Cactaceae Anhängsel
Die Kakteen-Familie schließt die bekannten
homöopathischen
Mittel Cact. Cere-b. und Anh. ein, die sich bei Herzbeschwerden
hervorragend
bewährt haben. Die Pflanzen zeichnen sich
durch
einen sukkulenten
Stamm, Stacheln (eigentlich
zurückentwickelte Blätter) und
farbenprächtige Blüten aus.
Themen:
Empfinden
Zusammengeschnürt, kleiner gemacht,
geschrumpft,
kontrahiert, gebunden in der Falle,
zusammengedrückt,
niedergetrampelt, bedrückt, von einer Last
niedergedrückt. Von einer Kralle
festgehalten.
Passive Reaktion
Geschrumpft.
Aktive Reaktion
Ausdehnung, Größer werden, ohne Fesseln und
befreit.
Kompensierung
Unbeeinträchtigt von Zusammenziehen und
Bedrückung.
Zusätzliche
Mittel
Cactina
Carnegia
gigantea
Cactus
grandiflorus
Opuntia vulgaris
Cereus
bonplandii
Anhalonium
lewinii
Cereus serpentinus
Salsola tragus = Tumbling weed/= Russian thistle/=
saltwort/= Russian cactus/= buckbush/= roly-poly/=
Wind Witch
URSUBSTANZBEGRIFFE DER CACTACEAE
Zusammengeschnürt, zusammenschnüren,
kontrahiert, kleiner gemacht,
geschrumpft, schrumpfen, in der Falle,
zusammengedrückt, umkrallt, packen,
von einer Last niedergedrückt, bedrückt,
drücken, Druck, niedergetrampelt,
gebunden, vollpfropfen, vollpacken, fest,
zusammenpacken, ergreifen, greifen,
grapschen, kompakt machen, festmachen,
niederzwingen, komprimieren,
quetschen, einengen, verdichten,
kondensieren, kleiner werden, gefangen, in
ein Netz verstrickt, in die Falle gegangen,
im Netz, klammern, gestrandet,
zusammenbündeln, mit Klammern stützen,
eingeengt, Ausdehnung,
ausdehnen, ohne Fesseln, befreit, grenzenlos,
ohne Ende, unendlich,
unaufhörlich, niemals endend, unbegrenzt,
weit, sich ausbreitend, größer
werden, größer machen, wachsen, groß.
Shrunk,
contracted, bound trapped, pressed, downtrodden, oppressed, clutched, weighed
down
Used; Feel
abused; Treated badly
Isolated
(< than forsaken)/alone
Wants to
be part of the greater whole; “I’m not complete”
Their
vision; “Meaningful” (big cactus word)
Conscience
changes more in the desert, Intuitive ability to see farther; In desert things
are very expansive/vast.
Less about
responsibility/more about seeing
Things to
be accomplished; Huge need to be of service
Work hard;
omit and transpose letters in writing. Industrious (Cactus works hard to exist)
I have
energy, so much to do (in the world), and I’m going to do it
Don’t
realize until too late, until completely debilitated (burnout)
Contracts
and expands; Constricts and grows
Feelings
of large and small; When I’m big enough I’m alright
They feel
weighed down
I have
great vision of what needs to be done, but I have this great pressing feeling
keeping me back
When they
can’t work; Life is empty
“big
heart” “idealism” “I love my family”
“my heart
has shrunken” “I don’t feel that way anymore”
Intensity
of symptoms that bring them to a halt in a periodic type way
„Wie EINgeengt/-geschränkt
zu sein“; zu wenig Patz für sie; will Platz/Freiheit/offenes Herz für alle
haben/will alle lieben/will Gemeinsamkeit + Wärme, und Angst nicht
verstanden/nicht gehört/missbraucht zu werden und ziehen sich zurück; innerlich
