THINKING THINGS OVER

Here are two thought experiments.

(A shorter version of the first

appears in “Steiner’s Racism”.)

I.

Try a thought experiment: A white person is standing next to a black person. You've never met either of these individuals, never talked to them, have no information about them except that one is white and one is black. What can you conclude about them?

According to Steiner, you can know that these two individuals partake of different "group souls" or "racial souls" — that is, they live under the aegis of different Archangels.

You can also know that the white person leads a "thinking life" whereas the black leads an "impulsive life" — that is, the white makes extensive use of his/her "forebrain," whereas the black is largely driven by urges and instincts processed by the "rear brain." The white tends to be coolly reasonable whereas the black is heated and excited internally, or so Anthroposophy teaches.

If your encounter with the two individuals occurs anywhere but in Africa, then you know that the black person has moved from the place where s/he belongs, and thus s/he is in danger of perishing. The white person, on the other hand, having evolved from a European lineage, is free to move virtually anywhere s/he wants.

You can know that the white is more highly evolved — spiritually and probably ethically — than the black. People evolve to higher racial forms because they are good, Steiner said. Thus, the white person you see before you is either morally superior to the black now or s/he has been morally superior in the recent past. Perhaps s/he is making moral errors in this life and therefore s/he will slip down a rung or two in the next life — s/he may incarnate in a lower race next time around. Still, even if s/he is morally wobbly just now, s/he is currently superior to any black person in an important sense: S/he occupies a higher level; because s/he is now, or has been, morally superior, s/he is now a member of a higher race.

Let's amplify on some of these points. According to Rudolf Steiner's teachings, the black person standing before you is a member of a low race, which means s/he is evil or at least spiritually retarded. According to Steiner, evil people move downward through the races until, in the end, they cease to be human at all. So any black person you see is quite likely an evil soul headed to deeper and deeper levels of depravity OR s/he is a soul who is becoming good but who for some reason lags behind in humanity's upward evolutionary march to whiteness. Perhaps s/he started out in a low race, as we all do; s/he later evolved to a higher racial form; but then s/he regressed and sank to blackness again. That's one possibility. Another possibility is that s/he is spiritually abnormal — s/he is a spiritual infant who has not truly developed yet, so she has not progressed beyond blackness. Hence, s/he trails behind all good, mature whites walking the Earth today.

No matter how we cut it, according to Steiner, the black is currently lower than the white in an important sense: S/he occupies a lower level; s/he is a member of a lower race.

In sum, you know a lot about the two strangers you see standing before you.

Now, ending the thought experiment, ask yourself whether Steiner's views on race are helpful in the real world. What if there is no such thing as reincarnation? What if we are all now living our one and only earthly lives? Then blacks will not catch up with whites in future incarnations — there will be no future incarnations. Thus, in the real world, here and now, labeling anyone inferior due to race is a permanent judgment: The white is higher, the black is lower, and that's it. Period.

In the real world, in other words, Steiner's views are invidious, discriminatory, and prejudicial — they are racist. Presumably Steiner didn't mean to be a racist. Presumably he didn't understand the implications of his own teachings. But that is no excuse. His teachings are racist.

◊

II.

Try another thought experiment: You meet a group of people who are kindly, well-meaning, and spiritual. You ask them their views on human rights, and they respond affirmatively. The rights of all peoples should be respected, they reply. Every human being deserves respect; all human beings are fundamentally equal.

Of course, they add, different people stand at different levels of development. White people are the most highly evolved. Black people, by comparison — while wholly worthy of respect — stand at a lower level. Blacks are childlike. They are less evolved. They are impulsive and not really very thoughtful: They lead "impulsive lives," using mainly their "rear brains." Whites, by comparison, lead "thinking lives," making great use of their "forebrains."

The well-meaning group tells you this without a trace of rancor or malice.

How would you respond? Would you consider these nice people to be virulent, hate-filled bigots? Surely not — they are too pleasant, too clearly well-intentioned for that. But would you accept their views on race? Would you agree with them about whites and blacks? Surely not — the racial views expressed by these nice people are clearly insupportable.

So, what should you conclude? A nuanced evaluation might be that these kindly people are, as individuals, upstanding. But their views on race are, as ideas, false and (there's no other word for it) racist.

You might wonder how they came to hold such views. And thereby would hang a tale.

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FROM THE WALDORF WATCH NEWS

“[I]n one’s study of the so-called American ‘people’, it appears more justifiable to refer here to the formation of a new race [sic]. In checking off the characteristics of a race of people according to its own particular anatomical and physiological phenomena, taking into account such factors as skin color, hair growth, position of the eyes, the formation of the skull, etc., all in accordance with older racial theories, it becomes obvious that, [among you] in America, out of a large number of European peoples, there is something in formation which exhibits all the characteristics of a race in genesis.” — Anthroposophist F. W. Zeylmans von Emmichoven, AMERICA AND AMERICANISM (St. George Publications, 1984), p. 15. 

As of December, 2016, this booklet is still for sale at the Rudolf Steiner College bookstore, under the imprint of Rudolf Steiner College Press.

Rather than repudiating Rudolf Steiner’s racial teachings, his followers have tended to speak of nations and races is the same terms he used.

For Steiner’s racial views, see, e.g., “Steiner’s Racism”, “Races”, and “Differences”. We should note, in passing, that Emmichoven finds merit in "older theories;" in particular, he laments modern psychological and sociological work, preferring the old ways of looking at things, ways he finds in Steiner.

◊

CLIPPINGS

Here are a few additional quotations culled from recent Anthroposophical publications, quotations that reflect the continuing influence of Steiner's teachings about the special spirits that distinguish various peoples, nations, and races. It is quite likely that most of these authors would repudiate racism, yet all of them retain in their thinking the effects of Steiner's doctrines, such as the belief that nations, peoples, and races have their own distinct spirits, gods who guide and direct them. Thus, they tend to affirm that the differences between various peoples are far more than skin-deep; the differences reach down into the very souls of human beings, distinguishing various groups from one another in highly important ways. — R.R.

“[W]e experience and trust the higher archangels to watch over the diversity of groups on earth. Their task is to lead, guide and influence the healthy development of groups as large as nations because their vision is so great.” — Anthroposophist Veronika van Duin, HOMEMAKING AS A SOCIAL ART (Rudolf Steiner Press, 2000), p. 140. 

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"[A]nthroposophy should be able to 'heal' the young Russian national soul and help it to fulfil its mission between East and West." — Waldorf advocate Agnes Nobel, EDUCATING THROUGH ART — The Steiner Approach (Floris Books, Anthroposophical Press, 1996), p. 206.

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"Nation spirit — [this is an] archangel...that leads a population and endows its language ... The activities of an archangel as nation spirit are also expressed in the general character and disposition of a people, and their historical destiny." — Waldorf teacher Henk van Oort, ANTHROPOSOPHY A-Z (Sophia Books, Rudolf Steiner Press, 2011), p. 85.

◊

“Folk soul. The spirit...which aids mankind during oracular dreams, and occurs in [a people's] fables, myths, and folklore [which are spiritually true]." — Anthroposophist George Riland, THE NEW STEINERBOOKS DICTIONARY OF THE PARANORMAL (Rudolf Steiner Publications, 1980), pp. 102-103.

◊

"For Rudolf Steiner a Spirit of the Age (Zeitgeist) or a Folk- Soul (Volkseele) were realities indeed, actual spiritual beings existing in the spiritual worlds with definite functions to perform on the Earthly plane." — Waldorf teacher Gilbert Childs, EDUCATION AND BEYOND (Floris Books, Anthroposophical Press, 1996), p. 112. [1]

◊

“The blood of the Englishman is dynamic, the bearer of his individual will; through this the Spiritual Soul in England finds its normal means of expression on the physical plane... Through this pure, receptive element — the blood of Lear, the blood of Arthur — England possesses the power to receive a Grail-Initiate, who can manifest the Will of God on earth with a force beyond what is possible to any human Ego as this stage of man’s evolution.” — Anthroposophist Doris Eveline Faulkner Jones, THE ENGLISH SPIRIT: A New Approach Through the World Conception of Rudolf Steiner (Rudolf Steiner Press, 1982), pp. 215-216.

◊

An archangel can serve as a national spirit, inspiring a whole nation with all its characteristics such as language, ethics and folk customs. Expressions such as `folk-soul' and `folk-spirit' indicate the same spiritual being.” — Waldorf teacher Henk van Oort, ANTHROPOSOPHY A-Z (Sophia Books, Rudolf Steiner Press, 2011), p. 9. 

◊

"What is being prepared for the East depends on the German Folk Spirit finding souls who are able consciously to grasp the Christ impulse with their astral bodies over the next thousand years." — Anthroposophist Richard Seddon, THE END OF THE MILLENNIUM AND BEYOND (Temple Lodge Publishing,1993), p. 44.

◊

"[I]t can be appreciated why the Wise Guidance of humanity caused the individuality of [the scientist Michael] Faraday to incarnate as an Englishman and thereby endowed him with a characteristic quality of the British Folksoul. This protected him from the danger of succumbing to the effect of the force [electricity] he was destined to raise to its cultural power through the spiritual gifts he had brought with him [into this incarnation].” — Waldorf teacher Ernst Lehrs, SPIRITUAL SCIENCE, ELECTRICITY, AND MICHAEL FARADAY (Rudolf Steiner Press, 1975), p. 17. 

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"It was inevitable that the decline of national spirit should be reflected in all aspects of Egyptian life." — Anthroposophist Stewart Easton, THE HERITAGE OF THE ANCIENT WORLD (Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1970), p. 72.

◊

"[T]he folk spirit and the folk soul of the Israelite-Jewish people had taken the place of the old gods. The archangel, 'who has charge of your people' (Dan. 12:1), was Michael." — Anthroposophist Emil Bock, KINGS AND PROPHETS (Floris Books, Anthroposophical Press, 1989), p. 363.

