At winter solstice, the sun begins its northward journey. It marks a significant change of energies, and therefore it is celebrated as an annual ritual. Winter solstice is a symbol of spirit rising again from dense matter. Inwardly, you can experience this in form of inner light shining through, and therefore this is the actual time of esoteric Christmas.

Like the last years, we celebrated on 22 December the winter solstice with a small group at the Paracelsus-Center of the WTT in Einsiedeln. The weather was cold, rainy and on the mountain ridge of the Etzel Pass it was very stormy. In the afternoon, we wanted to make a walk but after some minutes we had to return – indeed a time of turning inward.

Here are some impressions of the group life.

In ten years of Spiritual Astrology Paintings, ten images for the month of Capricorn have manifested giving various aspects of the symbolism of the sign. They form part of the Images of Synthesis series. You find the detailed descriptions of the Capricorn paintings on the ludgerphilips.org website.

The Sun upon entering Capricorn is called the Son of the Virgin. Its reddish rays are considered by the seers as the blood of the Sun, the blood of the Saviour. These life-giving rays of the northern Sun are the food of the spiritual life, which the Sun God distributes again during this annual ritual and thus helps us to orient the consciousness upwards. More about the importance of winter solstice.

Please find five photos of Capricorn / winter solstices from five different years. And here you can send them as a Christmas postcard.

In the solar year, Capricorn symbolizes the time of the sunrise and of the awakening. The winter solstice at the beginning of Capricorn stands for the birth of the sun god and it is the actual Christmas. When entering Capricorn, the sun comes into the fifth house, counted from Virgo, the house of the progeny; therefore, it is described as the Son of the Virgin. Capricorn is also called the mount of initiation. The brilliant five-pointed star is a symbol of the light of the super-soul, which lifts us out of matter. The red sky in the morning stands for the flame of the higher mind.

The mystic animal of Capricorn with the head of a goat and the body of a fish or a crocodile is, in Eastern symbolism, the vehicle of Varuna – the Lord of the hidden etheric potencies of space.

The picture shows the figure of the goat-fish in the ethers of space, created with the help of a drawing by Zacharias Bornmann (1596). I designed the lower part of the picture with photos of the Swiss Mount Jungfrau and of a sunrise over India as well as with a pentagram – symbol of the enlightened mind. In the top left you can see the glyph of Capricorn and in the top right the outline of the constellation of the sign.

See more pictures on the site with my paintings. If you want to print the image, you can download the file in medium and high resolution format.
The different zodiacal signs are clustered in groups – you can see here all my Capricorn paintings.

In January-February 1983 I did a series of six paintings about the “Birth of Christ”. They were done with liquid glazing paint and fast glue on paper in A4 format. The pictures arrived at the end of a long and profound crisis where the first signs of deep changes in my life started to show up. In a way, it was also a birth of the inner Christ in me.

You can see the pictures also on my website.

Birth of Christ 1 – The Logos
This is the first picture of a series on the birth of Jesus Christ. This series was painted immediately after the series on Way of the Cross.
The cosmic cross – the transformed and light-filled version of the physical cross of crucifixion – has the sun god in its centre. It is the cosmic person (Purusha) fixed in matter and through this sacrifice enables the creation. So you see the spiral of manifestation in the background, on a basis of the deep blue / indigo of the background, the ocean of the space waters. The sun globe has the white disc in its centre, standing for the central sun manifesting from the background. The square formed in the centre stands for the matter aspect, and the parallels forming the cross are the vertical and horizontal dimensions forming the cardinal cross in heaven. So the Logos, the Word of God, is spoken out from beyond – and the Word was with God, as it says in the beginning of the Epistle of St. John. It is the Word taking on the “flesh” of matter – the cosmic prelude for the physical incarnation of the Christ consciousness – expressed in this series of paintings.

Birth of Christ 2 – Announcement
You see here the Angel Gabriel with a white lily announcing the future birth of Jesus to Mary. The whole is surrounded by ether, the cosmic space waters, from where the soul of Christ approaches the form of his future incarnation.