lebendige Emotionen werden unterdrückt/eingeengt und werden dann reizbar sogar
zurückweisend bei Kontaktversuchen; sehr wichtig ist ihnen Liebe zu geben + geliebt
zu werden von allen; universelle, mystische Liebe für alle, so auch
ekstatisch/romantisch/religiös/mystisch (unio
mystica)/Aggression und Grobheit abgeneigt/
Sex: vom kompletten öffnen in der Expression
von Liebe bis zum kompletten Rückzug in Verschlossenheit (Vaginismus)
Empfindungen: Eingeengt (constricted),
zusammengedrückt, geschrumpft; kontrahiert, bedrückt, von Last niedergedrückt; squeezed
passive Empfindung: geschrumpft/aktive
Empfindung: Ausdehnung, größer werden, grenzenlos und released
Großzügig
Zusammengezogen/kleiner
gemacht/geschrumpft/Kontraktion/eingebunden/in der Falle/gedrückt (in die
Ecke)/unterdrückt (downtrodden)/gepackt/niedergedrückt/ausgesperrt/nicht
ausdehnen können
Letztes Stadium des Lebens
‡ Schwellung #
Hemmung/Mond (ätherisch) bekämpft Sonne (astral) ‡
Frei nach: JJ Kleber
Scholten: “Wie eingeengt (constricted)/eingeschränkt zu sein; “Wie zu wenig Patz für
sie”; will genug Platz/genug Freiheit haben, ein offenes Herz für alle haben;
will alle lieben; diese Gefühl vor allem in Begleitung, will Gemeinsamkeit +
Wärme, hat Angst nicht verstanden/nicht gehört und missbraucht zu werden und
ziehen sich zurück; innerlich lebendige Emotionen werden unterdrückt, eingeengt
und werden dann reizbar sogar zurückweisend bei Kontaktversuchen; sehr wichtig
ist ihnen Liebe zu geben + geliebt zu werden von allen; universelle, mystische
Liebe für alle, so auch ekstatisch, romantisch, religiös, mystisch (unio mystica) und
Abgeneigt: Aggression und rudeness;
Sex: vom kompletten öffnen in der Expression von Liebe
bis zum kompletten Rückzug in Verschlossenheit (Vaginismus)
Eingeengt (constricted), zusammengedrücht, geschrumpft; kontrahiert, bedrückt, von
Last niedergedrückt; squeezed.
passive Empfindung: geschrumpft
aktive Empfindung: Ausdehnung, größer werden, grenzenlos
und released
Krebs
Es geht um Ausdehnung des Selbst/Verlust der Grenzen, bis
das Selbst mit Universum verschmilzt.
Delusions (Halluzinatioen)
von Körperempfindungen (doppelt/durchsichtig/Identitätsverlust); natürliche
Objekte erscheinen farbenfroher, beweglich, ungewöhnliche Form usw; Ängste, Depressionen; gedankenschwäche,
Benommenheit, Zeitverlust; Stimmung plötzlich veränderlich, irrational;
schlaflos.
ZNS: Lähmungen;
Sonst: Kopfschmerz mit ZickZack;
Schwindel mit Ohnmachtsgefühl; Mydriasis,
Ptosis
Verfroren; < Wetterwechsel
Cactina
Miasma: akut
Cactus grandiflorus
Malaria
Constriction/contraction/congestion, gefühlt als Krampf/Enge/Butstau
o. flush einzelner Körperregionen (Kongestion heftig
wie Bell. ohne Hitze);
Ganzer Körper fühlt sich umklammert; Hitzewallungen zum
Kopf mit flush;
Engegefühl (constriction):
Herz/Kehle/Speiseröhre/Brust/Blase/Rektum/Vagina (ausgelöst durch Berührung);
STARKE zusammenschnürende Schmerz, zusammengepresst “Wie von Eisenband”;
Blutwallung über der Verengung (Uterus/Hämorrhoiden), Blutwallung zum Kopf mit
kalten Glieder; betroffene Region berührungsempfindlich.
