This is a continuation of the essay "Unenlightened." 

III. Highs and Lows 

Rudolf Steiner revealed his intentions for Waldorf schools during discussions at the first Waldorf. The following quotations come from books published by the Anthroposophic Press in the series called “Foundations of Waldorf Education”. 

◊ Steiner wanted Waldorf schools to spread Anthroposophy: “One of the most important facts about the background of the Waldorf School is that we were in a position to make the anthroposophical movement a relatively large one. The anthroposophical movement has become a large one.” [1] 

◊ To this end, Steiner arranged that “[We] need to make the children aware that they are receiving the objective truth, and...anthroposophy has something to say about objective truth ... Anthroposophy will be in the school.” [2] 

◊ To that end, the “staff consists of anthroposophists.” [3] Steiner elaborated on that last point, thus: “As Waldorf teachers, we must be true anthroposophists.” [4]

Various Waldorf schools implement Steiner's intentions, or violate them, in various ways and to various degrees.

The educational process at the Waldorf school I attended was both circumspect and subtle. Instead of teaching us explicit doctrines, the Anthroposophists on the faculty — those teachers who understood what Waldorf was really about — typically tried to lead us by indirection. They sensitized us to the supernatural, and then they worked, quietly, to nurture in us a feeling of intuitive connection to the spirit realm. [5] Their conception of that realm was largely determined by visions Rudolf Steiner claimed to have attained through the use of clairvoyance.

◊

Our school days were pleasant — mellow and tranquil. There was scarcely any unruliness or rude behavior at our school. Pranks and mild rebelliousness were not completely unknown, but they were rare. (Incorrigible troublemakers were weeded out during the application process or, later, they were expelled.) Arriving at the school each day was like entering a refuge from worldly turmoil. The morning began with a prayer, although no one called it that — we called it a "morning verse." [6] In the lower grades, after reciting the "verse," we had classes about myths and Bible stories (Steiner believed that myths are true clairvoyant reports of the spirit world, whereas he taught that the Bible is almost true, needing to be reinterpreted in light of his own teachings). [7] Interspersed with these supernatural lessons, there were classes in math and geography and history: regular subjects, although they were trimmed and modulated in ways we did not understand. We had no textbooks — we copied lessons written on the chalkboards for us by our teachers. The school's library was small — only the Waldorf worldview, and texts that might seem to confirm it, were available to us. Reading was not emphasized or, indeed, taught in the lower grades. We had no “Weekly Reader,” no “Dick and Jane.” Nor were modern teaching aids used, things such as movies; there was something repugnant, even evil, about them, although we were not told what. We laid our heads on our desks and listened as our teachers recited or read to us — often tales of the magical or mystical. Norse myths, in particular, were stressed — the mythology of Germany and northern Europe. The gods of many mythic traditions accompanied us throughout our Waldorf years. Anthroposophy holds that virtually all gods, of virtually all mythic traditions, are real beings, immanent presences. [8]

At various times of the day, we knitted, and crocheted, and painted, and played simple woodwind instruments in unison. Sometimes we merely gazed about while our teachers spoke. (We did not take notes, and we were rarely tested. We didn't have to study much.) The teachers urged us to imaginatively identify with whatever we studied or saw — to feel the life-force coursing through a tree, or absorb an eagle’s noble spirit, or experience the meaning of a boulder. In art classes, we were taught to produce misty watercolors having no straight lines or clear definitions. The images we created were otherworldly, bearing no resemblance to ordinary physical reality, yet completely unlike the stick-figure cartoons kids often produce. The teachers didn’t say so, but our paintings were in effect talismanic representations of the spirit realm as described by Steiner. [9]

In dance classes, we performed “eurythmy,” a form of bodily movement that looks a bit like slow-motion modern dance but that was intended to teach us the proper stances to manifest spiritual states of being — calling upon influences from our past lives and preparing the basis for our future lives. [10] We did eurythmy while manipulating therapeutic copper rods and holding our pelvises strictly still. We were made to feel that eurythmy had an especially strong spiritual component. Our teachers didn’t need to articulate their beliefs about such matters; their tone of voice and facial expressions conveyed the seriousness of the tasks they set us. The eurythmy instructors made a particularly powerful impression on us. Sometimes we did eurythmy for our parents during school assemblies. These performances were almost invariably solemn, freighted with spiritual significance. In my class’s first public eurythmic performance, coming in about the third or fourth grade, we enacted the creation of the world — the emergence of light, the separation of light from darkness, the separation of dry land from the waters, and so on. We portrayed angels and archangels and the fulfillment of God’s commands. I played the role of God Almighty.

