Steiner Statements

If you become interested in Waldorf schools, you should spend at least a little time

studying the thinking that lies behind these schools.

This thinking is Anthroposophy, the occult cosmological system

— that is, the religion — created by Rudolf Steiner.

Passages such as the following give you at least a glimpse of Anthroposophy.

(These items originally appeared, on the dates indicated,

on the Waldorf Watch "news" page.)

October 14, 2018

THE ARCHANGEL, THE DRAGON,

AND OUR MICROSCOPIC ENEMIES

Here are excerpts from a lecture by Rudolf Steiner. This lecture is among those featured today (October 14, 2018) at the Rudolf Steiner Archive and eLib.

Steiner delivered this lecture on October 14 in the year 1917. A transcript of the lecture can be fund in the book THE FALL OF THE SPIRITS OF DARKNESS (Rudolf Steiner Press, 1993). The lecture is the ninth in the book.

The title of the lecture is “The Battle Between Michael and ‘The Dragon’”. As the title suggests, the lecture deals with various subjects that have cropped up in Waldorf news items during the last few weeks (Michael, Ahriman, “the dragon”, and so forth).

Excerpts from

“The Battle Between Michael and ‘The Dragon’”

(Preliminary note: Steiner is hard to read. Some people find him virtually incoherent. I have edited these excerpts to give them clarity they otherwise don’t possess. If you still find them tough going, you might consult the paraphase I have appended.)

[I]n the middle of the nineteenth century, and especially in the 1840s…the materialistic point of view [1] came to its peak [on Earth].…

The deeper sources of such events…must be sought in the world of the spirit … To have the right idea about these things, you must visualize a battle which continued for decades in the spiritual worlds, from the 1840s until the autumn of 1879. [2]

This may be called a battle which the spirits who are followers of...Michael fought with certain ahrimanic powers [3] … The battle [reached] a conclusion in the autumn of 1879, when Michael and his followers won.…

To see something like this in the right way, we can always call on an image which humanity has known throughout its evolution — the fight between Michael and the dragon. [4] … [E]very battle between Michael and the dragon is similar to the one in the 1840s … We may say that a particular crowd of ahrimanic spirits seek over and over again to bring something into world evolution [5], but they are always overcome. And so they also lost the battle in the autumn of 1879….

Losing the battle means they are no longer to be found in the heavens … Instead they are to be found in the human realms…. [6]

The people who do not turn away from the ahrimanic, materialistic way of thinking and want to keep it, would then be in league with everything which has come about through similar victories won over the dragon by Michael. [7] They therefore would not unite with spiritual progress in human evolution but with material progress. And a time would come in the sixth post-Atlantean age [8] when the only thing to please them would be to live in something which will have been brought about by bacilli, those microscopically small enemies of humanity.… [9]

[T]he individuals who have become so tied up with the materialistic way of thinking…find ways of involving themselves in the activities of bacilli … Today’s bacilli are merely the prophets, let us say, of what will happen to the whole earth in future. Then a time will come when those who cling to the materialistic way of thinking will unite with the moon powers…. [10]

— Rudolf Steiner, “The Battle Between Michael and ‘The Dragon’”.

Interpretive Paraphrase

Human materialism [1] reached its peak in the mid-nineteenth century, particularly in the 1840s.

The causes of such things are found in the spirit realm. The culmination of materialism on Earth reflected a long-running battle in the spirit realm, a battle that ran from the 1840s until the autumn of 1879. [2]

This was a battle between the forces of the archangel Michael and the forces of the arch-demon Ahriman. [3] The conclusion of the battle came in 1879, when Michael and his followers won.

To understand this correctly, we can call up an image that humans have known throughout their evolution: It is the image of Michael fighting a dragon. [4] Michael and the dragon have fought many times, and these battles have alway been like the one in the 1840s. We may say that certain minions of Ahriman have tried, over and over, to interfere in human evolution [5], but they have always been defeated. And so they were defeated again in 1879.

Each time they lose one of these battles, Ahrimanic spirits are cast out of the spirit realm. They fall to Earth, into the realm of human activity on Earth. [6]

Humans who embrace the materialistic way of thinking promoted by Ahriman and his minions make themselves servants of these dark spirits, the Ahrimanic who have fallen to Earth after each victory attained by Michael over the dragon. [7] The humans therefore cut themselves off from the spiritual progress of humanity; they focus instead on mere material progress (such as the development of physical science and technology). This means that in the near future, during the sixth epoch since the destruction of Atlantis [8], they will choose to live in the diseased conditions caused by bacilli — bacteria that are microscopic enemies of humanity. [9]

Humans who are tied up in materialism find ways to become involved in the dire actions of bacilli. The bacilli found on Earth today are merely the forerunners of bacilli that will infect the entire Earth in the future. Then the materialists on Earth will ally themselves with the baleful influences streaming down from the Moon. [10]

— Paraphrase by Roger Rawlings

The prospect is dire. But Steiner’s vision is not wholly bleak. The fall of the spirits of darkness has provided us a huge potential benefit. The positive effect of Ahrimanic powers coming down into human affairs has been to create great possibilities for human freedom. We gain the knowledge of good and evil — a terrible knowledge, but also a potentially beneficial knowledge.

Here is a passage occurring elsewhere in this lecture:

Everything which happens within the great scheme of things does also have its good side. It is because the ahrimanic powers entered into us when Michael won his victory that we are gaining in human freedom. Everything is connected with this, for the crowd of ahrimanic spirits has entered into all of us. We gain in human freedom, but we must be aware of this. We should not allow the ahrimanic powers to gain the upper hand, as it were, and we should not fall in love with them.

We must accept the potential benefits of Ahriman’s influence. But at the same time, very importantly, we must reject the terribly evil side of his influence. We must not be materialistic purveyors of moon powers; we must not be human pawns of demonic bacilli.

Explanatory Footnotes

[1] “Materialism,” as Steiner used the term, is excessive involvement in the material or physical level of existence. Importantly, it includes reliance on the brain (a physical organ) for thinking. Such thinking is dead and generally wrong, Steiner said. Thus, in this lecture, Steiner describes materialistic thinking as “a way of grasping dead, outer facts with the intellect, refusing to enter into living reality.” Living reality is spiritual reality, Steiner taught, and we cannot approach it through rational thought.

[2] The year 1879, Steiner taught, marked an important turning point. In that year, a battle between the forces of good and the forces of evil was won in the spirit realm. Simultaneously, at about that time, Steiner received initiation into occult mysteries — he started traveling the path that would lead him to become a great spiritual leader. [See “What a Guy”.]

[3] I.e., the battle in the spirit realm was fought by the Archangel Michael with his legions against the arch-demon Ahriman and certain of his legions. (Steiner will go on to say that Michael and Ahriman have fought many times. Generally speaking, the battles have occurred on the Moon, as it were.)

[4] The dragon is Ahriman and/or Ahriman's minions (subordinate demons) and/or Ahriman's works. Battles between Michael and Ahriman (and/or Ahriman's minions and/or his works) are symbolized by the image of St. Michael fighting a terrible dragon. Steiner says we humans have known this image throughout our evolution.

[5] I.e., in each battle between Michael and Ahriman (the dragon), various minions of Ahriman attempt to derail “world” evolution (the evolution of the Earth and humanity).

[6] When Ahriman and his hordes lose a battle in the spirit realm, they are cast out of the spirit realm to the earthly realm below. This is what Steiner meant by “the fall of the spirits of darkness”— the title of the book containing this lecture.

[7] Each victory by Michael in the spirit realm sends Ahrimanic spirits down into the earthly realm, where they influence human life on the Earth. Materialistic people are particularly receptive to the foul influences of these Ahrimanic spirits. (Materialism is, in a sense, the consequence of Ahrimanic influence among humans.)

[8] According to Steiner, we currently live in the fifth post-Atlantean age — the fifth major epoch since the sinking of Atlantis. During the coming sixth post-Atlantean age, Steiner says, people who embrace “the ahrimanic, materialistic way of thinking” will separate themselves emphatically from the correct line of evolution. They will devote themselves to material progress, not spiritual progress.

[9] I.e., materialists will ally themselves with disease-causing bacilli. (“Bacilli” is the plural of “bacillus.”) Bacilli, Steiner taught, are essentially demonic, and as such they are our enemies.

At another point in the lecture, Steiner says this about bacilli:

After one of these battles...the crowd of ahrimanic spirits populated the earth with the earthly life-forms which the medical profession now calls bacilli. Everything which has the power to act as a bacillus, everything in which bacilli are involved, is the result of crowds of ahrimanic spirits being cast down from heaven to earth at a time when the dragon had been overcome.

[10] I.e., in the future, materialists who ally themselves with evil bacilli will unite with evil powers (Ahrimanic powers) streaming downward from the dead and deadly Moon.

Sans Ellipses

Here are full, unedited versions of the paragraphs I excerpted, above, from Steiner's lecture:

I have frequently spoken of the significant break which occurred in the spiritual development of the peoples of Europe and America in the middle of the nineteenth century, and especially in the 1840s. I have pointed out that this was the time when the materialistic point of view came to its peak, with a peak was reached in what we may call a way of grasping dead, outer facts with the intellect, refusing to enter into living reality.

The deeper sources of such events — and today we are very much involved in their after-effects, which will continue to have an influence for a long time to come — must be sought in the world of the spirit. And if we investigate the processes in that world which have come to outer expression in the event of which I have just spoken, we have to point to a struggle, a real war in that world, which began then and came to a certain conclusion for the world of the spirit by the autumn of 1879. To have the right idea about these things, you must visualize a battle which continued for decades in the spiritual worlds, from the 1840s until the autumn of 1879.

This may be called a battle which the spirits who are followers of the spirit belonging to the hierarchy of Archangels whom we may call Michael fought with certain ahrimanic powers. Please consider this battle to have been in the first place a battle in the spiritual world. Everything I am referring to at the moment relates to this battle fought by Michael and his followers against certain ahrimanic powers. A good way of strengthening this idea, especially if you want to make it fruitful for your life in the present time, is to have it in your mind's eye that the human souls who were born exactly in the fifth decade of the nineteenth century actually took part in this battle between Michael's followers and the ahrimanic powers when they were in the spiritual world. If you think on this, it will give you a great deal of understanding of the outer and inner destiny experienced by these individuals, and above all of their inner constitution. The battle thus took place in the 40s, 50s, 60s and 70s and came to a conclusion in the autumn of 1879, when Michael and his followers won a victory over certain ahrimanic powers.

What does this signify? To see something like this in the right way, we can always call on an image which humanity has known throughout its evolution — the fight between Michael and the dragon. This image has come up again and again in the course of evolution. We may characterize it by saying that every battle between Michael and the dragon is similar to the one in the 1840s, but it is about different things — harmful and damaging things. We may say that a particular crowd of ahrimanic spirits seek over and over again to bring something into world evolution, but they are always overcome. And so they also lost the battle in the autumn of 1879, and, as I said, this was in the spiritual world.

But what does it signify that the powers of the dragon, this crowd of ahrimanic spirits, are driven down into the human realms, banished from heaven to earth, as it were? Losing the battle means they are no longer to be found in the heavens, to use the biblical term. Instead they are to be found in the human realms, which means that the late 1870s were a particular time when human souls became subject to ahrimanic powers with regard to certain powers of perception. Before this, these powers were active in the spiritual realms and therefore left human beings more in peace; when they were driven out of the spiritual realms they came upon human beings. And if we enquire into the nature of the ahrimanic powers which entered into human beings when they had to leave the realms of the spirit, the answer is, the ahrimanic materialistic view with its personal — mark this well — its personal bias.

◊

This is tremendously important. There always is the danger of people continuing in materialism, in the materialistic, ahrimanic way of thinking, and carrying this on into ages when, according to the plan of things, it should have been overcome. The people who do not turn away from the ahrimanic, materialistic way of thinking and want to keep it, would then be in league with everything which has come about through similar victories won over the dragon by Michael. They therefore would not unite with spiritual progress in human evolution but with material progress. And a time would come in the sixth post-Atlantean age when the only thing to please them would be to live in something which will have been brought about by bacilli, those microscopically small enemies of humanity.