Gemüt: Furcht und Anspannung in Folge der heftigen Konstriktion (nicht
plötzliche akute Todesangst von Acon.);
schweigsam/wortkarg/depressiv/meidet Trost; überempfindlich Schmerz, schreit
vor Schmerz; will nicht alleine sein, will aber keinen Trost + nicht gestört
sein; ängstlich, leicht erschreckt, Verzweifelt um Genesung, Selbstmitleid
Herz “Wie zusammengeschnürt” o. Oberbauchregion (“Wie
eisernes Band”); aber auch Druck und scharfer Schmerz; < kalte Luft; HerzklopFEN auch attackenweise; Wundheitsschmerz am Herz in
l. Arm ausstrahlend.
Bauch: Schmerz: kolikartig/brennend/im Unterbauch
drückend.
Atmung: gepresst/schwierig Atmung, Erstickung, Ohnmacht
< Treppensteigen; Bronchitis mit Rasseln + viel Auswurf und Obstruktion.
Blutung durch Blutandrang oft mit Bildung von Koageln die Abfluß blockieren
(Nase/Lunge/Blase).
Anfälle: 11 h. + 23 h.; Periodisch; Herzklopfen < l.
Seitenlage/Gehen; < liegend/Hitze/Feuchte/Sonne;
Hauptwirkung auf Herz/Gefäßsystem und glatte Muskulatur
allgemein; entzündliche rheumatische und gichtische Krankheiten; Blutung durch
Blutandrang
Carnegia giganteus
Miasma: typhoid
Konflikt mit Authoritäten (Adoleszens); fühlt sich unfrei/rebelliert/ist gegen
Familie, Kultur/Tradition
Krampfende Schmerzen, Jucken, verfroren
tuberkuloid
Drückend, krampfender Schmerz im Herz + Pectoralis
Gemüt: will immer arbeiten, etwas nützliches tun; fühlt
sich miserabel ohne Arbeit/< Pensionierung; weiß nichts mit sich anzufangen;
< nachts/< Kleidungsdruck; > Entkleiden;
Hautjucken
Lepra
Mehr psychisch weniger kardial; reizBAR,
wilder Ärger, wenig Moral, Beten + Schwören; Leben langweilig, arbeitet nach
Routine; laszive Gedanken
< Kälte (verträgt keine Kälte);
Ringworm
Empfindung: Kontraktion; Zusammenziehen, Pulsieren, Kälte
‡ Folgendes hat anthroposofische Einschlüsse ‡
Frei nach Pelikan
This plant family has very characteristic features.
Two formgiving principles are fighting for supremacy.
The water principle wants to swell out into a sphere, to form the closed shape
of a drop filled with life. The forces of air and the warmth principle try in
vain to give more detailed structure to this drop, to dissolve it, and entice
it into their own particular sphere. They move in the sphere around the plant,
but all they are able to do is to dry it out at the periphery, to cause it to
harden into spines, thorns and stiff bristles. Where in the "normal"
plant we have the leaf, the side shoot, where we see branching, and a
dissolving into the sphere of air and warmth, the Cactaceae
show only a hint of this, developing warts, areoles, ribs, and spines, but
nothing which goes beyond this. Tremendous potential vitality is held in,
congested, and does not come to full expression in exteriorized form. Thus we
have the enormous vitality of these plants. They will put out shoots and may be
propagated from sections of jointed stems or branches, warts and damaged
tissue. They produce new vegetative shoots from the tubercles of developing
fruits, start new fruit on these shoots, and again proliferate from this; all
before the first fruit has dropped. The life burgeoning in these plants may
lack form, but it is irrepressible, and this is the reason why the Cactaceae are able to grow in some of the most inhospitable
regions. (There is the story of how the wife of a British diplomat in
Disk, sphere and column are the basic shapes seen in
the most typical of the Cactaceae. Growth is slow
with these plants. The living metamorphosis of form which is such an essential
feature of true plant life, is very much brought to a halt. There may perhaps
be branching at an early stage, so that the column turns into a candelabra, or
an arrangement of organ pipes. Leaf growth, the very essence of plant life, is
wholly suppressed; the rhythmic principle of the middle seems to have been
extinguished. Stemstructure may still develop,
extending the sphere to a column or to a snakelike form. The "leaf
cacti" broaden their stem sections, flatten them out, and thus betray
something of the leafnature which they have
swallowed. There are only a very few species in this family which permit normal
leaves to emerge into the open; this makes them normal plants but abnormal
cacti. The spiral sequence of leaf growth here takes the form of rib and
channel structures on the spheres and columns; it has attained geometrical
permanence and has taken up something of the formative laws belonging to the
mineral world. In the shape and form of the cactus, plant nature appears as
though under a spell. If the spell could be broken, the bulky shape would
expand, warts would turn into stems and branches, thorns into structures
branching over and over, spines and bristles into rich green foliage. The thick
stem would of course have to lose its greenness; its tremendous vitality would
harden into wood.
