Rudolf Steiner (1861-1925) was a modern initiate, who taught about human evolution, the reality of the spiritual worlds and, above all, the transforming power of love. His work provided an impetus for the spiritual renewal of many human activities, including education, agriculture, medicine, economics, philosophy, the arts and religion. Steiner?s original contribution to human knowledge was based on his ability to conduct ?spiritual research?, the investigation of metaphysical dimensions of existence. A natural seer from childhood, he had cultivated his spiritual vision to a high degree, enabling him to speak with authority on previously veiled mysteries of life.

We think of Christmas and Easter on the one hand as integrally associated with the Christian religion, and on the other hand with the rampant consumerism and indulgence that surrounds them. But could it be that they - along with the other key festivals of Michaelmas, Whitsun and St John - are actual spiritual events that exist independently of religious denomination and cultural history? This series of introductory readers brings together excerpts from Steiner?s many talks and writings on the subject of festivals, with each volume featuring an editorial introduction, afterword, commentary and notes.

How can Christmas truly be celebrated as a spiritual event? Steiner explores the image of the Mother and Child, as well as the meaning of the Tree.
164pp, 124mm x 174mm, softback, 2007

Extracts

Love, the Greatest Power
What is it really that we should write in our thoughts - the feelings we can engender in ourselves on this Christmas Eve?

In this Christmas night there should pour into our hearts the fundamental human feeling of love, which says: compared with all other forces, powers and treasures of the world, the treasure, power and force of love is the greatest and loftiest. Into our hearts should pour the feeling that wisdom is a great thing, but love is still greater; that power is a great thing, but love is still greater. And this feeling of the power, force and strength of love should pour into our hearts so strongly that from this Christmas night something may overflow into all our feelings during the rest of the year. Then our deeds at any time throughout the year would shame us if they fall short of the universal power of love we can pour into our souls on Christmas night...

And what must be added to wisdom and power as a third thing and must sink into our souls as something transcending the other two is presented to us as the quality and power through which human evolution proceeds... And if at Christmas an understanding of the feeling of love is rightly awakened in us, if we celebrate this birth of Christ - the awakening of love - then the moment in which we experience it can radiate what we need for the remaining hours and days of the year, flowing through and blessing the wisdom we continually strive for.

Try to awaken in your souls something of the feeling that can come over us when we inwardly realise those impulses of love which must at last, in the distant and still more distant future, come ever closer to us, when the Christ impulse... takes hold on human evolution with ever-increasing power, ever-increasing understanding. For it will only take hold if there are souls who understand its full significance - although in this realm 'understanding' cannot be devoid of love. Love is the fairest thing in human evolution, to which we give birth in our souls this Christmas Eve when we infuse our hearts with that spiritual picture of the Jesus child, cast out by the rest of humanity, cast in a remote corner, born in a stable. Such is the picture of him given to us - as though he comes into evolution from without, and is received by the simplest in spirit, the poor shepherds.

Earth Holds Its Breath
In the yearly cycle of the seasons Christmas comes at a time when the earth is most separate and distinct from the cosmos, most alone with itself - like someone who has breathed in and hold his breath. By analogy once can also say that this midwinter period corresponds to the 'midnight hour' in the cycle of day and night. Of course we can 'sleep' through this period like the rest of dormant nature, but as human beings we also have the opportunity to awaken at this time to our inmost depths, unsustained by the physical realities of external warmth and light.

Today let us consider this seasonal cycle of the earth as a kind of mighty breathing process which the earth carries out in relation to the surrounding cosmos... Of course it is not air that is breathed in and out but rather those forces which are at work, for example, in vegetation - those forces which push the plants out of the earth in spring and withdraw again into the earth in autumn, allowing the green plants to fade and finally paralysing plant growth...

Let us first look at the earth at the time of the winter solstice, in the last third of December. At this time of year we can compare the earth's breathing with that of a person who has inhaled a breath of air and holds it in his lungs. In the same way the earth holds within itself those forces I spoke of as being inhaled and exhaled. At the end of December it holds these forces within itself. And what is happening then with the earth I can outline for you schematically in the following way... We can of course only consider one part of the earth in connection with this breathing. We shall consider that part where we ourselves dwell, in the northern hemisphere; conditions are of course reversed in the southern hemisphere. We must picture the earth's respiration in such a way that one region exhales while the opposite region inhales...

Picture the time of December. At the end of December the earth has breathed in fully and holds within itself the forces I referred to. It has entirely sucked in its soul element, for that is what these forces are. It has drawn this completely into itself in the same way that someone hold breath in himself when he inhales.

This is the time when, for good reason, the birth of Jesus is celebrated, because Jesus is thus born out of an earth force containing the entire soul element of the earth within it.

From Christmas, ?2007 by Rudolf Steiner, published by Sophia Books, an imprint of Rudolf Steiner Press.