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“[T]he art of singing...has to transmit the appropriate method of singing to humanity from epoch to epoch ... [I]t was the strength of more or less instinctive talent, and the support of mother tongue and folk-soul...that brought these singers [such as Enrico Caruso] to greatness....” — Anthroposophist Valborg Werbeck-Svardstrom, UNCOVERING THE VOICE (Rudolf Steiner Press, 2008), p. 186.

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“The destiny of a nation can be reflected in the destiny of an individual: this is what Rudolf Steiner can read in the tragic life of [Helmuth von] Moltke, whom he addresses as the representative of the German Folk Spirit....” — Waldorf teacher Johannes Tautz, “Helmuth von Moltke and Rudolf Steiner,” in LIGHT FOR THE NEW MILLENNIUM (Rudolf Steiner Press, 1997), pp. 7-8. 

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“[Steiner said:] ’To enable the Archangeloi [i.e., archangels] to lead the people aright, there must be Initiates of the fifth degree upon the Earth ‘... Elijah possessed both of the [needed] spiritual qualities ... To this testified his activity as the representative of the Folk-Soul of the ancient Hebrews and also his direct connection with...the Archangel Michael....” — Anthroposophist Sergei O. Prokofieff, ETERNAL INDIVIDUALITY (Temple Lodge Publishing, 1992), p. 310. 

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“For 12 years [1933-1945: i.e., during Nazi rule] the Ego centre of humanity [was] seduced and overpowered, possessed entirely by those anti-Sun forces that separated for this period of time the true folk soul and spirit of the German people from their physical life and existence.” — Anthroposophist Jesaiah Ben-Ahron, THE SPIRITUAL EVENT OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY (Temple Lodge Publishing, 2011), pp. 55-56. 

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"Maccabee was a rune for invoking the warring victorious sun-archangel. He had once been Israel's folk spirit, then the time spirit between the ages of the prophets and Alexander. Now, as the spiritual herald preparing his way, Michael stood exclusively before the countenance of Christ." — Anthroposophist Emil Bock, CAESARS AND APOSTLES (Floris Books, Anthroposophical Press, 1998), p. 70. 

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“[I]n the 15th century...the British Folk-Soul had then undertaken significant extensions of territory ... The British Folk-Soul is especially chosen [by the gods] for the unfolding and development of the Consciousness Soul.” — Anthroposophist Joan M. Edmunds (Temple Lodge Publishing, 2008), THE MISSION OF JOAN OF ARC, p. 4.

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“[A]rchangels...help individuals relate in a positive and harmonious way to their national group and to what may be termed the folk-soul that regulates the relationship between individuals and their nation's totality. The folk-soul is an individual spirit of considerable stature who exerts great influence on everything...within his sphere of influence.” — Anthroposophically inclined doctor Werner Hartinger, THE ANIMALS ARE OUR BROTHERS AND SISTERS (Temple Lodge Publishing, 2005), pp. 139-140.

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HE HIMSELF

Here are two quotations drawn from a key book written by Rudolf Steiner.

◊ "Each of us belongs to a family, a people, a race. Our activity in this world depends upon our belonging to such a unit. Even our individual personality is related to it. In fact, our membership in a family, a nation, or a race affects not only our conscious activities [but also our unconsciousness], for every family, nation and race has its own destiny, just as each has its own particular character ... The life of families, nations, and races is affected not only by the individuals who belong to them but also by 'family souls,' 'nation souls,' and 'race spirits.' These are real beings. In a sense, as individuals, we are only the instruments — the executive organs, so to speak — of these 'family souls' and 'race spirits.' Indeed we may say, for example, that the soul of a nation or people makes use of the individual who belongs to it to accomplish certain tasks ... In the truest sense, we each receive our allotted human task from our family, nation, or race soul ... [A]s isolated individuals, we would wholly harden within ourselves and fall into ruin if we did not acquire the powers inherent in the spirits of our race and nation." — Rudolf Steiner, HOW TO KNOW HIGHER WORLDS (Anthroposophic Press, 1994) , pp. 190-192.

◊ "Peoples and races are, after all, merely different developmental stages in our evolution toward a pure humanity. The more perfectly that individual members of a race or people express the pure, ideal human type — the more they have worked their way through from the physical and mortal to the supersensible and immortal realm — the 'higher' this race or nation is. Human evolution, through repeated incarnations in ever 'higher' nations and races, is thus a process of liberation." — Rudolf Steiner, ibid., p. 201.

Note that HOW TO KNOW HIGHER WORLDS is one of Steiner's two most important books, books that his followers — including many Waldorf teachers — study intently. Doctrines such as these lie near the heart of Anthroposophy. [For more on Steiner's two most important books, see "Knowing the Worlds" and "Everything".]

We should also note that the word "higher" was not placed inside embarrassed quotation marks in earlier translations. Thus, here is the second passage as presented in a 1947 translation:

"[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." — Rudolf Steiner, KNOWLEDGE OF THE HIGHER WORLDS AND IT ATTAINMENT (Anthroposophic Press, 1947), p. 252.

Putting the word "higher" in quotation marks indicates that at least some of Steiner's followers had begun to be embarrassed by some of his racial teachings. But they did not become sufficiently embarrassed to renounce his teachings and quit republishing his works. Indeed, quite unembarrassed, the Rudolf Steiner Press recently released a translation that, reverting to previous practice, dispenses with the quotation marks around the word "higher":

“[P]eoples and races are only different stages of evolution on the way to a pure manhood [sic]. A race or a people stands at a higher level in proportion as its members bring to expression the pure, ideal type of manhood, and in so far [sic] as they have worked their way from the physical and perishable to the supersensible and imperishable. The evolution of man through reincarnations in ever higher ethnic and racial forms is thus a process of liberation.”  — Rudolf Steiner, KNOWLEDGE OF THE HIGHER WORLDS - How Is It Achieved? (Rudolf Steiner Press, 2009), pp. 207-208.

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To consider a lecture that 

Anthroposophists often cite

as "proof" that their 

worldview is not racist, 

see "Universal".

To read a suppressed lecture 

by Rudolf Steiner,

see "Forbidden".

To explore of Steiner's 

teachings about blood,

see "Blood".

◊

To consider a "study guide" 

used by Anthroposophists

when delving into Steiner's doctrines 

about nations and races,

see "Souls of the Nations" 

by George Adams Kaufmann.

Published in 1938, the book is today 

ensconced in the Rudolf Steiner Archive

(December 2016).

[Anthroposophical Publishing Co., 1938.]

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THE CENTRAL TEXT

Steiner's book OCCULT SCIENCE - AN OUTLINE is his most important publication — in it, Steiner provides an overview of his doctrines, the propositions that underlie his initiatives such as Waldorf education. Various passages in the book deal with races, peoples, and other divisions among humanity. Here are a few examples. Some of these passages reiterate doctrines we have already reviewed; other introduce additional themes. All indicate, once again, the degree to which questions of human division, and distinctions drawn between various branches of the human family, are built into Anthroposophy. For Steiner and those who believe him, different peoples stand at "different levels of evolution — and also of corruption." They have different destinies, characters, and relationships with the spirit realm. Humanity has divided and divided many times during the millennia of its evolution. Reunification beckons in the future, chiefly through the figure of Christ, the Sun God. But that future is distant.

The following quotations are all drawn from the edition of OCCULT SCIENCE - AN OUTLINE published by Rudolf Steiner Press in 2005 and republished in 2009. I have highlighted significant terms, including some that take us back to matters we saw in previous quotations from Steiner and others.

“[Very early in Earthly evolution] human bodies were like wraiths, like shadows. Distributed as they were over the whole Earth, they came under different kinds of Earthly influence at different parts of the Earth's surface. While the bodily images, being in accordance with the soul of man that quickened them, were heretofore essentially alike over the whole Earth, diversity began now to appear among the human forms. Thus was the way prepared for what afterwards showed itself in variety of race.” — p. 170. 

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“[T]he souls, formerly translated on to Mars, Jupiter, etc., were guided once more to the Earth. For every human descendant born in the sequence of the generations, a soul was thus made available. And so it went on for a long time: the coming of fresh souls to settle on the Earth corresponded to the increase in the population. And when these souls left the body through Earthly death, they retained like a memory, in the body-free condition, the echo of their Earthly individuality. This memory worked in such a way that when a body proper for its habitation was born again on Earth, the soul would incarnate in it once more. Thus is came about that among the progeny of men, there were some with souls coming from outside— appearing again on Earth for the first time since the primeval ages of its evolution — and others with souls that were not reincarnating. As evolution continued, the ‘young’ souls appearing for the first time grew ever less and the reincarnated more in number. Nevertheless, for long ages of time the human race still consisted of these two kinds of human beings.” — pp. 187-188. 

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“Mighty and ominous powers of Nature were thus let loose by the deeds of men, leading eventually to the gradual destruction of the whole territory of Atlantis by catastrophes of air and water. Atlantean humanity — the portion of it, that is, which did not perish in the storms — was compelled to migrate. As a result too of the great storms, the whole face of the Earth changed. Europe, Asia and Africa on the one hand, and America on the other, began gradually to assume their present shape. Vast numbers of human beings migrated into these countries. For us in our time those above all are of importance who went eastward from Atlantis. Europe, Asia and Africa gradually became colonized by descendants of the Atlanteans. Peoples of many kinds took up their abode in these countries, peoples that stood at many different levels of evolution — and also of corruption. And in their midst went the Initiates, the Guardians of the secrets of the Oracles. In various regions the Initiates established holy places where the services of Jupiter, Venus, etc. were cultivated in a good — or in an evil — sense. Most detrimental of all was the betrayal of Vulcan secrets.” — p. 198.

