If we are unfamiliar with the work of a man like Rudolf Steiner, for instance, all that means is that we have no thought images of the information contained in his lectures. It is pointless for any of us to try to convince each other about the truth of Steiner's teachings. We can't see each other's reasoning because we only have your own thinking habits, our own memory pictures, by which to make sense of the words. Michael is saying to us: let me help you create some thought pictures that you can share with each other. He says: if you put some effort into it, if you can raise yourself above the superficial meaning of things I will enliven your thinking, I will enliven the pictures in your memory and enrich them so that they become living images, imaginations that you can experience.

Then we don't need to convince anyone about anything that they have not experienced themselves. We must realise that we cannot reason with someone who does not share our thought pictures, our images. What actually happens when a thought picture is not shared is that we rely on our feelings. If we try to present our reasoning to the other person to convince them of something, then it is their feelings - not their thinking - which guide them to accept what you say. If they cannot see your images, they resort to their feelings which usually sway them away from your point of view. One person operating out of feelings cannot connect with the other person operating out of thinking.

When we work with material like Steiner's he shows us a new way to view our images. We become aware of a new way to think and feel and act. As we experience the inner meaning of Steiner's ideas it is as though our thinking is being stretched and exercised. We start to create new images from ideas that come to us as if unbidden, and we get better at that. Archangel Michael is our companion in this effort. He encourages us to be objective in our thinking, not to be swayed by feelings of like and dislike. Then our vision is eased out of its habitual rut and we can flex our thinking muscles and see more deeply into issues.

How Thinking, Feeling and Willing work together.

Let's take an even closer look at how our thinking, feeling and willing works. Consider that when we look at a chair or a table we never really enter into it. We don't think of the joints and the screws, all that keeps them together - well a carpenter probably would but for the rest of us - we don't enter intimately into the material they are made of, we don't think of the tree that grew to provide the wood, we don't think of the man or machine that created them.

The inner soul activity that results from this kind of thinking, this kind of imagery gives our thinking vibrant life. Thoughts are no longer superficial theory but active, living realities. If we can be more conscious we will know that it is Michael that gives thoughts light and warmth in the heart, otherwise our thoughts remain cold, lifeless and abstract in our head. We can only bring dead thoughts to life though our inner creative will.

One of Steiner's close pupils, Carl Unger speaks clearly of the progression through thinking, feeling and willing and shows how these must not act alone. These three work in a circular motion whereby thinking acts on feeling and feeling is tempered by will, and will rises up in our thinking and so on. Unger shows how science, art and religion are intricately connected with thinking, feeling and willing. He explains how the unbalanced approach of science, art and religion is caused by the imbalance in thinking, feeling and willing.

Essentially, when thinking, feeling and willing act alone freedom is eroded. Michael is the prince of freedom, he does not impel us to walk the path, he shows us the way so that we can freely travel on it. This takes an act of will.

Will-filled thinking is particularly the way of Michael. The use of will without thinking amounts to dogma and authority. For science to take its rightful place willing must be active in thinking. Without this science takes the place of religion, science is worshipped as a dogma. Science is worshipped today isn't it? Science is god! Stand-alone thinking, without willing and certainly without feeling, without emotion, is what we find in science.

This gives us an insight into how our soul and its evolving consciousness can feel ill at ease in the modern world. The symptoms in society can be traced to the way science, art and religion displace each other. Art is seen as science, religion is overpowered by art and science becomes religion.

Art can only be real for the soul when thinking is active in feeling. A lot of art today streams from thinking and the depth of feeling that should accompany thinking is not to be found. Thinking without feeling is science. People make a science out of art which overpowers it, especially when aesthetics is seen as a science. How can beauty be a science?

Religion - and I am not speaking of church as we have it today - is a real soul process which comes about when feeling stirs our will. Feeling on its own is sentimentality, then art is seen as religion, or religion is overpowered by art. The religious feelings that are essential for us to have can be found in the sense of awe, a sense of wonder for the beauty and wisdom in the world.

Unger then says; "In pondering over this "circular process" we shall indeed grasp something of the soul's longing; yet if we look at what the longing of the soul meets with in present-day life, the crisis in the spiritual life of our time is revealed. It can truly be said that this crisis owes its origin to …. the criticism that comes from the heart, from the soul itself, which cannot maintain itself as a being in the midst of modern forms of life. But feels itself annihilated. In the one-sided course of the development of science in the external, material, technical forms of life, infinitely much soul substance has been poured forth, which now turns back as though demonically on man himself. And threatens the continuance of our spiritual-soul being.(2)

Can't we see that happening in Genetically Modified cropping, Mad Cow disease and other consequences of science interfering with nature? If we look closely we can see how many modern processes are soul destroying. If we become more aware we will understand Michael's battle with the dragon.

The trick is to think more rigorously, we often do not think things through to the end, we have a few thoughts about a situation and then we drift off. If we can think things through to the end then thinking becomes seeing - we see right into the heart of a matter. That is esoteric thinking, thinking that penetrates below the surface. That is the thinking that Archangel Michael presides over. The dragon encourages us to think hastily. Michael encourages us to have living Imaginations of how he works in our consciousness so that we can foil the dragon.

