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Alan speaks in a very symbolic and esoteric manner in some parts of his books. Although they can be read anthroposophically, passages speaking of Atlantis, archangels, gods, etc. do not need to be taken literarily to be meaningful. The more you read, the more you will realize he uses many different religions to express ideas in a symbolic manner and not in a religious manner. His writings are not religious. In some places his writings are meant to refer to religious events in a historical way. In some places he is using religious figures (from Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, Paganism, Ancient Roman and Greek Religions, etc.) in a symbolic manner. However, at no point is he promoting a specific religion or speaking from a religious point of view.
I have kept the writing as close to one-hundred percent original so you will also find that he speaks of Australia often and some spelling or manners of speaking may be cultural. Any words I have changed are presented like this: <word>.
Also keep in mind that these books are written by a Waldorf teacher with decades of experience who also studied with a Steiner student himself, so he speaks to an audience that is dedicating their lives to the Waldorf method without exception.
Because of this, all of his views are not reflected in the Earthschooling curriculum and not all of them may be ones you want to embrace or are able to use. In all of Alan Whitehead’s writings the opinions are his own and may not align with Earthschooling or Waldorf Books. In some cases, we will be updating some of these chapters in the future with additional and/or updated information.
Ultimately, however, as I read through these passages I find I can distill wisdom from even those paragraphs that do not resonate with me.
We invite you to read with an open mind and heart and with eagerness to learn and discuss…
7 TERRA BROTHERS
Continental Geography – Class 7 – Main Lesson
In the beginning of the 4th planetary ‘glove’, Earth, the las=test incarnation of our telluric home, there was only fire – Polaria, as it is known in occult circles. Fire condensed to gas in Ancient Hyperborea; then to liquid in Lemuria. Here, in the early stages at least, the world was all ocean; but with the advent of Atlantis, mighty Shiva, a compendium of the Spirits of Form, danced on the surface of the good earth, dividing the waters from the land.
Panthalassa, World Ocean, and Pangaea (Roman Tellus), world land, were born. These two sisters, Mothers of Material Creation, each had 7 children. Panthalassa give birth to the seven oceans, the Seven Sea Sisters, and her sister to their igneous cousins, Pangaea’s seven sons, the seven continents, the Seven Terra Brothers.
Actually it wasn’t quite that simple, with Pangaea at least; she was actually the grandmother of the seven continents. She first had two daughters, Laurasia and Gondwana; Laurasia, in modern geographic understanding, was the original land mass which comprised Asia, Europe and North America. These in time, according to continental drift theory, split apart to become the 3 continents we know today.
Europe parted from Asia, sailing happily westward – but found he missed his big, protective brother; he returned, to be joined at the hip at the great rift in the Ural Mountains, Caspian Sea region.
Gondwana, the second, the southern daughter of Pangaea, had four sons – Australia (Yea!); Antarctica; South America and Africa. Actually there was a runt in the litter called India, known even today as the ‘subcontinent’, the 8th. Strangely enough, in later civilization nomination, India is the Land of the Eight.
Whether India is sub because of his subordination in size to his behemoth brothers, or because he hangs below Asia like some suckling pup, is unclear. Young India nevertheless still does not rate full continent status; he was also somewhat too peripatetic, wandering up from his Gondwana Southern Hemisphere home, to attach himself to his colossal brother, Asia.
In so doing, he created the Himalayas – ‘When an irresistible force such as you, meets an old immovable object like me, you can bet as sure as you live, somethin’s gotta give…’!
And Something did, the powerful uplift resulted in the world’s mightiest mountains! So, at the end of Atlantis the 7 continents (a significant number, that of ‘perfection’) were in place. A brief geographical biography can be described to 13-year-olds for each great land mass. This can include such things as coal-forming; granite uplift; metamorphism; erosion – and so on. Tis biography of ‘life drawing’ of a supposedly inanimate object, as well as the necessary scientific description, invests the continents with ‘Being’.
Without this, their existence is essentially meaningless, especially to children; without being there can be no moral element; especially in how the human being relates to the world in general, and the 7 continents in particular. If the earth is merely a resource body, then we can exploit it without compunction.
If the continents really are beings, we are obliged not only to relate to them differently, and diffidently due to their awesome nature, but have a responsibility to enhance their welfare, to progress with them. The investiture of geographical phenomena with heart has been a consistent theme in this equivalent main lesson for the last 7 years; since the children began their exploration of their living planetary home with an Area Geography (‘Home and School’) main lesson in Class 1.
Geography is part of the social studies stream of main lessons, that which calls on the forces of the ether or ‘life’ body of the child. It is inspired from the distant mansions of Gemini, with that constellations’ ‘sense of ego’ dispensation. Social studies is the ‘Know Thyself’ – the ego subject par excellence. In geography, it is ‘know thyself in relation to the earth’ – to great Gaia herself, the material planet, and to her consort Shiva who endows it with not just force, but form.
