire mission as every event occurring during a different aspect of the Zodiac. Mark begins with events that inspire imagination, the next solar cycle of events inspires imagination, and the final cycle of events inspires intuition.”  [For additional information that may prove useful in understanding the connection of the Zodiacal path in relation to the chronology of Mark’s Gospel here is some information from Hermann Beckh: Beckh tells us that the zodiac-sign of the Lion stands in the comic rhythm of Mark’s Gospel differently from the normal arrangement. As we read the whole gospel in the manner of a spiritual starry script, the Sun as the accompanying ‘planet’ of Leo, is in its own house, the sun has its own home, and the Lion is the esoteric sign of the Sun-rhythm. The other signs of the Zodiac are considered exoteric. Leo, the Sun, is the inner centre of the cosmic rhythm of Mark’s Gospel, and the Lion is the heart for this rhythm. The Sun transforms and sparks life in plants, it facilitates fermentation and so on, it is a great symbol of transubstantiation. The Lion becomes the sign of cosmic change, of metamorphoses, of transubstantiation.]

The Gospel of Mark begins at the Baptism in the Jordan and ends with the Resurrection. Some scholars argue that this gospel ended at chapter 15 and the Resurrection narrative was later added from other sources. Later in the talk Stephanie spoke a little more on the gospel itself.

A motif that is strongly present for Stephanie is the connection of the lion with Mark. The prophet Ezekiel describes the Cherubim, the living beings, in his vision of the heavenly chariot, as having four faces: that of a man, a lion, an ox and an eagle. These images are very ancient and were envisioned by the ancient Sumerians as the lamassu, beings that had the head of man, the body of a bull and a lion and the wings of an eagle. The lamassu were horned indicating that they had a connection to the spiritual world. The Four Living Beings are again described around the Throne of God in the Book of Revelation. The evangelists have been connected with these images from the earliest times and Mark was connected with the lion, Luke with the bull, Matthew with the man and John with the eagle.

The link of Mark to the lion also forms part of the legends that exist about Mark. Mark is said to have faced down a lion as young man while walking with his father along the River Jordan in the wilderness regions.

Stephanie presented several stories of the life of Mark. About his origins she told: “Mark was born approximately 12 AD. He was born in Cyrenaic Africa, which is in modern Libya. He is considered to be of the Tribe of Levi, and his family were merchants who escaped the oppression of Roman occupied Jerusalem and set up their lives in Cyrene. He was related to Simon Peter, who many feel actually dictated the Gospel to Mark as he was quite young when many of the events of Christ’s life were happening. Because of this, it is very likely that Mark travelled frequently to Jerusalem for holy days and family events. He was educated in Greek and Hebrew cultures, likely spoke both languages and also Aramaic. Mark is known to have visited Peter in Capernaum on many occasions.” “Eventually, things got tense in Cyrene, as the Ethnic Greek population took out their frustrations on the group they thought of as “other,” the Jews living in the region, which meant Mark’s family eventually returned to Jerusalem when he was a teenager. With the family’s close relatives associating with Jesus during his ministry, this is how the connections and conversions occurred between Mark and his parents and the Disciples and followers of Jesus.”

We learn about his travels after the Resurrection for the Act and the Epistles of the Apostles. Mark is held by the Coptic Church as being its founder and there are stories of Mark in the Coptic traditions. Another source that tells us of Mark is The Golden Legend: Readings on the Saints, a Medieval compilation of legends and extra-scriptural tales. In some Coptic traditions the young man in white describes as standing on the right in the empty tomb on Easter Sunday in Marks Gospel is considered to be Mark himself. In Coptic scripture, a young man is described as having stayed with Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane and fled without his clothes, and this young man is considered to have been Mark. He followed Jesus throughout the night and the next day and was there to report to the women who come to the tomb that Jesus has risen.