The spines of cacti present a rich variety of form.
This can be no surprise. Inherent in them is the whole wide range of form which
any plant family presents in its differentiation into species. In the cacti,
this has been held back at inception, and become frozen.
For a long time, life continues to be held in closely
in the spherical or columnar form of the plant. Growth is slow. And that might
be all there is to it, in the cacti, if just this one pole were active in the
plant, the pole which finds expression in watery, swelling growth. But another
pole is at work as well, one which gathers its forces over an equally long
period.
At first its gains on the plant form are limited to
wholly peripheral elements, to the warts and spines. Yet finally it has
gathered sufficient strength, and its hour has come. From the innermost heart
it suddenly calls for the flowering process which bursts out abruptly, rapidly,
and in great abundance. Often there is a wait of many years; but then the
unexpected does happen. From the tips of warts, from the axils, the flowers
push out. They tend to be handsome, white, yellow, or, in most cases, red. They
have long funnels, with plenty of nectar; the calyx tends to continue straight
on into the petals, without a dividing line. Above the inferior ovary crowd numerous
stamens. Bright, often rather loud, colours go hand
in hand with strong scents reminiscent of jasmine, orange flowers, vanilla, gum
benjamin, orchids, or violets. As one would expect
with a flowering process of such general vehemence, the individual flower is
short lived, sometimes lasting only a few hours.
In the floral region, the watery element appears only
in form of nectar. In the fruit, it is allowed to swell out again; most of the
fruits are berries and juicy edible fruits. Many are enjoyable to eat, and the Cactaceae are one of the major fruit producing families in
the plant kingdom. In some species, the whole cactus may be eaten like a fruit,
and is bottled with sugar. Flavour, sugar and acid make the stem into something
of a fruit.
The phenomenon of aqueous congestion, of succulence,
normally represents a passing phrase during two stages in the development of a
plant. It is soon overcome. During germination, a plant is intensively taking
up the watery element. In many plants, the cotyledons and the piece of stem
between them and the radicle, the hypocotyl,
do swell up to a greater or lesser degree. Soon afterwards the plant connects
with the element of air, and in the leaf broadens out into a plane. What
otherwise might well swell up into a sphere is taken up by the forces of the
periphery and opens out to infinity as a plane.
When plant growth is coming to an end, and once again
moving from plane to point, from leaf to seed (existence in leafform
is now given up), the sphere may develop, as an intermediary form between plane
and point. Around the developing fruit flow the ripening forces of the
periphery. The fluid principle may then be drawn into the developing fruit, and
in a juicy fruit swell mightily, into a sphere or spherelike
structure. Thus one phase of swelling growth comes at the beginning, the other
at the end of sprouting, shooting growth; between them lies the stretching of
the stem, the unfolding of the leaf. In the cactus, the intermediate stage is
suppressed; in this plant, pole immediately follows pole, and the leaf
principle exists only as a timeform, not as a spatial
element. The green cactus sphere performs the functions of the leaf in its
green cortical layer. It will go on for a long time, often for years, behaving
as a leaf and assimilating, although no actual leaves are allowed to develop.
