ASTRONOMIE UND ANTHROPOSOPHIE

by Dr. Elisabeth Vreede

Philosophisch-Anthroposophischer Verlag, Dornach, 1980.

From: Anthroposophical Newsletter, Autumn 1981

Review of Dr. Elisabeth Vreede by Willi Sucher, Meadow Vista, CA

The hardened remnants of newspaper astrology cry out for a nourishing and renewing content. The fruits of such a revitalizing impulse are amply offered in Dr. Vreede’s work on Astronomy and Anthroposophy. Long out of print, we can all — those who read German — be grateful for the revised edition of an earlier (1954) publication of this comprehensive work. The book contains thirty-seven chapters which originally formed the content of a regular publication, the Rundbrief (Newsletter).

Many years of intensive study and work have shown this work to be of great significance. It reminds us strongly of Rudolf Steiner’s remarks in a lecture on October 10, 1919: “Of the forces that are bringing about the decline of our civilization, the first is the lack of a Cosmogony.” (The other two are lack of Freedom and lack of true Altruism.) He explains Cosmogony as an element which should be developed especially in Western (i.e., English and American) humanity.

Elisabeth Vreede, appointed by Steiner to head the Mathematical-Astronomical Section at the Goetheanum, offers in great detail most aspects of modern astronomy and indicates how they can be understood and worked with in a positive way through Rudolf Steiner’s Science of the Spirit. There is hardly a field of modern astronomical knowledge which is not investigated.

In addition to the astronomical perspectives, Dr. Vreede presents positive approaches to a new astrology. According to traditional astrology, we are for the most part seen as a helpless product of the universe of stars. The new astrology indicates that we can develop our inner, spiritual potential to the point where we will be able to become a cooperating member of the starry universe.

Dr. Vreede describes how this has become possible since the Christ event. Christ introduced into humanity the beginnings of a slow but certain maturing of the human being so that we will be able to receive the impact of the stars for creative and even, eventually, healing activities. From this we can understand Steiner’s warning remark, “If the connection of the Earth with the extra-terrestrial world is not comprehended again in a spiritual sense, the Mystery of Golgotha cannot live on into the future.”

Some of the most significant perspectives in Dr. Vreede’s book are in the chapters concerning the soul’s connection with the world of the stars at the moment of death and during the following stages of passing through the spheres of the cosmos. Life after death has become in modern humanity a meaningless perspective. Rudolf Steiner, however, has opened the gates to a new, positive understanding of existence and the movement of the human soul through the spheres of the planets and beyond, after its departure from the Earth. On the basis of Steiner’s indications, it was possible to work out concrete details of these post-death experiences. Dr. Vreede describes in her book the foundations of this insight, and in later years they form the groundwork for the beginnings of astrosophy, for a star wisdom that no longer needs rely on astrological tradition.

The book includes chapters on the daily movement in the celestial sphere, the threefold sun, astrology in light of the arts, the future of astrology, the horoscope, comets, shooting stars and meteorites, the spiritual essence of the stars, and Copernicus, Kepler, and their systems. Dr. Vreede’s work can indeed be experienced as a gateway to an active and creative wisdom of the stars which we will need increasingly to bring a renewed, creative perspective into our existence within the cosmos.