◊

You see from this how unconsciously human beings are, in fact, being guided. But we are now in an age when such things must be perceived and understood. It is necessary to link such an idea with the other ideas we have characterized today. A time will come when we must have transformed our materialistic ideas to such an extent that we can progress to a more spiritual form of existence, but by then the earth will have been a corpse for a long time. It will no longer support us, and incarnations in the flesh such as we seek today will no longer be sought. But the individuals who have become so tied up with the materialistic way of thinking that they cannot let go of it will still sneak down to that earth and find ways of involving themselves in the activities of bacilli — the tubercle bacillus and others — bacillary entities which will be rummaging through every part of the earth's corpse. Today's bacilli are merely the prophets, let us say, of what will happen to the whole earth in future. Then a time will come when those who cling to the materialistic way of thinking will unite with the moon powers and surround the earth, which will be a burnt-out corpse, together with the moon. For all they want is to hold on to the life of the earth and remain united with it; they do not want to take the right course, which is to progress from the earth's corpse to what will be the future soul and spirit of the earth.

◊

These things really do belong together, in a way, and it is extremely useful to consider this, for it has profound significance. Some individuals develop an irresistible hankering for intellectual materialism which arises from being in league with the fallen Ahriman. They gradually come to love the impulses which Ahriman raises in their souls and, indeed, consider them to be a particularly noble and sublime way of thinking. Once again, it is necessary to be fully and clearly aware of these things. Unless they are in our conscious awareness and we have clear insight, we cannot make head or tail of events. The danger inherent in all this must be looked at with a cool eye, as it were, and a calm heart. We have to face them calmly. We shall only do so, however, if we are quite clear about the fact that a certain danger threatens human beings from this direction. This is the danger of preserving what should not be preserved. Everything which happens within the great scheme of things does also have its good side. It is because the ahrimanic powers entered into us when Michael won his victory that we are gaining in human freedom. Everything is connected with this, for the crowd of ahrimanic spirits has entered into all of us. We gain in human freedom, but we must be aware of this. We should not allow the ahrimanic powers to gain the upper hand, as it were, and we should not fall in love with them.

◊

If you were to go back to very early times in evolution, you would find a battle similar to the one I have just described. As already mentioned, these battles have recurred over and over again, but always on different issues. In the distant past, the crowd of ahrimanic spirits were also cast down from the spiritual worlds into the earthly realm when they had lost such a battle. You see, they would return to the attack again and again. After one of these battles, for example, the crowd of ahrimanic spirits populated the earth with the earthly life-forms which the medical profession now calls bacilli. Everything which has the power to act as a bacillus, everything in which bacilli are involved, is the result of crowds of ahrimanic spirits being cast down from heaven to earth at a time when the dragon had been overcome. In the same way the ahrimanic, mephistophelean way of thinking has spread since the late 1870s as the result of such a victory. Thus we are able to say that tubercular and bacillary diseases come from a similar source as the materialism which has taken hold of human minds.

To read the entire lecture (which I strongly recommend), but THE FALL OF THE SPIRITS OF DARKNESS, or go to https://wn.rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA177/English/RSP1993/19171014p01.html.

— R.R.

September 7, 2018

QUOTING THE FOUNDER

ON THE EDUCATION OF THE CHILD

Here is the beginning of today’s quotation posted at “The great [sic] Rudolf Steiner Quotes Site”:

It is of vast importance for the child that he should receive the secrets of Nature in parables, before they are brought before his soul in the form of ‘natural laws’ and the like. An example may serve to make this clear. Let us imagine that we want to tell a child of the immortality of the soul, of the coming forth of the soul from the body. The way to do this is to use a comparison, such for example as the comparison of the butterfly coming forth from the chrysalis. As the butterfly soars up from the chrysalis, so after death the soul of man from the house of the body. No man will rightly grasp the fact in intellectual concepts, who has not first received it in such a picture. By such a parable, we speak not merely to the intellect but to the feeling of the child, to all his soul. A child who has experienced this, will approach the subject with an altogether different mood of soul, when later it is taught him in the form of intellectual concepts. It is indeed a very serious matter for any man, if he was not first enabled to approach the problems of existence with his feeling. Thus it is essential that the educator have at his disposal parables for all the laws of Nature and secrets of the World.

— Rudolf Steiner

Translated by George and Mary Adams

[9/7/2018 https://rudolfsteinerquotes.wordpress.com]

◊ • ◊

Waldorf Watch Response:

This quotation is from Steiner's essay "The Education of the Child in the Light of Anthroposophy", and it tells us a great deal about Waldorf education. [1]

Waldorf education is full of parables, fables, myths, fairy tales, and other narratives meant to convey spiritual meanings and lessons in an non-intellectual manner. [2]

Waldorf teachers often tell their students about such things as the immortality of the soul. Waldorf education is essentially religious — the religion being Anthroposophy. [3]

Parables, fables, etc., enable Waldorf teachers to convey Anthroposophical messages indirectly and subtly — in ways that may seem innocuous. But, indeed, the purpose is to lead children toward Anthroposophy. Steiner told Waldorf teachers they should express Anthroposophical “truths” in a form children can grasp. Thus, Steiner once corrected a teacher at the first Waldorf school is this way:

“The problem you have is that you have not always followed the directive to bring what you know anthroposophically into a form you can present to little children. You have lectured the children about anthroposophy when you told them about your subject. You did not transform anthroposophy into a child’s level.” — Rudolf Steiner, FACULTY MEETINGS WITH RUDOLF STEINER (Anthroposophic Press, 1998), pp. 402-403.

Bringing Anthroposophy — and all other matters — down to a child’s level largely means avoiding intellectuality, Steiner taught. Although Steiner himself was an intellectual, he warned his followers against intellect, which he said can kill truth. [4]

Steiner taught that intellect is most damaging for young children (who are incapable of rational thought, he said), but it is potentially harmful for the pursuit of truth at all stages of life. Intellectuality should be developed and guided among older students, Steiner said; the Waldorf curriculum in the higher grades provides for this. [5] But the cold, rational, intellectual use of the brain is always potentially damaging, Steiner taught.

Here are a few of Steiner’s cautionary words about intellect or critical thinking:

◊ “The intellect destroys or hinders.” — Rudolf Steiner, WALDORF EDUCATION AND ANTHROPOSOPHY, Vol. 1 (Anthroposophic Press, 1995, p. 233.

◊ "Intellectuality flows forth from Ahriman as a cold and frosty, soulless cosmic impulse.” — Rudolf Steiner, ANTHROPOSOPHICAL LEADING THOUGHTS (Rudolf Steiner Press, 1998), p. 98. [6]

◊ “[T]he brain and nerve system have nothing at all to do with actual cognition.” — Rudolf Steiner, THE FOUNDATIONS OF HUMAN EXPERIENCE (Anthroposophic Press, 1996), p. 60. [7]

◊ "You will injure children if you educate them rationally.” — Rudolf Steiner, THE FOUNDATIONS OF HUMAN EXPERIENCE, p. 61.

◊ “A man who would receive Anthroposophy with his intellect kills it in the very act.” — Rudolf Steiner, LIFE, NATURE, AND CULTIVATION OF ANTHROPOSOPHY (Anthroposophical Society in Great Britain, 1963), p. 15.

Waldorf education steers children away from critical thought and toward the uncritical embrace of Anthroposophy. [8]

◊

[1] Steiner delivered this lecture years before the founding of the first Waldorf school. But after the school was up an running, he repeated the quotation's central messages many times. Thus, for instance, he said the following to faculty members at the first Waldorf School:

“[I]t is important that we develop imaginative pictures through which we can show the supersensible through nature. For example, I have often mentioned that we should speak to the children about the butterfly’s cocoon and how the butterfly comes out of the cocoon. I have said that we can explain the concept of the immortal soul to the children by saying that, although human beings die, their souls go from them like an invisible butterfly emerging from the cocoon.” — Rudolf Steiner, FACULTY MEETINGS WITH RUDOLF STEINER (Anthroposophic Press, 1998), p. 43.

The "supersensible" is anything that lies beyond the reach of our normal senses. In general, this means anything spiritual or supernatural.

[2] See "Oh My Word" and “Sneaking It In”.

[3] See "Is Anthroposophy a Religion?"

[4] See "Steiner's Specific".

[5] See "The Waldorf Curriculum".

[6] Ahriman is a terrible demon, according to Steiner. [See "Ahriman".] Steiner associated Ahriman with intellect, the brain, and science. So, for instance, Steiner once said this"

"To conceal from mankind that in modern intellectual, rationalistic science with its supplement of a superstitious empiricism, one is dealing with a great illusion, a deception — that men should not recognize this is of the greatest possible interest to Ahriman. It would be a triumphant experience for him if the scientific superstition which grips all circles today and by which men even want to organize their social science, should prevail into the third millennium. He would have the greatest success if he could then come as a human being into Western civilization and find the scientific superstition.” — Rudolf Steiner, THE AHRIMANIC DECEPTION (Anthroposophic Press, 1985), a lecture, GA 193.

Steiner taught that Ahriman and his colleague/rival, Lucifer, offer mankind gifts. These can be put to good use, Steiner said; but they may also prove to be temptations that will lead us to ruin. We must remember, Steiner said, that these demons have evil intentions. So, for instance, Steiner once said this:

“Lucifer wants to take men's souls away and found a planet with them of his own. Ahriman has to help him. While Lucifer sucks the juice out of the lemon, as it were, Ahriman presses it out, thereby hardening what remains. This is what he tried to do to the civilization of Rome. Here we have an important cosmic process going on — all due to the intention and resolve of luciferic and ahrimanic powers [i.e., the powers of Lucifer and Ahriman]. As I have said, they were disappointed. They have continued their efforts, however, and our fifth post-Atlantean age [i.e., the present — the fifth age since the sinking of Atlantis] has yet to learn how strong these attacks are. They are now only beginning but they will become stronger and stronger. This age must learn, too, that the necessity to understand these attacks will become ever greater.” — Rudolf Steiner, INNER IMPULSES OF EVOLUTION (Anthroposophic Press, 1984), lecture 2, GA 171.

Steiner often reiterated such beliefs when addressing Waldorf teachers. For example, he told Waldorf teachers this:

"[T]oday...the spirit-soul [i.e., the combined human spirit and soul] is asleep. The human being is thus in danger of drifting into the Ahrimanic world [i.e., Ahriman's own world or planet], in which case the spirit-soul will evaporate into the cosmos. We live in a time when people face the danger of losing their souls ... This is a very serious matter. We now stand confronted with that fact." — Rudolf Steiner, FACULTY MEETINGS WITH RUDOLF STEINER (Anthroposophic Press, 1998), p. 115.

[7] A recent Anthroposophical text, written by a Waldorf teacher, affirms this surprising proposition:

"The brain does not produce thoughts." — Henk van Oort, ANTHROPOSOPHY A-Z (Sophia Books, Rudolf Steiner Press, 2011), p. 16.

Actual cognition, according to Anthroposophical belief, comes through the use of clairvoyance, which is not seated in the brain but in non-physical "organs of clairvoyance." [See the entry for "organs of clairvoyance" in The Brief Waldorf / Steiner Encyclopedia.]

[8] See,"Spiritual Agenda" and “Indoctrination”.

— R.R.

September 8, 2018

QUOTING THE FOUNDER

ON THE EDUCATION OF THE CHILD

(CONT.)

Yesterday, we looked at the first paragraph from a long quotation posted at “The great [sic] Rudolf Steiner Quotes Site”. Here is the second, concluding paragraph:

Here we have an excellent opportunity to observe with what effect the spiritual knowledge of Anthroposophy must work in life and practice. When the teacher comes before a class of children, armed with parables he has ‘made up’ out of an intellectual materialistic mode of thought, he will as a rule make little impression upon them. For he has first to puzzle out the parables for himself with all his intellectual cleverness. Parables to which one has first had to condescend have no convincing effect on those who listen to them. For when one speaks in parable and picture, it is not only what is spoken and shown that works upon the hearer, but a fine spiritual stream passes from the one to the other, from him who gives to him who receives. If he who tells has not himself the warm feeling of belief in his parable, he will make no impression on the other. For real effectiveness, it is essential to believe in one’s parables as in absolute realities. And this can only be when one’s thought is alive with spiritual knowledge. Take for instance the parable of which we have been speaking. The true student of Anthroposophy need not torment himself to think it out. For him it is reality. In the coming forth of the butterfly from the chrysalis he sees at work on a lower level of being the very same process that is repeated, on a higher level and at a higher stage of development, in the coming forth of the soul from the body. He believes in it with his whole might; and this belief streams as it were unseen from speaker to hearer, carrying conviction. Life flows freely, unhindered, back and forth from teacher to pupil. But for this it is necessary that the teacher draw from the full fountain of spiritual knowledge. His words and all that comes from him must receive feeling, warmth and colour from a truly anthroposophic way of thought.

