ExpO N&C

  • Pauline Anderson; the Camomile Preparations

THE CAMOMILE PREPARATION.

When considering Man through the insight of Rudolf Steiner, as a 3-fold Being, with his head as the focus of the nerve-sense system culminating in thinking: his chest encompassing the breathing and circulatory processes as the basis for the life of feeling and his limbs and metabolism as the seat of will and transformation, we can draw the corollary in the plant kingdom with the root, of a more hardened mineral nature as ‘Head Man’, with the stem and leaves of an upright stance and rhythmic outgrowths as ‘Chest Man’, and with the blossom of etherializing substances of scent, colour, and etheric oils as ‘Metabolic-Limb Man’.

For our purpose of studying the Camomile Preparation, we will focus on the relationship of the Camomile flowers to the metabolism – wherein lies this connection?

In the flower the plant reaches its culmination, “Plant wants to become Flower”, but at the hight of its flowering the ‘dying’ process already takes over; in Anthroposophical Approach to Medicine, 4 lectures to doctors in 1922, Rudolf Steiner talks about the flower as the expression of the most powerful de-vitilizing process of all, a leading over into the most delicate inorganic substances of colour, aroma, pollen, essential oils, to be seen as a combustion process, a burning away (as in Autumn) and the production of Dead Warmth’ in the element of fire, and only subsequently can it be raised up into ‘Living Warmth’:

‘Fire destroys’.

Warmth creates’.

The organic is led over into the realm of Life; this is the “Seed” process, from flower to seed, a process of death and resurrection, guarded over and nurtured by the Salamanders: “The Beholders of the Seed”.

In the Abdomen of the cow, we find the Jejunum portion of the small intestine with its intestinal mucosa (that part of the gut in which the little Camomile flowers are wrapped, and carefully await their placement into the earth at Michaelmas). This is a gland and a sense organ and rests outside, in that it is part of an inverted passage from mouth to rectum, and is still separated from the true ‘inner being’; this gland comes under the influence of Mercury, as one of the planets nearer than the Sun. The small intestine is of a highly absorptive and specialized nature, and extends to about 40 sq.m., it is composed of millions of small formations or Villi, each moving independently to a rhythm of 6 oscillations per minute; these minute Villi receive the partially digested foodstuff, or Chyme, to “sense” or “taste” it and to move and further digest it accordingly, in the most varied and specific ways. Here there follows the final destruction of ingested foods to obliterate any remaining identifiable properties – such as Proteins, Carbohydrates, Fats, Minerals and all further vestige of Life, to bring it to an inorganic state; here again we see another most extreme process of devitalization, this time in the animal, as we saw previously in the plant: that is, physical nature divested of Life through a combustion (heat) process, and rendered to the ‘inorganic’.

This can be likened to a natural process of potentization whereby food substances are taken in, of a most varied nature and quality, and subjected to a rhythmical progression (individualized in the Villi) and a continual dilution from the many enzymes and secretions, individually selected by the ‘sensing/tasting’ of the gut lining, gradually diluting the contained substances and releasing their inner, hidden, individual force, or dynamic.

Finally, this devitalized substance (for as such, the varied substances have become one), is sucked through minute holes in the Villi into the inner Being’ of the cow, that is, into the Lymph Lakes, (only the secretions, now as Chyle, can pass through, and the most rarified of minerals). Here there is a meeting of 2 streams of nutrition earthly, and the destruction by ‘fire’ ends, and the resurrection into new Life starts in the ‘Warmth Process; dead Albumin is transformed into living organic Albumin (new protein) – similar to the ‘Blossom to Seed’ process in the plant; this warmth process is under the guidance of the Group Ego in the cow, and in Man under the direction of his own individual Ego, nourished through the warmth in which lives the dynamic of his own will.

A true image of Death and Resurrection!

All this is groundwork for considering the Camomile Preparation 503, Camomilla officinallis, in which the force of Mercury also is active. Camomile belongs to the Compositae family, the highest of plant families; it has a compound flower with a common calyx; the root is very light and fine and barely connected to the earth; the stem is root-like in quality right up to the flower and shows much proliferation, crossing and branching of a spiralling nature, it is green in colour as the leaves, and seeming to be formed from light and air; the feathery leaves give the impression of being held back’, not becoming fully formed the delicate white petals of the flower, as pseudo petals – which are really sepals, assume a ‘streaming backwards’ to expose the little yellow conglomerate of stamens, feigning a ‘flying away’ gesture; the stamens are also of a ‘stem-like’ nature and contain Calcium; the pistil is hardened and root-like. In looking at the whole plant, it suggests itself as ‘all stem’, with the characteristic of ‘holding back’, with an urgent readiness to reach for something higher (the next stage) – generally a gesture of “sacrifice” for what could have been developed before culmination, yet was not achieved.

