XXII. Zarathustra, His Teaching and His Mission

GA 69e/1911-01-31/p009 ·1911-01-31 · English HighHigh alignmentThis translation's paragraph count matches the German original — the locus maps cleanly to the same paragraph in DE.
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At that time, in Zarathustra's time, completely different signs were needed, a completely different writing to make sense of this. This ancient writing was in the heavenly bodies. Zarathustra attributed both contradictions to something higher. He needed symbols. During the day, the sun passes through part of the zodiac; the day sun is Ormuzd, the night sun is Ahriman. Ormuzd is associated with one half of the zodiacal signs and Ahriman with the other. There is a common basis for good and evil. In an ever-widening arc, the circle becomes flatter and flatter, finally becoming a straight line, infinity. A circle with an infinite diameter is a representation of the infinite passage of time. The past holds back, the future is for progress, uplifting. The entire zodiac is actually a line, imagined as a minimized circle. “Zaroana akarena” is the image of infinite time.

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Cite: GA 69e/1911-01-31/p009 · edition English