Just how gullible are Steiner's followers? Here is a leading Steiner follower (if you follow me) who believes 1) Steiner's claim that he was clairvoyant, and 2) the claims to clairvoyance made by numerous members of a family, and 3) the alleged clairvoyance of a child who claimed to have the lowdown on dead folks (evidently she could see and perhaps hear them). 

"He [Rudolf Steiner] was never at any time afraid of anything he perceived through his clairvoyance, taking it entirely for granted. What he perceived [clairvoyantly] was, if anything, more real to him than anything he saw in the material world. For example, when he was eight years old a woman appeared to him as he was sitting in a waiting room. Indeed he saw her open the door and come toward him, and heard her ask him 'to do everything he could for her now and later.' At the same time he was well aware that she was not present in her earthly body. By this time he had learned not to speak to anyone about such experiences. But he was neither surprised nor frightened when he learned later that a near relative of his parents had committed suicide on the day the woman appeared to him.

"Such experiences are not at all uncommon with children and, as a rule, such early clairvoyance tends to disappear with puberty onward. For example, I well remember meeting a charming child of eleven, daughter of a Dutch father and a partly Mexican-Indian mother, almost all of whose female relatives were clairvoyant, and several were mediums [i.e., they could communicate with the dead]. Little Alexandrina used to prattle on about the dead, what they were doing, where they were...." — Anthroposophist Stewart Copinger Easton, RUDOLF STEINER: Herald of a New Epoch (SteinerBooks, 1980), p. 17.

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Waldorf Watch Response:

Oh, my. Did it not occur to Easton that children are imaginative in the ordinary sense? Kids make stuff up, they play make-pretend. Did it not occur to him that a young child who insists he saw a ghost, and who is clearly not playing a game, might need therapy? Did it not occur to him that someone like Steiner who, as an adult, claimed to be clairvoyant might invent clairvoyant episodes for his past? Did it not occur to him to look for the slightest bit of evidence supporting Steiner? Or what about all those "clairvoyant" relatives of little Alexandrina? On what basis did Easton decide to believe the claims that they were clairvoyant, even mediums? And why oh why would he believe a child who "used to prattle on about the dead, what they were doing, where they were"?

Please. Easton's position is nonsense. What's more, it is transparent nonsense. And yet he, a leading Anthroposophist, offers it to us for our serious consideration. You might be interested to know that Easton actually served as General Secretary of the Anthroposophical Society in America. He, like Steiner himself, is what passes for a serious authority in the wild and wacky Waldorf universe.

When a Waldorf teacher uses "clairvoyance" to determine such things about a student as her/his "temperament," what is the teacher really doing? (S/he is not making a sensible judgment about temperament, because temperament — in the sense that Waldorf teachers mean — does not exist. [See "Humoresque" and "Temperaments".]) 

A "clairvoyant" Waldorf teacher, being a good and conscientious (albeit deluded) soul, will take the matter very seriously. S/he will sleep on it, meditate about it, pray about it — and eventually s/he will reach a conclusion. The only thing that s/he will not do is to use clairvoyance, because there is no such thing. [See "Clairvoyance".] S/he will think she uses clairvoyance, but in this s/he will be practicing self-deception. So what does s/he do, really, when s/he thinks s/he is using clairvoyance? S/he fantasizes, s/he has a hunch, s/he guesses, s/he has an intuition, s/he has a feeling, s/he consults a horoscope, s/he believes a dream, s/he imagines... S/he tricks himself/herself into thinking s/he has had a clairvoyant insight, and s/he goes with it.

Think about this for a moment. There is no such thing as "temperament" as Waldorf teachers conceive it, and there is no such thing as clairvoyance, in any sense. So the Waldorf teacher uses a nonexistent faculty to slot a kid into a nonexistent category. This is nonsense squared, nonsense piled upon nonsense. It would be funny if it weren't so serious. A kid pegged as phlegmatic (or sanguine, or melancholic, or choleric), will be treated as such for months or years or decades. And it is all a fantasy, a delusion, a phantasm, a bad dream, a nightmare. The Waldorf teacher deludes him/herself, and Johnny or Susie suffers the consequences, perhaps permanently.