In a nutshell, Michael-thinking transforms feelings and strengthens will and creates rational coherence. Thinking actually becomes a spiritual Imagination which is freed from the nervous system so we can think with our heart.

If we are observant, which we must, we will notice that in our daily life pictures rise up within us unconsciously all the time. They bubble up and influence the way we express ourselves. What we need is conscious pictures, pictures that we create. Through an effort of our will we can create new pictures continually so that our soul life becomes more and more active and energetic.

The Will Forces

To complete the picture there are a few observations to be made about our will forces. The will forces are largely unconscious forces within us that digest our food, move our blood and other fluids around our body, and do many other things that keep us alive. So the will is associated with movement. When we raise our arm it is the will at work moving all the muscles and tendons in the right way so that our arm is raised appropriately. We are unconscious of how most of this happens which is a good thing because we wouldn't have time for much else if we were to consciously direct all that life-sustaining movement in our body. It is helpful to know that our will usually arises out of our desire and desire can be a very selfish thing. Michael wants our will to arise out of love, out of thought for others. A good illustration of the difficulty of this is when you give two children a glass of cordial and the glasses are different sizes. You know how difficult it is to convince a child that they should act in the interests of others, that they should take the small glass of cordial and let their friend have the big one.

The will also operates in our thinking, but in a natural way. When we think a thought, and then correct that thinking with another thought, it is by the will that we do that. So we can see that the directive force within us is the will. When will is applied to an idea we bring about an action in the world. Mostly our will operates in our body, not our soul, and in our body the will is on automatic pilot. Our will must burst forth into our soul life and wake us up. Then we can become more and more conscious and aware of how our thinking, feeling and willing work.

When we learn to use our will in a more conscious way we can use it to strengthen our thinking. There are many exercises to assist us in this area. We can do it though concentration - concentrate on a thought or an image for 5 minutes and preventing anything from interrupting the thought.

Freedom and individuality are the key notes to Michael's mission. Freedom is not about doing what we like; freedom has to do with being conscious. Freedom means that nothing impels us. When we are hungry we are impelled to eat - that is not freedom.

The dragon works in all things that are abstract, that are not our personal experience. He also works in all that is unconscious within us. If we are to fight this adversary then our experiences must be as living and as conscious as possible. For this we need strength and courage of soul.

Through the Michael imaginations we can experience ourselves as a higher soul being, a thinking and aware being, with control over our lower nature which always wants to rise up and take over. When our thinking is filled with the appropriate will forces we will be the conqueror. Then we will work side by side with Michael with a balanced consciousness. Thank you for your attention, I hope these ideas will assist you in practical and living ways.

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Footnote 1.

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Any questions about this review, Contact: Bobby Matherne

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Kristina Kaine gave this talk to a Steiner School (what is called "Waldorf School in the USA) called Briar Hill Primary School in Australia.

This essay is an excellent introduction to Michaelmas, one of the neglected cardinal or hinge points of the year. Michaelmas opens the gate to Fall for us in the Northern Hemisphere, just as Christmas opens the gate to Winter, Easter to Spring, and St. John's Tide to Summer. It is a time for us to bring into our awareness the deeds of the Archangel Mi-cha-el. Mi-cha-el is the favored pronunciation because when we pronounce it that way, we acknowledge him as Micha of El or Micha of God, where El represents "of God" in all the Archangels names, such as Gabriel, Oriphiel, Samael, and Raphael, among others. It behooves us to avoid eliding the reference to "of God" by our usual two-syllable rendering of "my-kull", up until now. We do best to replace it in our daily speech with the more rhythmic and beautiful "mee-kah-ahl" (regardless of how it is spelled) from now on.

In the usual image of the Archangel Mi-cha-el, we see a youth in armor wielding sword while standing upon a writhing dragon. He has the dragon under the power of his foot and is about to slay the dragon with his sword. The dragon represents the forces of non-thinking or darkness, and Mi-cha-el represents the forces of light. Someone once wrote about this image, that the palpable writhing of the dragon indicates that it is under Mi-cha-el's control and that we are safe when Mi-cha-el is around us.

Each Michaelmas in places around the world (more so than in the USA), school children re-enact the slaying of the dragon. They built a paper mache dragon and dance around the one chosen to be Mi-cha-el until finally with a play sword he slays the dragon and all the children have tea and cookies. A similar ritual is enacted in our skies every Fall when the meteorite showers of the Leonids and Perseids rain down meteoric iron upon Earth which strengthens the Michaelic forces of the Earth.

I wish to thank Kristina Kaine for giving us persmission to publish this fine essay on Good Mountain Press in A Reader's Journal. Through her work, many more will be brought to understand why the Archangel Mi-cha-el is very important in bringing freedom and light to our world during this time.

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Footnote 2. Carl Unger's Language of the Consciousness Soul, a study of the Anthroposophical Leading Thought #39.

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