By the time we reached the upper grades, our spiritual conditioning was fairly well advanced and the curriculum became somewhat more conventional. We had a few textbooks now — although sometimes these were simple collections of primary texts: historical documents from US history, for instance, with little editorial commentary. Our teachers told us what to make of the texts. As in the lower grades, history classes were primarily recitations of exciting tales, with legends and myths intermixed, although for the first time some consideration was given to tracing the causes of historical developments. In language classes, dictionaries and grammars became permissible, and we started, tentatively, to write short essays in our own words rather than simply copying out what the teachers presented. [11] In art classes, realism was increasingly permitted, and our dancing now included some ballroom instruction. Math, foreign languages, and a few other subjects became electives: At the fringes of the curriculum, we could choose which courses to take. But the longest, most important classes of each day — called "main lessons" — were still compulsory: All the kids at each grade level took these classes together.

So things changed, a little, as we moved up through the grades, but Waldorf’s essential nature remained. Throughout most of each day, throughout most of the curriculum, the school's spiritualistic vibe persisted. Eurythmy persisted. Misty watercoloring persisted. Norse myths persisted. We sat through lessons on the shortcomings of science and the failings of modern technology. [12] Our math classes were infused with Platonic idealism: The numbers, operators, and geometric figures we worked with were, we learned, rude shadows of their true, perfect counterparts residing in an ideal, supersensory region. [13] In literature classes, we read carefully selected novels having themes consistent with Anthroposophy, [14] interspersed with works of supernatural and even theological content: THE ODYSSEY, THE DIVINE COMEDY, PARADISE LOST [15] — and, naturally, an anthology of myths from around the world, featuring (naturally) Norse myths. [16] Most of the works assigned to us were literary classics, and as such they were perfectly defensible as high school reading matter. Our reading list was, in fact, impressive; most parents would be delighted if their kids were assigned any one of these works, and at Waldorf we read several such. But bear in mind what these works meant to us. From the earliest grades on, we had been fed a steady diet of myths and fabulous supernatural tales. Each new supernatural story built on the others, confirming us more and more in the otherworldly perspective our teachers wanted us to adopt. Gods and giants and fairies and goblins and demons and angels and cyclopses and... They were real to us, or nearly so. They danced attendance on us, and we on them. [17]

In brief, our teachers were astute in choosing class materials that would support Anthroposophy, if only tangentially, without raising parents’ suspicions. The crucial element was the commentary given to us in class by our teachers, most of whom imparted a slow Anthroposophical backspin to just about everything. It is amazing how much can be conveyed in a few choice words by true believers who hold positions of authority. We read no critics, we received no outside views. (Imagine. What if most of the tales and texts presented during your schooling were mystical, spiritualistic, and/or religious? And what if the interpretations of these works given by your teachers conformed to the beliefs of a strange, mystical, spiritualistic cult? Your education would largely amount to indoctrination in that cult's vision of reality. Such was our education.)

Our headmaster — John Fentress Gardner — devised reinterpretations of important works of American literature, endeavoring to bring those works into line with Anthroposophical doctrine. [18] Such slanted versions of American and European intellectual history worked their way into our studies. Intimations of the great beyond were subtly, recurrently present in most of our high school studies — and Christ became increasingly central. Our headmaster guided us in reading spiritualistic essays: Ralph Waldo Emerson’s SELECTED WRITINGS, for instance, and Thomas Carlyle’s ON HEROES AND HERO-WORSHIP. I still have my copies of these books, in which I see that I dutifully underlined passages honoring Christ [19] and praising “Christianism.” [20] Our teachers rarely acknowledged their interest in Christ, explicitly, but His overwhelming significance for them was hard to miss in much of our “nonsectarian” schooling. [21] We were encouraged to read disguised Christian parables by J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis, who were members of a coterie known as the Oxford Christians. [22] Our high school chorus, which included all the kids in the high school, rehearsed and performed holy music, including (during my senior year) Handel’s “Messiah.” The central event of each “nonsectarian” year at our school was the Carol Sing on a December evening. Students, parents, faculty, and alumni filled the candlelit auditorium, which for the evening became a kind of chapel. The Sing was our community bonding experience. It was unmistakably reverent (all the carols were traditional birth-of-Jesus songs — no secular ditties about Santa Clause or reindeer or snowmen), and it always culminated in “Silent Night” — which most of us sang in English but some sang in contrapuntal German. 