Now, Waldorf teachers are not idiots. So why do they do such idiotic things as using "clairvoyance" (which doesn't exist) to determine "temperament" (which doesn't exist)? This seems like a deep and difficult question, but really it is not. The answer is obvious. Human beings lie to themselves all the time. We believe what we want to believe; we imagine; we invent; we make leaps of faith; we go with our feelings; we have hunches; we have intuitions; we have dreams... In brief, we lie to ourselves. We do it over and over. Self-deception is far more common in human behavior than long, sustained efforts at rationality. Living rationally is hard, dauntingly so.

Being an Anthroposophist is easy. Believing Steiner (or Rev. Moon, or Mme. Blavatsky, or Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, or Jimmy Swaggart, or, or...) is easy as pie. Turn off your intellect and just do it. We all want easy, prepackaged answers, especially if they assure us that 1) we will go to heaven, or at least 2) we will live forever, or at least 3) we are really, really, really important, or at least 4) we may become a guitar hero someday (without bothering to practice the guitar), or at least 5) [fill in the blank].

It is sad and it is funny. And it is terrible. Every adult who wants to be an Anthroposophist can join the cult. Go. Peace be unto you. But don't take our children with you. There is nothing more wicked than dragging children into the darkness. Stop. Just stop.

(To delve a bit more into the reasons why good, smart people might elect to live in the darkness of occultism, and why they even strive to drag children into that darkness, see "Why?" and "Fooling (Ourselves)" and "Deception" and...)

Anthroposophists are very good at deceiving people. Indeed, they are good at deceiving themselves. They have to be good at deceiving themselves or they could not possibly accept the doctrines of Anthroposophy. What are these doctrines? A few examples: 

◊ We have four bodies, three of which are invisible. 

◊ Our actions are heavily influenced by karma and astrology. 

◊ We began our evolution "on" Saturn. 

◊ We are heading toward life "on" Vulcan.

◊ Atlantis really existed. It was our home.

◊ Before we lived on Atlantis, we lived on the continent of Lemuria. We destroyed both of these continents.

◊ Christ (the Sun God) has already returned.

◊ There were two Jesuses, one carrying the essence of Zarathustra, the other carrying the essence of Buddha. 

◊ The two Jesuses merged into one, who became the vessel into which the Sun God descended.

◊ Gnomes or goblins really exist. 

◊ The heart does not pump blood. 

◊ The brain does not think. 

◊ The planets do not orbit the Sun. 

◊ Islands like Great Britain float in the sea and are held in place by the stars.

◊ Rudolf Steiner knew all this because he was super-clairvoyant. (He could track our souls, and tell us what really happened on Atlantis, and report on the doings of spirit beings such as Lucifer, Ahriman, and the Archangel Michael. And so on.)

Anthroposophists believe stuff like that. And a vast amount more. Most of which is bosh.

Waldorf schools generally try to defend themselves by saying that, yes, their methods are based on Anthroposophy (i.e., the clairvoyant "insights" of Rudolf Steiner), but they do not teach Anthroposophy to the students. This is not quite true, but let's accept it as true for a moment. How reassuring is it? 

Consider this analogy. Imagine a school that says "All of our methods are based on sorcery. However, we do not teach sorcery to the children." Would you be reassured? Would you send your child to that school?

To dig further into some of these matters, see, e.g., "Advice for Parents", "Here's the Answer", "Spiritual Agenda", "Soul School", and "Steiner's Blunders". Take your time. If you are considering a Waldorf school for your child, you really should understand what you are getting her/him involved in.

"As interesting as the results of Steiner's trained clairvoyance may be...it is the clairvoyance itself which accounts for the significance and neglect of his teachings and works. For many observers, the idea of someone tracking souls, reporting on Atlantis and on the historical function of spiritual beings such as Lucifer, Ahriman, and the Archangel Michael, tends to cast a suspicious shadow over even the most effective systems of education [sic] and farming [sic]." — Anthroposophist Robert McDermott, THE ESSENTIAL STEINER (Lindisfarne Books, 2007), p. 5.

Now that you mention it...

REPRISE

Waldorf education is intimately linked to Anthroposophy. 

Waldorf is an expression of Anthroposophy as it touches the lives of children. 