— Rudolf Steiner

Translated by George and Mary Adams

[https://rudolfsteinerquotes.wordpress.com]

◊ • ◊

Waldorf Watch Response:

To remind you: This quotation is from Steiner's essay "The Education of the Child in the Light of Anthroposophy", and it tells us a great deal about Waldorf education.

The essence of this second part of the quotation is that a true Waldorf teacher must be a true-believing Anthroposophist. [1] S/he should not invent a parable "out of an intellectual materialistic mode of thought." S/he should not devise a parable that needs to be puzzled out with "intellectual cleverness." We saw, yesterday, how Steiner disparaged intellect. [2]

No, the Waldorf teacher must truly, deeply believe in the parables s/he tells. "[I]t is essential to believe in one’s parables as in absolute realities." Waldorf parables must be spiritually true, in other words; they must convey genuine spiritual lessons to the students. Then "a fine spiritual stream passes from the one [the teacher] to the other [the student]." Then the teacher conveys genuine "spiritual knowledge." [3]

In other words, the instruction given by a true-believing Waldorf teacher is Anthroposophical religious instruction. It is Anthroposophical indoctrination. The teacher believes the lesson "with his whole might." The teacher conveys "conviction" to the students. The teacher draws "from the full fountain of spiritual knowledge." This fountain is Anthroposophy. The teacher's words "receive feeling, warmth and colour from a truly anthroposophic way of thought." The lesson is, then, Anthroposophical indoctrination. [4]

The true Waldorf teacher is a true believer, and the objective of Waldorf instruction is to lead the children toward becoming true believers. The teacher does not propound doctrines for the students to memorize. This would be intellectual instruction, and Waldorf schools heed Steiner's cautions about the dreadful dangers of intellect. No, the teacher speaks out of a "warm feeling of belief," aiming to affect the children's own feelings far more than their thoughts. Indoctrination is always most effective when it operates below the level of conscious thought. The children aren't so much told what to think as they are told what to feel. When a Waldorf teacher uses words that "receive feeling, warmth and colour from a truly anthroposophic way of thought," the feeling is far more important that the thought.

When Waldorf education works as designed, it is an example of how "the spiritual knowledge of Anthroposophy must work in life and practice." When the fine stream of conviction and feeling passes from teacher to student, a process of subtle proselytization occurs. [5] Waldorf schools do not aim to provide a good education in a conventional sense. [6] Instead, they aim to provide religious training in the spirit of Rudolf Steiner.

Perhaps you want to send your child to a school that will provide religious instruction. That's fine; it is your right. But make sure you understand what sort of religion is promoted by teachers at the school you select. At a Waldorf school, the religion promoted — subtly, quietly, but insistently — is Anthroposophy. [7]

True-believing Waldorf teachers think they are on a divine mission. They think they serve the gods. [8] They think they are the conduit through which the beneficent blessings of the gods flow out into the world. Remember what Steiner said to teachers at the first Waldorf school:

“Among the faculty, we must certainly carry within us the knowledge that we are not here for our own sakes, but to carry out the divine cosmic plan. [9] We should always remember that when we do something, we are actually carrying out the intentions of the gods, that we are, in a certain sense, the means by which that streaming down from above will go out into the world.” — Rudolf Steiner, FACULTY MEETINGS WITH RUDOLF STEINER (Anthroposophic Press, 1998), p. 55.

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[1] This is what Steiner meant when he said the following to teachers at the first Waldorf school:

“As teachers in the Waldorf School, you will need to find your way more deeply into the insight of the spirit and to find a way of putting all compromises aside ... As Waldorf teachers, we must be true anthroposophists in the deepest sense of the word in our innermost feeling.” — Rudolf Steiner, FACULTY MEETINGS WITH RUDOLF STEINER (Anthroposophic Press, 1998), p. 118.

[2] For more on the issue of intellect, see "Steiner's Specific".

"Materialism," as Steiner means it here, is excessive devotion to life in the physical world; it is the belief that only the physical world exists. Use of the brain, as when relying on intellect, is materialistic in that the brain is a physical organ. Steiner taught that real knowledge comes primarily through the use of clairvoyance, which is not seated in the brain but in non-physical "organs of clairvoyance." [See the entry for "organs of clairvoyance" in The Brief Waldorf / Steiner Encyclopedia.]

[3] Remember that Steiner delivered this lecture years before founding the first Waldorf school. But once the school was up and running, Steiner made the same points again:

“Imagine that we wanted to convey a simple religious concept — for instance, the immortality of the human soul — to a class of young children ... A Waldorf teacher, an anthroposophically oriented spiritual researcher, would not feel, ‘I am the intelligent adult who makes up a story for the children’s benefit,’ but rather: ‘The eternal beings and powers [i.e., the gods], acting as the spiritual in nature, have placed before my eyes a picture of the immortal human soul, objectively, in the form of the emerging butterfly. Believing in the truth of this picture with every fibre of my being, and bringing it to my pupils through my own conviction, I will awaken in them a truly religious concept.’” — Rudolf Steiner, WALDORF EDUCATION AND ANTHROPOSOPHY (Anthroposophic Press, 1995), Vol. 1, pp. 49-50.

True Waldorf instruction is truly religious instruction ("I will awaken in them a truly religious concept"). The religion involved is Anthroposophy. [See "Is Anthroposophy a Religion?" and "Waldorf Worship".]

[4] All true Waldorf lessons have this as their ultimate purpose. [See, e.g., "Here's the Answer" and “Indoctrination”.]

[5] Bear in mind, in discussing the use of parables, we are primarily considering Waldorf education aimed at young children. The nature of Waldorf instruction changes in progressively higher grades. Just as Anthroposophists use their intellects to puzzle out Steiner's books and lectures, older Waldorf students are encouraged to begin using their dawning intellects in the higher grades. But Steiner's warnings about intellect persist throughout. Intellect destroys or hinders, Steiner said. The only form of intellect that can truly be trusted, from a Waldorf perspective, is intellect that is conditioned by heartfelt spiritual belief. Waldorf education is meant to continue throughout a child's life — a student should begin in a Waldorf nursery school and stay at Waldorf through the end of high school. In the earliest, formative years, the young child's feelings are worked upon by the teachers' feelings. The teachers conveys "conviction" to the students at a deep, almost unconscious level. This conviction should persist ever after — it is true "spiritual knowledge." When the child becomes old enough for the use of intellect to become permissible, all her/his thoughts should be controlled by the deep conviction implanted in earliest childhood. This, indeed, is indoctrination.

[6] Thus, for instance, we find statements such as the following:

“The success of Waldorf Education...can be measured in the life force attained. Not acquisition of knowledge and qualifications, but the life force is the ultimate goal of this school.” — Anthroposophist Peter Selg, THE ESSENCE OF WALDORF EDUCATION (SteinerBooks, 2010)‚ p. 30.

Waldorf schools do not primarily aim to pass knowledge to the students, and they do not primarily aim to help the kids become qualified for any future path in life — except the path of Anthroposophy.

“One could say that Waldorf education has a hidden agenda. Its curriculum is described in terms common to public schools in general; arithmetic, writing, reading ... But in Steiner schools the dimensions of these subjects are threefold: they are artistic, cognitive, and religious ... There is a continual interconnecting, a relinking, a re-ligioning, of one activity with another." — M. C. Richards, TOWARD WHOLENESS: Rudolf Steiner Education in America (Wesleyn University Press, 1980), p. 164.

Waldorf schools rarely give accurate, honest accounts of their real objectives. [See, e.g., "Secrets".] The "hidden agenda" is Anthroposophy.

[7] Not all Waldorf schools comply fully with Steiner's directives. Some are more Anthroposophically religious than others. Evaluating any particular Waldorf school — figuring out what sort of Waldorf school it is — can call for clever detective work on your part. [For some guidance, see "Advice for Parents" and "Clues".]

[8] Anthroposophy bears a superficial resemblance to Christianity, but it is in fact a polytheistic faith. [See "Polytheism".] Christianity, of course, is monotheistic.

[9] See the entry for "divine cosmic plan" in The Brief Waldorf / Steiner Encyclopedia.

— R.R.

August 28, 2018

ILLNESS, KARMA, ATLANTIS, EVOLUTION,

RACES, DEMONS, AND LEPROSY

Here is a quotation from a lecture by Rudolf Steiner. The lecture is featured today — August 28, 2018 — at the Rudolf Steiner Archive and e.Lib. I have added some explanatory footnotes and two supplementary quotations.

Illness need not be a matter of individual karma only; the karma of a whole people has to be taken into account. [1] An interesting example…can be seen in the migration of the Huns and Mongols who poured from Asia into the West. [2] The Mongols were stragglers of the Atlanteans. [3] While the Indians, the German and other peoples were progressing, the Mongols had remained behind. Just as the animals have separated off from the evolutionary path of mankind, so have certain lower peoples and races fallen behind. [4] The Mongols were Atlanteans whose physical development had taken a downward course. [5] In the astral bodies of such decadent people an abundance of decaying astral substance can be seen. [6] When the Mongols fell upon the Germans and other Central European peoples, they created a wave of fear and panic. [7] These emotions belong to the astral body, and under such conditions decaying astral substances will flourish. [8] Thus the astral bodies of Europeans became infected and in later generations the infection came out in the physical body, affecting not merely individuals but whole groups of peoples. It emerged as leprosy, that terrible disease which wrought such devastation in the Middle Ages. It was the physical consequence of an influence on the astral body. [9]

— Rudolf Steiner, “Workings of the Law of Karma in Human Life”, AT THE GATES OF SPIRITUAL SCIENCE (Rudolf Steiner Publishing Co., 1986), lecture 7, GA 95.

[8/28/2018 https://wn.rsarchive.org/Lectures/Dates/19060828p01.html Steiner delivered this lecture on August 28, 1906.]

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Waldorf Watch Footnotes:

[1] Karma and reincarnation are key beliefs held by Steiner’s followers. [See “Karma” and “Reincarnation”. For Steiner’s teachings about illness and health, see, e.g., “Steiner’s Quackery”.]

[2] Steiner is speaking of the intrusion of Asiatic peoples (“Huns and Mongols”) into Europe, intrusions that he said had dire effects. The Huns were Eurasian nomads. Their leader, sometimes called Atilla the Hun (circa 406-453 CE), was a feared enemy of the Roman empires, eastern and western. Atilla led his people across the Danube into Germanic lands more than once, and he plundered Central Europe. The Mongols were a Central Asian ethnic group. The emperor of the Mongols, Ghengis Khan (1162–1227 CE), led what is sometimes called the “Mongol Invasion” of Europe in the 13th century. His successors continued assailing, and ruling, large swaths of Europe in subsequent years.

Here, Steiner focuses chiefly on the Mongols (as conceived in his esoteric imaginings). We will consider a statement Steiner made about the Huns, presently.

[3] Steiner says the Mongols were very little changed from their forebears, who lived on the continent of Atlantis. Unlike some other races and peoples, the Mongols had not evolved much beyond the level of the Atlanteans. [Steiner and his followers believe in Atlantis. For Steiner’s teachings about Atlantis, see “Atlantis and the Aryans” and “Atlantis”.]

[4] Steiner taught that humans have evolved by separating themselves from lowly or degenerate types that were unable to keep pace. Thus, Steiner says here that subcontinental Indians, Germans, and others have evolved to higher levels, but “animals” and “lower peoples and races” failed to evolve and thus fell by the wayside (they “separated from the evolutionary path of mankind”). [For Steiner’s teachings on such matters, see, e.g., “Evolution, Anyone?”, “Steiner’s Racism”, and “Races”.]

[5] I.e., the Mongols did not simply remain at the evolutionary level of the Atlanteans — they actually degenerated to lower levels. Their “physical development had taken a downward course.”

[6] Steiner taught that humans have three invisible bodies that supplement the physical body. The “astral body” — consisting of astral or soul subtances — is the second of these invisible bodies. [See “Incarnation”.] Here, Steiner says that the astral bodies of the Mongols contained “an abundance of decaying astral substance.”

[7] I.e., the invasion of the Mongols caused “a wave of fear and panic” in Central Europe.

[8] Steiner says fear and panic are located primarily in the astral body, and they cause the substances of the astral body to decay. Thus, the Mongols — with their degenerate astral bodies — caused the astral bodies of their European victims to degenerate also.

[9] I.e., the damage to Europeans’ astral bodies caused, by extension, damage to Europeans’ physical bodies. This damage expressed itself as the disease of leprosy.

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Supplementary Quotation #1:

Here is another Steiner statement about leprosy in Europe. In this case, Steiner speaks about the effects produced by invading Huns, rather than invading Mongols, on the people of Central Europe. He also introduces the concept of demonic influence.