Birth of Christ 3 – Pregnancy – The Mother Standing on the Dragon of Matter
Here you see his mother in an archetypal representation as the World Mother. Often she is represented as standing on the crescent of Moon, or on a serpent or a dragon. This symbolises that the incarnation of the soul is into a pure, virgin vessel, and the serpent/dragon represents the cosmic creative force (kundalini) bound to matter. It is being liberated through the divine light. The pregnant mother (Lat. “mater” / matter) carries the light in her womb, surrounded by the space waters of ether.

Birth of Christ 4 – The Birth
Here you see the cosmic cross of the first picture of this series, where the cross manifests in the cosmos, now linked to earth. The sun in the centre, the Consciousness, comes down from the cosmic centre through the vertical movement into the physical sphere and enters into the form of the new born child. In the background you see the spiral of the first image now with blue and violet, the ether of the physical plane. The spiral condenses to the forms, and it surrounds the forms of Joseph and Maria who are blessing and protecting the child. The child is surrounded by a golden aura, and towards the bottom the colours change to the vital red, the colour of the blood of the earth into which the child now is “implanted”.

Birth of Christ 5 – Announcement to the Shepherds
In a glowing aura of light, a group of three angels appears to the shepherds in the nearby fields announcing the birth of Christ upon earth, blessing them with their presence. The shepherds, sitting on the ground and dazzled by the light, incredulously look at the apparition. A great contrast between the spheres of night and light.

Birth of Christ 6 – Worship of the Three Kings
This is the sixth and last picture of a series on the birth of Jesus Christ. In the centre you see the infant Jesus held by Mary and surrounded by an aura of light, which is adorned by a crown of light. One of the three kings prostrates before the child, while another puts down his gift and the third one stands in the background in veneration. The three kings / magi carry crowns of red fire and are surrounded by a sphere of electric blue light. Mary is surrounded by the warm golden-yellow and red, colours of the heart, while the infant is of pure light.

With the cycle of Spiritual Astrology Paintings, there are now ten images for the month of Sagittarius. They give various aspects of the symbolism of the sign. You find the detailed descriptions on the ludgerphilips.org website.

For 19 years, 1990 – 2009, I didn’t paint anything. I felt I would never paint again. The creative streak was frozen, hidden under a veil deep within.

In November 2009, during a deep and long crisis, I experienced two intense night inner openings. Suddenly there was an urge to express these experiences on paper, and so the series “Images of Synthesis” started.

On Friday the 27th of November 2009, I bought paper, colours, and paint-brushes. The next day I started the first painting, not knowing that it was a new beginning. I started painting on a photo which I had shot some days before. After painting, I scanned the picture, printed it, worked on it with pencils, scanned it again and then worked again on it on the screen, increasing the brightness of the colours: My new technique was born. I use it to this day, refining the procedure with every work done.

More and more, I realised that the images were not from me but through me. Often I was much surprised about what came out. Doing these paintings is an activity full of unforeseen, done besides many other activities.

Upto now, there are 151 images. They are available for free download on the website with the paintings (I had done about 80 prints on aluminium dibond and framed hi-res prints – resting in the basement – I stopped doing so; there was not much interest in them).

Since April 2010, I have been working on the “Spiritual Astrology Paintings”. I recently finished the 10th annual cycle, with 12 paintings each – 120 paintings – as part of the Images of Synthesis series. I did a photo-book with the last three annual cycles, until Pisces 2020 – so it will have to wait for some more months.

The “Images of Synthesis” are also published on the Good-Will website, with short extracts of the wisdom teachings of the World Teacher Trust, giving the inspiring idea. You find them also on Facebook and on Flickr.

Will the work continue? I do not know. It is not my planning but depends on the inner impulse. But upto know there is a “green light” to continue.

Here you can see the first five images of the series – and you find explanations on the ludgerphilips.org website (series “Subtle Worlds”).

For our daily meditation it is recommended to visualize the correspondences between parts of the body, of the planet and of the cosmos. We can see ourselves as sitting in the middle of the earth and having the North Pole in our head and the South Pole towards the lower end of our vertebral column. We can further visualise the constellations of the Great Bear (Big Dipper) in the head and the Pole Star as the pivotal point at the top. At the base centre, there is the dog guarding the infernal gates; it is Sirius, the Dog Star which is called Cerberus in Greek mythology or Sarama in the East.