To quote directly: “There are extensive documentations of the relations between Mark and Peter in the Gospels, some of the Epistles and especially in the Acts of the Apostles. In the Book of Acts, we are told that Mark was the cousin or nephew of Barnabas and accompanied him on his missionary journeys. Mark’s mother was closely related to Barnabas, Barnabas brought both Paul and Mark into the mission to the Gentiles in Antioch. Barnabas and Mark’s mother were generous to the earliest disciples, offering hospitality and resources to them. Traditionally, it is thought that the Last Supper and the Upper Room event where Christ appeared to the Disciples after his resurrection were in the house of Mark’s mother.”

From the Golden Legend we learn that Peter sent Mark to Alexandria to preach the Good News. Philo (a learned Jew) tells us that “a great multitude was brought together in faith and devotion and the practice of continence.” Tradition places this at 49CE. The Coptic Orthodox Church, the Greek Orthodox Church of Alexandria, and the Coptic Catholic Church all trace their origins to this original community. The Golden Legend tell us that Mark uncovered a plot against his life and ordained a man by the name of Anianus, whom he had healed, as Bishop of Alexandria and himself went to Pentapolis. Two years later he returned to Alexandria to build a church of the rocks near the sea. On Easter Sunday he laid hold of by the conspirators and dragged through the city and throw in jail. In prison an angel ministered to him. He was martyred and buried in Alexandria. In 468CE the Byzantine Emperor Leo I gave Mark’s body to the Venetians who placed it in the cathedral that now bears his name. St Mark’s Square in Venice is adorned with statues of the winged lion.

Mark’s connection to Africa comes through his birth and his apostolate in Africa, through the connection to the lion, both as a symbol of African tradition and through a tradition that the four beings cover the earth as a cross with the eagle in the north, the lion in the south, the bull in the east and eagle in the west.

In describing the nature of Mark’s Gospel, Stephanie says: “One of the terms I absolutely LOVE which is given to Christ is that he is the ‘Sublime Being of the Sun’. The Lion, or Leo is the Esoteric Sign of the Sun. In Anthroposophical Medical Theory, the heart receives energy from the sun, the beats so to speak are there to stop the blood so it can become etherised by the sun. Here Stephanie draws the connection between the sun, the lion, Mark and Africa.

by John-Peter Gernaat
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In September we studied chapters 2 and 3 of John’s Gospel. Firstly we encountered John’s focus on the festival of the Passover. He uses this as a pointer towards the important deed of Christ on Good Friday.

We studied the cleansing of the temple. We came to understand a dual translation of the same Greek word. Greek has a very different word for the Temple of Solomon and for Sanctuary within the Temple. Yet, the word for Sanctuary is sometimes translated as Temple and sometimes as Sanctuary. When we use the correct translation and realise that Christ is cleansing the Sanctuary (the place of sacrifice) and not the Temple, a new understanding arises. The sacrifice of animals, the sacrifice of Abel that was acknowledged by the spiritual world, is coming to an end and a new sacrifice will replace it. For this reason the animals are cleansed from the Sanctuary. There is a second understanding that we gain from the Old Testament that the sacrifice made in the sanctuary is made freely and therefore the concept of trade for a sacrificial animal is anathema.

We learned about the building of Solomons Temple in 46 years. This is a symbolic number of forty and six. Forty is the period of gestation (40 weeks for a human being) and the number for initiation (something new coming into the world). The number six is the number of creation – in six days God created the world and on the seventh day He rested. Christ introduces a new number for creation: the number 3, the number of the Divine. This number was new to the Jewish people who were monotheist in their understanding of the divine.

We studied the conversation that Nicodemus has with Jesus at night. Jesus recognises the true standing of Nicodemus when he says in John 3:10 “You are THE teacher among the leaders”. The indefinite article is generally used in translation, which does not recognise Nicodemus’ true position. Jesus tells Nicodemus that the human being needs to gain a new insight of what it means to be on the earth in our relationship to the place from which we have come. We are beings with a spiritual existence that enter into an earthly existence. We are not earthly beings hoping to gain a spiritual existence. It is when we recognise our spiritual nature that the Kingdom of God is revealed in us. This birth of a recognition of our spiritual nature must occur in our earthly life.