[W]e must distinguish so carefully between [individual] evolution and racial evolution. [Upwardly evolving] souls reappear in bodies belonging to higher races, while the bodies of the lower races die out … [W]ith the dying out of the worst parts of the ancient population [of Europe and Asia Minor], the whole region gradually became filled with demonic beings that represented the products of decay of what had died out. The whole of Europe and also Asia Minor were thus filled with the spiritual products of decay from the dying out of the worst parts of the population. These demons of decay…endured for a long time … Their influence can best be seen at the time of the Great Migrations, when large masses of people, including Attila and his hordes, came over from Asia and caused great terror among the people in Europe. This terror made the population susceptible to the influences of the demonic beings that still persisted from earlier times. As a consequence of the terror produced by the hordes coming over from Asia, there gradually developed what manifested during the Middle Ages as the epidemic of leprosy.

— Rudolf Steiner, THE SPIRITUAL FOUNDATION OF MORALITY (SteinerBooks, 1995), p. 31, GA 155.

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Supplementary Quotation #2:

Both of the quotations above hinge on the concept of racial inequality. Steiner taught that some races are higher than others. The lower races are generally degenerate — they have failed to keep abreast as the higher races evolved, Steiner taught. The best parts of humanity are freeing themselves by evolving to higher and higher levels, Steiner said. A race is "high" because it is more evolved than the degenerate races. The high races are approaching the ideal human type.

[P]eoples and races are but steps leading to pure humanity. A race or a nation stands so much the higher, the more perfectly its members express the pure, ideal human type, the further they have worked their way from the physical and perishable to the supersensible and imperishable. The evolution of man through the incarnations in ever higher national and racial forms is thus a process of liberation. Man must finally appear in harmonious perfection.

— Rudolf Steiner, KNOWLEDGE OF HIGHER WORLDS AND ITS ATTAINMENT (Anthroposophic Press, 1947), p. 252, GA 10.

KNOWLEDGE OF THE HIGHER WORLDS is one of Steiner's most important books, laying out some of his central teachings. [See "Knowing the Worlds".]

— Footnotes and supplementary quotations provided by R.R.

June 30, 2018

STARS, PLANETS,

PRAYERS, AND ANTHROPOSOPHY

Here is the quotation for today from the "The great Rudolf Steiner Quotes Site":

What could be more uplifting than to know that we can discover the fount of our life between death and rebirth. We can discover our kinship with the whole universe! What could give us greater strength for our duties in life than the knowledge that we bear within us the forces pouring in from the universe and must so prepare ourselves in life that these forces can become active in us when, between death and rebirth, we pass into the spheres of the planets and of the Sun.

One who truly grasps what occultism can reveal to him about man’s relation to the world of the stars can say with sincerity and understanding the prayer that might be worded somewhat as follows, “The more conscious I become that I am born out of the universe, the more deeply I feel the responsibility to develop in myself the forces given to me by a whole universe, the better human being I can become.”

One who knows how to say this prayer from the depths of the soul may also hope that it will become in him a fulfilled ideal. He may hope that through the power of such a prayer he will indeed become a better and more perfect man. Thus what we receive through true spiritual science works into the most intimate depths of our being.

Source: Rudolf Steiner – GA 140 – Life Between Death and Rebirth: III – Hanover, November 18, 1912

Translated by Rene Querido

[6/30/ 2018 https://rudolfsteinerquotes.wordpress.com/2018/06/30/what-could-be-more-uplifting/]

Waldorf Watch Response:

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Rudolf Steiner’s teachings (which he dubs, here, his “occultism,” his “spiritual science”) are indeed uplifting — if they are true. But that’s a big If.

When Steiner says “we bear within us the forces pouring in from the universe,” he is essentially talking about astrology (as reconceived by himself). We are tiny replicas of the universe, he taught — we are microcosms containing the imprint of the entire macrocosm. We are the center of everything. [See “The Center”.] The spiritual forces of the stars and planets flow down into us. [See “Astrology” and “Star Power”.] After we die, “we pass into the spheres of the planets and of the Sun,” rising progressively through these spheres and their presiding gods. [See “Higher Worlds”.]

Steiner’s professed “occultism” is his claimed possession of secret, gnostic, hidden — in a word, occult — spiritual knowledge. Like innumerable other mystics and occultists before him, Steiner taught that the gods have hidden much essential knowledge from us. But Steiner asserted that by becoming occultists — especially by buying into his version of occultism — we can acquire much of this knowledge. We can become, then, occult initiates. [See “Occultism”, “Gnosis”, and “Inside Scoop”.]

Steiner’s “spiritual science” is Anthroposophy, the system he offered that would enable us to crack the occult secrets of the cosmos. [See "Everything" and "Knowing the Worlds".] In calling Anthroposophy a science, Steiner followed the example of Theosophy, which identifies itself as a spiritual science.* But the truth is that Anthroposophy is a religion. [See “Is Anthroposophy a Religion?”.] To be “uplifted” by it, we need to believe it — we must have faith. [See “Faith”.] And to enact Anthroposophy, we must do such things as praying. Steiner offers us a prayer, here, and he prescribed many other prayers on many other occasions, including some prayers for Waldorf students to recite. [See “Prayers”.]

The key requirement for Steiner’s occultism or spiritual science is the use of clairvoyance. It is through disciplined use of clairvoyance that we can make spiritual discoveries, Steiner said. The problem in this is that clairvoyance does not exist. Nothing real comes from clairvoyance, which itself is unreal. [See “Clairvoyance”.]

Steiner’s teachings would be uplifting if they were true. But that’s a big If.

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* Steiner was nominally still a Theosophist when he spoke the words we are considering here. Soon thereafter, he broke away to set up Anthroposophy as a separate movement. He began calling his own teachings “Anthroposophy” a good while before formally breaking away from Theosophy.

— R.R.

May 23, 2018

RUDOLF STEINER VS.

SO-CALLED EDUCATED PEOPLE

Today's quotation posted at The great [sic] Rudolf Steiner Quotes Site:

"At the present time, one regards every man as intelligent, even as if he were wise. However, that is not the case. One can be intelligent and have the most stupid thoughts. The greatest foolishness is thought out very intelligently. Especially if one looks at a large part of contemporary science, it must be said: This science is actually intelligent in all areas, but it is certainly not wise."

Source (German): Rudolf Steiner – GA 353 – Die Geschichte der Menschheit und die Weltanschauungen der Kulturvölker – Dornach, May 10, 1924 (page 214)

Translated by Nesta Carsten-Krüger

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Waldorf Watch Response:

This quotation touches on a subject we have discussed here recently: the relationship between Anthroposophy and modern science. Although Rudolf Steiner sometimes said that there are no real contradictions between Anthroposophy (which he classified as a spiritual science) and the modern physical sciences, he in fact harbored a deep hostility to modern science. There is a fundamental conflict between Steiner's teachings and the findings of modern science. The universe described by "spiritual science" — in particular the description propounded by Rudolf Steiner — is utterly unlike the universe described by modern physical science — built on the insights of Isaac Newton, Albert Einstein, and others. [See, e.g., "Science" and "Steiner's 'Science'".]

Modern physical science is wrong. That's part of what we can find in today's quotation. But Steiner's words are also interesting at a deeper level. Steiner meant his statement one way; we may read it another way.

"One can be intelligent and have the most stupid thoughts." Steiner presumably meant that it is possible to be quite intelligent and yet to disbelieve his teachings — a smart person may stupidly accept the modern physical-scientific description of reality instead.

Steiner's followers will read his words as he meant them. But many other people nowadays would be inclined to turn Steiner's words around. They would agree that a smart people can believe stupid things, but one example that would likely spring to mind is Anthroposophy itself. [1] A smart person may fall under Steiner's sway — but how can this be? Why would any intelligent person accept Steiner's phantasmagoric, irrational teachings?

It's a deep question, touching on many deep yearnings in the human psyche. We would all like to think that our lives have meaning. We would all like to think that we matter. We would all like to think that life is more than a series of random, serendipitous accidents. We would all like for life to be more fulfilling, more meaningful, more magical than that. Steiner was one of the many seers and prophets who have volunteered to answer our questions and satisfy our yearnings.

The chief problem with believing Steiner is that he requires us to reject virtually all real knowledge. If we are to believe him, we must reject real knowledge, and established facts, and the testimony of our own senses.

Steiner did not just oppose modern physical science; he rejected most modern scholarship of all stripes. He said we need a wholly different mindset than the kind of thinking used by "so-called educated people." Steiner said the following, for instance:

"The time must come when [we] take up the irksome task of [getting beyond] the way thinking is taught by the so-called educated people in the universities." — Rudolf Steiner, SECRET BROTHERHOODS (Rudolf Steiner Press, 2004), p. 92.

The "so-called educated people" — these were his real opponents, he knew. Steiner stood against education as it is usually understood; he stood against modern knowledge, as university-educated people understand it. [2] The knowledge found in universities is, he knew, ultimately incompatible with his own teachings:

"The kind of life and thinking emanating from the Universities started the trend towards abstraction — towards what was subsequently to be idolised and venerated as the pure, natural scientific thinking which to-day invades the customary ways of thought with such devastating results." — Rudolf Steiner, “Spiritual Emptiness and Social Life” (THE GOLDEN BLADE, 1954), GA 190.

Actual knowledge, such as that found in universities, is "devastating" for "customary ways of thought." The customary ways come to us from out of the past; they are suffused with superstition, fantasy, and ignorance. [See "The Ancients".] But Steiner embraced those antique ways of thinking, turning to them to develop his fantastical belief system, Anthroposophy. We must reject factual, knowledge-based, university-based thinking, Steiner said:

"Human beings must embark upon the unpleasant task of abandoning the mode of thinking which the universities produce in the so-called educated classes today...." — Rudolf Steiner, BEHIND THE SCENES OF EXTERNAL HAPPENINGS (Rudolf Steiner Publishing Co., 1947), lecture 1, GA 178.

The "so-called educated classes" (that is, college graduates) and the "so-called educated people in universities" (that is, college professors and students) — Steiner set himself up in opposition to these people, people who actually pursue and may even possess actual knowledge about the actual universe. Steiner wanted us to accept a different way of thinking instead. He want us to accept his way of thinking — his dreams and fantasies and falsifications.

Come to Anthroposophy, Steiner urged. All that is required is to repudiate rationality, and knowledge, and real education.

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So, yes, it is possible to be quite intelligent (as Steiner was) and yet think the most stupid thoughts (such as the doctrines of Anthroposophy). Steiner was, in this sense — and quite contrary to his intended meaning — completely correct.

[To delve more into the question why intelligent people might fall for Steiner's falsehoods, see, e.g., "Why? Oh Why?", "Fooling (Ourselves)", and "Inside Scoop".]

— R.R.

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Waldorf Watch Footnotes:

[1] If you are unacquainted with Steiner's teachings and the many bloopers they contain, you might take a gander at "Steiner's Blunders".

[2] Steiner's repudiation of regular, rational education has clear implications for the sort of education he founded: Waldorf education. [To consider the actual nature of Waldorf "education," see, e.g., "Here's the Answer", "Soul School", and "Spiritual Agenda".] Waldorf education is ultimately religious. [See "Schools as Churches".] This may appeal to you. But make sure that you understand the particular religion on which Waldorf is based: Anthroposophy. [See "Is Anrothroposophy a Religion?"]

May 6, 2018

LIFE ON THE MOON —

A LOOK BACK

Waldorf education arises out of Anthroposophy, the occult belief system established by Rudolf Steiner. To understand the rationale for Waldorf education, it is necessary to delve into Anthroposophy.

One element of Anthroposophy is an extraordinary history of the cosmos that Steiner claimed to have learned through his advanced use of clairvoyance. This history is wholly unlike anything found in modern science. From a rational perspective, it is little more than fantasy. Yet it lies at the root of Waldorf belief and practice.

