 PRAYERS aka “Morning Verses” Here are two prayers, written by Rudolf Steiner, that students in many Waldorf schools recite each morning. Various wordings are used; I will take the texts from the book PRAYERS FOR PARENTS AND CHILDREN (Rudolf Steiner Press, 2004), which consists of multiple prayers Steiner composed. The use of the following prayers in Waldorf schools certainly indicates that the schools — despite frequent denials — are religious institutions. What else can we find by studying these prayers? I’ll suggest how Anthroposophical tenets peek out from between the lines: MORNING VERSE FOR THE FOUR LOWER CLASSES “The Sun with loving light [1] Makes bright for me each day; The soul with spirit power [2] Gives strength unto my limbs; In sunlight shining clear I reverence, O God, [3] The strength of humankind, [4] That thou so graciously Hast planted in my soul, That I with all my might May love to work and learn. [5] From Thee come light and strength, To Thee rise love and thanks.” [6] MORNING VERSE FOR THE FOUR UPPER CLASSES “I look into the world; [7] In which the Sun shines, [8] In which the stars sparkle, [9] In which the stones lie, [10] The living plants are growing, The animals are feeling, [11] In which the soul of man Gives dwelling for the spirit; [12] I look into the soul Which lives within myself. God’s spirit weaves in light Of Sun and human soul, [13] In world of space, without, In depths of soul, within. God’s spirit, ‘tis to Thee [14] I turn myself in prayer, [15] That strength and blessing grow [16] In me, to learn and work.” [17] [1] How can the Sun, a ball of flaming gases, send “loving” light? Steiner taught that Christ is the Sun God who came to Earth. In this sense, the Sun has sent us the loving light of Christ's spirit.  [2] Why is there reference to both soul and spirit? In Anthroposophy, these are not the same. The soul is an inner spiritual element of each human, revised and altered during the process of reincarnation. The spirit, on the other hand, is an unchanging spiritual essence coming from the mighty spirit realm. [3] Note that the children address God. They are praying. [4] What is the strength of humankind? It is our spiritual capacity to rise into the spirit realm (Steiner said we can do this through eurythmy, for instance — most Waldorf schools require eurythmy); the strength of humankind is also our ability to reincarnate and evolve to higher and higher states of consciousness. No other creature on or in the Earth can do this; we have a spiritual ego, an “I”, while animals and such beings as gnomes (which Steiner said live in the earth — this is why gnome figures are often present in Waldorf classrooms) do not have "I"s. [5] The main forms of work and learning stressed by Steiner entail the arduous task of spiritual “science” — Steiner's new religion, which he called Anthroposophy (meaning human wisdom). Waldorf schools are often weak academically, in part because they focus on implanting Anthroposophical attitudes and beliefs rather than academic knowledge, which Steiner disparaged as the product of dead materialistic thinking. [6] The importance of light (the “loving” light of the Sun, i.e., Jesus) is reinforced here, and the prayerful nature of this “verse” is underscored by the love and thanks offered to God. [7] Looking "into" the world is quite different from looking at it. Looking "into" suggests looking within, under the surface of apparent reality. This would be fine, except that Waldorf teachers often think that below the surface are gnomes, Norse gods who are alive and well, and so on: occult hogwash that they often convey, one way or another, to their students. A second meaning of looking "into" the world involves alienation. Steiner taught that there are at least two "higher" worlds, the soul world and the spirit world. Waldorf students, even if they are not explicitly informed of this doctrine, are urged to feel themselves separate from the world around them, the material world — what some would call the real world. The students do not look around themselves at the real world, they look "into" the real world from a vantage point outside it (specifically, the vantage point of the enclosed, insular, "higher" Waldorf community — as it were, a higher world). [8] Like the prayer recited by younger children, this one gives priority to the Sun (implicitly Jesus, the Sun God). In this case, the reference may pass casual inspection, since there is no reference to the Sun’s “love” or any other religious concept. Indeed, various lines in both prayers may seem unobjectionable — they seem more or less consistent with ordinary religious belief. Concealment, as Steiner himself said, which was part of Steiner's objective. The prayers, like the entire Waldorf curriculum, have Anthroposophical content, but measures are taken to disguise this. [9] This line, too, is or seems innocuous; It maybe recited without stirring Anthroposophy within a child’s soul. Still, we should note in passing that Steiner said all stars, not just the Sun, are the dwelling places of spirits; and he advocated astrology, as when using the stars in casting horoscopes. [10] Some schools use the word “repose” instead of “lie”. The Waldorf school I attended did. Why would they? Steiner taught that stones are alive, at least in that they are part of the Earth, which he said is alive, breathing in or out every six months or so. [11] Like all the other lines in this verse so far, these lines about plants and animals seem innocuous. Plants grow; no denying that. Animals feel; no denying that. The difference between plants, animals, and humans, according to Steiner, is that all three have etheric bodies (nonphysical “bodies” in addition to physical bodies), animals and humans also have “astral bodies”, but only humans have “I”s. Also, animals have no real capacity for thought or even memory — in this sense, the resemble subhumans who also lack "I"s and who can only remember words, not sentences. [12] Now the prayer begins to place Anthroposophical concepts at its surface. These two lines differentiate between soul and spirit — see note #2, above. I apologize for the syntactical flaws in the prayer — Steiner wrote it, not I ("I"). [13] The distinction between soul and spirit is repeated, and the light of the Sun is mentioned again. Significantly, there is also a reference to “God’s spirit”. Although Steiner taught that a monotheistic God may exist one day, at present we live in a polytheistic universe, swarming with gods, both good gods and evil gods. Young children are given