Both Waldorf and Anthroposophy hinge on "exact clairvoyance." 

When Waldorf teachers apply the methods of Anthroposophy

 in their work as educational artists, they mold children 

in such a way as to have lifelong impact on them.

"At the Goetheanum [the worldwide Anthroposophical headquarters], we are cultivating a direction in spiritual life that leads us to a definite understanding of new ideals of human education. We have been able to apply those ideals in practice at the Waldorf school ... The method applied in [at the Goetheanum] can be designated as 'exact clairvoyance' ... To attain such 'exact clairvoyance' and exercise it demands no less application of the human soul than is demanded of a mathematician or a practicing natural scientist. It is a clairvoyance that we apply consciously in matters of everyday life, a clairvoyance that awakens genuine faculties of knowledge and perception in the human soul ... Acquiring this kind of exact clairvoyance by a strictly methodical process, we become able to recognize and know what lives within us as a spiritual, supersensible reality between birth and death ... [A]s an educator, one can be an [educational] artist only if one is able to enter into connection with the supersensible creative element, the supersensible that lives in the human being’s self. The anthroposophical method of research makes this possible and so provides the basis for an art of teaching and education ... When educators have completed their work upon the child, they are in the position of an artist whose work continues to evolve. For this, philosophy does not suffice, only pedagogical principles and methods do: exact clairvoyance.  I would like to sum up in a picture how we must work in such artistic education — for artistic education is, finally, the great principle of our Waldorf method ... Waldorf education, which we at the Goetheanum are endeavoring to cultivate and carry into the world, sows in the child something that can grow and thrive from early childhood into old age." — Rudolf Steiner, WALDORF EDUCATION AND ANTHROPOSOPHY, Vol. 1 (Anthroposophic Press, 1995), pp. 205-208.

Here are items from the Waldorf Watch News.

In each instance, I quote a text of interest, 

and then I offer a response.

1.

From Rudolf Steiner Press:

"[T]he third set of lectures [in this book] concerns the astral-etheric beings known as elemental spirits, whose existence is rarely acknowledged today beyond the sphere of folklore. We discover how indebted we are to these beings, both benevolent and malevolent, for our continued existence. Steiner gives an account of their different levels of consciousness and, in doing so, throws light on some of the characters from traditional nursery tales. Many of us will be familiar with the wise but gruff dwarf, the water sprite or mermaid who tries to lure the human being into its own fluid consciousness-world, and the unearthly beauty of the fairy queen which would entrap men and render them powerless, as if they slept. The fact that the elemental spirits, like irresponsible children, might choose to sport with the unprotected human consciousness should not undermine the fact that these spirits 'wish man to make a move onwards with his consciousness, so that he may participate in their world.'" — Ann Druitt, introduction to HARMONY OF THE CREATIVE WORD (Rudolf Steiner Press, 2001), a collection of lectures by Rudolf Steiner, pp. xvii-xviii.

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Waldorf Watch Response:

The gullibility of Steiner’s followers can be astonishing. The clearest example, perhaps, is their belief in fairy tales and the creatures described in fairy tales. Steiner taught that fairy tales are true clairvoyant accounts of the activities of invisible beings — gnomes, fairies, giants, dwarfs — who really exist. This is staggering. Yet when Druitt says that Steiner shines light on “the characters from traditional nursery tales,” she does not mean that Steiner offers a form of literary criticism, examining the import of fantastical, invented stories. No, she and other Anthroposophists accept Steiner’s assurances that 

“Fairy tales are never thought out [i.e., invented]; they are the final remains of ancient clairvoyance ... All the fairy tales in existence are...the remnants of the original clairvoyance.” — Rudolf Steiner, ON THE MYSTERY DRAMAS (Rudolf Steiner Press, 1983), p. 93. 

And the strange beings who populate these tales are real, Steiner said. Thus, for instance, Steiner tells us 

“There are beings that can be seen with clairvoyant vision at many spots in the depths of the earth ... Many names have been given to them, such as goblins, gnomes and so forth.” — Rudolf Steiner, NATURE SPIRITS (Rudolf Steiner Press, 1995), pp. 62-3. 