Christ was important at Waldorf, but He was Christ as reinvisionejd by Rudolf Steiner. He was not the Son of God worshipped in Christian churches; He was the Sun God, the same god known in other traditions by such names as Ra, Apollo, and Baldr. [23] We were not told this, directly. We had to absorb the "truth" from the misty atmosphere of the school — or wait to absorb it later in life, or in a later incarnation. Anthroposophists are patient. Mankind's future evolution, as foreseen by Steiner, runs for millennia. [24]

◊

The effects of Waldorf’s educational program gradually accumulated in our heads and hearts. After I had been at the school only a few years, the notion of trying to see the world clearly had lost almost all meaning for me. Everything seemed to me symbolic rather than concrete — although what the symbols stood for was vague. Everything had its hidden, mystical deeps. My distrust of facts and phenomena was entirely consistent with Steiner’s teachings: 

“I must emphasize this again and again, that the saying ‘the world is Maya’ is so vitally important.” [25] 

A booklet written by our headmaster, Mr. Gardner [26], throws light on the worldview Waldorf encouraged. Mr. Gardner discusses “the art of education developed in Waldorf Schools.” The booklet includes such statements as the following: 

“Is not the contrast between mountain and sea a cause as well as an image of deep contrasts in the moral experience of mankind? Mountains define, but by the same act they also divide. They teach integrity, but may go further to instill antipathy.” [27] 

The language is more elevated than any that our teachers would have used with us, but the message is very familiar to me: Nothing is simply what it is, it is always something else, something higher, or lower. Moral and spiritual lessons abound; the actual, physical world has value only to the extent that it points us away from itself. Accordingly, we must not conceive that a mountain is merely a towering mass of rock and earth — it is a manifestation, a lesson, an image bearing on our moral experience. Insisting that all phenomena represent (in ways that must be hermetically divined) esoteric precepts, Anthroposophists cause phenomena to recede into a multi-layered, oracular haze. 

Later in the booklet, Mr. Gardner writes this: 

“Understandably, many teachers today [at conventional, secular schools] do not recognize that the world-content [i.e., the sum of the world's phenomena] has something to give, through completely experienced thought, to every power of the human soul. Their training has not led them to appreciate that within each of its facts the apparent world conceals many levels of truth....” [28] 

Properly trained teachers at Waldorf schools don’t make that mistake: They always direct attention away from the “apparent world” to the many concealed “levels of truth” in order to empower the human soul. They have their eyes on what lies beyond — real or otherwise. And that is the key: real or otherwise. Peering deeply, seeing beyond superficial appearances, can be, of course, wise. Indeed, it may be considered the essence of wisdom. But you must see what is really present in the phenomena you study — you must not imagine “hidden truths” that are mere figments of your fancy. Steiner's followers often commit precisely the error of substituting fantasies for facts. They “perceive” occult states and events that do not actually exist. They dream, and they lure students into their unconscious fabrications.

We should pause over one phrase used by Mr. Gardner: “completely experienced thought.” For Steiner and his followers, the truest thinking is not rational cognition or brainwork, which they deem dry and un-heartfelt. An “experienced” thought is felt — it is a thought tempered by imagination — it is more akin to emotion than to cool, rational conceptualizing, and it often leads to complication or mystification rather than to clarity. Ask yourself whether this is the sort of thinking what you want for your children. Nothing in the physical world is real. What we see around us isn’t what it is — it is all illusion. The Anthroposophical solution is to feel one’s way past appearances by opening outwards through imagination or clairvoyance (in Anthroposophy, these terms are often synonymous). According to Steiner: 

“Essentially, people today have no inkling of how people looked out into the universe in ancient times when human beings still possessed an instinctive clairvoyance.... If we want to be fully human, however, we must struggle to regain a view of the cosmos that moves toward Imagination again....” [29]

One implication of the foregoing is that Waldorf schools would find little benefit in explicitly teaching their students Anthroposophical doctrines, even if the students were old enough to comprehend them and even if there were no other incentives for the faculty to keep mum. Memorizing doctrines is brainwork, which does not help us (and possibly may hinder us) in our efforts to become “fully human.” [30] So Waldorf schools generally work to inculcate the doctrines and attitudes of Anthroposophy at an unconscious, emotional level, rather than at the dry, dull intellectual level.

I should stress again that not everyone at our Waldorf school was an occultist. Most of the students, lots of the parents, and even a fair number of the teachers seemed to be regular folks. And there were a few apparent fence-sitters, teachers and parents who seemed to sense something spiritually alluring about Waldorf without fully committing themselves to it. But among the faculty, undeniably, there were also the others, the true believers: individuals who always seemed to be trying to peer through the thin veil separating the physical realm from the spiritual realm (as they might have put it). [31] They were serious individuals, mainly, who sometimes got faraway looks in their eyes — yet they also had a sort of steel in them, a sense of sureness. They possessed holy secrets, keys to cosmic truth.