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“In those times, the size, form and plasticity of man's physical body were still largely determined by qualities of soul. Hence the results of the betrayal [of Vulcan secrets] appeared in changes of this very kind in the human race. Where supersensible forces were placed in the service of lower instincts, passions and desires — where, that is, the prevalent corruption took this particular form — human figures [i.e., body types] would arise that were monstrous and grotesque in size and shape. These could not, however, survive beyond the Atlantean epoch; they died out. Physically speaking, post-Atlantean humanity evolved from Atlantean forebears whose bodily figure had already become firm enough not to give way to the soul-forces which had grown to be so contrary to their true nature. There was a period in Atlantean evolution when the laws prevailing in and around the Earth were such as to subject the human figure precisely to those conditions under which it had to grow firm. Human racial forms which had hardened before this time could continue to propagate themselves for a good while to come, but by degrees the souls incarnating in them found themselves so restricted that these races too had to die out. Many of the forms were nevertheless able to maintain themselves right into the post-Atlantean times; indeed, some of them that had remained mobile enough, survived in a somewhat altered condition for a very long time. On the other hand, the human forms which had retained their plasticity beyond the above-mentioned period, became bodies for those souls in particular who had suffered in a high degree the harmful influence of the betrayal. Such forms were destined to die out early.” — pp. 199-200.

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“As a result of the prolonged migrations from West to East ever since the beginning of the Atlantean catastrophe, a group of peoples had settled in the regions of Western Asia, the descendants of whom are known to history as the Persians and kindred races. Supersensible knowledge must however look back to far earlier times than those of which history tells. We are here concerned with very early forefathers of the later Persians. Among these arose, following upon the Indian, the second great civilization-epoch of post-Atlantean evolution. The peoples of this epoch had a different task. Their longings and inclinations were not directed solely to the supersensible world. They were a people well fitted for the physical world of the senses. They learned to love the Earth. They valued what man can win for himself on Earth and what he can then also acquire by making use of its forces. Their achievements as a warlike nation and the means they invented to possess themselves of the treasures of the Earth, correspond with this trait in their character.” pp. 205-206.

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“We saw how the human beings have to be traced back in their soul nature to diverse beings who, coming down from other worlds, incarnated in the bodily descendants of the old Lemurians [Lemuria was a continent that sank before Atlantis]. The varieties of race are a consequence of this. And when the souls reincarnated, all kinds of different interests arose in them, as an outcome of their Karma. While all this was working itself out, there could not exist for man the ideal of a ‘universal humanity.’ Mankind went forth from unity in the beginning, but Earth evolution hitherto had led to diversity.” — p. 218.

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"In the fourth, fifth and sixth centuries A.D., a new civilization was preparing in Europe ... The peoples who after manifold wanderings and destinies came forward as the bearers of this epoch, were descended from those Atlanteans who had been least affected by what had taken place meanwhile in the four preceding epochs [i.e., the epochs since Atlantis sank]. They had not penetrated to the countries where the civilizations of these earlier epochs took root [i.e., non-European lands]. They had instead transmitted the heritage of Atlantean civilizations in their own way ... In the mythologies of the European peoples can be found traces of what the Initiates in the Mysteries were able to make known to men. Yet these mythologies also contain [other occult lore], though in a less perfect form than either the Southern or Eastern Mysteries ... The God of Light was indeed proclaimed, but not in such form and figure as would enable one to say with assurance that He would conquer Lucifer. Nevertheless these Mysteries too were irradiated by the figure of the Christ that was to come ... (The sagas that tell of the Twilight of the Gods, and kindred legends, originated in this knowledge of the European Mysteries.)" — pp. 219-220.

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CENTRALLY: US

In Anthroposophical belief, human beings were the first creatures to appear in our universe, aside from the gods themselves. In Anthroposophical belief, this entire universe was created for us and around us. Other creatures existing in our universe are inferior beings who fell away from our central, upward-evolving line. They failed to evolve as they should have, so they became cast-off relicts — animals, for instance, or subordinate nature spirits. They showed themselves to be inadequate, so they fell out of evolution. They remained mired at low levels while we ascended ever higher.

The process of evolution continues, Anthroposophists believe. The process of casting aside abnormal, inadequate, or evil creatures continues. Among the beings who fall by the wayside, according to Anthroposophical teachings, are humans who become too embedded in a particular racial form — they fail to keep evolving upwards as they should. Steiner taught that such beings eventually fall out of evolution just as animals have done. Here is how Steiner diagrammed this Anthroposophical tenet (the diagram comes from a German-language Steiner text that has rarely been translated into English):

In all probability, few students in Waldorf schools are taught that some peoples become sidetracked from proper human evolution, failing to progress beyond inferior racial forms. (Some Waldorf students, however, are taught that animals branched off from the human evolutionary line. I was taught this as a Waldorf student. See "I Went to Waldorf".)

In all probability, few English-speaking followers of Rudolf Steiner have been wholly exposed to Steiner's doctrines about racial decadence. They may not yet have encountered Steiner's assertion that some people become sidetracked from proper human evolution, failing to progress beyond inferior racial forms.

But Steiner did teach these things. These teachings remain embedded in Anthroposophical doctrines today. They are part and parcel of Anthroposophy, and anyone who probes deeply enough into the Anthroposophical worldview will come upon them sooner or later. They lie in wait for anyone who truly wishes to follow Rudolf Steiner and accept his "wisdom."

◊

Steiner's racial teachings are documented 

on several pages here at Waldorf Watch.

See, e.g., 

 "Steiner's Racism",

"Steiner's Bile",

and

"Races".

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FACING UP

Some of Rudolf Steiner’s followers have occasionally attempted to deal forthrightly with his racism. Here is an example.

The authors of the report “Racism and Waldorf Education”, published by the Research Institute for Waldorf Education, make an admirable admission. Some of Steiner’s teachings are apparently racist, they say, and Waldorf schools may need to repudiate them.

This is commendable. But we need to recognize the limits of the admission. The authors refer to Steiner’s racial “speculations,” for instance. But Steiner did not speculate — he asserted “truths” that he claimed to confirm through the use of “exact clairvoyance.” [See "Exactly".] Steiner’s racial teachings are firmly located within the central body of his work; they cannot be glossed over as mere “speculations.”

Moreover, the authors greatly underestimate the depth and number of Steiner’s racial teachings. It is not possible to sanitize the record by excising a few unfortunate statements from Steiner's books and lectures. In truth,  if all traces of his racism were to be removed, the entire body of Steiner's teachings about archangels, group souls, folk souls, nations, peoples, etc., would need to be thoroughly reworked. But this would fundamentally alter Anthroposophy. Steiner's racism is integrally woven into the tapestry of falsehood and fantasy that constitutes Anthroposophy.

The authors indicate that Steiner’s racism may be at least partially excused if we do sufficient research and interpret his works properly. There is some truth in this — we certainly need to try to understand precisely what Steiner meant — but by and large it reflects a vain hope. Steiner was a racist, and racism obtrudes frequently in his writings and utterances. No amount of careful exegesis or apology can change this.

The authors use various devices to minimize or excuse at least some of Steiner’s racist statements. Still, they strike close to the truth, and within an Anthroposophical context they are distinctly bold. They raise a dramatic imperative: 

“[A]ll members of the Waldorf community will have to appraise critically whatever racism might be inherent in their world view.” 

In this, they stop short of the truth only by qualifying “racism” with “whatever,” and by saying that racism “might be” found embedded in Anthroposophy. A more forthright and accurate statement would be this: “[A]ll members of the Waldorf community will have to appraise critically the racism that is inherent in their world view.” 

All that being said, here are excerpts from “Racism and Waldorf Education”, RESEARCH BULLETIN (Research Institute for Waldorf Education), Vol. 1, #2, June 1996, written by Ray McDermott and Ida Oberman. 

This brief note addresses a specific issue that developed in the course of our [visit to one American Waldorf school], the reality of racism in Waldorf education as well as, apparently, in the teachings of Rudolf Steiner. One of our team members, on the basis of her time at the Urban Waldorf School, has written glowingly about the promise of Waldorf education for African American children (Dillard, 1996). If that promise is to be realized, all members of the Waldorf community will have to appraise critically whatever racism might be inherent in their world view.

...Is Waldorf education up to the challenge of leading American education away from the treachery of various racisms? ... One vestige of nineteenth-century German culture, phrased in its most pernicious and uni-lineal form as the progress that led to the triumph of the white, Christian and rational modes of thought, can be found in Steiner’s thinking about the evolution of consciousness ... [M]uch of Steiner’s writing can be read — some would say misinterpreted — through contemporary sensitivities as Eurocentric in the worst sense of the term.

... [Steiner spoke] freely about the five races of the world as if they were quite different kinds of humanity, each with a different place in the evolution of consciousness, right down to the blood that courses through their bodies ... In choosing to use the accepted folk terms for race — by color: black, red, white, yellow and brown — Steiner may have been using an unfortunate dimension of his own culture to explicate his inquiry into human evolution. In a later lecture, Steiner...exacerbates the difficulty with the claim that racial history is the key to understanding the different modes of thought available to people, and worse, he traces the various ways of thinking right down to the propensity of members of different races to rely on different parts of the brain. His speculations on the importance of skin color are uninformed, racist and far behind the intellectual developments even of his own time.

...Although Steiner urged his followers to think for themselves and to adjust his insights for new circumstances, a social study of anthroposophists in England found that many of them considered Steiner infallible (Ahern, 1984). If Steiner’s theories do not provide an adequate safeguard from being accepted uncritically by Waldorf teachers, then his writings on race could be dangerous. It is difficult to imagine how his speculations on the evolution of consciousness among different peoples could be applied to individual children from different traditions without being racist ... When a key category in the interpretation of the child’s karmic path through multiple lives is the individual child’s skin color or ethnic background, it is more than a risk: it is racism, and it is intolerable. It is time to sound the alarm against the possibility that Waldorf teachers could be using such ideas to guide their thinking about children in their classes.