Or, 

"[O]ur brain connects us with certain elemental beings,* namely those elemental beings that belong to the sphere of wisdom ... To etheric observation**, [a green aura] hovers in the immediate vicinity of our head. The I [our spark of individual divinity] lives in it, and alongside the I are found the elemental beings of the myths and sagas. There they are called elves, fairies, and so on." — Rudolf Steiner, THE RIDDLE OF HUMANITY (Rudolf Steiner Press, 1990), lecture 5. 

The etheric observer — the clairvoyant — is able to see elemental beings cavorting around or within the aura surrounding the human head. These elemental beings are the characters whose actions are described in myths and sagas — and in fairy tales, "[T]hey are called elves, fairies, and so on." 

Steiner said that fairy tales need to be interpreted, because the facts they relate are hard to convey in ordinary language; and he said that we participate in the creation of such beings as goblins and fairies. But he also firmly stated that goblins, fairies, and other elemental spirits do actually exist. He claimed to be able to see them, thanks to his "exact clairvoyance," and he said that you could see them too if you would just follow his instructions.

At one level, this is all quite silly; but at another level, it is quite important, revealing something fundamental about Anthroposophy. There is a real world and there are fantasy worlds, and Steiner’s followers get them confused — they mistake the fantasies for reality. This is a serious matter, especially when people who are deluded in this way offer to educate children. Do you want to entrust the education of your child to people who believe that fairy tales are clairvoyantly true and that goblins really exist?

* In the Waldorf belief system, Anthroposophy, "elemental beings" are also called nature spirits. The four main types are gnomes (which live in the earth), sylphs (which live in the air), undines (which live in water), and "salamanders" (which live in fire). [See "Neutered Nature".]

** "Etheric observation" is clairvoyance focused on the etheric realm, the region from which the etheric body comes. An aura is an invisible yet colored spiritual nimbus, perceptible through clairvoyance. [For more on auras as conceived in the Waldorf belief system, see "Auras".]

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2.

"Rudolf Steiner intended Waldorf education to be a preparation for life ... Education should follow human nature, should orient itself to the universal nature of the developing human being, whilst addressing the specific needs of individuals in their time and space." — Martyn Rawson, foreword to Anthroposophist Francis Edmunds’ AN INTRODUCTION TO STEINER EDUCATION (Sophia Books, 2004), p. xiii.

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Waldorf Watch Response:

Waldorf schools have high and noble purposes, and they are generally staffed by conscientious, well-meaning individuals. Good intentions, however, are not necessarily sufficient. Is the Waldorf view of the world and of human nature realistic? Is it rooted in true knowledge?

The “preparation for life” offered by Waldorf schools centers on an idea that Waldorf faculties consider fundamental but that the rest of humanity may deem nonsense. A child is properly prepared for life, according to Waldorf belief, only when his/her invisible bodies are incarnated. The etheric body generally incarnates at about age seven, the astral body at about age 14, and the “I” at about age 21. Much of what happens in Waldorf schools is predicated on this idea. Unless you consider this idea true, Waldorf education may not suit you or your child. [For information on our invisible bodies and the seven-year stages of human development, see "Incarnation" and "Most Significant".]

What is “the universal nature of the developing human being”? In part, it is what we have just seen: the incarnation of invisible bodies to supplement the physical body. But the Waldorf view of human nature is even more involuted and fantastical. [For an overview, see “Holistic Education” and "Our Parts".] Fundamentally, according to Waldorf belief, we are the central spiritual beings in the universe [see “The Center”], worshipped by the gods, evolving from Saturn to Vulcan and beyond [see “Everything”], a process that will lead us to become God the Father. This is all quite flattering, but to believe it you must subscribe — as most Waldorf teachers do — to Rudolf Steiner’s occult doctrines.