◊

Sometimes some of the school's secrets were partially revealed. Surprisingly, at least a few of the secrets seemed to involve race. One year in high school, my class was taught biology by our headmaster, Mr. Gardner. I don’t know what credentials he had in biology, if any [32], but because he was headmaster, his authority to do almost anything he wished at the school was virtually unquestioned. He commanded respect — he was tall, dignified, articulate — a dominant male whose word was not to be doubted. Still, I remember being troubled by a lecture he delivered one morning. Mr. Gardner laid out for us the overarching structure of the family of man. He explained that the various races stand at different levels of moral development — each is forging its own destiny. He said these things sympathetically, with no hint of condescension. Yet the vibe was in the room that morning: The terms he used were more metaphysical than biological. The Oriental races, he said, are ancient, wise, but vitiated. The African races are youthful, unformed, childlike, he said. Located near the center of humanity’s family are the currently most advanced races, the whites, he said. (To my shame, I must admit that I was sufficiently struck by these notions to write a paper essentially parroting them. I got a good grade, of course.) [33]

I also remember a lesson our class received from another of our teachers, Hertha Karl, who taught both German and “earth science.” Her background is, to me, a closed book — but of all the Waldorf faculty, she made the least effort to disguise a strong devotion to Steiner. She drew figures-of-eight on the blackboard and lectured us about “lemniscates”: the mystic interaction of the “telluric” and “etheric” forces, which is the basic structure of nature, she said. During one day's main lesson, she veered off topic to warn us never to receive blood transfusions from members of other races (all of us were white). Blacks and Orientals have blood types that are physically different from ours, she taught us: Receiving such inferior blood would harm us. As with Mr. Gardner's lecture, the moral once again was that racial identity has great significance.

There is no way for me to prove that Mr. Gardner and Mrs. Karl made the remarks I have attributed to them. All I can do is offer my solemn oath that I have carried clear, consistent memories of those remarks throughout my life. (Some of my own classmates have told me that their recollections confirm mine.) If my memory has grown dim or betrayed me in any particulars, nonetheless I am confident that my account of these two lessons is, in all essentials, accurate. Years after leaving Waldorf, I learned that the things Mr. Gardner and Mrs. Karl said are largely consistent with Steiner’s doctrines. If I had known this at the time, perhaps my teachers’ remarks would not have startled me enough to burn such lasting impressions.

Because the students in my class were white, Mr. Gardner and Mrs. Karl — also white — presumably felt free to speak to us about race in invidious terms. Today, Waldorf schools seem to be fairly well integrated, and I trust the faculties are free of racial bigotry. But I wonder how those faculties reconcile racial integration with the racism that infects Anthroposophy. I hope teachers as Waldorf schools no longer engage in open discussions of superior/inferior races, and I doubt that the word “Aryan” (which Steiner used often) is spoken aloud much now. The task of downplaying Steiner's racism is made easier, in English-speaking countries, because some translations of Steiner’s books from the original German omit certain “difficult” passages. Anthroposophists outside Germany who rely on expurgated texts may understand Steiner’s basic teachings about race, but they are shielded from Steiner’s most bigoted assertions. 

One of Steiner’s basic racial tenets is that the division of mankind into races was a crime committed by two disruptive spirits. The arch-demons Lucifer and Ahriman interfered with the harmonious evolution of humanity by causing older forms of mankind to survive even while other segments of humanity evolved to higher levels:

“Lucifer and Ahriman...fought against this harmonious tendency of development in the evolution of humanity, and they managed to change the whole process so that various developments were shifted and displaced. While there should have been basically only one form of human being...Lucifer and Ahriman preserved [earlier human types]...even into the time after the Atlantean flood. Thus, forms that should have disappeared remained. Instead of racial diversities developing consecutively, older racial forms remained unchanged and newer ones began to evolve at the same time. Instead of the intended consecutive development of races, there was a coexistence of races. That is how it came about that physically different races inhabited the earth and are still there in our time although evolution should really have proceeded [unimpeded].” [34]

Set aside the question of Atlantis (“the Atlantean flood”) for the moment. Note that the older racial forms preserved by Lucifer and Ahriman would necessarily be less evolved and hence inferior to newer forms. Anthroposophists often argue that Steiner was not a racist. Yet making distinctions between races, and placing whites at the top of a racial hierarchy, are recurrent themes in his work. In Steiner’s view, the simultaneous existence of multiple races is, in itself, wrong. Correcting this “error” means removing inferior racial strains. 