From this point, related to Sagittarius, the kundalini ascends. The ascent can be visualised as an arrow shooting up through the central axis of the spine. Occult Meditation 48 says, “Matter, mind, Master. Matter is the South Pole. Master is the North Pole. Mind is the equator.” The movement from matter to spirit, to the stage of the Master, is the path of evolution.

The picture shows the arrow on the bow as the central axis from the base centre, the South Pole to the head centre, the North Pole, and further pointing to the Pole Star. The seven stars of the Great Bear are called the Seven Judges or Seers in the East. They are related to Sagittarius, whose constellation you can see in the upper right corner. The globe is formed with the help of a picture of the earth and a crystal ball. In the dark part below the equator, symbolising matter, you see the constellation of the Great Dog with Sirius positioned at the base centre.

See more pictures on the site with my paintings. If you want to print the image, you can download the file in medium and high resolution format.
The different zodiacal signs are clustered in groups – you can see here all my Sagittarius paintings.

I recently had a phone call with a friend in the course of which she told me she would never again join a spiritual group. The experiences she had with a group and its teacher 2-3 decades ago had marked her for her whole life. And another one lately told me: “I no longer recognize myself in the group where I was (of an Indian teacher) and so I left it.” She added, “For my spiritual quest, I have always been fascinated and attracted by the Masters, and the WTT is a beautiful synthesis.”

From my own experiences in various spiritual groups and contexts I know how delicate it can be to associate with a group and a teacher. In public here in the West, it is mostly disparaged as Guru cult. And when you come in closer contact with a group you unavoidably also meet shadow aspects – be it of the teacher or the group. You can call the shadow the personality. And what makes the thing even more tricky is that we mostly have blind spots towards our own shadows and like to project them on others.

Spiritual groups and teachers are no exception to this. I very well understand people who want to keep aloof from getting into such situations.

However, when you are fairly well grounded in yourself, you can take it as an excellent field of training – how to evolve if you don’t work on yourself and on developing friendly relations with others? For me, the obstacles were a challenge to get more committed.

In my life, I came to know a number of spiritual teachers directly and a few more by way of books. It was an odyssey and a great way of meeting people with many different attitudes – the devotional type, the sceptic type, the indecisive one, the impractical intellectual, the fervent apologist, and even the spurned love…

For a while, I myself was a mixture of several of these. I learnt much by observing and putting to practice what I learnt. And so I approached my present teacher, Sri Kumar, who more and more became the role model for me. A lot of transformation happened – I would call it an occult process because it mostly went on within, very slowly. Or was it more the outcome of my work with meditation and persevering activities, with others, with groups in various contexts? In a way, I ended up to come to myself, not to the teacher. The teacher, the teachings and the group were instrumental in this. On the other hand, it’s an interrelated thing.

A close friend said to me, “I don’t need a teacher for this. I want to rely on the inner guidance and autonomy – no dependence or pressure of rules.”

I understand and respect and I also feel the same – inner guidance of the soul and putting to practice what I have realised as right – not because of any dependence of pressure of rules.

At the same time, I receive great support by following my teacher and the teachings (and leaving other things behind). They are giving strength and orientation and help me not to get side-tracked and stuck. Joy is the compass in this.

I yesterday found a thrilling video about the history of Europe from about 400 BC to the present (published 1. 1. 2018) in less than 12 minutes.

For every year, it shows – partly just for a split-second – the borders and populations of each country in Europe, northern Africa and Middle East. (Vassal states and colonies are not included in the count of a country’s population.)

The rise and fall of great empires – of the Romans, the Huns and Mongols, of Napoleon or the two world wars of last century – they all appear like the pulsating heart of a part of humanity. Behind all this flickering of states lie the destinies and sufferings of millions of people.

Keep in mind that from the larger perspective of the immortality of the soul, we all have gone through many incarnational experiences in the past leading us to where we are working out our lives now.