How about “the specific needs of individuals in their time and space”? How well do Waldorf schools respect and address the students’ individual needs? According to Waldorf belief, each individual has lived many previous lives, and s/he arrives in this life with a karma that needs to be fulfilled. In addition, s/he has a “temperament” (sanguine, phlegmatic, choleric, or melancholic) that must be respected. Class assignments, seating, etc., will be based at least in part on “temperament.” [See “Temperaments”]. Moreover, each child is a member of a racial group, and this membership crucially reflects her/his level of spiritual evolution, according to Anthroposophical belief. Steiner taught that blacks are the least evolved, whites are the most evolved. [See “Races”]. To an unfortunate degree, Waldorf schools treat students not as individuals but as members of various categories, and quite often the schools' attitudes on these matters are benighted. The most unfortunate children, according to Waldorf belief, are those who are not really human beings at all but demons in disguise. Such kids are likely to be expelled, since, as Steiner said,  

"We cannot...create a school for demons." — Rudolf Steiner, FACULTY MEETINGS WITH RUDOLF STEINER (Anthroposophic Press, 1998), p. 650.

Waldorf schools have high and noble purposes, but their view of the world and of human nature is deeply unrealistic — and this view informs everything about the schools.

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"I ended up sharing a house with a Waldorf teacher ... As I was walking in with my first box of things my new housemate confronted me about my belongings.  She was upset that I had so many books and made it clear that I had to keep them locked away in my bedroom!  After that first encounter everything I did seemed to be horrible in her eyes. She didn’t like the medicine I took; it was made in a lab. I needed to go to anthroposophical doctor and use only natural medicines. She didn’t like the clothes that I wore; they weren’t all cotton and dyed with natural dyes. She didn’t like me talking on the phone even though it was in the kitchen and belonged to the house; the phone was a tool of [the devil] Ahriman ...  I was told, ‘Steiner had exceptional powers, he saw the future, he knew the truth. If you truly need to learn, you need to study and follow Steiner. Steiner is all anyone ever needs to know.’”  — A Waldorf teacher quoted by a former Waldorf teacher-in-training. [See "Ex-Teacher 5".]

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Waldorf Watch Response:

Devout, true-blue, Anthroposophical Waldorf teachers generally dwell within a very small mental universe. They typically get their teacher training at unaccredited institutions such as Rudolf Steiner College. While there — and subsequently in their teaching careers — they generally restrict their serious reading to the works of Rudolf Steiner and his disciples. This would be ok if Rudolf Steiner had been (as his followers often seem to believe) omniscient, able to impart all necessary knowledge and wisdom. But he was very far from that. Having been a scholar and intellectual as a young man, he did a sudden U-turn in early middle age and became an occultist. Thereafter, he rarely wrote or spoke a true word. He spun an elaborate, mystical description of the universe; compared to reality, his vision is miniature and simplistic. Yet his is the universe that most Waldorf teachers take for real; it is the fantasy that controls the beliefs and actions of most Waldorf faculties. Children inducted into Waldorf schools are in danger of being led far from rationality and reality.

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4.

Quote of Note

December 13, 2019

"Mediums [1] have their visions because they are able to extract the etheric body [2]...out of the sleeping physical body and in the sleeping physical body to perceive consciously. They are then still able to make use of the physical body; the physical body becomes clairvoyant [3] in a remarkable way...

"On future Venus [4] a complete consciousness in the etheric body will develop [5]. Then, while man sleeps, he will gain a consciousness concerning the other side of the world [6]. On Vulcan [7] the spirit is completely detached [8] ... This condition endows man with an exact knowledge of the entire world [9].

"We distinguish [10]:

On Saturn    Trance consciousness, universal consciousness [11]

On Sun    Dreamless sleep, consciousness limited to what is living [12]

On Moon    Picture consciousness [13]

On Earth    Waking consciousness [14]

On Jupiter    Astral consciousness, further extended [15]

On Venus    Etheric consciousness, still further extended [16]

On Vulcan    Universal consciousness" [17]

 — Rudolf Steiner, FOUNDATIONS OF ESOTERICISM (Rudolf Steiner Press, 2019), pp. 198-199.

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Footnotes

[1] Mediums are spiritualists who claim to be able to communicate with the dead. Rudolf Steiner claimed to have this power. [See "Steiner and the Warlord".]

[2] This is one of three invisible, incorporeal bodies that Steiner claimed incarnate during the first 21 years of a human being's life. The etheric body is the first of the three; it incarnates around age seven, Steiner said. Much of Waldorf education centers on the supposed incarnation of the three incorporeal bodies. [See "Incarnation".]