Geography, or ‘earth drawing’, is the Will strand of the 3-fold social studies stream. These will forces surge up from the earth, through the lower limbs and into their mansion in man, the metabolic system. When we teach geography, we inform the children about the will of the world, and in microcosm of themselves, their physical body at least. Even we are a droplet of Gaia substance.
In the 7 Continents main lesson, we embrace, like Puck, the whole world. Puck is a messenger, a Mercury being; he is a being through whose eyes we travel to far places. This mercurial quality is specially apt in social studies/Gemini teaching, as Mercury traditionally live in the House of Gemini.
Social studies, that of the form and movement ether world, certainly is a quicksilver subject. This whole-world concept accords perfectly with the 7th and last development stage of the etheric body of the primary child, that which is known as the ‘Samballa’.
This is the number of, as well as perfection, completion; where nothing new occurs, rather a reflection or revision of the previous 6 stages. “god rested on the 7th day’ was the divine Shamballa.
Having established the separate existence of the 7 Terra Brothers, as I named them for my Class 7m it is necessary to individualize them with names, mine were: our own precious home, Terra Australis the Fire Giant (from an earlier main lesson); South America became Terra Dorado (‘gold’), this reflected his sun-etheric nature. Africa was Terra Animus, in respect of his teeming animal/astral life.
Terra Aquila is North America; the eagle is the emblem of both native and new American. Terra Europa – Beautiful Giant, both culturally and naturally; Terra Asia, Giant of the Lotus. He is the most manifestly spiritual of the 7 brothers. And finally Terra Antarctica, the Great White Whale, the most cryptic sibling of the family.
Before a study of the separate Terra giants is begun, a look at their familial connections interests the children, providing texture to the ever-expanding metaphor. Terras Australis and Antarctica are strongly related, both being roughly circular (when considering their continental shelves at least). Over eons they have been close but warring brothers, with the Great White Whale making various frigid forays north, visiting the life-destroying Ice Ages onto the complementary fire continent.
North and South America, Terras Dorado and Aquila, could never quite let go; that is until De Lessops forced their fingers apart by building the Panama Canal! In this study Europe ends at the Bosphorus and Asia meets Africa at the Red Sea.
Even North America and Asia have a filial link, being separated only by the Bering Straits. Asia is also loosely connected to Terra Australis through the necklace of islands which form the archipelago of the East Indies. It is also instructive to see which continents are not connected, like Australia, Africa and South America. These physical relationships form the Big picture, that which places the land masses in a meaningful context; a living tapestry of mineral, plant, animal, and man.
In studying each continent, a distinction should be made between the two human migrations (and animal ones for that matter), the post-Atlantean, or in Australia’s case, post-Lemurian, and that of modern times, those of the so-called Anglo-Teutonic cultural regency of the planet since the 15th Century.
Descriptions of the life-styles of indigenous peoples will contrast strongly with that of the European colonizers. It is through their eyes that the children will gasp in wonderment at the grandeur, either natural or man-made, which met the land explorers (we studied maritime discovery last year in the 7 Sea Sisters main lesson) as they pushed into the secret and silent interiors of those continents they respectively ‘conquered’. Silent? To those without ears to hear perhaps; how many of the explorers did not listen through the silence to hear the voice of the continent? It is no accident that the words silent and listen are anagrams!
A single classic explorer story is usually all that’s needed to ignite the discovery soul of the class. Marco Polo is obviously the best for Terra Asia. He brought home tales of civilizations so spectacular that he was scorned by this skeptical Venetian audiences, who pulled down the blinds of credibility when told of the fabled cities of Cathay! The eager class will not be so lacking in imagination!
Stanley and Livingston probed the dark heart of Africa; Scott’s is an exemplary tale of heroism – and stupidity – in the so-called conquest of the unconquerable, Terra Antarctica. The blood-stained Pizarro provides another perspective in his – this time sadly true – conquest of Terra Dorado. He went in search of gold, which he found by the galleon full; but unwittingly opened a treasure-trove of higher gold, the fabulous plant world of food and medicines of South America.
No one person explored the interior of North America; Even the cavalier Colonel Custer went where no man had gone before. No Terra Aquila’s heart was opened up, and in most cases desecrated, by a steady march of settlers, soldiers and scoundrels, a leprous-white pestilence which spread relentlessly form east to west.
Of course Terra Europa was never ‘discovered’ as such, being rather the base camp of the discoverers (Terra Australia was dealt with in other lessons). How much richer these stories of exploration are if described in terms of modern consciousness meeting a Being – having converse with it even. This is more than mere metaphor, rather a spiritual reality that the sensitive inhabitants of the continent, like 13-year-olds, even today can experience. However those first meetings were not always friendly, as Scott learned to his terminal dismay!
How much psychic density we can invest in the 7 Beings, when their characters can experience joy, fear, kindness, pain, and anger even. They can react to any level of activity on their broad backs; such as animal life, flora, industry, land-use, cultural activities and so on.
All these should form part of the connecting sinew of the continent under study; all help to define its being. So too does knowledge, which can inspire story content, description and dialogue of the esoteric reality of the 7 Continents. Collectively they form an image of Man, a mighty one indeed, but one from which, as well as world knowledge, self-knowledge – to Know Thyself – can be derived.