Whatever Steiner did say, whatever he might say if he were alive today, if only a few Waldorf teachers can nurture what might be a Steiner derived anti-Semitic or anti-African American prejudice, then Waldorf educators will have to critique themselves before their pedagogy can be of systematic use across the country. The offending texts must be identified, criticized, explained if possible and disowned if necessary ... [Offending passages] can be read perhaps by scholars familiar with a wide range of Steiner’s writings as having nothing to do with the current arrangements among groups of persons designated by various racial terms either around the world or, now far from the soils that nurtured their races of origin, within American cities. Without an extensive explanation of the text, however, it is much easier to read the passage as simple racism, with black people once again treated as the simple children of the earth, close to their senses and instincts, and no doubt in need of guidance from those less driven by the instincts of the body. A non-critical reading of such texts could [account for a Waldorf faculty member] teaching her class about the exceptional sense of rhythm shared by contemporary black persons.

Waldorf teachers are going to have to add racism to the list of concerns they must worry about every day before entering the classroom. The legacy of color racism is karma to American democracy in much the same way that anti-Semitism follows Christianity. If Waldorf teachers do not take this challenge to heart, then Waldorf schools have no place in American education.

...Some of the [offending] texts, having been transcribed by friends from discussions with Steiner, can be questioned as to their authenticity; others...can be disowned as seemingly unconnected to the rest of Steiner’s thought; still others...are closer to the core of Steiner’s thought and can be either reinterpreted in terms of their historical context or disowned at the cost of radically reinterpreting a major theme in Steiner’s work.

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ONLY OSTENSIBLY ABOUT 

NATURE SPIRITS

Steiner's racial teachings are embedded in his doctrines about other, seemingly unrelated subjects. Consider, for instance, his teachings about nature spirits — the invisible beings that Steiner said dwell within the forces of nature. [See "Neutered Nature".]

Here are three items from the Waldorf Watch "news" page; they deal with passages found in the book NATURE SPIRITS.

I.

“Man has either hardened or possesses the possibility of developing to higher stages [i.e., if you have not hardened your heart and soul, you have the potential to evolve upwards]. Races would not stay behind and become decadent if there were not men who wish to stay behind and are obliged to stay behind, since they have not developed their eternal life-kernel [i.e., their spiritual essence]. Older races only persist because there are men who cannot or will not move forward to a higher racial form ... There are sixteen possibilities of becoming merged with the [i.e., a] race. They are called the ‘sixteen paths of perdition.’ On these paths man would merge with the material [i.e., become almost wholly material rather than spiritual]. By striving forward, however, he [i.e., a moral person] is drawn up from race to race to ever higher stages.” — Rudolf Steiner, NATURE SPIRITS (Rudolf Steiner Press, 1995), p. 69.

Most of Steiner’s teachings are absurd; some are also morally repugnant. When Steiner spoke of subhumans, people who are not really human, demons in human form, etc., he was not speaking metaphorically. He meant what he said, literally. In the passage above, Steiner is saying that we should evolve upwards toward increased spirituality. So far, so good. But in part, according to Steiner, the evolutionary process requires us to rise from low races to higher races: Each human soul should move upward through the hierarchy of races in successive incarnations. Old, low races continue to exist because some evil individuals do not move beyond them. And indeed, some people move downward, to lower and lower races. If an evil person makes profound moral errors in sixteen successive incarnations, s/he will become totally material — which is to say, totally unspiritual. Such a person ceases to be human. But good people, striving to evolve properly, rise to higher and higher races. 

 II.

“We see then that it is actually possible for a man to combine with the one incarnation [i.e., to get stuck at one stage of development] in such a way that he remains behind in evolution. His other soul-brothers are therefore at a higher stage when he reappears in a new incarnation. He must then content himself with an inferior incarnation which has been left to him in a decadent race. This is something that positively takes place.” — Rudolf Steiner, NATURE SPIRITS (Rudolf Steiner Press, 1995), p. 69.

According to Steiner, we evolve upward from low races (black is lowest) to high races (white is highest). We do this through the process of reincarnation, returning in successive lives to racial forms that are a step down or a step up from where we stood before. If you are good in one life, you will return in a higher race next time around; if you are bad, you will return in a lower race. However, sometimes people stall at particular levels. If you have incarnated in a race that perfectly suits your moral and spiritual development, you may stall there, unable to go further up or down. If this happens, you fall behind the other souls of your generation, who move on. Thus, in the next incarnation, you (the retard) will be racially inferior to your previous peers (the virtuous upward evolvers). The race you stay in should have died out when everyone evolved beyond it, but because you and other deficient individuals stay at that level, the race continues to exist, but only in a decadent form.

(Steiner said decadent races exist because demons interfered in our evolution: 

“While there should have been basically only one form of human being...Lucifer and Ahriman [interfered] ... 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.” — Rudolf Steiner, THE UNIVERSAL HUMAN (Anthroposophic Press, 1990), p. 75.)

 III.

"Now let us take an extreme case and imagine that a man unites too fully with what is to constitute the character of an incarnation [i.e., he stalls at a certain racial level]. Let us suppose he reaches what is to be reached in sixteen incarnations; he takes the sixteen false paths. The earth does not wait for him, the earth goes forward and he finally arrives at a point where he can no longer incorporate in a human body, for none are in existence. There will be no more bodies in which souls that have grown too much involved in their bodily nature can incarnate. Such souls lose the possibility of incarnation and find no other opportunity ... They must therefore live a bodiless existence. They must cut themselves off entirely from the progress of evolution. Why have they deserved this? By reason of the fact that they have not made use of life! ... They do not advance with world evolution, they remain behind at a certain stage. Beings that stay behind at such stages appear in a later epoch with approximately the character of the earlier age. They have grown together with it, but not in the forms of the later epoch. They appear in a later epoch as subordinate nature-spirits." — Rudolf Steiner, NATURE SPIRITS (Rudolf Steiner Press, 1995), pp. 69-70.

The entire Earth and all the good people on it are evolving upwards. Evil or deficient people get left behind. If, during sixteen incarnations, you repeatedly choose the path of evil and falsehood, you will be unable to incarnate again. The members of the good races will have risen high, beyond race, while you and the other incorrigibles lose the last vestiges of humanity. Races will cease to exist, so there will be no lowly race left for you to incarnate in. Therefore, you will become a subhuman nature spirit — that is, a being like a goblin who cannot evolve in the proper, human way and who will be excluded from the joyous destiny of all the good (white and whiter-than-white) humans on Vulcan and beyond. [To glimpse the future of good humans, see “Sixth Epoch” and the pages that follow it. To pick up the thread earlier in our evolution, start at “Prehistory 101”.]

Anthroposophists argue strenuously that their belief system is not racist. Look, they say, everybody passes through all the racial levels. We are all the same. If you happen to be black in this incarnation, you are low on the ladder, but you will rise in future incarnations. We all were black once. This argument overlooks a few things. According to Steiner, it is not true that everyone passes through all levels. Some people stall at a lower-than-white stage — which means some people never become white. Moreover, Anthroposophy teaches that every black person is less evolved — and almost certainly less moral — than any white person. (The other races fall between the white and black poles.) Moreover, to be realistic for a moment, reincarnation is a fantasy. Thus, the racial identity of every person alive today is the only racial identity s/he will ever have. So believing that blacks are less evolved than whites means passing a permanent racial judgment. 

Racism means judging people based on race. If you hate someone because of race, you are a racist. If you love someone because of race, you are a racist. If you, a high white Anthroposophist, lovingly try to prepare a lowly black to rise in a future incarnation, you are a kind, loving racist. Anthroposophy is racist.

— Roger Rawlings

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WHEN I WAS YOUNG

[CAN THE RED  MAN HELP THE WHITE MAN?

(Myrin Institute, 1970); Sylvester M. Morley, editor.]

Here is a semi-personal aside. Like all of my reports referring to events that occurred during or soon after my years as a Waldorf student, this report is dated. But you may find that it remains relevant today.

The image, above, is the cover of a booklet that details a meeting held between two Anthroposophists and a group of American Indian elders in 1968. Although Rudolf Steiner spoke and wrote slightingly of American Indians and, indeed, of America in general, American Anthroposophists have tried to alter the picture, positing spiritual powers and wisdom in people and a continent that Steiner viewed askance. [For Steiner's views, see, e.g., "Races" and "America".]

The two Anthroposophists at the conference were Dr. Franz Winkler, an Anthroposophical physician, and Sylvester M. Morley, who had undertaken studies of American Indian culture. Dr. Winkler was my own doctor, as well as a board member at the Waldorf school I attended. Sylvester Morley, chairman of the Myrin Institute, delivered the commencement address during my Waldorf class's eighth grade graduation ceremony. He spoke to us about the spiritual wisdom of American Indians.

CAN THE RED MAN HELP THE WHITE MAN? was published in 1970 by the Myrin Institute, an organization that in those days was deeply committed to Waldorf education. H. AlarIk W. Myrin, founder of the institute, was the major financial backer of the Waldorf school I attended. Without his support, our school would not have been built. I met Mr. Myrin on several occasions.

The main point worth considering here, in our examination of embedded Anthroposophical racism, centers on the title of the booklet. The title refers to "the red man" and "the white man." We should pause to ask ourselves whether these terms have any real meaning. Is there such a thing as "the red man"? Are all American Indians alike? Can we characterize all American Indians, as individual human beings, by discussing the racial category designated by the term "the red man"?

Likewise, is there any such thing as "the white man"? Are all whites the same? Can we characterize all whites (Germans, Russians, Canadians, Britons...), as individual human beings, by discussing the racial category designated by the term "the white man"?

Clearly not. There is no such thing as "the red man"; there is no such thing as "the white man." These labels represent unjust, unfounded racial stereotypes. Yet to Anthroposophists, such labels are perfectly sensible. Indeed, Anthroposophists have used such terms even when their intentions have been to counteract racial prejudice, as when publishing booklets that praise "the red man." The racism embedded in Anthroposophy often goes unnoticed by Anthroposophists themselves; it often exists within the context of self-affirmed racial "enlightenment;" yet it exists, embedded in the Anthroposophical worldview.