Here is an excerpt from a lecture by Rudolf Steiner that is featured today (May 6, 2018) at the Rudolf Steiner Archive & e.Lib. To assist you in navigating it, I have added a few footnotes:

When the earth was still at the old Moon stage [1] there was no human kingdom such as the one we have. [2] The whole Moon was a kind of a plant being like a peat bog, soft and alive. [3] The beings who are now men developed out of this plant-mineral earth. [4] This plant porridge also contained present plants and animals. [5] There was an intermediate kingdom between these two: animal-plants had sensation. [6] There was a plant kingdom on old Moon, higher than the present mineral kingdom, an animal-plant kingdom of sentient plants, and a kingdom of man-animals, higher than the present animal kingdom and lower than the present human kingdom. [7]

Creatures on this old Moon mainly lived in a nitrogen atmosphere. [8] The Moon was surrounded by it, and it perished from an excess of nitrogen.... [9]

After old Moon had perished from its atmosphere everything went through a pralaya [10], re-emerged, and present earth evolution began. [11] Then after awhile everything that wasn't favorable for further evolution split off and formed the present moon. [12]

— Rudolf Steiner, FROM THE CONTENTS OF THE ESOTERIC CLASSES, Berlin, May 6, 1906, GA 266 [https://wn.rsarchive.org/Lectures/Dates/19060506e01.html].

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Waldorf Watch Footnotes:

[1] "Old Moon" was a period in the evolution of the solar system — it was the third incarnation of the solar system, coming after periods called Old Saturn and Old Sun. [See "Old Saturn", "Old Sun", and "Old Moon, Etc."] Steiner taught that the solar system has evolved much as we have evolved. Indeed, our evolution is intimately linked to the evolution of the solar system — the planets have evolved for our benefit. We are the center of the whole business. [See "The Center".] Therefore, Steiner often spoke of Old Saturn, etc., as stages in the evolution of the Earth, since the Earth is our home, and we are the central figures in this cosmic history. So, when Steiner says "the earth was still at the old Moon stage," he is saying that the entire solar system, including the Earth, once existed in a form known as Old Moon.

[2] We were present during Old Moon, but we were not yet human beings. We had not yet evolved that far. Thus, there was no "human kingdom" at that time. (We had not yet evolved far enough to separate ourselves from the animals. During Old Moon, we and the animals were combined in a class of beings Steiner called "man-animals." We will return to this point in a moment.)

[3] The solar system at that time (as at all other times) was alive. Old Moon, in this sense, was a living entity. Here, Steiner tells us that it was a "plant being," something like peat.

[4] The "beings who are now men" were ourselves as we existed then. We were subhuman, but we were evolving toward becoming human. We evolved out of the "plant-mineral" substance of Old Moon (which had itself evolved out of Old Sun and, before that, Old Saturn). The word "earth," as Steiner uses it here ("men developed out of this plant-mineral earth") can best be understood as soil, or the peat of the Old Moon.

[5] The nutritious substance of Old Moon (a "plant porridge") gave rise not just to us but also to the beings that would evolve to become plants and animals after Old Moon ended.

[6] Just as there was a class of beings called "man-animal" (combining beings that would become human with others that would become animals), there was a class of beings called "animal-plants" (combining beings that would become animals with others that would become plants). The "animal-plants" were alive and conscious. (Today's higher animals evolved from the "man-animal" beings, while today's lower animals evolved from the "animal-plant" beings.)

[7] This is a survey of the population of Old Moon. There were "plants" that were more highly evolved than the minerals we know today; there were animal-plants that stood halfway between the plants and animals we know today; and there were "man-animals" that stood halfway between human beings as we exist now and the animals we know on Earth now.

[8] Although Old Moon was more a time than a place, it can be described as a place. In this sense, it was a globe consisting of the parts of the solar system intermingled with one another. Moreover, this globe had an atmosphere — which, Steiner tells us here, was mainly nitrogen.

[9] I.e., the Old Moon asphyxiated itself (it died) because of its noxious atmosphere.

[10] I.e., a period of rest. Generally, according to Steiner, the solar system blinks into existence and then out of existence again. The periods when it blinks out of existence are called pralayas (from the Sanskrit for melting away). Thus, when Old Moon died, it receded from existence; there was a rest period; then the solar system reincarnated in a new form.

[11] The new incarnation of the solar system is called Present Earth. This is the incarnation in which we now exist. [See "Present Earth".]

[12] During Present Earth, the solar system has diversified — the planets that we see in the sky today have become separate worlds, no longer intermingled in a single globe. One of the newly separated worlds is the Moon that we see in the sky today. That world contains "everything that wasn't favorable for further evolution" — the Moon is, in effect, a deadly cosmic refuse bin. (For this reason, Anthroposophists consider the present Moon to be cut off from the rest of the solar system. It is dead and inaccessible. Therefore, many Anthroposophists deny that the Apollo space program sent astronauts to the Moon — no one can go to the Moon, so the "Moon landings" must have been staged. This is just one of the conspiracy theories Anthroposophists are prone to accept.)

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For an overview of the entire history of the solar system as described by Steiner, see the entry for "historical narrative of Anthroposophy" in The Brief Waldorf / Steiner Encyclopedia.

— R.R.

April 13, 2018

GODS, PLANETS,

LUCIFER, AND RACES

The following is from one of the lectures featured today (April 13, 2018) at the Rudolf Steiner Archive & e.Lib.

[Steiner can be very hard to read. To assist newcomers to make sense of Steiner’s words, I have provided an interpretive paraphrase of Steiner's remarks. I have also provided some footnotes.]

In our present cycle of time there are Luciferic Spirits [1] in every category of the hierarchies. [2] Whereas the animal group-souls [3] are the normal and proper offspring of the Spirits of Motion [4], the Luciferic Spirits corresponding to the Spirits of Motion are those who resisted the normal path, and have remained in opposition to the normal Spirits of Motion. [5] These Luciferic Spirits of Motion are grouped on the various planets in relation with the earth, just as are the normal offspring of the Spirits of Motion. [6] They too, have their parts assigned to them, so to speak, and have their abode apportioned to them on the various planets. [7] Just as the group-souls of the animals dwell on the various planets, so also do certain Luciferic Spirits of Motion. [8] They have set themselves the task which really belongs to the Spirits of Motion; that of working formatively from the planets, so that groups of corresponding beings arise upon the earth. [9] ... [T]he Luciferic Beings of Motion work from the planets on to the earth to differentiate the human race, which was actually, in a certain sense, designed according to a single plan. [10] Whilst in the whole cosmic plan it was intended that a single human form was to arise throughout the earth, these Luciferic Spirits of Motion worked down from the various planets and differentiated the human form all over the earth in such a way that the forms of the chief individual human races were able to arise. [11]

— Rudolf Steiner, THE SPIRITUAL BEINGS IN THE HEAVENLY BODIES AND IN THE KINGDOMS OF NATURE (Steiner Book Centre, 1981), lecture 9, GA 136.

[downloaded 4/13/2018 http://wn.rsarchive.org/Lectures/Dates/19120413p01.html]

◊ • ◊

R.R. Interpretive Paraphrase:

In our present time, demons allied with Lucifer — Luciferic Spirits [1] — are spread throughout the ranks of the gods. [2] Spirits of Motion are the gods who properly create the group soul of animals [3], but today we find Luciferic Spirits standing at the same level as the Spirits of Motion [4]. These Luciferic Spirits of Motion oppose the actions of the normal Spirits of Motion; they oppose the proper course of evolution. [5] These Luciferic Spirits dwell on the various planets of our solar system, as do the offspring of the Spirits of Motion (i.e., the group souls of animals). [6] The Luciferic Spirits of Motion have their parts to play in the divine plan of the cosmos, and they have their assigned homes on the planets. [7] Just as the group souls of the animals dwell on the various planets, so also do certain Luciferic Spirits of Motion. [8] These Luciferic Spirits have taken upon themselves a job that really should belong to the normal Spirits of Motion — the Luciferic Spirits work from their locations on the planets to cause certain types of beings to be born upon the Earth and to develop there [9] ... The gods originally intended all human beings to be alike, molded according to a single plan — but the Luciferic Spirits of Motion have caused humanity to subdivide into differing races. [10] Whereas the divine cosmic plan had intended for just one type of human being to exist on the Earth at any given time, the Luciferic Spirits of Motion sent down their influences from the planets, causing different races to develop at different places upon the Earth. [11]

◊ • ◊

Waldorf Watch Footnotes:

[1] Steiner is speaking about minions of Lucifer; demons in the train of the arch-demon, Lucifer.

[2] I.e., every rank of god. Steiner taught that there are nine ranks of gods. The highest three ranks comprise the “first hierarchy,” the middle three ranks comprise the “second hierarchy,” and the lowest three ranks comprise the “third hierarchy.” Here, Steiner says that there are Luciferic Spirits spread throughout the ranks of gods.

[3] “Group souls,” according to Steiner, are souls shared by all members of a group such as a species or race. Animals lack individual souls, Steiner said, but each species of animal shares a group soul.

[4] Spirits of Motion, Steiner taught, are gods in the middle rank of the Second Hierarchy — that is, they are gods of the fifth rank overall. Here, Steiner says that the Spirits of Motion created the group souls of the animals.

[5] Normal gods, according to Steiner, are those who have evolved at the proper pace and in the proper way. (Steiner taught that gods evolve just as humans do.) Abnormal gods are those who have failed to evolve properly. The Luciferic Spirits have not only failed to evolve properly, but they have actively opposed proper spiritual evolution. This is what makes them demonic.

[6] Astrology is woven throughout Anthroposophy. Steiner taught that gods and demons dwell on the stars and planets, sending their influences down to us on the Earth.

[7] All gods and demons play their parts in cosmic evolution, Steiner taught. Seen in one way, then, even the demons are constructive or good. But, seen from another perspective, a clear distinction can be drawn between normal (“good”) spirits and abnormal (“evil”) spirits.

[8] Group souls are, in and of themselves, spiritual beings — they are, in a manner of speaking, gods. Here Steiner says that group souls dwell on the planets just as other spirits — such as Spirits of Motion — do. (The group souls work from the planets to create the various species of animals upon the Earth.) Steiner also indicates that the Luciferic Spirits on the planets are essentially "Luciferic Spirits of Motion" — i.e., they are Luciferic Spirits who stand at the same level as Spirits of Motion. These Luciferic Spirits act, in effect, as abnormal Spirits of Motion.

[9] I.e., the Luciferic Spirits usurp the proper activities of the normal Spirits of Motion — they send down influences from the planets affecting the types of human beings who exist upon the Earth.

[10] I.e., the Luciferic Spirits “differentiate” (divide) the human race, so that different races exist simultaneously upon the Earth. Originally, Steiner says, the gods intended for all humans to be the same (“the human race…was actually…designed according to a single plan”), but the Luciferic Spirits worked against this original plan — they divided humanity.

[11] The Luciferic Spirits, working from the planets, enabled differing races to arise. Note that on other occasions, Steiner said that Ahrimanic Spirits (minions of the arch-demon Ahriman) were also involved, and he made it clear that the activities of the two types of demons (summarized as Lucifer and Ahriman) were evil. If human evolution had proceeded correctly, Steiner said, all humans on the Earth at any one time would be the same. We would all start out together as members of a single primitive race, and then we would all reincarnate together as members of progressively higher and higher races. The existence of multiple races on the Earth at the same time — races standing at different levels of development — resulted from demonic interference, Steiner taught. Thus, for instance:

“Lucifer and Ahriman...fought against [the] harmonious tendency of development in the evolution of humanity, and they managed to change the whole process so that various developments were shifted and displaced. While there should have been basically only one form of human being...Lucifer and Ahriman preserved [earlier human types] ... Thus, forms that should have disappeared remained. Instead of racial diversities developing consecutively, older racial forms remained unchanged and newer ones began to evolve at the same time. Instead of the intended consecutive development of races, there was a coexistence of races. That is how it came about that physically different races inhabited the earth and are still there in our time although evolution should really have proceeded [correctly].” — Rudolf Steiner, THE UNIVERSAL HUMAN: THE EVOLUTION OF INDIVIDUALITY, Lectures from 1909-1916 (Anthroposophic Press, 1990), p. 75.

[For more on some of the matters touched on here, see, e.g., "Steiner's Racism", "Lucifer", "Astrology", "Evolution, Anyone?", and "Neutered Nature". Also see such entries in The Brief Waldorf / Steiner Encyclopedia as "gods", "demons", "animals", "group souls", and "good and evil".]

— R.R.

March 25, 2018

THE TASK OF

ANTHROPOSOPHY

A statement by Rudolf Steiner, posted on The great [sic] Rudolf Steiner Quotes Site:

We are only separated from the so-called dead through the fact that we are not in a position to perceive with our ordinary consciousness how the forces of the dead, the life of the dead, the actions of the dead, play into our own life. These forces, these actions of the dead, continually permeate the life of our feeling and the life of our will. Therefore we can live with the dead. And it is indeed important to realize at the present time that the task of Anthroposophy is to develop this consciousness — that we are in touch with the souls of the dead.