The 7 continents embody the same 7 incarnational principles found in the human being – the ‘7 bodies’. Conveniently starting from home, we have the Physical Body continent itself, Terra Australis. This is the ‘fire continent’ in the argot of both spiritual and natural science; fire is the archetypal element of the physical body. Like our own fire body, Australia is the oldest of the 7 brothers, and the flattest, and the driest. And the smallest – and the best! (Sorry for this jot of jingoism!)
How Australia’s sclerotic, desiccated hair, its plant life, contrasts with its eastern brother, Terra Dorado, the Etheric Body continent. Almost all descriptions of that green land, that living lung (even in shape an etheric triangle, a tree), contain references to its wonderful flora. So many South American plants are part of the staple diet of the world – tomato, potato, aubergine, capsicum, paw-paw, avocado, pine apple, et al! And what of drugs, medicinal and otherwise? Tobacco, cocaine, quinine…
There are not many globally popular plant foods originating in Africa however. This is rather a faunalcontinent, one which expresses the Astral Body. Even its epithet, The Dark Continent, points to a secret ‘sentient body’ power, one which impassions its human habitués to an often excessive degree.
Africa’s darkest face is as the home Voodoo, or Black Magic, a perfidious astrality which has often been exported by migrating – or migrated to – negro people. The shape of Africa., the 2nd largest continent, is a series of ape-like astral curves. If one wants to imbue the excitement of a seemingly limitless animal world, one sits on the elevated verandah of a savannah lodge to watch the herds of zebra, gnu, and antelope stream by in an endless parade into t dusty sunset!
Our imagination balloon now journeys to the land of Spirit Self, North America. The square-curve forms of this ‘future consciousness continent’ is an evident but ignored clue to its ‘fully transformed (‘ego-ized’!) astral body’ nature.
The spine is the region of higher consciousness in man, and the Rocky Mountains the equivalent in Terra Aquila. These are a timeless reminder of our obligation to advance self-consciousness; that which is easier to acquire in North America than on any other continent.
In a reversal of the normal discovery sequence, we sail east from North America to Europe, continent of the Ego; of highly evolved, but past, culture. Indeed the acquiring of ego faculties was the long-term mission of the European civilizations. When we think Europe, we imagine orchestras, libraries, art galleries and fine buildings. Even science can be a civilizing element, originating directly out of the crucible of self-hood based European cultural awakening as it is.
A connection exists between Asia and South America. Asia is the land of Life Spirit, a factor which will yeast human evolution in the far future. Life spirit – Buddhi – is ‘full transformed etheric body’. The less evolved gold of South America become the golden Light of the Lotus of Asia. All the artistic emanations from the mysterious East are a mere fore lighting of the splendor to come – albeit in the far future.
Finally to the most enigmatic continent of all, the 7th Brother, Terra Antarctica, he of Spirit Man. His time will come in an even more distant age, when the black carbon, ash of the fire of Terra Australis’ physical body, becomes the fully-transformed diamond (formula C) of Spirit Man. Douglas Stewarts’ ‘Fire on the Snow’ hints at this mystery.
Terra Antarctica lives in splendid isolation, waiting patiently for his day of glory; a day so far hence that even the need for a physical body is gone. Until then he broods alone, his white breath a perpetual frozen northerly, blowing all life off the continent; and ultimately even human beings who dare to trespass into his sacred interior.
13-year-olds find endless fascination in this secretive Being, even pressing your author to arrange the annual class trip to the Antarctic! He would have too, if the complex logistics, imposed by the truculence of The Great White Whale (Antarctica really is shaped like a whale, look at a map) weren’t insurmountable.
Uniquely this is a continent containing only two of the four elements, mineral and air – an extraordinary phenomenon! There is no warmth, the temperature always being blow freezing, as such there is no liquid either It is this combination of air/mineral, leading ultimately to the etherization of the earth, which is one of the keys to the mystery which is Spirit Man.
7 Terra Brothers…
…left their mother
For 7 terra homes of their own.
7 Terra brothers left Pangaia,
With her gifts in their hands,
Like a statue she stands
As she weeps on the sands – all alone.
7 Terra Brothers venture bravely forth
Three made their home in Laurasia in the north.
Four traveled south to giant Gondwana free.
7 Terra Brothers, terra homes for you and me.
Full music notation in my book 33 Sun Songs.
ATMAN ANTARCTICA
Southward soars the albatross, across the Frigid Zone,
The night less day is Summer long, Antarctica’s alone.
Cold Winter strikes with knives of ice,
Their edges keenly honed,
The seals and birds are leaving now
To seek their northern home.
The frosted breath of lightless night,
Heeds not the silent call,
Of heartbeats deep beneath the snow’s
Pure crystalline white shawl
No man-made wars have shattered him,
His history book is small;
But there’s magic in his future,
With a Diamond for us all.
For more spiritual insights on the Seven Continents, see my book Sacred Places.
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