"The Indian way of life — the Indian manner of thinking and observing the world — is different from the white man's way ... Indians...think with their hearts ... White men think with their brains." — Sylvester M. Morley, Introduction to CAN THE RED MAN HELP THE WHITE MAN?, p. ix.

— Aside by Roger Rawlings

◊

POP QUIZ

Have Anthroposophists cleansed themselves 

of the racism Rudolf Steiner bequeathed them? 

Here’s a quiz. 

Who made the following statement? 

a) Rudolf Steiner in 1911. 

b) One of Steiner’s followers in 2011.

(I have highlighted some key terms.)

“I had the opportunity of working alongside a South American couple today. Both were of dark skin; the man had small eye sockets yet the woman had large ones. The woman struck me as being racially mixed in an obvious way in that not only did she have large eyes, but her entire physique carried quite defined and fine characteristics which I recognized as typical of 'northern races'. As well, the way in which she dealt with issues facing her was through imposing a slow, reflective outward mannerism. What impressed me in this, was that this woman seemed to engage the activity of 'thought' not only as an instrument for determining an outward task but also as an instrument for the maintenance of the various levels of her physical composure, even to the biological level. I personally found this tendency familiar in that it relates in a generalized way, to northern peoples. The man on the other hand had a little more of a coarser [sic] demeanor and possessed a predominantly stalky [sic: stocky] physique yet I found him to be surprisingly tall. He could very well have a little racial mixing to his background though I did find 'elements' to physique [sic] quite imposing. I suspect that this impression reflected the fact that the man engages an instinctual force through his body.

“I've been reassured by several 'white' South American acquaintances that there is indeed a strong European presence in South America, in fact a couple of my own maternal grandfather's brothers immigrated there ... I hope these observations [help in] your ongoing reflections on race.“

Answer: 

b) One of Steiner’s followers in 2011. 

[http://groups.yahoo.com/group/anthroposophy_now/message/2380]

Perhaps some of Steiner’s followers have cleansed themselves of the racism Rudolf Steiner bequeathed them. But evidently not all of them have. In the quotation we have seen, the writer (“organicethics”) analyzes racial characteristics almost precisely as Steiner did. [See, e.g., "Forbidden".] If nothing else, the writer demonstrates the dire effects Steiner's teachings can still have on the susceptible, decades after Steiner himself left this mortal coil.

◊

According to Steiner, different nations and races 

stand at different levels of spiritual development.

Thus, the "initiates" of one people have different 

spiritual insight than the initiates of other peoples.

This is "the Egyptian initiate." 

[See THE GOETHEANUM CUPOLA MOTIFS OF RUDOLF STEINER

(SteinerBooks, 2011), p. 125; R.R. copy, 2013.

For more on initiation, see, e.g., "Inside Scoop".]

◊

MISSIONS

We have seen more than enough statements by Steiner and his followers dealing with the topics we are considering on this page. Nonetheless, I will now offer more. Read them on not, as you choose.

The following are all statements made by Steiner in his book THE MISSION OF FOLK-SOULS (Anthroposophical Publishing Co., 1929), GA 121. All of these statements are pertinent to our discussion — they reinforce our understanding that racial concepts are embedded deep in Anthroposophy. I leave it to you to decide whether these statements provide enlightenment.

(The English translation of this book is particularly turgid. I have attempted to improve readability by adjusting the translation slightly, from place to place, without altering Steiner's meaning. Most of my adjustments are clearly signaled by ellipses and brackets.) — R.R.

Lecture 1

“[W]hat after all is...the soul or spirit of a nation?  ... It is...a being [i.e., a spirit, a god] just as man himself is a being ... A human being presents himself to the external organs of perception [i.e., he is perceptible to our ordinary senses]; a Folk-spirit does not present himself in an external form that can be perceived or felt by the outer senses, but [it] is nevertheless an absolutely real being.”

◊

“[T]he individuals belonging to the several peoples will only be able to bring their free, concrete contributions to [humanity’s overall development], if they have, first of all, an understanding of the folk to which they belong, an understanding of what we might call ‘The Self-knowledge of the Folk.’ In ancient Greece...‘Know thyself’ played a great role; in a not far-distant future this sentence will be addressed to the Folk-souls; ‘Know yourselves as Folk-souls’.”

◊

“If we contemplate the various peoples on the earth and draw special attention to some of them, then in the characteristics and qualities peculiar to these peoples, we see a reflection of what we may consider as the mission of these peoples ... [W]e can then say what a nation really is: it is a group of persons belonging together, guided by one of the Archangels.”

◊

“[Y]ou can distinguish the periods influenced by the great peoples from whom the post-Atlantean civilizations came forth [i.e., since Atlantis, there has been a succession of civilizations, each led by a particular people]: the old Indian, the Persian, the Chaldæan-Egyptian, the Græco-Latin and our present-day civilization ... [T]he inspirers [i.e., spirits] of the peoples have been at work in those civilizations, working successively ... Thus we can observe the peoples side by side as well as following one after another." [2]

◊

“[I]n everything which evolves in and with the peoples there is something else that evolves also. Human evolution progresses. Whether we consider one civilization higher than another is of no consequence ... [F]or every epoch we can find the ‘Spirit of the Age’ [i.e., a zeitgeist or archon] ... From epoch to epoch they pass on their task to the next one. The Spirit of the Age who worked during the Greek age, handed on his mission to the one who came after him [and so on]....” [3]

Lecture 2

“[I]n the different parts of our earth there are very different conditions [that contribute to] the unfolding of the characteristics peculiar to the various peoples ... To clairvoyant consciousness there arises over every part of our earth a peculiar spiritual cloudlike formation which we must designate as the etheric aura of that special part of the earth. This etheric aura is quite different over the land of Switzerland [for example] from what it is over the land of Italy, and again different over the lands of Norway, Denmark or Germany [etc.] ... [T]hose who wish to follow the destinies of our human race in their true form on earth, endeavor to follow the interpenetration...of the etheric auras of the different parts of our earth ... In truth that which mysteriously confronts us in the part of the earth inhabited by a certain people, is the etheric aura of that particular part of the earth.”

◊

“The etheric aura of the folk acts upon the choleric, the phlegmatic and the sanguine temperaments [4]; on the whole, therefore, the power of the etheric aura of the folk flows into these three temperaments. Now these three may be mingled in many different ways and may co-operate differently in different human individuals. You may think of an endless variety of ways in which the three forces co-operate, when one influences another, or conquers it, etc. Thus arise the many configurations which we meet with, e.g., in Russia, in Norway or Germany. That which works into the temperaments constitutes the national character of man ... National temperaments are therefore mingled according to the interpenetration of the folk aura.”

◊

“[W]e shall only understand the history of the world, in so far [sic] as it consists of the histories of peoples, if we follow up the normal and abnormal Archangels, [and] the normal and abnormal Spirits of Personality [i.e., Archai]...and at the same time follow up their work in peoples that succeed each other in the course of the world's history.” [5]

Lecture 3

“By means of [cooperation among the gods] the shaping of what we call the human races takes place, which we must distinguish from the peoples.... [W]e must not confuse all this. A nation is not a race ... [R]aces are different communities from nations. We are certainly right in speaking of a German, a Dutch, a Norwegian nation, but we speak of a Germanic race. Now what acts in the idea of a race? The Beings whom we describe as normal Spirits of Form or Powers act therein in combination with those Beings whom we have learnt to know as the abnormal Spirits of Form, but who in reality are Spirits of Motion [6] ... That is why mankind is divided into races. That which makes man the same over the whole globe, which makes each man...a member of the whole human kingdom, is brought about by the normal Spirits of Form. But that which...divides the whole of humanity into races, is brought about by the abnormal Spirits of Form, who have denied themselves so that there should not be one humanity only upon the earth but a variety of peoples.” [7]

◊

“Think of [folk spirits or archangels] as gazing into a world which does not extend to the minerals, plants or animals. Think that instead of this, their vision [focuses on] human egos, around which...is gathered something that appears as a sort of aura. You have then the picture of how the Archangelic Being looks down upon...the folk belonging to him ... His world consists of an astral field of perception in which there are certain centers; these centers, these central points, are the several human personalities, the several human egos [who are members of that folk spirit's people]. Just therefore as to us, colors and sounds, warmth and cold are within our field of perception...so to the Archangelic Beings, to the Folk-spirits, we ourselves...are the field of perception ... [We are] the scene of action for the Archangels or Folk-spirits.” [8]

◊

“[For an] Archangel...the rise and decline of a nation...gives him the occasion to incarnate in some particular people at a certain time. When the possibility of incorporating himself occurs, when there is a people living in the ascending period of its life...then the Archangel goes down [to the physical plane] ... [T]he Archangel goes down into a people and embodies himself in it. In the same way too, does the Archangel feel his death, the necessity of withdrawing from the people in question, when [they begin to decline] ... Then comes the time when he forsakes that community of people and enters...into his life between death and a new birth, in order at a later opportunity to seek out in another way a community of people. Thus the youthful upward life of a people signifies the youth of its Folk-spirit ... The descending period of a people's life he perceives as a withering of the [people] in his domain of perception.” [9]

Lecture 4

“[M]an has thoroughly grown together with his mother-earth through being so closely connected with the place, with that part of the earth on which he is born ... [H]e is determined by those attributes which he thus receives, by the earth-forces connected with that particular place ... All these things determine his racial character, and in this indirect way the abnormal Spirits of Form...are the originators of the racial differences in mankind over the whole earth, which therefore depend upon the part of the world in which a man is born.”

◊

“At a later epoch race began to assume the character of being bound up with heredity and no longer with place. So that in race we see something which was originally connected with one special part of the earth and which afterwards propagated itself in mankind through heredity, but became more and more independent of place.” [10]

◊

“We must look for the beginning of racial characteristics, of racial peculiarities, in the old Lemurian epoch, and we must then follow their propagation down into our own times, but in doing so we must be quite clear, that when our present fifth epoch of evolution shall have been succeeded by the sixth and seventh, there will be no question of a condition which we may describe as race.” [11]

◊

“[There is] a point which lies in Africa; at this spot there radiate out from the earth...all those forces which could affect man particularly during his early childhood ... [T]his spot imprints the characteristic of his early childhood permanently upon him ... What we call the black race is particularly determined by these [childish] attributes.