Succulent forms similar to cacti are found in quite a
number of plant families; for instance, the stonecrops (= Mesembryanthemum
species), Liliaceae, Euphorbiaceae,
species of Fouqueria, Stapelia
and certain Compositae (Kleinias).
All are based on congestion of etheric forces
resulting in watery swelling tendencies. This gives them great vitality, so
that they are able to hold their own even in extremely barren country.
The bodies of cacti show little lignification.
The woodforming process has "turned soft"
in these plants, and they produce plenty of mucilage instead. The mucilaginous
compounds derive from cellulose. They also contain a considerable amount of
plant acid which arises because exhalation is held back. In the process of
life, sugar is normally broken down in the process of respiration into carbon
dioxide and water. In the succulents, this process of degradation comes to a
halt halfway through, and plant acids such as malic,
tartaric, oxalic and citric acid are formed. This type of acid makes unripe
fruit taste sour. Ripening results not so much in an increase in sugar content,
but rather in the combustion of fruit acids.
Plant mucilage has the property that it holds on very
strongly to the water taken up by the plant. It thus plays a role in making the
stage of watery swelling growth into a permanent form of life.
Much plant wax is produced at the surface of the body
in a cactus; elsewhere in the plant kingdom we find such wax as a coating on
fruit. Some cacti also produce resins.
The two Americas, from Canada down to the Straits of
Magellan, are the home of this family. One thousand five hundred species
produce every possible variation on the type, making this one of the great
families in the plant kingdom. The occurrence is significant. Because of the
direction of their mountain ranges, always strictly from north to south, in the
east as well as in the west, the two Americas allow the polarities of the earth
organism to interact freely. Tropical forces interact with polar forces. The
contrast between them may be epitomized as proliferative swelling on the one
hand, and the imposition of rigid form on the other. There are no mountain
ranges running from east to west, as in Europe and Asia, to create a middle
region, and thus no areas where a middle element, a balancing, rhythmical
principle, may develop strongly.
Dry regions at some height, in the deserts and semideserts of Mexico, in the southwestern states of the
Union, and on the slopes of the Andes, provide the habitat for giant cacti
shaped like columns, candelabra and organpipes. High
up in the mountains one finds the Mamillaria species.
These may form small spheres the size of a hazelnut, and spread to form a turf
of such spheres. Other species climb up the chalk cliffs of the West Indies
islands, their bodies elongated into long cylindrical forms or flattened stemlike structures. On entering into more humid and shady
environments, the type produces epiphytes; sections of the body are elongated,
jointed, hanging down in long strings, or widened into leafshape.
Finally there are the Pereskia species. These grow in
damp and shady places. They drop the spiny carapace and appear as perfectly
normal plants, with wide thin leaves. Only the strong spines growing from the
leaf axils, and the typical shape of the flowers, betray the fact that these
are Cactaceae.
R.S.: pointed out that in the Cactaceae,
a sun principle is struggling with a moon principle, whereas in the Ranunculaceae, sun forces and moon forces are linked in
harmony.
To the moon belongs the (enlivened) fluid element.
This is obvious in the phenomena of the tides, where we see it on the large
scale, and on a smaller scale in the rhythms of plant growth (germination).
Hypertrophy of the water principle, and a reproductive power maintained in full
through all stages of growth these indicate the moon nature of the cacti.
The moon thus acts on the fluid element. Air and
warmth are open above all to the action of the sun. Air bearing light and
warmth is woven into all plant life, taking it from the spheres of water and
earth, from the germinative stage, through the
development of leaf and flower, into the region of fruiting. Plant
metamorphosis, changing form according to specific laws, is set in motion by
the combined action of moon and sun forces. One can see this very clearly in
the Ranunculaceae. In that family, the laws of
metamorphosis "have become visible and tangible." But it is exactly
this which is lacking in the Cactaceae. Metamorphosis
does not get going. The watery element contracts to a sphere, the vital powers
do not unfold, but become congested; air, light and warmth move around the
compacted structure and are able to act on it only at the periphery, where they
cause everything to turn hard and spiny. The cactus acts towards these cosmic
powers as though it were a fruit, and yet in reality it has so far managed only
to become a huge spherical cotyledon. Moon and sun forces are indeed in combat.