The earth will not continue to evolve in the direction of the welfare of humanity unless humanity develops this living feeling of being together with the dead. For the life of the dead plays into the life of the so-called living in many ways.

Source: Rudolf Steiner – GA 179 – Historical Necessity and Freewill: Lecture 3: Our Life with the Dead – Dornach, December 10, 1917

[3/25/2018 https://rudolfsteinerquotes.wordpress.com/2018/03/24/the-life-of-the-dead-plays-into-the-life-of-the-so-called-living-in-many-ways/ This quotation was posted at The great Rudolf Steiner Quotes Site on March 24.]

◊ • ◊

Waldorf Watch Response:

Numerous Anthroposophical texts deal with the dead and the relationship between the living and the dead. See, e.g.,

◊ THE DEAD ARE WITH US (Rudolf Steiner Press, 2006),

◊ OUR DEAD (SteinerBooks, 2011),

◊ STAYING CONNECTED: How to Continue Your Relationships with Those Who Have Died (Anthroposophic Press, 1999).

For his own part, Steiner claimed to maintain contact with the military commander who launched the German offensives at the beginning of World War I. Steiner's "correspondence" with the dead warlord is recorded in LIGHT FOR THE NEW MILLENNIUM: Rudolf Steiner's Association with Helmuth and Elizabeth von Moltke; Letters, Documents and After-Death Communications (Rudolf Steiner Press, 1997). [See "Steiner and the Warlord".]

Anyone interested in Waldorf education should particularly consult the following book put out by a Waldorf educational organization:

WORKING WITH THE DEAD

(Waldorf Early Childhood Association of North America, 2003)

In this volume, you will find Waldorf teachers encouraged to teach their young students to serve the dead. As part of this process, Waldorf teachers are encouraged to have their students celebrate "death days":

"Should we foster ways to serve the dead with small children? ... If death can live in adults' attitudes as a heavenly birthday, then the children will approach it as a fact of life ... Yes, celebrate the death day like an earthly birthday ... Children who become accustomed to celebrating from a very early age the birthdays and death days of people who are part of their social life, learn to accept the spiritual world of beings [i.e., gods] as real. Thus they gain a basis for religious experience...." — Helmut von Kügelgen, WORKING WITH THE DEAD, p. 2.

If you doubt that Waldorf schools are religious institutions that aim to inculcate Anthroposophical beliefs in their students, a book such as this should prove informative. [See "Waldorf Wisdom".]

— R.R.

March 12, 2018

CONTINENTS, PLANETS,

AND RACES

The "Book of the Week" currently featured at The Rudolf Steiner Archive & e.Lib. is a collection of lectures by Rudolf Steiner: ROSICRUCIAN ESOTERICISM. Here is the beginning of the description given at the Archive:

These lectures present an overview of the western Rosicrucian esoteric knowledge elaborating on the nature of the human being; the physical world as an expression of spiritual forces and Beings; the stages of earth evolution in Lemuria, Atlantis, and after Atlantis; and the human being's experience after death.

[downloaded 3/12/2018 http://wn.rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA109/English/AP1978/RosEso_index.html Also see http://www.rsarchive.org/Basics/Arenson50.php]

◊ • ◊

Waldorf Watch Response:

Rudolf Steiner taught that Rosicrucianism is the proper spiritual path for modern humanity. By this, he meant Rosicrucianism as redefined by himself. His Rosicrucianism is essentially Anthroposophy's twin. [See “Rosy Cross”.]

Here is a sample of Steiner's "Rosicrucian" teachings as found in ROSICRUCIAN ESOTERICISM. This is an excerpt from lecture 8, "Stages in the Evolution of our Earth - Lemurian, Atlantean, Post-Atlantean Epochs." Steiner tells of the activities of Lucifer's minions ("luciferic beings"), the destruction of the continent of Lemuria, our emigration to Atlantis, the return of human souls from various planets ("Jupiter, Mars, and so on"), and other marvels. Some fundamental Anthroposophical teachings about race are also touched upon:

Through the wickedness of masses of human beings and the fact that man succumbed too completely to the influence of the luciferic beings and lent himself to evil, the forces of fire in Lemuria were kindled. Thus, Lemuria perished as the result of the raging fires and the wickedness of a large section of its population. The human beings who were saved went to the West, to a continent lying between the present Africa, Europe and America, namely, Atlantis. There the evolution of humanity continued for long, long ages. The number of human beings gradually increased and the souls who had gone to Jupiter, Mars, and so on, during the period of desolation, came down to this continent. The process lasted for a long time. It was thus that the concept of race developed in ancient Atlantis. In occultism it is said that there were human beings in Atlantis whose bodies were inhabited by souls who had previously been on Mars, Jupiter, Venus, and so on. They were called Mars men, Jupiter men, for example. The external forms of the bodies differed for this reason. During the whole first half of Atlantis the texture of the human body was much softer, much more flexible, and yielded to the forces of the soul. These soul forces were essentially more powerful than they are today, and they both shaped and overpowered the physical body. A man of ancient Atlantis would have been able to break a railroad track, let us say, with ease, not because his physical forces were strong, for his bony system had still not developed, but through his magical, psychic forces. A cannon ball, for example, could have been repulsed by this psychic force. The density of flesh developed only later. A similar phenomenon is still to be found today in certain lunatics who on account of the liberation of strong psychic forces — in that condition the physical body is not properly connected with the higher bodies — can lift and throw heavy objects.

Because in Atlantis man's physical body was still pliable, he could more easily adjust himself to processes in the life of soul; the physical stature could be made to decrease or increase in size. If, for example, a man in Atlantis was, let us say, stupid or sensual, he fell into matter, as it were, and became a giant in stature. The more intelligent human beings developed a delicate constitution and were smaller in stature; those who were dull-witted were giants. Man's external form was far, far more strongly influenced by the forces of soul than is the case today when substance has become rigid. The bodies of men developed in accordance with the qualities of soul, and this accounted for the great differences in the races.

When myths and legends have described the dwarfs as being clever and the giants as dull-witted, we recognize once again the reflection of a profound, occult trend. When a soul came down again to the earth from Mars, the qualities with which it had been connected there continued for a long time to influence it and the body it inhabited. This fact explains the differences in races and racial characteristics.

— Rudolf Steiner, ROSICRUCIAN ESOTERICISM, lecture 8 - http://wn.rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA109/English/AP1978/19090610p01.html.

◊

We should be grateful to the Steiner Archive & eLib. for making such materials freely available. Anthroposophists have more typically kept things like this out of public view. Perhaps they've been shrewd to do so.

◊

P.S. Note that ROSICRUCIAN ESOTERICISM has also been published under other titles and in different translations. See, e.g., THEOSOPHY OF THE ROSICRUCIAN (Rudolf Steiner Press, 1954) and ROSICRUCIAN WISDOM (Rudolf Steiner Press, 2000).

In the past, such publications circulated almost exclusively within cloistered Anthroposophical circles. Nowadays, the Internet and web-based outfits like the Steiner Archive have pulled away the veil from those circles, at least a little, for good or for ill. Anthroposophists today — including many Waldorf teachers — are still evasive and secretive in many of their dealings with outsiders. But their public lives have become more complicated, for good or for ill, in this time of digital information-sharing.

— R.R.

March 6, 2018

WALDORF, KARMA,

AND WHAT KIDS DESERVE

The quotation for today (Match 6, 2018) posted on The great [sic] Rudolf Steiner Quotes Site:

KARMA

In fact the law of karma is the most consoling law there is. Just as it is true that nothing exists without a cause, so it is equally true that nothing existing remains without its effects. I may be born in poverty and misery; my abilities may be very limited; yet whatever I do must produce its effect, and whatever I accomplish now, by way of industry or moral activity, will certainly have its effect in later lives. If it depresses me to think that I have deserved my present destiny, it may equally cheer me to know that I can frame my future destiny myself.

Anyone who really takes this law into his thinking and feeling will soon realise what a sense of power and of security he has gained. We do not have to understand the law in all its details; that becomes possible only at the higher stages of clairvoyant knowledge. Much more important is it that we should look at the world in the light of this law and live in accordance with it. If we do this conscientiously over a period of years, the law will of its own accord become part of our feelings. We verify the truth of the law by applying it.

Source: Rudolf Steiner – GA 95 – At the Gates of Spiritual Science – Lecture VI,– Stuttgart, 27th August 1906

Translated by E. H. Goddard & Charles Davy

[3/6/2018 https://rudolfsteinerquotes.wordpress.com/2018/03/06/karma-5/]

◊ • ◊

Waldorf Watch Response:

Is the law of karma consoling? This is debatable. The essence of the law karma is that you deserve your destiny. If you are born impoverished, or suffering from a severe disease, or tormented in any other way — well, this is what you deserve. In your past lives (the law of karma is connected to the law of reincarnation), you behaved in such a way that you now deserve to be terribly poor, or terribly sick, or tormented in some other way. It is good for you. You need this, so that you may straighten yourself out and proceed to a better fate in a future life.

Are you consoled?

Steiner once consoled his followers with the following remarks. A child of one of the followers had been crushed to death in a grisly accident. Materialistic people, relying of mere earthly logic, might see this as a tragic, random, senseless occurrence, Steiner said. But "spiritual scientists" — that is, Anthroposophists — know better. They know that the event occurred for a very good reason. The child's karma required the accident to occur. Indeed, the child's own ego had "ordered" the accident to occur:

"In the autumn we experienced the death of a member's child, a child seven years of age. The death of this child occurred in a strange way. He was a good boy, mentally very much alive already within the limits set for a seven-year-old; a good, well-behaved and mentally active child. He came to die because he happened to be on the very spot where a furniture van overturned, crushing the boy so that he died of suffocation. This was a spot where probably no van went past before nor will go past again, but one did pass [at] just that moment. It is also possible to show in an outer way that all kinds of circumstances caused the child to be in that place at the time the van overturned, circumstances considered chance if the materialistic view is taken ... Studying the case in the light of spiritual science [i.e., Anthroposophy] and of karma it will be seen to demonstrate very clearly that external logic, quite properly used in external life, proves flimsy in this case and does not apply ... [T]he karma of this child was such that the ego, to put it bluntly, had ordered the van and the van overturned to fulfil the child's karma." — Rudolf Steiner, THE DESTINIES OF INDIVIDUALS AND OF NATIONS (SteinerBooks, 1987), pp. 125-126.

Are you consoled?

◊

Another point needs to be examined. The work of Waldorf teachers is guided, in almost all ways, by the doctrines of Anthroposophy. These doctrines include belief in karma and reincarnation.

Here is an example, which harkens back to our previous discussion about children's temperaments. [See the item for March 4, below.] Steiner told Waldorf teachers to consider the temperaments of their students, and this means considering the kids' karmas:

"[C]hildish temperament is actually connected with karma ... [I]n the child's temperament something really appears that could be described as the consequence of experiences in previous lives on Earth ... We must not view karma from a moral but from a causal perspective ... Temperament is connected, to a remarkable degree, with the whole life and soul of a person's previous incarnation." — Rudolf Steiner, DISCUSSIONS WITH TEACHERS (Anthroposophic Press, 1997), pp. 60-61.

Understand what we are seeing, here. Prior to the opening of the first Waldorf school, Rudolf Steiner met with the first group of Waldorf teachers, preparing them for their duties. This preparation included discussion of karma and reincarnation — not as abstract concepts, not as ideas found in faraway faiths, but as practical realities for the teachers to recognize as they began their work, there and then, in contemporary Europe, in the Waldorf School.

You see, Waldorf schools and Waldorf classes are themselves the result of karma. Waldorf teachers are fated to teach in Waldorf schools. Specifically, they are fated to take responsibility for certain groups of children. They had disliked these kids in previous incarnations, so now they need to compensate by becoming attentive teachers for these same kids:

"The fact that you are present to teach these children...indicates that this group of teachers and this group of children belong together in terms of karma. You become the appropriate teacher for these children because in previous times [i.e., previous lives] you developed aversion toward them. Now you free yourself from these aversions by educating their thinking." — Rudolf Steiner, PRACTICAL ADVICE TO TEACHERS (Anthroposophic Press, 2000), p. 29.

Discussions of this kind (spiritual science, karma, reincarnation, the four temperaments) are unlikely to occur in any other kind of schools except Waldorf schools. But in Waldorf schools, such discussions are common. This is how many, if not all, Waldorf teachers really think. Really.

You should understand this well, and weigh it carefully, before deciding to send a child to a Waldorf school.

[For more on Waldorf beliefs about karma and reincarnation, see "Karma" and "Reincarnation".]