“If you now pass on further into Asia, you find a spot on the earth's surface where the characteristics of youth are imprinted permanently on man from the forces of the earth...[giving] him this racial character. The races which come into consideration here are the yellow and the brownish races of our epoch.

“If we then go further from the East to the West, we find towards Europe a point which permanently imprints more mature characteristics upon man, those [characteristics] which belong to the years following early youth ... [These] ripest characteristics are imprinted on man by [this] spot in Europe. This is simply a law. As all persons in their different incarnations pass through the various races, therefore, although it may be argued that the European has the advantage over the black and the yellow races, we should not be prejudiced thereby ... [Y]ou see that with the help of spiritual science [i.e., Anthroposophy] we really do come upon remarkable truths. [12] 

“If we continue...far to the West, to America, [we come to] the region where those forces are active...which have a great deal to do with the decline and death of man, with what in man belongs to the last third of his life. The line [we have traced, from east to west] is laid down by law, it really does exist, it is a reality, a real curve, and it expresses the law according to which our earth acts upon man. The forces which determine man with respect to race take this course. The American Indians did not die out because it pleased the Europeans that they should do so, but because they had to acquire those forces which lead them to die out... Where racial character comes into consideration [the gods] work in this way; but in our age the racial character is gradually being overcome.” [13]

◊

“The further we come over towards the West, the more do we see how the attributes of a riper age of civilization are imprinted ... [M]en no longer proceed towards the West exclusively with attributes of the race ... [T]he tendency of civilization is such, that the full freshness of its youth, of its productive element, declines more and more the further it goes towards the West." [14]

Lecture 5

“[I]t will certainly be necessary for one to rise above all the feelings that may easily come to a person from what we must now describe quite objectively. As long as one has the smallest tendency to take an objective description of this or that race, or of this or that people, as a personal matter, so long will it be difficult to obtain an unprejudiced understanding of [our evolution through the diverse racial forms] ... [F]or whatever we may hear about the character of this or that people, and however our feelings and so on may be affected because we belong to a certain race or people, yet [Anthroposophy] gives us the outlook that, with the inmost kernel of our being [i.e., our inviolate inner identity], we shall be reincarnated in successive ages in many different races and peoples. We may therefore be sure, when we contemplate this kernel of our being, that we shall take part with it, not only in the sunny or perhaps also in the shadow-side of all races and peoples, but we may be sure that in our inmost being we shall receive share after share of the blessings of all races and peoples through being incarnated first in one place and then in another.” [15]

Lecture 6

“[T]here are five possible centers of [spiritual] influence [on the surface of rhe Earth], and these, in their reflection upon humanity from the centre of the Earth, really produce what we know as the five main races who inhabit the Earth. [16]

“If we now more closely characterize the spot which in our recent statements we placed in Africa [where the forces of Mercury are dominant, and where] the negro race came into existence, we are then...quite correct in describing...the black race as the ‘Mercury race’.

“...We [next] come to Asia and find there the Venus race or the Malay race. We then pass on across the wide domain of Asia and in the Mongolian race we find the Mars race. We then pass over into the domain of Europe and we find in the Europeans...in their racial character, the Jupiter men. If we cross over the ocean to America, where...races or civilizations die, we then find the race of dark Saturn, the original American-Indian race ... The American-Indian race is the Saturn race.”

◊

“What [can we say about] a man of the Mercury race, of the Ethiopian race? ... This man is originally destined and organized by the Elohim [i.e., normal spirits of form] to express in himself the whole of human nature. But...from the Mercury centre the abnormal Spirits of Form worked with great power and caused man to be so varied that the form of the Ethiopian race arose; and it was the same with each of the other races.” [17]

◊

“Thus were the great foundations of the races created, and when man looks up into the infinite expanses of the heavens, he must there seek the forces which constitute him. They constitute him however in their rays which [are reflected by] the Earth. When he looks up to the normal Spirits of Form, to the Elohim, he is looking up to that which really makes him into man; and when he looks up to what is centered in the several Planetary Spirits...he sees that which makes him belong to a particular race.” [18]

◊

“Everything which gives the Ethiopian race its special characteristics comes from the fact that the Mercury forces seethe and surge in the glandular system of this people. What modifies the universal human form into the special form of the Ethiopian race with black skin and woolly hair and so on, is the result of [the Mercury forces].” [19]

◊

“Venus Beings [exert their influence] in the Malay race, in the yellow tinted races of Southern Asia ... [O]ver these parts of Malaya there is spread the type of man in whom the abnormal Spirits of Form work upon the nervous system indirectly through the respiratory system ... In the nervous system is brewed that which...produces the more or less yellow-colored part of humanity ... The Venus-forces which work in this race, [they] seethe deep down in the unconscious organism.”

◊

“Now let us go up over the wide Mongolian plains. In those plains those [abnormal] Spirits of Form are principally active who work indirectly through the blood. There in the blood is brewed that which brings about a modification of humanity and produces the basic character of this race. There is, however, something very peculiar in the Mongolian race. There the Mars-spirits enter the blood: But they work in it in quite a definite way, viz., they are there able to work towards the six Elohim who are centered in the Sun. In the Mongolian race, therefore, they work towards these six Elohim, and in doing so they make a special attack in the other direction towards Jahve or Jehovah who has separated his field of action from that of the six Elohim.” [20]

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“We shall now go back still further and trace how the Spirits and Beings who have their centre in Jupiter seethe and boil in man ... The attack proceeding from Jupiter goes indirectly through the sense-impressions and streams out from thence upon those portions of the nervous system which are centered in the brain and spinal cord. [21] Here flow in, in those races belonging to the Jupiter humanity, those forces which give the special stamp to the racial character [of Jupiter humanity]. This is more or less the case in the Aryans, in the peoples of Asia Minor and Europe, those whom we reckon as belonging to the Caucasian race. In these arises that modification of universal humanity which comes from the abnormal Spirits of Form whom we may describe as Jupiter Spirits, working upon the senses. The Caucasians therefore are determined through the senses [i.e., they are characterized by the presence of Jupiter forces in their sense organs].”

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“Finally, what we may describe as the abnormal Spirits of Form who have their centre in Saturn, act upon the glandular system ... Therefore in all that we must describe as the Saturn-race...we must look for something which draws together and embraces that which leads again to the evening twilight of humanity...to a dying away. The expression of this action on the glandular system is seen in the American-Indian race. From that action comes its mortality, its disappearance. [22] The Saturn influence...separates out the hardest parts of man, and we may therefore say that this dying-out consists in a sort of ossification ... If you look at the pictures of the old American Indians, the process [of ossification] is palpable in the decline of this race. In a race such as this, everything which existed in the Saturn-evolution is now present in them ... [I]t has withdrawn into itself and left man alone with his hard bone system, and brought him into decline.”

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Steiner taught that we are heading toward a post-racial future, and along the way the racial evolution of mankind is being replaced by the evolution of civilizations. The peak of human civilizations is currently to be found in Europe, and especially in Germany. Waldorf education is particularly intended to assist in the German national/spiritual mission. [See "The Good Wars".] If we look farther West — to America — we see the destructive forces that may lead to civilization's decline. 

"[I]t is America’s endeavor to mechanize everything, to push everything into the realm of pure naturalism, thus gradually extinguishing Europe’s culture altogether.” [See “America”.]

We have reviewed a bit over half of THE MISSION OF THE FOLK-SOULS. There are several more lectures the book — I urge you to read them. Some readers will find those lectures hopeful and uplifting. Others will see very different attributes in them. Steiner offers a vision of human betterment, an evolution to higher and higher stages. He foresees a future in which humanity will become godlike. All humans who rise to such heights will be equal and superb. Our future will be, in this sense, grand.

But what Steiner does not offer is an affirmation that all races existing today are equal. He does not say that all human beings alive today stand at the same evolutionary level or that the differences between races are superficial. Human equality, in Steiner’s vision, is a future goal, not a present reality. The reality today, he teaches, is that there are important differences between human races; some races are lower (darker, less competently adult) and others are higher (lighter, more competently adult). Thus, the race you are born into defines, to a great extent, who you are. This is the “reality” of the world today, as painted in Anthroposophy. “With the help of spiritual science we really do come upon remarkable truths.”

The question I would leave you with is straightforward: Do you consider Steiner's “truths” to be true? 

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REPORTS FROM PARENTS

Some parents have reported encountering racism (apparently institutional racism) in Waldorf schools. Here are two examples:

“Have you seen it written somewhere that Steiner believed white people were most evolved??? This was blatantly apparent in the curriculum of the Waldorf school we visited.

“My daughter is African American, and this is one of the two reasons (along with the sexist dynamics) that we decided against the school. The teacher, telling me about the history part of the curriculum, said that since 5th graders are becoming rational, and rationality ‘came in with the Greeks,’ that's what they study in 5th grade.

“The whole ‘history as a developmental process paralleling children's development, with Western civilization at the pinnacle’ is inherently racist.

“I saw the unit study books one class had done about Africa. At the beginning, under their identical paintings of a traditional African man hunting in silhouette, they all had the same saying copied: ‘Perhaps this life of ours which begins as the quest of the child for the adult, ends as a journey by the adult to rediscover the child ... It is in the Bushman wherein the two are finally and lovingly joined.’ (Laurens van der Post) I shudder to think of my daughter learning about her heritage in this way.” — waldorfcritics.org/active/articles/WomanSeesRacism.html.