For a long time, the moon forces keep the upper hand, but at last the sun
forces wrest a flowering from the mucilagefilled
sphere (or column, etc.). The fruits developing from the flowers present the
appearance of cactus bodies which have merely moved one stage higher; they are
spiny, vital, and able to reproduce, as it were, from every single cell.
We have a high degree of etheric
congestion which at a later point relaxes to permit a brief, vehement
flowering, and in this yields to the astral sphere. After the explosion into
flower it is immediately restored to the previous state. It is not only the
struggle between moon and sun forces which is so characteristic of the cacti,
but also the enormous tension between etheric and
astral principles. These dynamics can be utilized for medicinal purposes. Two
genera in the family have attained some significance in this respect, and we
shall consider them in more detail.
Anh. = Loph. = peyote
Ursprung: northern
Experiences like these appear like caricatures of the
stages of initiation into supersensible worlds. They arise because the
supersensible members of man's being become free, in part and to an abnormal
degree, of the body. In a properly conducted initiation, the process of
mediation is used to form organs of supersensible perception out of activities
of the soul and spirit; in fully thoughtthrough
exercises for the soul and spirit, undertaken in conscious awareness, these are
then freed from the bonds holding them to the body, in a thoroughly healthy
manner. The line of development in this is the one which in man's evolution
quite generally led to the development of higher faculties; for example, the
development of thought in man. Thinking, as we know it, has become possible
because part of the etheric body, of the formativeforces organization, was freed from the bonds
holding it to the brain and made available to the ego. According to Rudolf
Steiner, we think with the same forces as we grow with. The brain relinquishes
growth and intensive vitality; the formative forces thus liberated are at the
disposal of thought. This process attained a certain maturity around the time
of the early Greek period, and we may say that from around this time the art to
form concepts (philosophy) developed.
That, in a way, was only the beginning of the
tremendous process of liberating the spirit and soul of man from the body. R.S.
indicated that a second process of that type has been in progress for some
centuries, but this time involving the heart, not the brain. Certain etheric forces relating to the heart are gradually coming
away from the bonds which hold them to the body. They will give power to feel
freely, just as the liberation of part of the etheric
body in the region of the head provided man with the ability to think freely.
It is the will which now determines whether we are thinkers or thoughtless. We
must, no, we may, freely evolve our thoughts. And in future, the same will
apply to our feelings. We shall have rich emotional experiences if the will
creates them, out of the force of ego. We shall have to create those
experiences, let them grow, and cherish them; otherwise, we shall be wholly
deprived of feeling. A desolation of the centre is in preparation; it is
already making itself felt. A hole, an abyss, will open. To fill it, we are
being offered a surrogate, a chemical crutch for emotional cripples. The
eagerness with which we reach for it even at this stage indicates the extent to
which the abyss has already opened. The world of the warm, expansive emotions
felt by our grandparents and greatgrandparents, a
world that "simply was there" because, after all, people do have a
heart, has by now considerably shrunk. In future we shall have to formour emotions as actively as today we do our thoughts.
The cacti are plants which prevent their etheric organization from acting into the physical and
there affecting the release of growth. What in other plants we see unfold as
they sprout in freshness and vitality is in them shrivelled
up. This applies particularly to the rhythmic organization of the cactus, and
that is why, as an offprint of those abnormal vital processes, they produce
poisons which take effect in the rhythmic system of man, forcing out the higher
members of being which are active in that system. Those members are not only
the astral body, but also, in part, the etheric body.