— R.R.

March 4, 2018

WALDORF AND THE

"FOUR TEMPERAMENTS"

Waldorf education is built on Rudolf Steiner's mystical belief system, Anthroposophy. Waldorf pedagogy is a "practical" application of Anthroposophical concepts.

Proponents of Waldorf education often describe it as a forward-thinking form of alternative education. But in fact Waldorf is often extraordinarily backward. Consider the matter of the "four temperaments," for example.

According to the ancient Greek physician Galen, there are four primary bodily fluids or "humours": blood, phlegm, black bile, and yellow bile. Depending on which fluid is predominant in a person's body, s/he has one of four "temperaments": sanguine, phlegmatic, melancholic, or choleric.

This may have been highly advanced thinking two thousand years ago, but it is hardly at the forefront of modern medical or educational knowledge. Indeed, modern science rejected Galen's faulty, simplistic paradigm long ago. Yet Waldorf schools today still base many of their practices on belief in the four temperaments.

Here are excerpts from a Steiner lecture featured today (March 4, 2018) at the Rudolf Steiner Archive & e.Lib. In this lecture, Steiner offers guidance for the education of children embodying the four temperaments:

[A]s a rule, there is one thing we can always stimulate the sanguine child's interest in. However flighty the child might be, we can always stimulate his interest in a particular personality. If we ourselves are that personality, or if we bring the child together with someone who is, the child cannot but develop an interest ... More than children of any other temperament, the sanguine needs someone to admire. Admiration is here a kind of magic word, and we must do everything we can to awaken it.

...The choleric child is also susceptible of being led in a special way. The key to his education is respect and esteem for a natural authority. Instead of winning affection by means of personal qualities, as one does with the sanguine child, one should see to it that the child's belief in his teacher's ability remains unshaken ... Any showing of incompetence should be avoided. The child must persist in the belief that his teacher is competent, or all authority will be lost. The magic potion for the choleric child is respect and esteem for a person's worth ... Outwardly, the choleric child must be confronted with challenging situations. He must encounter resistance and difficulty, lest his life become too easy.

The melancholic child is not easy to lead … [T]he important thing for the melancholic is for his teachers to be people who have in a certain sense been tried by life, who act and speak on the basis of past trials … Let your treatment of all of life's little details be an occasion for the child to appreciate what you have suffered … We should expose the [melancholic] child to legitimate external pain and suffering, so that he learns there are things other than himself that can engage his capacity for experiencing pain. This is the essential thing. We should not try to divert or amuse the melancholic.…

The phlegmatic child should not be allowed to grow up alone. Although naturally all children should have play-mates, for phlegmatics it is especially important that they have them … We should bring into the phlegmatic's environment objects and events toward which ‘phlegm’ is an appropriate reaction. Impassivity must be directed toward the right objects, objects toward which one may be phlegmatic.

From the examples of these pedagogical principles, we see how spiritual science [i.e., Anthroposophy] can address practical problems.

— Rudolf Steiner, "The Four Temperaments", GA 57 [http://wn.rsarchive.org/Lectures/Dates/19090304p01.html]

◊

The Waldorf belief in the four temperaments amounts to the stereotyping of children, and this is done on the basis of a fallacious, ancient medical theory. Worse, students in Waldorf schools are often segregated on this basis: seated in different parts of the room, given different work assignments, and so on. Moreover, hurtfully, the temperaments are associated with body types.

“The melancholic children are as a rule tall and slender; the sanguine are the most normal; those with more protruding shoulders are the phlegmatic children; and those with a short stout build so that the head almost sinks down into the body are choleric.” — Rudolf Steiner, DISCUSSIONS WITH TEACHERS (Anthroposophic Press, 1997), p. 34.

[For more on the four temperaments as conceived in Waldorf education, see "Humouresque" and "Temperaments".]

February 9, 2018

CHRISTIAN ROSENKREUTZ,

BUDDHA, AND MARS

Among the Steiner lectures currently featured at The Rudolf Steiner Archive are those gathered under the title THE MISSION OF CHRISTIAN ROSENKREUTZ. They are well worth reading.

Christian Rosenkreutz was the putative founder of Roscrucianism, the mystical movement that — as we have seen recently — was so important to Steiner. [See, e.g., the Waldorf Watch "news" item for February 6, below.]

In these lectures, Steiner ranges over a wide spectrum of topics, including karma, the starry heavens, the dawn of modern occultism, the Christ impulse, and so forth. The awesome culmination of the series is reached in the final lecture, number seven. If you want to understand Steiner — and, thus, to understand the thinking upon which Waldorf education is founded (Anthroposophy) — you really should spend some time with all of these lectures, and especially with number seven. The title of that mighty, culminating lecture is "The Mission of Gautama Buddha on Mars."

Here is an excerpt:

A Conference of the greatest and most advanced Individualities was called together by Christian Rosenkreutz. His most intimate pupil and friend, the great teacher Buddha, participated in these counsels and in the decisions reached. At that spiritual Conference it was resolved that henceforward Buddha would dwell on Mars and there unfold his influence and activity. Buddha transferred his work to Mars in the year 1604. And on Mars he performed a deed similar to that performed by Christ on the Earth in the Mystery of Golgotha [i.e., Christ's Crucifixion and its aftermath]. Christian Rosenkreutz had known what the work of Buddha on Mars would signify for the whole Cosmos, what his teachings of Nirvana, of liberation from the Earth would signify on Mars. The teaching of Nirvana was unsuited to a form of culture directed primarily to practical life. Buddha's pupil, Francis of Assisi, was an example of the fact that this teaching produces in its adepts complete remoteness from the world and its affairs. But the content of Buddhism which was not adapted to the practical life of man between birth and death was of high importance for the soul between death and a new birth. Christian Rosenkreutz realised that for a certain purification needed on Mars, the teachings of Buddha were pre-eminently suitable. The Christ Being, the Essence of Divine Love, had once come down to the Earth to a people in many respects alien, and in the seventeenth century, Buddha, the Prince of Peace, went to Mars — the planet of war and conflict — to execute his mission there. The souls on Mars were warlike, torn with strife. Thus Buddha performed a deed of sacrifice similar to the deed performed in the Mystery of Golgotha by the Bearer of the Essence of Divine Love. To dwell on Mars as Buddha was a deed of sacrifice offered to the Cosmos. He was as it were the lamb offered up in sacrifice on Mars and to accept this environment of strife was for him a kind of crucifixion. Buddha performed this deed on Mars in the service of Christian Rosenkreutz. Thus do the great Beings who guide the world work together, not only on the Earth but from one planet to another.

[downloaded 2/9/2018 http://wn.rsarchive.org/GA/GA0130/19121218p01.html]

◊ • ◊

Waldorf Watch Response:

It may seem inconceivable that Steiner meant the things that he said and wrote. But he certainly did. At least, he repeated many of his most preposterous teachings many times. He certainly gave every indication that he wanted us to take him seriously on all of his assertions, even the strangest.

As one of Steiner's enthusiastic acolytes has written in a different but related context:

“I wouldn’t be surprised if the last few pages have taxed some readers’ capacity for giving Steiner the benefit of the doubt and left them wondering who could possibly believe this science fiction story. Yet this cosmic history is the backbone of Steiner’s work.” — Gary Lachman, RUDOLF STEINER (Jeremy P. Tarcher/Penguin, 2007), p. 147.

Steiner meant what he said and wrote. The only real question for us now is whether we can possibly take him seriously.

◊

To delve further into Steiner's astonishing statements about Buddha and Mars, see, e.g., "Mars". To look into other, related subjects, see, e.g., "Matters of Form", "Lunacy", "Sci Fi", "The Planets", "Planetary Humans", "Vulcan", "Supermen", and "Steiner's Blunders".

— R.R.

February 1, 2018

WALDORF, IMAGINATION,

AND CLAIRVOYANCE

The following is from a lecture by Rudolf Steiner featured today (Feb. 1, 2018) at the Rudolf Steiner Archive. I have highlighted key terms; I comment on these following the extract:

Someone attains a kind of Imaginative knowledge as the first level of clairvoyant knowledge who makes his soul an instrument of spiritual research by that self-education which I have characterised in my book How Does One Attain Knowledge of the Higher Worlds?....

In my book Occult Science. An Outline. you find the attempt to show not only the human development on earth Imaginatively, but also the former embodiments of our earth in other, preceding heavenly bodies. You find everything that was shown in this respect represented in such a way that it corresponds to the logical consciousness and the facts of sensory life. Now a theologian who had read this book said to me once, what I have read there is absolutely logical and rational, so that one could deign to remember that the author got around to writing this book completely out of the today's cultural life only by logical conclusions. — This made me wonder and I said to myself, then the whole representation has not come about maybe by clairvoyance but by mere logic. — He said this, although he had to admit that he could not find by his own logic what is given in this book as knowledge. One meets this fact often today that such representations are put up by mere logic, even if the results are pieced together from trains of thought to make them comprehensible. However, everything that you read in the Occult Science is not found by logical conclusions. It is hard to find these matters by logic. However, after they have been found, they are interwoven with logic. They are found of course also not without logic, but not at all on the way of logical conclusion, everything does absolutely correspond to Imaginative knowledge.

[2/1/2018 http://wn.rsarchive.org/Lectures/Dates/19120201p01.html]

◊ • ◊

Waldorf Watch Response:

Rudolf Steiner is the founder of Waldorf education. If you want to understand Waldorf, you need to understand Steiner.

Steiner delivered thousands of lectures. Transcripts of most of these lectures are available in book form and online. They are difficult to read, but the effort can produce surprising rewards.

Here are some of the key Waldorf / Anthroposophical matters touched on in the lecture extract above:

◊ Imaginative knowledge Waldorf schools place great emphasis on imaginative thinking. This emphasis can be alluring; some people are drawn to Waldorf schools primarily because Waldorf stresses imagination. Imaginative children can make great mental leaps; they can be creative and innovative; they are not bound by narrow, constricting rules of mere logic. Einstein himself said that imagination is extremely important.

This is all alluring. But you need to understand that in the Waldorf worldview, called Anthroposophy, imagination is a precursor to — or, more specifically, it is a stage of — clairvoyance. Steiner tells us as much here. He speaks of "Imaginative knowledge as the first level of clairvoyant knowledge." Everything in the Waldorf worldview ultimately derives from clairvoyance. This is a point we must consider with some care.

◊ Clairvoyant knowledge Rudolf Steiner claimed to be clairvoyant, and many Waldorf teachers make a similar claim. They think they can see things that most people cannot. They think their "imaginative knowledge" or their "clairvoyant knowledge" penetrates to spiritual truths that lie hidden behind the illusions of ordinary, physical existence.

Steiner said that his disciplined, highly refined clairvoyance let him study the spirit realm objectively; he claimed to be an objective spiritual researcher. This is an extremely alluring proposition. Who would not want to possess definite, objective knowledge of the spirit realm? But Steiner's claim — like the claim made by so many of his followers — depends on the existence of clairvoyance. If you do not believe in clairvoyance, you should be skeptical of all the things Steiner said and did, including his creation of Waldorf education. We will return to this point.

◊ How Does One Attain Knowledge of the Higher Worlds? This is one of Steiner's two most important books. It is more commonly referred to as KNOWLEDGE OF THE HIGHER WORLDS AND ITS ATTAINMENT or, more simply, HOW TO KNOW HIGHER WORLDS. In this book, Steiner lays out his central prescriptions telling his followers how to develop their clairvoyant powers.

To understand the Waldorf vision, you really should look into this book. A detailed guide to the book is available here at Waldorf Watch: See "Knowing the Worlds - Steiner's How-To"

◊ Occult Science. An Outline. This is the other of Steiner's two most important books. It has also been published under such titles as AN OUTLINE OF OCCULT SCIENCE and AN OUTLINE OF ESOTERIC SCIENCE. In this book, Steiner lays out the main results of his professed use of clairvoyance. He reveals, at least in outline form, much of the hidden knowledge that is dirfectly available only to clairvoyant savants such as himself.

To understand the Waldorf vision, you really should look into this book. A detailed guide to the book is available here at Waldorf Watch: See "Everything - Steiner's Big Picture".

◊ Former Embodiments of the Earth A key part of the hidden wisdom Steiner reveals has to do with the evolution of humanity, which is deeply interwoven with the evolution of the solar system or, more specifically, the evolution of the Earth. Steiner taught that the solar system and the Earth go through a process of reincarnation much as we humans do. The first "embodiment" of the Earth was a phase of evolution called Old Saturn. (This was not the planet Saturn that we know now. It was an incarnation of the entire solar system in a form extremely unlike anything we know now, but suffused with the powers of Saturn.) This was followed by periods called Old Sun and Old Moon. We now live in the period called Present Earth. Next, the solar system will reincarnate as Future Jupiter, then Future Venus, and then Future Vulcan.