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“To belittle the experiences of families who have been through these schools and seen the worst of Anthroposophy in action would be a grave mistake. Where our children went, not only was there unnecessary physical force from teachers (apparently quite violent), and bullying amongst the children. There were occasions when dark children with some non-European roots (including ours) were singled out; questioning this brought rage from the teachers; I constantly question the motives for this now; at the time, we hadn't read enough Steiner.

"Moving them [from the school] was traumatic. But the relief on our children's faces was palpable. Guilt, too, plays a huge part; if a parent can't shield their children from harm, but actually throws them into the arms of the perpetrators, it's not unnatural to react." — http://groups.yahoo.com/group/waldorf-critics/messages/9085.

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DAVIDSON VIA DUGAN

A message from Dan Dugan

on July 28, 2016

[https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/waldorf-critics/conversations/messages/31102]:

Today James Davidson posted the following text in the Facebook group “Independent Anthroposophical Research Examination.”

"Something important to consider with regard to the events occurring in Europe and America at present.

"'[Future human evolution] cannot happen in the world without the most violent struggle. White mankind is still on the path of absorbing spirit more deeply into its essence. Yellow mankind is on the path of preserving the period when the spirit was blocked from the body [i.e., colored peoples are stuck at a level where spirit and body are separated] ... But the result will have to be that the transition from the fifth cultural epoch [i.e., the present] to the sixth cultural epoch [mankind's next evolutionary stage] cannot happen differently than as a violent fight between white mankind and colored mankind in the most varied areas.' — Rudolf Steiner, DIE GEISTIGEN HINTERGRÜNDE DES ERSTEN WELTKRIEGES, p. 38.

"'If the blonds and blue-eyed people die out, the human race will become increasingly dense ... In the case of fair people, less nourishment is driven into the eyes and hair; it remains instead in the brain and endows it with intelligence. Brown- and dark-haired people drive the substances into their eyes and hair that the fair people retain in their brains.' — Rudolf Steiner, HEALTH AND ILLNESS, Vol. 1 (Anthroposophic Press, 1981), pp. 85-86.

Amazing, just amazing. Anthroposophists have accused critics of making quotes like these up. The second quote was the one I read at the San Francisco Waldorf School in 1988, that made me ask the faculty to disavow Steiner’s racism. They wouldn’t. Here we are in 2016, after 28 years of public discussion, and an Anthroposophist says these sayings are “important to consider.”

— Dan

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LANGUAGES AND FOLK SOULS

The study of foreign languages is an integral part of Waldorf education. This can be very good — children may be led to appreciate many world cultures and their traditions.

Unfortunately, Anthroposophical conceptions of language study are bound up with Steiner's doctrines about folk souls.

Steiner was a German nationalist. One consequence was that he considered the French language to be a spiritually inferior.

“The use of the French language quite certainly corrupts the soul." — Rudolf Steiner, FACULTY MEETINGS WITH RUDOLF STEINER (Anthroposophic Press, 1998), p. 558.

Steiner said languages reflect the folk souls of various peoples. The differences between various families, nations, and races reflect different spiritual conditions, different levels of spiritual evolution. We receive our tasks in life from our folk souls.

"In the truest sense, we each receive our allotted human task from our family, nation, or race soul ... [A]s isolated individuals, we would wholly harden within ourselves and fall into ruin if we did not acquire the powers inherent in the spirits of our race and nation." — Rudolf Steiner, HOW TO KNOW HIGHER WORLDS (Anthroposophic Press, 1994) , pp. 191.

The languages of the peoples arise from their unique gods, their folk souls, Steiner said. The French language corrupts because, from Steiner's perspective, the French people stand at an inferior level of development.

One of Steiner's key texts about foreign languages is THE GENIUS OF LANGUAGE. A "genius," as Steiner uses the term, is a divine capacity, a spirit, a god. In this case, "the genius of language" is the transcendent god of all language. The genius of language stands, as it were, above the folk souls — the gods of individual peoples. The genius of language expresses itself through all peoples, albeit differently from one human group (a people, a nation, a race) to another.

Interpreted somewhat differently, the genius of language may be considered essentially equivalent to each individual folk soul in its turn; the genius takes particular form in each particular instance.

"[T]he conscious and the unconscious are interwoven in the marvelous being called the genius of language that expresses itself through the totality of a folk, tribe, or people." — Rudolf Steiner, THE GENIUS OF LANGUAGE (Anthroposophic Press, 1995), p. 34. 

Considered either way, language and its genius are interconnected with the folk souls. Thus, to understand the real nature of the German language, Steiner said, we must cleanse it of all the foreign terms that have invaded it, to find its true folk soul beneath the surface.

"[W]e have to sift off [these importations] if we want to study the character of the German language proper. Almost all the specifically foreign words must be lifted off, because they do not express what comes out of the German folk soul but have been poured over its real being, forming a kind of varnish on its surface. We have to look for what lies underneath the surface." — Rudolf Steiner, THE GENIUS OF LANGUAGE, p. 19.

A folk soul is "active, creative," Steiner said; it is the spiritual essence of a country and its culture. [THE GENIUS OF LANGUAGE, p. 27] When a culture evolves, its language evolves. And this evolution is an outward manifestation of the inner life of the evolving folk soul.

"[Y]ou can follow language changes by noting how they shine through the accompanying changes in the feelings and perceptions of the folk soul." — Rudolf Steiner, THE GENIUS OF LANGUAGE, p. 65

The Anthroposophical perspective on these matters — as on virtually all other matters — is esoteric and occult. It separates Anthroposophy profoundly from ordinary, rational perspectives.

"The present book will be understandable in a general way to readers familiar with anthroposophy. They will read it as an extension of what they know of anthroposophy, the folk soul, and certain principles of Waldorf education ... But the non-anthroposophist linguist will not know what to make of concepts like that of the folk soul, the ether body, the 'Genius of Language,' [etc.]." — Adam Makkai, Afterword to THE GENIUS OF LANGUAGE, pp. 97-98.

These esoteric, occult conceptions (the folk soul, the ether body, the 'Genius of Language'...) continue to be embedded in the beliefs of Anthroposophists today. It is for this reason that, as Makkai puts it, "the present book will be understandable" to "readers familiar with anthroposophy."

— R.R.

Footnotes for the Foregoing Sections

[1] Actually, Steiner generally differentiated between folk souls and Zeitgeists. The latter are the Archai, gods one step higher than Archangels. The Zeitgeists establish the overall direction of human evolution in a given historical period; the folk souls work under the Zeitgeists, directing individual peoples during these periods.

[2] In Steiner's account, humanity progresses as new civilizations supplant old ones. The various peoples he names all exist today, "side by side." But their civilizations have developed in a succession, from old to new: from the ancient Indian civilization up to today's European civilization, "following one from another." The folk spirits have guided this progression, working in cooperation with one another.

Note that the Indians Steiner means here are the people of subcontinental, Asian India. Steiner spoke of American Indians in a different context, as we will see.

[3] This is not to deny that some civilizations are higher than others, according to Steiner. But our opinions are irrelevant. What matters, from Steiner's perspective, is objective reality. A civilization would be truly higher than another if it represented a more advanced stage of evolution. 

As we have seen, Zeitgeists are Archons, gods three levels above humanity. The Zeitgeists work to carry humanity to higher and higher stages of evolution: Humanity evolves upward through a series of successive civilizations, spearheaded by various peoples under the guidance of their folk souls.

"[T]he inspirers [i.e., spirits] of the peoples have been at work in those civilizations, working successively ... Thus we can observe the peoples...following one after another." 

Each folk soul has "handed on his mission to the one who came after him."

We should also remember that Steiner spoke of objective differences in the evolutionary levels of various races and peoples — the human beings who exist within civilizations. The objective reality, he taught, is that some races and peoples really are higher than others. In his book KNOWLEDGE OF THE HIGHER WORLDS, he says so, and he even defines how some races stand higher than others: 

"A race or a people stands at a higher level in proportion as its members bring to expression the pure, ideal type of manhood." [p. 207.]

[4] Steiner taught that human beings, as individuals, fall into four categories of “temperament”: melancholic, choleric, phlegmatic, and sanguine. [See “Humouresque”.] Here he extends this analysis to groups of human beings: nations or peoples also have characteristic temperaments. 

"That which works into the temperaments constitutes the national character."

Steiner likewise taught that the parts of the earth have auras, and peoples (folk) also have auras. A locality and its people have "the etheric aura of that particular part of the earth" and also "the etheric aura of the folk." The two types of auras affect one another.

[5] “Normal” spirits are those that evolve in the proper way at the proper pace. “Abnormal” spirits lag behind, failing to evolve in the usual way. As we have seen, Steiner taught that gods of various ranks have influenced human evolution. Likewise, he taught that both normal and abnormal gods of particular ranks have played roles. An abnormal Archangel, lagging behind, may function as an Angel (that is, a god who normally would be two levels above humanity may sometimes act as a god just one level above humanity). Likewise, an abnormal Archon or "Spirit of Personality" may sometimes act as an Archangel (that is, a god who normally would be three levels above humanity may sometimes act as a god just two levels above humanity).

[6] As we have seen, in Anthroposophical discourse, distinctions between such terms as “race,” “people,” and “nation” are often lost. But Steiner frequently contradicted himself, and here he insists on distinguishing these terms.

Spirits of Motion are gods five levels above humanity. Spirits of Form or Powers are gods four levels above humanity. Archai or Principalities or Zeitgeists are gods three levels above us. Archangels are gods two levels above us. Angels are gods one level above us.

[7] Spirits of Form are gods one step higher than Archai (and thus two steps higher than Archangels), and Spirits of Motion are a step higher than Spirits of Form. [See “Polytheism”.]

Steiner gave varying reasons for mankind's division into races and for the simultaneous existence of different races on the Earth now. In these lectures, he attributes virtually everything to the operations of the spirits or gods whom he names. The operations of the normal Spirits of Form, in particular, made us all human. If the normal Spirits of Form were the only gods who influenced our evolution, we would all be the same. But abnormal Spirits of Form (such as Ahriman) also were at work, and due to them we were divided into races. The abnormal Spirits of Form "denied themselves" the opportunity to evolve upward alongside their normal kindred; they did this so they could remain behind and divide humanity. (In other places, Steiner gives somewhat different accounts of our division into races and peoples. His various statements may or may not be reconcilable, depending on how liberally one interprets Steiner's words in the various texts.)  