[3] Steiner claimed to be clairvoyant, and his followers (including many Waldorf teachers) believe in clairvoyance. Generally, indeed, Steiner's followers strive to become clairvoyant themselves. [See "Clairvoyance".] Steiner said that some Waldorf teachers have attained clairvoyance, and he said the rest of them accept the reports given by professed clairvoyants such as Steiner himself and other Anthroposophists.

[4] Future Venus will be the sixth of seven incarnations of the solar system, according to standard Anthroposophical teachings. (Steiner sometimes said there will be five more such incarnations after the seventh, but they cannot be discussed.) Anthroposophists believe that humanity has evolved from a dim consciousness during the first incarnation of the solar system (called Old Saturn) to our present waking consciousness during the fourth incarnation of the solar system (called Present Earth). Ahead of us lie evolutionary stages called Future Jupiter, Future Venus, and Future Vulcan. [See "Future Stages".]

[5] Steiner taught that during Future Jupiter, all humans (except those who have fallen out of the upward evolutionary stream) will attain a clairvoyant consciousness that may be described as perfected imagination. [See "Jupiter consciousness" in The Brief Waldorf / Steiner Encyclopedia (BWSE).] In a sense, Jupiter consciousness will be situated within the etheric body (we will no longer have physical bodies as we know these now).

Steiner identified three stages of clairvoyance: imagination, inspiration, and intuition. He used these terms in a special, very particular way, different from ordinary usage. [See the entries for "imagination", "inspiration", and "intuition" in the BWSE.] Essentially, according to Steiner, these are progressive stages of clairvoyant consciousness taking us far beyond any awareness we experienced previously.

[6] I.e., our consciousness will not be localized — it will encompass events occurring far away ("on the other side of the world," as it were).

[7] This will be the seventh incarnation of the solar system: Future Vulcan. [See "Vulcan".]

[8] That is, the human spiritual ego or "I" [see "Ego"] will be freed from limitations.

[9] I.e., our consciousness will be universal, encompassing precise knowledge of events everywhere ("exact knowledge of the entire world," as it were).

[10] Here Steiner lists the seven describable incarnations of the solar system (Old Saturn, Old Sun, Old Moon, Present Earth, Future Jupiter, Future Venus, Future Vulcan), and he indicates the evolution of consciousness that he said occurs as we pass through these incarnations. Steiner thus presents, in outline form, the central narrative of Anthroposophical belief. [See "evolution", "evolution of consciousness", and "historical narrative of Anthroposophy" in the BWSE.]

[11] Steiner indicated that our initial consciousness was equivalent to deep coma — we were virtually unconscious, except that at the deepest level, far below anything that we might today call consciousness, we were attuned to the entire cosmos (which itself was, at that earliest stage, largely undifferentiated and formless). [See "Old Saturn" in the BWSE.]

[12] I.e., we had risen to a consciousness equivalent to deep, dreamless sleep. We remained attuned (in a insensate way) to all living things, but we had evolved beyond attunement with lifeless things. [See "Old Sun" in the BWSE.]

[13] This was a consciousness equivalent to dreaming sleep. We were waking up, in a sense, and our minds now formed pictures or visions — but these were analogous to dreams rather than clear-eyed, rational reports. Our consciousness was higher than before, but it was withdrawing from innate attunement with living things beyond the self. [See "Old Moon" in the BWSE.]

[14] This is the ordinary, rational, limited consciousness we experience today upon the Earth. We wakefully perceive and know phenomena, but we have largely withdrawn from awareness of transcendent realities beyond the reach of our physical senses. [See "Present Earth" in the BWSE.] By embracing Anthroposophy, however, we can break free of the limitations of ordinary consciousness — so Steiner assured his followers, anyway. [See "Anthroposophy" in the BWSE.]

[15] This will be perfected imagination — the "Jupiter consciousness" mentioned earlier. It will be a form of clairvoyant awareness that extends beyond anything we are capable of now. We will be able to picture in our minds, with clarity and accuracy, supersensible realities (things beyond the reach of ordinary senses).

[16] This will be perfected inspiration — "Venus consciousness." Far more than anything we can experience now, this consciousness will produce — through inspiration, welling up from within — innate comprehension of supersensible realities.