We also came to a deeper understanding of possibly the most well-known words in scripture: “For God so loved the world that He gave his only begotten Son”.

And we studied the last witnessing of John the Baptist (described at the end of Chapter 3) whose primary mission was to bear witness to the Christ.

A report for September 2023 by John-Peter Gernaat
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“Tell me about your church!” This is something we may be asked to do periodically by people who are friends or who are strangers. I am asked by people who arrive at the church gate and by people who agree to take a stall at the Ferndale Community Market. How does one answer this question?

I had a friend, now deceased, who was a Roman Catholic. He could answer every question about his church. The Catholic Church offers catechism all the way through school (Encyclopaedia Britannica: Catechism a manual of religious instruction usually arranged in the form of questions and answers used to instruct …) Catholics know the theology and the dogma of Catholicism and can recite it to anyone asking. Most Christian denomination have a fairly robust instruction for those entering the church as children or youth or as new converts.

The Christian Community does not have a dogma and engages congregants on the level of thinking. We do not have a catechism that we ask people to know by rote. Yet, we have a very strong theology. Our theology is contained in our sacraments and rituals and is most profoundly heard in the Act of Consecration of the Human Being.

I learned something during the Covid lockdown when the Africa Seminary could not meet in person and Reingard and Michaël offered a study of the Lord’s Prayer. Although I have prayed it as many days as I have been alive and have read a few commentaries on it, it required a little prompting for the knowledge I had to fall into place like puzzle pieces to reveal the power that is contained in this universal prayer.

The study on the theology expressed in the Act of the Consecration of the Human Being is achieving the same in providing a full understanding of the theology of The Christian Community and a more precise way of answering my opening question.

The third study still looked at the first three sentences said by the celebrant in the Sanctury before taking the three steps to the altar. Part of this study reflected on our understanding of the Deed of Christ. Is the deed of Christ his death on the cross and his resurrection? In previous studies (e.g. The True Nature of the Second Coming of the Christ by Rev. Michaël Merle in August 2021) we have considered the pre-earthly sacrifices and deeds of Christ. Immediately it becomes clear that the Deed of Christ is larger that any one of the deeds that Christ offered for humanity. When we understand the Deed of Christ, we see that salvation is a part of the Deed from the beginning. So, we begin to understand the theology of The Christian Community, and what lights up is how different it is from most other Christian theologies. Others see salvation as the purpose of Christ’s deed on Golgotha.

While studying the Christ we turned to the words said by the celebrant when facing the congregation. These are words spoken from the Realm of the Spirit through the celebrant to us. “Christ in you”, is a statement, a reminder to each of us. It is a reality that we understand. Yet, it is very different to most other Christian theologies where the understanding and the wish is for Christ to be with you. This is a fundamental difference in our theological understanding.

The next study, and future studies, will begin to penetrate further our theological understanding of the Divine Trinity. We began by considering together the words spoken with the first of the crosses we inscribed over our forehead and the first part of the Trinity Epistle. What does it mean when we say: “The Father God be in us” and “Conscious of humanity we feel the Father God …”. The beingness of the Father God that we become conscious of through our humanity differs from many other denominations. Our being is inseparable from the Being of the Father God. The Father God is being, He is not a Being. This is a profound idea.

This also makes it is easy to understand how people today struggle with the concept of a Father God as a discrete Being living somewhere in a place called Heaven, with no Google Map to finding Heaven. This naive image drives people away from religion because they struggle to connect with it. The word ‘religion’ means to re-connect, to reconnect to our source. When religions create pictures in which it is difficult to find a connection, one understands how they no longer serve the purpose of reconnecting the human being to the Divine.

In delving into each concept held in the Act of Consecration of the Human Being the words that have been heard many times become connected to the understanding that has been brought by our many priests over the years. Suddenly, and sometimes only for a brief moment, a clear picture emerges of our theology, that so clearly answers the question as to what The Christian Community, Movement for Religious Renewal is.