In searching for the qualities of Mercury as the ruling Planet in both the intestine and the Camomile, and in so doing, taking our context from the principles of metamorphosis in relation to the planetary qualities we can perceive:

  1. An opening up’, a going away from myself.

  2. Giving oneself longingly. I out of myself.

  3. What is standing on the earth – only touching.

  4. Mass upwards. A shooting out, but a pulling back.

  5. Asymmetry with strong forces crossing.

  6. Balancing.

  7. Streaming movement. Influenced from without rather from within Generally speaking: qualities of sacrifice.

Mercury in Camomile: can be seen as full of light and air in the hollow spaces: a streaming up in spirally flowing movement which hold back in root, in leaf, in flower and can not complete Generally speaking: Camomile as a plant of sacrifice.

The active working in the intestines can continue in their sheath-like nature even after extraction from the cow, it would however seem imperative that these should be used fresh, not frozen or kept in a fridge so that the delicate micro organisms adhering to the lining can most effectively play their role as in life this animal organ, with its Astral ‘sensing’, senses the inner Mercurial quality of the Camomile ‘flowers’ (as culmination of its plant-nature), senses at the ‘threshold poised between death and new life midst the villi of the intestinal mucosa, at the brink of the Lymph Lakes, and held – in a moment – in the fire of combustion before passing to the warmth of new Life on the further side of the intestinal wall.

The Camomile Preparation is laid into the ground in a place where snow can lie and the sun shine; here it is subjected to the influence of the planets beyond the Sun:

Saturn with its force of Resurrection and overcoming death. Jupiter concerned with chemistry and movement, creating form. Mars of Protein formation and substance forming.

New Albumen in Man and Animal.

Fruit and Seed formation in Plant.

Here 2 forces meet, the forces of the outer planets and forces of the inner planets; there is a principle that when one force can be taken up and absorbed by another, there ensues a true healing, a new step, New Life!

This Camomile Preparation, with its sacrificial, Mercurial healing nature when placed into the compost/manure heap, can imbue it with New Life and when this manure is distributed to the soil, it has renewed power to grow more healthy plants through the Mercury force released from the Camomile in its intestinal sheath, and at the same time, buried in the winter to receive sun and snow, to take forward to that place (the Lymph Lakes) – the place of resurrection (Saturn)

with the “Vertue of kindling the life in the earth so that the earth itself will have a wonderfully. stimulating effect on the plant growth – Above all, you will create more healthy plants – really more healthy, if you manure in this way than if you did not”. R.S.

The Camomile Preparation brings to the plant a healing of its metabolic powers so that the plant can extract from its environment those mineral needed, to build into the several cellular tissues as true parts of the united organism.

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  • Observation
  • Things you may never hear of again

Veal butcher could tell the calf was fed by bucket or teat

  • From M Klett’s letter No 54 Feb 1994

In letter No 54. February 94 by Manfred Klett we find the follow of which I thought some of you might be interested:

At the turn of the century 78% of the Swedish population war engaged in agriculture. In Finland it was 87%, as against todays 8% In Denmark there was one horse to 6 people, in Sweden to 10 people Today it is one to 166. The number of cattle decreased, that of pigs very much increased. In Denmark it has more than doubled. Compared with 1924 wheat harvests incraesed 155%, rye 210%, potatoes 260%.

The B-D pioneers were in the 1930’s : Karl Dobelin in Norway, his farm Slener Gard was then taken over by Ingemar Johanson who, to this day has no tractor on the farm. In Denmark Elstru Rasmussen started the B-D-work (He insisted that valuable silage has to contain 3% crushed oats.) In Iceland work started in connection with curative education. In Finland Karl Donner gave the first impulse, In Sweden it was Gustav Ritter. The second world war brought the work almost to a stands till. It began again in 1949 in connection with the work in middle Europe. 3 Nordik Experimental Circle was founded. In 1958 the research Institute in Jarna was founded under Magda Enquist and Bo Petterson, the work of the institute was even acknowledged by the University in Uppsala.

The changes since 1990/91 resulted in problems which cannot be tackled along conventional lines. The social conditions mirror conditions of the human soul which is not conscious of the fact that mankind as a whole has crossed the threshold. Thinking, feeling and willing go their own separate ways. If they are not illumined by the light-force of the ego – in their new-found independence- they become instruments for the powers of evil, as becomes increasingly obvious.

  • In thinking an inability to come to sound judgements.
  • In feeling the trend to let it run away with you and so has played into the hands of the media
  • In willing no reverence, and hence destruction for nature

Agriculture is affected by this: If it is industrialised it destroys the environment and corrupts social life. Producer prices tend towards zero and subsidies have to step in.