FIFTH LETTER - August 1944 The Spiritual Nature of the Fixed-Star Zodiac (continued) In the previous two letters we elaborated some of the twelve constellations of the Zodiac according to the events of the Ancient Saturn evolution. Now we must finish this picture by describing the seventh great cycle of this planetary existence of our universe. During the preceding six cycles, a being had been created that consisted of warmth, bore the semblance of life, animation, individualization, and showed the first traces of an inner life. Now in the last and seventh cycle, this being appears to have reached a certain completion within this great round of evolution. Its actions are automatic and in accordance with the events and activities that take place in its environment. Different spiritual beings once more have a possibility to penetrate these heat beings with their forces. These are the Spirits of Will who were already mentioned in connection with the beginning of Ancient Saturn evolution. In the beginning they sacrificed their Will-substance, and this substance became the foundation for the activities of the other spiritual beings. This substance also became the foundation of the physical substance of heat or warmth that was created within Ancient Saturn. In fact, it is the origin of all physical substances that have been created in later stages of creation. After this Will-substance has been transmuted into warmth, the Spirits of Will are again able to work into the heat beings, which are the origin of the human physical body today. So the beginning of this great round of cosmic creation is connected with the end, and, thereby, the events reveal the inner meaning of the whole world existence in the midst of which we are today. During this last cycle on Ancient Saturn, the Spirits of Will created, within these heat bodies, capacities that even today cannot be developed consciously by the human being but still slumber and have to wait for a distant future of cosmic evolution. In order to describe this, we have to start from another end. We described this phase of evolution in letters three and four as it can be read in the constellations of Ram, Bull, Twins, Archer, Goat, and Waterman, with Crab and Lion in the background. Also, we found its traces in the human form, in the head or brain, the larynx or speech-and-sound organization, and in the arms with upper arm, elbow, and lower arm. The last cycle of the Saturn evolution can be found written into the constellation of Fishes. The constellation of Fishes is visible, during the midnight hours at Michaelmas, exactly above the southern horizon. The constellations of Andromeda and Pegasus are above it. Thus we come back again to the beginning of Ancient Saturn, and as we found the sacrifice of the Spirits of Will written into Fishes, so we now find their activity during the last cycle indicated in Fishes. Within the human form it is pictured in the hands. The two hands are an image of the two Fishes that swim in the sky in opposite directions, yet are connected by a faint ribbon of stars. With our hands we work in the world. All the achievements of art, science, building, as well as the millions and millions of small deeds that make human life on Earth possible, have, in the last resort, been brought about by human hands. They have been and are constantly flowing down from human heads into hands. If we once try to imagine the vast amount of human labor of all kinds that has been done in the past and which will be done in the future, we can look with admiration and reverence at the human hand. However, we do not know how it happens that our thoughts are realized by our hands, or how it is possible that we can handle the pan or the spade. This is still hidden from our day consciousness. But we could imagine a future condition of the human being in which we would be conscious of what goes on when we move our arms and limbs and work with our hands. We can even imagine that sometime the human being will be able to use the hidden faculties in the hands for radiating forces that today are only indicated by the form of the hand. In fact, we meet our destiny with our hands. The hands are that part of our organism with which we are constantly confronting the world. Meeting the world with the reality of our working hands, we meet our destiny. Destiny appears to most human beings as something that hovers above them, which is foreign to them and that takes them in the one direction or the other by surprise. It is experienced like a superhuman will power. As we have now found the connection between the hands and Fishes and read behind Fishes the deeds of the Spirits of Will, we can see working behind Fishes, also in our hands, the cosmic Will forces that we call the forces of destiny. In the way in which we experience those Will forces today is hidden the last trace of the mirror-like Will forces of our Ancient Saturn ancestors, as described above. We can also imagine that one day, in a very distant future, we shall be able to be one with those Will forces that are still foreign and incomprehensible to us; that we, in full consciousness, could fulfill what the cosmic Will desires to do through us. Then we would be “God like”. We would be united with the Will of the Father-God. This capacity, which can only ripen in us in the future, was put as a spiritual seed into those Saturn heat-beings by the activity of the Spirits of Will. Rudolf Steiner calls it the germ of Spirit I, or Spirit Man. This we can find written into the constellation of Fishes: the Will-substance of the Spirits of Will in the beginning of the world evolution, its crystallization into “Earth” and “destiny”, which we experience most directly with our hands, and the germ of union with the Will of the Father in a fully conscious and fully active way. Thus we have now found the ethereal image of humanity as it was created by the Gods and its connection with the universe of the stars. It is an image of the upper human being, the head with the brain, speech and sound organization, and arms — right down into the hands. It is