That part will then "vitalize" the sensations of the astral body,
distorting the images of imagination which because they are not produced by the
ego in full awareness forcibly drag along those who experience them. The
results are states resembling certain mental diseases. As a remedy, the mescal
button cactus may well be indicated in conditions due to the loosening of the
higher members of man's being in the rhythmic system,
Cact.
The genus Cereus has about 400 species. These have
gone in for length rather; the most typical form among them is an upright
column, but some are creeping, or push their way up rock cliffs, against the
pull of gravity. The etheric forces are acting into
the physical somewhat more strongly than in the spherical cacti, getting
movement into the form, though this is linear only. Stem section follows stem
section in rhythmical sequence. Cereus grandiflorus
belongs to the species which climb the chalky cliffs of the West Indian
islands. The leaf element appears only as an angular rib on the elongated stem
sections. The spines have disappeared; instead, aerial roots emerge everywhere
from the ribs, and the branching stems give the impression of a root stock
growing above instead of below the earth. In the tropics, elements belonging to
the earth do quite generally tend to push upwards, and earth forces make
themselves felt also above ground level. Many of the herbaceous species of our
latitudes have huge tree forms as their relatives in the tropics. The moistureladen air of the tropics is more earthy than the
air of our regions and particularly that of high altitudes in mountain areas;
there, only the airrelated organs, the leaf and
flower, are permitted to exist. The tropical air causes roots to emerge from
trunks and branches above the ground. In the West Indian island home of the
queen of the night, this air is furthermore filled with subtle salt processes.
Cereus grandiflorus
cannot get away from the earth; it has to raise itself, painfully, and needs to
fight against gravity.
When the much branched, thickened stalk has reached a
certain age, a fat bud will project here and there among the green branches. It
swells into roundness and has lost growth into length, as if a small spherical
cactus wanted to grow on the stalky cactus. Growth
into length not being possible, those forces cause a dense cover of spines to
emerge. This spherical structure is in fact the inferior gynoecium
of a developing flower. This flower now grows to the length of a hand and then
horizontally, seeking the balance between levity and gravity, uncertainly
trying to determine the direction of the sun's path. It is the sinking sun,
however, which brings the moment of flowering; for the length of one night, the
huge flower opens, reaching a diameter of close on 20 cm. The long, fleshy tube
consists of creamcoloured sepals, with a tinge of
red. These merge without clear division into the petals, forming a bellshape, gleaming white inside, with a satiny sheen. The
lower part of the flower holds numerous stamens and a starshaped
pistil. Waves of strong scent come from the flower, reminding of jasmine, benzoin, vanilla and the leaves of violets. The flowering
force (the astral principle) takes hold of the plant so strongly that in a few
hours the whole has withered. In the morning, a flaccid sac hangs down where
the night before we were enchanted by a truly marvellous
form.
A struggle between levity and gravity; a struggle also
between etheric formgiving
forces and astral spheres of being that is the signature of this cactus, with
an astral principle which comes to manifestation at night. Dynamics like these
must obviously also find expression in the development of certain alkaloidtype principles in the plant. Cereus grandiflorus is poisonous. Suitably prepared, it will act
on an organic region where the rhythmical interaction of etheric
and astral impulses is a keynote, a region which furthermore has its place, in
the living "topography" of the human body, at a point midway between
levity and gravity. This is the heart, the organ which R.S. described, giving
new insight into its essential nature, as placed between levity and gravity,
between the upper organization of man which is withdrawn from the forces of
earth, and the lower organization which is particularly involved with those
forces of earth. Dynamics like these belong to all plants with cardiac action,
and this will be discussed in detail in a later chapter. Man's rhythmic system
is altogether living in the rhythmical encounter of etheric
and astral modes of action; here processes of the airy and of the fluid sphere
are rhythmically combined and also separated from each other.
Loosening of the etheric, so
that everything becomes too physical, in the heart region, and on the other
hand astral clenching, the cramped grip of the astral (angina pectoris), can
find a remedy in preparations made from the flower and young stem shoots of
Cereus grandiflorus.
Vorwort/Suchen Zeichen/Abkürzungen Impressum