[8] We “belong” to the folk spirits; we are, in effect, their field of vision — we are what they perceive, the “folk belonging” to them. Each folk spirit sees and acts on one people, and his influence therefore extends down to the individuals who are members of that people. The folk spirit does not look down lower than humanity — he does not perceive animals, plants, or minerals.

[9] A people, nation, or race is effectively the incarnation of an Archangel or folk spirit. The folk spirit is young when its folk is young, and it "dies" (i.e., it withdraws to the spirit realm) when its folk expires. Later, the folk spirit will find another people in which to incarnate.

[10] This is one of the evolutionary changes Steiner outlines: Racial differences originally were connected to the forces coming out of the Earth at various locations, but later racial difference resulted more from heredity than from physical location on the Earth. Nevertheless, Steiner sometimes indicated that race is still tighly bound up with location: If a race moves away from its proper place on Earth, it is in danger of going extinct. 

“On one side you have the black race, which is the most earthly. When it migrates to the west, it dies out. We also have the yellow race ... When it migrates to the east, it becomes brown, attaches itself too much to the cosmos, and it dies out. The white race is the future, it is the most spirit-building race.” — Rudolf Steiner, VOM LEBEN DES MENSCHEN UND DER ERDE - ÜBER DAS WESEN DES CHRISTENTUMS (Verlag Der Rudolf Steiner-Nachlassverwaltung, 1961), GA 349. 

In this sense, Steiner taught that each race should stay where it belongs. He strongly objected, for instance, to the immigration of black Africans to Europe. 

"The Negro race does not belong in Europe, and of course it is absurd that blacks now play a large role in Europe." — Rudolf Steiner, ibid. 

[See "Forbidden".]

[11] In Anthroposophical belief, Lemuria was a continent where humanity lived before Atlantis. Here Steiner says division into races began while we lived in Lemuria and it will end when our present historical period ends. (We currently live in the fifth historical period since the sinking of Atlantis. This period will be followed by the sixth and seventh such periods. [See "Matters of Form".])

[12] Steiner’s followers often point to this passage as “proof” that there is no racism in Anthroposophy. We should not be prejudiced against any races since all humans pass upward from the low races to the high races. 

Of course, no one actually advocates prejudice; even an extreme racist will often decry prejudice, which is pre-judgment, passing judgment without good reason. A racist thinks he has very good reasons for looking down on "lower" races — such races truly are inferior, he thinks. If Steiner did not build extreme racism into his belief system, he nonetheless claimed that, factually, there are very real differences between the races. (“We come upon remarkable truths.”) Indeed, he outlines such differences in this very set of paragraphs: Some races are childish, others are youthful, still others are mature...

We should also note that Steiner did not always say that everyone passes upward “through the various races.” He sometimes indicated that evil, backward, or abnormal people fall downward into lower racial forms, and the worst individuals actually fall out of human evolution altogether. [See, e.g., “Secrets”.] Thus, we cannot exonerate Steiner on the basis of his claim that "all persons in their different incarnations pass through the various races." He made this assertion on some occasions, but on other occasions he contradicted it. 

(Steiner's followers often repeat the idea that every human being passes through all the racial levels. Thus, for instance, Wolfgang Schad has said 

"[E]ach of us has, in the course of his or her incarnations, passed through all the races." — "I and Body", MICHAELMAS, 2012 #45, Paedagogik-Goetheanum, p. 23.

Probably without meaning to, Schad speaks here as a member of a "high" racial group addressing others of the same order — only they have "passed through all the races." According to Steiner's teachings, no people of color have completed the same journey; they have not yet reached the higher, lighter racial forms. So when Schad says "each of us has," he is addressing whites only.)

[13] Here is the turgid beginning of this paragraph without my efforts at clarification:

"If we continue this line, we come far to the West, to America, the region where those forces are active which lie on the other side of the middle third of life. We come, — I beg you not to misunderstand what is now being said, it only refers to man in so far as he is dependent upon the physical organizing forces, not upon those forces which constitute his essence as a human being but the forces in which he lives, — we come then to those forces which have a great deal to do with the decline and death of man, with what in man belongs to the last third of his life."

Steiner begs us not to misunderstand what he says here, and he reassures us that the importance of race is beginning to wane. Nonetheless, he tells us that racial differences result from real forces, and they express natural/spiritual laws. 

We might also note that although Steiner speaks of American Indians as extinct (he says they died out), he is mistaken. American Indians were victims of genocide, but they were not exterminated — many American Indians are alive today. By the logic of Steiner’s schema, all upward-evolving humans would incarnate originally with black skin, then reincarnate with yellow skin, then white skin, and eventually red skin. But he treats the red race as if it no longer exists, so he offers us a vision of humanity evolving from black incarnation to white incarnation. This is the upward journey "through the various races" that he affirms.

[14] Here Steiner extends his argument from races to civilizations. In the east, we have found youthful civilizations; in the west, we have found mature (ripe) civilizations; and, farther west, we have found dying civilizations. He will return to this point.

[15] This is a restatement of the most affirmative way to view Steiner’s racial teachings. Steiner offered it as reassurance to his followers, who were originally almost uniformly Germans and hence white. (The lectures in MISSION OF THE FOLK-SOULS were delivered in Germany, in 1910.) Steiner knew that his followers might dislike the notion of reincarnation in various non-white races. (Presumably, many would prefer to think that they had always been white.) He told them they may need to “rise above” the feelings that such a notion might evoke. Incarnating in differing races bestows “blessings,” he assured them, and one's innermost "kernel" does not change.

In a passage such as this, we see Steiner assuming a progressive position on racial matters, as judged by the standards of his day. Standards have changed, however, and we can assess Steiner's position in a very different light today. Steiner spoke of the blessings to be obtained by incarnating in various races, but his premise was that the races stand at different evolutionary/spiritual levels — the blessings he mentioned would come as individuals climbed from incarnation in low races to incarnation in high races. Such differentiation between races, judging some to be less elevated than others, is generally recognized today as inexcusably racist.

[16] In other texts, Anthroposophists speak of three, four, and seven main races.

[17] As we saw previously, Steiner taught that all humans would be the same if the normal Spirits of Form were the only gods who influenced our evolution. But due to the work of the abnormal Spirits of Form, we separated into races. The abnormal Spirits of Form worked through the planetary influences that are reflected at various locations on the Earth.

[18] The "planetary spirits" are gods residing on various planets. In these passages, Steiner equates them with abnormal Spirits of Form. They send their influence down to the Earth; it is reflected upward into human beings living at various places on the Earth; this causes the human beings to assume different racial forms.

We should recognize that not only are Steiner's racial teaching deplorable by today's standards, but they are rooted in mystical/astrological nonsense.

[19] The "universal form" is the form humanity would have taken if it had not divided into races. Steiner taught that we will become "universal humans" in the future, when we evolve beyond race. [See "Love and the Universal Human".] But we did divide, and thus "Mercury forces seethe and surge" in the bodies of black people. Other forces play predominant roles in the bodies of other races. 

[20] Steiner taught that the god Jehovah was one of the seven Elohim, but Jehovah separated from the other Elohim and took up residence on the Moon. From that orb, Jehovah ruled over the Hebrew people. 

"As you know, we distinguish the Jews from the rest of the earth's population. The difference has arisen because the Jews have been brought up in the moon religion for centuries [i.e., they worship the Moon being, Jehovah] ... The Jews have a great gift for materialism, but little for recognition of the spiritual world." — Rudolf Steiner, FROM BEETROOT TO BUDDHISM (Rudolf Steiner Press, 1999), p. 59.

In a "study guide" to THE MISSION OF THE FOLK SOULS, we find the following explication:

"Dr. Steiner reminds us of how the normal Spirits of Form, the Elohim of the Old Testament, by virtue of whom all humanity are one, are in their number seven. Six of them work from the Sun; in the Sun's light we have the outward garb of their activity. The seventh, Jahveh or Jehovah, took up His abode on the present Moon; He it was who by His power severed the Moon out of the body of the Earth, as described in [Steiner's book] OCCULT SCIENCE. It was indeed, says Dr. Steiner, to counteract the potent forces of the backward Spirits of Movement that Jahveh had to detach Himself from His six colleagues and go with the Moon instead of with the Sun.

"Now by co-operation — or by polarity and antithesis — between the normal Spirits of Form, including Jahveh, and the abnormal (Spirits of Movement working as Spirits of Form), the different races of mankind are brought about. Moreover, even as the normal Elohim and Jahveh work from Sun and Moon, so do the abnormal Spirits work from the five planets: Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn. Their forces ray down from these planets to the Earth; thence reflected, in their reflection from the Earth-centre they bring about the five fundamental races of mankind." — Anthroposophist George Adams Kaufmann, SOULS OF THE NATIONS (Anthroposophical Publishing Co., 1938), lecture 6.

[21] Note that the activities of the abnormal Spirits of Form, who caused the division into races, are referred to as "attacks," and the results of these attacks are forces that "seethe and surge" (Mercury forces), or "seethe deep down" (Venus forces"), or "seethe and boil" (Jupiter forces).

[22] Here again Steiner refers to the extinction or disappearance of the American Indian race. At other points, however, he pulls back a bit and refers to their "decline." American Indians do still exist, of course, but Steiner treats them as essentially absent from contemporary reality and from the upward evolution of humanity. As people evolve, reincarnating in higher and higher forms, we move toward fulfillment in white racial form. This is the glorious future that will allow us to move on to a post-racial existence, a more completely spiritualized existence. As we have seen, "The white race is the future, it is the most spirit-building race.” [See "Forbidden".]