also an image of the destiny of the world and the human being (as the Will of the hierarchies when the world was created), the thinking and the witnessing of the thoughts of the Gods in all that surrounds us, and their realization in Earth existence until the Will of the Father is awake and active in the will of the human being. This ether image of the upper human being is an image of one's higher being. It does not enter, in reality, into the bodily being, it only creates a semblance within the body. In the Middle Ages one will still find that the human being faintly experienced the Angelic Beings in the spiritual world in this way; Beings with heads only, without a body, and with wings instead of arms. Raphael Santi, for instance, painted them like this in the Madonna Sistina. It is an image of what human beings will become in the future when they have acquired more subtle and ethereal forms of existence. As shown below, we have achieved a picture of the link between the human being, the starry universe, and the world evolution: ANCIENT SATURN I Reflection of Life Ram Head — Brain II Refection of Animation Bull Speech Sound Organism III Reflection of Individualization and Personality Twins Arms — Symmetry IV Human Beings Archer Upper Arms V Primeval Sense Organs Goat Elbows VI Primeval Metabolism Waterman Lower Arms VIII Will Fishes Hands The question can arise: what has happened to the five other constellations of the Zodiac — Crab, Lion, Virgin, Scales, Scorpion? As we have already seen in connection with the creation of the primeval sense organs and the primeval metabolism, aided by the Angels and Archangels, these constellations are an image of “inner life”, but, as there is only a semblance of life within those heat bodies on Ancient Saturn, the five constellations from Crab to Scorpion are still, so to speak, in the background. They are veiled in the clouds of the cycles of evolution that follow Ancient Saturn. They manifest themselves later when the human being is able to acquire life and animation. We must imagine them standing “behind” the events on Ancient Saturn, revealing the highest motives and the innermost experiences of the Gods. In the following description of the characteristics of the twelve constellations of the Zodiac, according to Ancient Saturn evolution, we shall nevertheless, undertake to elaborate the five “missing” constellations in order that we may have a more or less complete picture. Explanations will follow in later letters. The constellations of the Zodiac are the chronicle or record of the creation. The imprints that have been made into these spheres of the universe are still working through the visible constellations. The destiny of the world appears there as the planets move in front of the constellations. The human being can be a witness of that which is the outer expression of the Will of the world, thus trying to understand and comprehend the Will, or, if one does not want to become a witness, become subject to the Will — meaning, subject to the forces of destiny. To try to understand and comprehend the Will of the world means to step along the path that leads toward freedom. Therefore, it will become more and more necessary to listen to the language of the stars in order to hear the Will of the world — the Will of the Father — which has its visible expressions in the movements of the stars. Thus we will not hear our “destiny” or our unchangeable fate, but we will hear our spiritual tasks on Earth. We can then perceive them in the sphere of active thinking, or spiritual activity. It is the sphere where we can achieve freedom, or freehood, in our present age of civilization. We can already try to read the script of the stars as the planets move through the constellations of the Zodiac. Of course, we can only find general indications so far, because the various planets do not always form the same “letter” as they pass in front of the constellations. The different planets modify their character according to the character and special activity of the planet that is in front of a certain constellation. The Constellation of Ram If anything happens in the constellation of Ram — if one or several planets are in this constellation — it means that a new impulse desires to come into the world. We are then reminded to open our eyes for something new, a new age of humanity, new aspects of life, or perhaps even new inventions that will bring about a change in our earthly life. It may still be hidden and we may have to seek it, but it may be like a message of the spiritual world to the beings on Earth to listen to changed conditions, to ask new questions and to do new tasks. This, for instance, happened in the times preceding the birth of Christ when the prophets of the Hebrew people spoke of Christ's coming. Then in the 8-9th century BC, when the prophet Elias lived as the great Forerunner of the Christ event, the vernal point was about in the center of the Ram. The Constellation of Bull Events in Bull call, so to speak, for cosmic “animation”. They are mostly a reminder that we have to break through walls of tradition and routine that may have been piled up by previous ages. Impulses and new aspects, which may have been born in silence and human loneliness, want to shape themselves into reality. It is as though the vowels and consonants of a new language, which hitherto were not known, have to be learnt and practiced in life. If humanity or the single human being does not respond to the call of Bull, then the cosmic forces “animate” evolution by means of catastrophes; for instance, the Thirty Years War started when Saturn was in the constellation of Bull, and it came to an end when Saturn was there again. In those times, even still today, humanity had a certain task that it did or did not wish to understand, and the result was the Thirty Years War. About this special task we shall have to speak later. The Constellation of Twins Star events in Twins indicate that humanity should awaken for tasks and quests in connection with the development of ego-forces. When Jesus was born ([Midnight] 24th