[17] This will be perfected intuition — "Vulcan consciousness." Without needing to think or meditate, we will intuitively know supersensible realities extending across the entire cosmos. The insensate universal consciousness we had on Saturn will have given way to a precise, fully aware, utterly sure universal consciousness spanning — and extending beyond — all of time and space.

If this sounds good to you, all you need to do is to embrace Anthroposophy and begin on the journey to deification. And if you want to give your kids a boost toward this journey, just enroll them in Waldorf schools.

Here is a message I posted 

at the Waldorf Critics discussion page

[http://groups.yahoo.com/group/waldorf-critics/message/20483].

It begins by mentioning "wedges" that Waldorf schools 

drive between students and their parents.

[See http://groups.yahoo.com/group/waldorf-critics/message/20477.]

I have edited the message slightly for use here.

On the question of wedges: Waldorf teachers have been known to literally ban private communication between students and their parents, at least for brief periods. Here is a report from a former, alienated Waldorf teacher:

In September 2005, the high school students, teachers and some staff members went to what was called a "communication retreat" on an island setup for summer camps. 

The retreat was the creation of two staff  members who claimed to be experienced in this kind of group work. It was later discovered that they had never tried this with a large group of students.

The main activity of students (ages 14 to 19) and staff members was to sit in a large circle, 67 people in total, in the cafeteria for six hours divided by three sittings. 

All were asked to keep silent unless the individual felt moved to speak. The beginning of this activity was signaled by a chime used by a staff member.  No one could speak until they said their name each time they wanted to speak, i.e. "My name is ...". 

The stated goal of this five-day activity was to bring all members of the group to one consensus of one thought. By the end of the second day, many students were intimidated by this process and were not able to express themselves. Many students showed signs of restlessness, agitation and they were clearly uncomfortable. They were not allowed to call their parents privately. Some students called this cult indoctrination and refused to attend meetings. 

I tried many times during the first days of the retreat to share my concerns with the other staff members. I tried to convey the damaging effects of this type of imprinting. This retreat was far too intimidating for most students to communicate anything but fear and anger. Some students wanted to leave; a teacher physically threatened a student if she did not comply.

Brainwashing and indoctrination are defined 'as unethically manipulative methods to persuade others to conform to the wishes of the manipulators often to the detriment of the person being manipulated'.  

Isolated on an island, not allowed to call parents privately, sitting long hours in a circle, falls into this category. 

Thought control begins by having individuals reveal things about themselves they would not normally reveal. Some students expressed feeling inadequate for not wanting to speak. Students who refused to attend were threatened with expulsion from the school. Students who followed directives were praised effusively.     

[See "Satanic Cult?".]

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The central activity of Anthroposophy is the use of "clairvoyance" to study the higher, spiritual worlds. Rudolf Steiner outlined the development of this technique in his book KNOWLEDGE OF THE HIGHER WORLDS AND ITS ATTAINMENT. [See "Knowing the Worlds".] According to Steiner and current Anthroposophists such as Eugene Schwartz, Waldorf teachers are expected to become clairvoyant or, at an absolute minimum, to accept the guidance of their clairvoyant colleagues.

Steiner claimed to use a high form of clairvoyance, "exact clairvoyance," which made his teachings virtually unquestionable — using "exact clairvoyance," he perceived the precise truth and thus should not be doubted. [See "Exactly".]

Steiner's claim of virtual omniscience is reflected, at a somewhat lower level, by all Waldorf teachers who deem themselves clairvoyant. Hence the extraordinary authority that Waldorf teachers assign to themselves.

Of course, the Steiner/Waldorf position on these matters is delusion. There is no such thing as clairvoyance. [See "Clairvoyance".] The frightening inference to be drawn is that genuine Waldorf schools (those that remain true to Steiner) are largely manned by delusional occultists. It is primarily for this reason that I urge parents in almost all circumstances to remove their children from genuine Waldorf schools as soon as possible. The process can be difficult, wrenching, even traumatizing. Keeping the child's welfare at the center of one's actions is of paramount importance, so switching schools may take longer than one would otherwise wish. But leaving a child under the control of people who are out of touch with reality is a dreadful prospect. The damage inflicted on the children can be severe.

- Roger

[Waldorfic art by R.R.]