To delve into this vision of our past and future — a tale that is the foundation of the Waldorf worldview — see, e.g., "Matters of Form".

◊ Mere Logic Steiner claimed that Anthroposophy is objective; it is, he said, a "science." Specifically, he said it is "spiritual science" or "occult science." He often said Anthroposophy is quite logical, and he sometimes said that there are no real conflicts between it and ordinary science (chemistry, physics, botany, and so on). But none of this is true. As you may have already started to suspect, Anthroposophy is extremely illogical; it is a farrago of fantasies. And, indeed, Steiner quite often disparaged real science, and intellect, and even the use of the brain. Logic — and truth — are absent from Anthroposophy; they are Anthroposophy's greatest opponents.

To delve into these matters, see, e.g., "Steiner's Specific", "Steiner's Illogic", and "Steiner's Blunders".

◊ Clairvoyance It all boils down to clairvoyance. Everything in Anthroposophy — including everything at the basis of Waldorf education — depends on clairvoyance. If clairvoyance doe not exist, then Anthroposophy collapses. And if Anthroposophy collapses, then there is no valid basis for Waldorf education.

Here's the kicker. Clairvoyance does not exist. There is no convincing evidence that anyone has ever been clairvoyant or that anyone living now is clairvoyant. There is no convincing evidence that clairvoyance exists. None. Zero. Zilch. See "Clairvoyance".

And what does this mean for Waldorf education? It means there is no valid basis for Waldorf education.

— R.R.

January 1, 2018

A NEW YEAR LECTURE:

EARTHQUAKES, ETC.

Here are excerpts from a lecture by Rudolf Steiner featured today, January 1, 2018, at The Rudolf Steiner Archive. Steiner delivered the lecture, "The Deed of Christ and the Opposing Spiritual Powers", on January 1, 1909.

(Steiner is hard to read. Following the excerpts, I provide a plain-English paraphrase and some clarifying footnotes.)

...Although it was Lucifer [1] who caused the human physical body to become denser than it would otherwise have become, nevertheless it was necessary for yet another influence to approach man in order to bring him completely into the material world of sense, in order to shut him off entirely from the spiritual world so that he was led to the illusion: There is no other world than the world of material existence outspread before me!

From the middle of the Atlantean epoch [2] an opponent quite different in character from Lucifer approached man, namely the Being who casts such mist and darkness around [man's] faculties of perception that he makes no effort nor unfolds any urge to fathom the secrets of the world of sense. If you picture to yourselves that under Lucifer's influence the sense-world became like a veil, through the influence of this second Being the physical world in its totality became like a dense rind, closing off the spiritual world. It was only the Atlantean Initiates [3] who were able, through the preparation they had undergone, to pierce this dense covering of the material, physical world.

...The mighty influence of the forces of black magic which finally led to the destruction of Atlantis had its origin in the temptations of that Being whom Zarathustra [4] taught his people to know as Ahriman (“Angra Mainyu”) [5], the Being who opposed the God of Light proclaimed by Zarathustra as “Ahura Mazdao”, the “Great Aura”. [6]

...[A]ncient Lemuria [7] was brought to its destruction by the fire of the passions of men. [8] ... So too it was with the forces working through air and water which, again by way of the passions of men, led to the Atlantean catastrophes. [9] These catastrophes were evoked by the collective karma of humanity [10] but a relic has remained and this relic awakens the echoes of those earlier catastrophes. Our volcanic eruptions and earthquakes are nothing else than the echoes of these catastrophes.

...[I]t is often the fate of occult science [11] to be obliged to formulate the questions in the right way before they can be correctly answered. Again do not take this to mean that the mysterious connection between earthquakes and the karma of humanity is a secret that cannot be investigated. It can be investigated ... Let the knowledge reach mankind through spiritual science that there is a connection between the deeds of men and happenings in nature and then the time will come when these things can be answered in the way the question demands. Spiritual science may pass through many destinies; its influence may even be crippled, remaining within narrow and restricted circles. Nevertheless it will make its way through mankind, will be integrated into the karma of humanity, and then the possibility will be created for individuals themselves to have an effect upon the karma of humanity as a whole. [12]

[downloaded 1/1/2018 http://wn.rsarchive.org/Lectures/Dates/19090101p01.html]

◊ • ◊

Plain Paraphrase

(with interpretation):

...Due to the influence of Lucifer, the human body became far more densely physical than ever before. But the actions of another demon were responsible for completely severing humans from the spirit realm. Thereafter, limited to what our physical senses reveal, we became prone to the illusion that only the physical world exists.

This second demon began working on mankind during the middle period of our life on Atlantis. He cast a pall of mist and darkness over our physical senses, so that we no longer tried to penetrate to the secrets hidden beyond the reach of our physical senses. Lucifer had dropped a veil over our senses; this second demon made the physical world fully opaque to our senses, so that we were really cut off from the spirit realm. Only the occult initiates living among us on Atlantis were able to pierce through the physical world to see the spirit realm beyond.

...Tempted by this second demon, the people of Atlantis resorted to black magic, which led to the destruction of Atlantis. The demon who offered this terrible temptation was the spirit identified by Zarathustra as "Ahriman" (the God of Darkness). Zarathustra recognized Ahriman as the chief enemy of the God of Light (the Sun God). Zarathustra called the God of Light "Ahura Mazda" (the Lord of Wisdom).

...Human wickedness caused the continent of Lemuria to be destroyed by fire, and then human wickedness caused the continent of Atlantis to be destroyed by wind and water. These catastrophes came out of the collective karma of mankind (affected by Lucifer and Ahriman). Traces of those ancient catastrophes are still present on Earth today. Volcanic eruptions and earthquakes are echoes of those ancient catastrophes.

...The karma of spiritual science obligates us to correctly formulate our questions about reality, so that we can reach the correct answers. Do not think that such mysteries as the connection between earthquakes and human karma cannot be investigated. They can be investigated. Spiritual science enables us to comprehend the connection between human actions and natural occurrences such as earthquakes. The karma of spiritual science may take many twists and turns; spiritual science may even be crippled for a time, so that only a tiny segment of mankind embraces it. Nevertheless, spiritual science will ultimately spread throughout humanity, merging with the karma of mankind as a whole, and then it will become possible for even individual spiritual scientists to beneficially affect the karma of all of humanity.

◊ • ◊

Waldorf Watch Footnotes:

[1] Steiner identified many demons who oppose the proper evolution of humanity. Lucifer is one of the foremost. [See "Lucifer".]

[2] I.e., while we lived on Atlantis. [See "Atlantis".]

[3] I.e., spiritual savants — masters, initiates — who lived among the population of Atlantis.

[4] Zarathustra was the founder of the religion called Zoroastrianism. Steiner said Zarathustra was the wisest human who lived before Christ, the Sun God, incarnated in the body of Jesus of Nazareth. [See "Zarathustra" in The Brief Waldorf / Steiner Encyclopedia.]

[5] According to Steiner, Ahriman is another mighty demon. In Anthroposophy, Ahriman is often depicted as more terrible than Lucifer. [See "Ahriman".]

[6] In Anthroposophy, the "God of Light" is the Sun God, who is often called Christ. [See "Was He Christian?".] By exerting his influence, Christ can convert the temptations of Lucifer and Ahriman into valuable gifts for humanity, Steiner said.

[7] Steiner taught that before living on Atlantis, we lived on the continent of Lemuria. [See "Lemuria".]

[8] Steiner said that humans, through their misdeeds, destroyed both Lemuria and Atlantis.

[9] Anthroposophists believe that Lemuria was consumed by fires unleashed by human evil; Atlantis was submerged in a might flood unleashed by human evil.

[10] Karma is a key Anthroposophical doctrine. [See "Karma".] Steiner taught that individuals humans have karmas, and so do groups of humans (families, nations, races, etc.), and so does humanity as a whole.

[11] For Anthroposophists, "spiritual science" — the objective study of the spirit realm — is Anthroposophy itself. For Theosophists, "spiritual science" is Theosophy. (Some other belief systems also apply this term to themselves.) When Steiner delivered this lecture, in 1909, he was a Theosophist; he would not break away to estbalish Anthroposophy as a separate movement until 1913. However, even while a Theosophist, Steiner began referring to his own esoteric teachings as anthroposophy. (Indeed, the word "anthroposophist" occurs once in this lecture.) One way to describe Anthroposophy — as least as it existed originally — is to say that Anthroposophy is Steiner's version of Theosophy.

Synonyms used by Steiner for "spiritual science" include "occult science" and "mystery science." Steiner's key text, in which he lays out the general contrours of his esoteric teachings, is titled OCCULT SCIENCE: AN OUTLINE. The first edition of the book appeared in 1909; Steiner later revised it numerous times. [See "Everything".]

[12] Anthroposophists seek to save their own souls, but they also work to save humanity as a whole. They do this through such Anthroposophical initiatives as Waldorf schools. In general, the Anthroposophical effort to remake human society is pursued under the rubric "threefolding." [See "Threefolding".]

— R.R.

November 5, 2017

ROOT RACES,

ATLANTIS, ETC.

The Rudolf Steiner Archive provides a useful service. For each day of the year, it directs visitors to lectures delivered by Rudolf Steiner on that date. Thus, for instance, today — November 5, 2017 — the Archive provides links to eight lectures Steiner delivered on November 5 during years ranging from 1905 to 1922. Reading the lectures associated with the days of the year enables us to walk through the year side-by-side with Steiner.

All parents considering Waldorf schools for their children should at least glance at these lectures. Waldorf education is based on the teachings of Rudolf Steiner. If you don't believe the sorts of things Steiner taught, then you probably should send your kids to other sorts of schools. Steiner's esoteric doctrines may not often be taught openly in Waldorf classrooms — but, sometimes, they are. [See, e.g., "Out in the Open".] When these doctrines are kept hidden, they nonetheless often find their way, covertly, into Waldorf classes. [See, e.g., "Sneaking It In".] And at a deeper level, these doctrines inform the thinking that shapes the Waldorf approach. [See, e.g., "Spiritual Agenda".]

Here is the beginning of one of the Nov. 5 lectures:

Our Fifth Root-Race, the present Post-Atlantean humanity, was preceded by that of Atlantis, on the now submerged continent between Europe and America. The Atlanteans can in no way be compared with the human beings who today inhabit our Earth Globe. For even the remnants of that old race have learnt a variety of things from the later inhabitants of the Fifth Continent and we are therefore unable to reconstruct from them the conditions of that civilisation. At the beginning of the Atlantean civilisation there were no tools. By means of clairvoyant forces it was possible for the Atlantean to make the earth serve his needs. The preparation of metals for such uses only appeared towards the end of the Atlantean Epoch.

A small group was separated off from the population of Atlantis ... It was their task to carry over a new civilisation into the Fifth Root-Race. You would find the place where those who were chosen lived, a small colony, in present England and Ireland. At that time this was where the original Semites lived. They were the first people who were in a position to think with their intellect. All the ideas of the Atlanteans were still of the nature of pictures. The rounded shape of the front of the brow, the formation of the part of the brain on which thought depends, first appears with the population of the original Semites, who were in no way similar to the present Semitic race. This original Semitic people who, one can say, discovered thinking, journeyed through Europe into Asia and there founded a civilisation. They formed the Fifth Sub-Race of the Atlanteans. The seven Sub-races of the Atlantean Root Race were as follows: Firstly the Rmoahals, secondly the Tlavatlis, thirdly the original Toltecs, fourthly the original Turanians, fifthly the original Semites, sixthly the original Accadians, seventhly the original Mongolians.

— Rudolf Steiner, FOUNDATIONS OF ESOTERICISM (Rudolf Steiner Press, 1982), Lecture 31, GA 93a [http://wn.rsarchive.org/Lectures/Dates/19051105p01.html].

◊

To investigate some of the esoteric beliefs found in this lecture, you might consult The Brief Waldorf / Steiner Encyclopedia. See such entries as "Atlantis", "root-races", "sub-races", "clairvoyance", "Post-Atlantean Epoch", "Primal Semites", "intellect", etc. Note that Steiner delivered this lecture while still nominally a Theosophist. In 1913, he broke from Theosophy to establish Anthroposophy as a separate spiritual movement. However, his teachings remained essentially unchanged. [See, e.g., "Basics".]

— R.R.