of December, 1 BC), Saturn had entered Twins, and 30 years later, at the time of the Baptism in the Jordan when the “I AM” entered the body of Jesus, Saturn was again in Twins. It was then the task of humanity to witness the life of Christ on Earth. Only a few did it, but they were enough to carry the stream of human evolution further. Just in these days (August 1944) Saturn has again entered the constellation of Twins. Again humanity will be confronted with the task of cognition of the “I AM of the World”, only on a higher level. Let us hope that enough human beings will listen to the call of the spiritual world. The Constellation of Crab In previous descriptions we have seen that Crab is connected with the creation of the sense organs within Ancient Saturn evolution. It was an interplay between the Spirits of Love and the Archangels, or in the language of the stars, Goat and Crab. Thus events in Crab are calling for “life in the senses”. We are then asked to direct our attention toward that which we can perceive with our senses in the world of matter. If we can do this without any prejudice, then we will be able to perceive the deepest mysteries of the universe. We can then perceive the mystery of death and rebirth in all spheres of life. This happened in the time of Christ's life on Earth. At that time, even in the moment of the Mystery of Golgotha, Saturn was in the constellation of Crab. There the Kingdom of Heaven was open even to the world of human senses, because the God was present in a physical body that could be seen with the eyes, and God's Words could be heard with ears — the Godhead could be approached not only in the spiritual world. Thereby, in the Mystery of the Death on Golgotha and the Resurrection, the rejuvenation of the whole universe could be perceived by a few who were awake. Others who were not awake in their senses could only see death and destruction. This happens if the call of Crab is not heard, as it took place in the event of the destruction of Jerusalem (70 AD) when Mars was in Crab. The Constellation of Lion Events in Lion ask for the opening of the human heart toward the language of the universe. We have found Lion connected with the primeval metabolism on Ancient Saturn, where the Spirits of Harmony together with the Angels established the digestion of warmth within those heat beings. These were like cosmic hearts through which the Gods could perceive the harmonies of the worlds. Thus Lion still acts in this manner today. It asks the human being to transmute itself into a great heart, into a kind of cosmic musical instrument through which the stream of the universal existence can flow and create a new harmony of the spheres. This is the language of Lion: that all existing beings want to be awakened and reborn in the human “heart-perception”. Many great individualities in the spiritual history of humanity have, each in their own way, answered this call as they were connected by their birth with Lion. Among them are the famous poet Novalis, H.P. Blavatzky, and Rudolf Steiner. They all have Saturn in Lion at the time of their birth. The Constellation of Virgin The Virgin is opposite the constellation of Fishes. The sacrifice of Will-substance by the Spirits of Will, which became the foundation of all physical matter, is connected with Fishes. Therefore, if we look at the constellation of Fishes — and even more at Virgin — we are at the gate to the mysteries of substance and matter. As these mysteries are, still today, not within easy reach of the human being, events in Virgin ask very much from human beings. They ask for the highest devotion and love toward the spiritual world and the world of physical existence. An inner attitude has to be developed there; for instance, that which Goethe had when he looked at the world that the senses presented to him and which enabled him to experience the “Urpflanze” —  #160;the archetypal plant. There the correct attitude must be found in which to develop meditation and also religious sacrament. The mystery of substance and also of transubstantiation can thus be found. The mysteries of transubstantiation, as they take place in the working of the powers of destiny, can reveal themselves if the human being cultivates the hidden capacities of the soul. The Last Supper took place when the Moon was in Virgin. This does not mean that Christ's deeds were dependent upon the constellations or the stars, but it reveals a new attitude toward the stars that came into the world through Christ. Today we are still far from this attitude; we can only learn it step by step. Our starry universe has become a mechanism, the movements of which we can calculate like the structure and the movements of a machine. Yet Christ while on Earth has written deeds and words into the events of this mechanical universe so that it is rejuvenated. Thereby Christ impressed into this position of Moon in Virgin, the new mystery of transubstantiation that was founded by Christ for the sake of the future of humanity. Since then the Moon may have gone thousands of times through the constellation of Virgin and nothing important may have been done within the family of humanity. However, that it has happened once may give humanity in future the possibility to fill this constellation with new spiritual content that will not be calculated but which will be the result of human deeds of moral imagination. In the preceding descriptions of the constellations of the Zodiac, a few planets — Saturn, Mars, Moon — have been mentioned. They should only be regarded as examples. The significance and the activities of the planets have still to be worked out in further letters. So far, they should only be taken as indicators, as the hands on the big clock of our universe. They are acting like mediators between the Zodiac and the Earth. The character of the zodiacal influence is modified according to the different planets that are in these constellations. Saturn certainly has quite a different power of modification than, for instance, Mars or Moon. But these modifications have still to be worked out in detail.