a prayer that addresses “God” because a sole god is an easy concept for young minds to grasp. But here, the older children are nudged toward a more sophisticated Anthroposophical concept. “God’s spirit” is the divine impulse, not yet perfectly realized in the One True God. This spirit can be found almost everywhere, including within one's own soul. Someday, we will transform ourselves "into what is called in Christianity 'the Father'", as Steiner put it. [Rudolf Steiner, THE LORD’S PRAYER (Rudolf Steiner Press, 2007), p. 17.] Some schools use the alternate wording "In sunlight and in soul-light,/ In cosmic space without,/ In depths of soul within." Again, these are words I think I remember reciting. What is soul light (or "light ... of human soul")? "Soul light" has a specific meaning in Theosophy and, by extension, in Anthroposophy. "The fifth level of the soul world is the level of soul light." [Rudolf Steiner, THEOSOPHY (Anthroposophic Press, 1994), p. 119.] The soul world is the realm our souls access, whereas our spirits access the spirit world. Soul light is the clarity attainable in the soul world. But Theosophy does not put sufficient emphasis on Christ, Steiner decided, so in Anthroposophy he sought to correct this error. Our souls can shed light when they are activated by the Christ Impulse, the spiritual impetus that enables us to be like Christ. Also, our souls shed light through the faculty of clairvoyance (which in Waldorf schools is prepared for, theoretically, through emphasis on imagination, intuition, and inspiration). [14] Some versions of this prayer refer to “Creator spirit” instead of “spirit of God.” The point is much the same as above — a spirit exists, but it is not God per se. Indeed, in Anthroposophy, there is no single Creator as seen in the Bible; certainly Jehovah is not the Creator. A creative spirit flows through the good gods, who participate in the process of creation and evolution, but Jehovah did not create the universe. Jehovah is just one of several “Elohim”. [15] Here, the verse explicitly refers to itself as a prayer. Some schools disguise this by substituting such words as “To Thee, Creator Spirit,/ I turn myself to ask...”. My memory is that we used these alternate words at the Waldorf school I attended. It is significant, however, that the Anthroposophical Press uses the word “prayer”. (The original German is “Will bittend ich mich wenden” meaning “pleadingly I want to turn” to you “Zu Dir, O Gottesgiest”, meaning “to you, O spirit of God”.) [16] The students ask for blessing from God or God's spirit. They are praying. [17] The prayer ends with references to learning and work, as did the previous prayer. See note #6. ◊◊◊◊ If you think I may have strained too hard to find hidden meanings in these prayers, I would just ask you to remember who wrote them: Rudolf Steiner, the father of Anthroposophy. And remember whom he wrote them for: students in Waldorf schools. Steiner said this about such schools: “[W]e have to remember that an institution like the Independent Waldorf School with its anthroposophical character, has goals that, of course, coincide with anthroposophical desires." [Rudolf Steiner, FACULTY MEETINGS WITH RUDOLF STEINER (Anthroposophical Press, 1998), p. 705.] Waldorf schools have an "Anthroposophical character", and their goals coincide with those of Anthroposophy. The prayers I have quoted are Anthroposophical; I didn't inject that meaning into them; Steiner put that meaning in them. Any school that requires students to recite these prayers is, for this reason alone, an Anthroposophical religious institution. (And any school that permits recitation of these prayers, or that promotes them in any other fashion, probably is as well.) And, of course, there is a great deal of other evidence that qualifies most Waldorf schools as religious institutions.  One other point worth noting: PRAYERS FOR PARENTS AND CHILDREN ends with a lecture by Steiner: "Life between Birth and Death as a Mirror of Life between Death and New Birth." Complete with diagrams, the lecture lays out some of Steiner's thoughts about reincarnation, arguing that our life here reflects our previous life in the spirit realm. To most people's minds, what he says is loony, e.g., “What takes place between conception and birth is in reality the interaction between sun and moon, and this is essentially a repetition of events which took place earlier during the Old Moon period of the earth." [Ibid., p. 63.] Steiner's ideas about life, and childhood, and education are irredeemably occultist. “[B]irth is a repetition of the influence of the Old Sun. Things which occur even before that, which are reflected in the period when we are educated, are a repetition of the Old Saturn stage of the earth." [Ibid., p. 63.] Such concepts lie in the background of the Waldorf prayers. In brief, Waldorf education is designed to impart Anthroposophical concepts and even terms. In longer brief, Waldorf schooling is designed to be, at a minimum, a "repetition of the Old Saturn stage of the earth." You don't need to know what the Old Saturn stage was in order to know that something extremely bizarre — nay, occult — is going on. (But if don't know and really want to know, "Saturn" or "Old Saturn" was our original evolutionary period, which occurred on Saturn, although Saturn then was of course different from what it is now: It was "Old" Saturn. Following Saturn, we had evolutionary stages on the Sun and the Moon, although the Sun and Moon then were of course... As you may have noticed, we are now in the Earth phase of existence. We will move along to Jupiter, Venus, and Vulcan. Whether we will find Spock on Vulcan remains to be seen.) No, I didn't read too much into the prayers. If anything, I read too little into them. ◊◊◊◊ On the other pages here at Waldorf Watch, I provide extensive documentation concerning Steiner's doctrines and their appearance in Waldorf schools. I won't repeat all that here. But you can easily find the references by using the Table of Contents, the Index, or the "Search Site" function in the upper right corner of each page. Waldorf student art courtesy of PLANS [http://waldorfcritics.org/] Praying hands by Albrecht Durer (1471-1528); an image popular in at least some Anthroposophical circles. Images of praying (here, Christ prays in Gethsemane) are common in many "nondenominational" Waldorf schools. Medieval and colored images often find special favor. [http://www.fromoldbooks.org/.] For more about Anthroposophical prayers, please see "Power Words". — Roger Rawlings |