“A race or nation stands so much the higher, the more perfectly its members express the pure, ideal human type ... The evolution of man through the incarnations in ever higher national and racial forms is thus a process of liberation [leading to] an ideal future.” [35] 

Attaining a “pure, ideal human type” may or may not be desirable goal. Racism would end if we all became alike, which Steiner said will happen when human evolution reaches new, higher plateaus. A natural form of eugenics will produce "ever higher national and racial forms," while lowly and wicked forms fade into the past. Anthroposophists celebrate this vision, since all individuals in all races are believed to have the option of bettering themselves and evolving upward. But Steiner's doctrines nonetheless run contrary to the more enlightened ideals of diversity, multiculturalism, and mutual respect among races. The belief that some races are higher than others is, in and of itself, racist. If we really want to end racism, we must accept all races as equal here and now. Anthroposophy does not do this.

In closing this section, I’d like to return to — and expand — a point I made a moment ago. I cannot swear that all of my memories are accurate, of course. But the research I have undertaken in recent years indicates that the description I’ve offered of my schooling is in line with Rudolf Steiner’s stated objectives for Waldorf education. In reading Steiner today, I find that almost everything he says rings a muffled bell of familiarity in my memory. I take this as at least indirect confirmation that what I have written about my school years is essentially accurate. Still, I urge you to evaluate my statements by comparing them with (a) Steiner’s own statements, and (b) statements made by Anthroposophists today, and (c) conditions you discover, through your own research, in Waldorf schools operating today. [36] I believe you will conclude that I am giving you a reliable and accurate exposition of Waldorf education. 

— Roger Rawlings

To reach the next section of “Unenlightened”,

please use the following link:

"Waldorf's Impact".

Waldorfish art.

[R.R.]

THAT SPECIAL FLUID

I described, above, how one of the teachers at my Waldorf school warned white students against receiving blood transfusions from nonwhites. Her warning was consistent with Steiner's teachings. 

◊ “[T]his question of race is one that we can never understand until we understand the mysteries of the blood and of the results accruing from the mingling of the blood of different races." — Rudolf Steiner, THE OCCULT SIGNIFICANCE OF BLOOD (Health Research Books, 1972), p. 13. 

◊ Steiner asked "How can a negro [sic] or an utterly barbaric savage become civilized?" — Ibid., p. 13. 

◊ Steiner said the answer depends on blood and whether a race "be on the up- or down-grade of its evolution...." — Ibid., p. 13. 

Steiner taught that whites are evolving upwardly while other races, having risen as high as they can, are degenerating. 

"The white race is the future, the race that is creating spirit." — Rudolf Steiner, VOM LEBEN DES MENSCHEN UND DER ERDE - ÜBER DAS WESEN DES CHRISTENTUMS  (Verlag Der Rudolf Steiner-Nachlassverwaltung, 1961), p. 62.

According to Steiner, whites can advance to higher spiritual levels because they are capable of high clairvoyant abilities. But mingling whites' blood with blood from other races would cut off this capacity. 

"The physical organism of man survives when strange blood comes in contact with strange blood, but clairvoyant power perishes under the influence of this mixing of blood, or exogamy." — Rudolf Steiner, THE OCCULT SIGNIFICANCE OF BLOOD, p. 42. 

Exogamy is sexual pairing outside one's own ethnic group, tribe, or race. It is equivalent to miscegenation, one of the prime bugaboos of racists.

In sum, Steiner taught that different races have different kinds of blood, which is reflected in the differences in their racial or folk souls. 

"[T]he blood of mankind is acted upon in a twofold manner; that two races originate, by the blood of mankind being acted upon; on the one side we have that which we call the Mongolian race, on the other that which we may describe as belonging to the Semitic race. That is a great polarity in humanity, and we shall have to trace much that is of immense importance back to this polarity, if we wish to understand the depths of the Folk-souls." — Rudolf Steiner, THE MISSION OF THE FOLK SOULS (Rudolf Steiner Publishing Co., 1929), lecture 6, GA 121.

Folk souls (also called national or racial souls) are the oversouls possessed by all members of a people, nation, or race. These souls are, in effect, spirits or gods. According to Steiner, different peoples have different souls and different gods. The difference between peoples is profound.

"You know that what is called Folk-soul, Race-soul, has become a somewhat abstract idea today ... To the occultist this is not so at all. What one calls the Folk-soul [or Race-Soul] is to him an absolutely independent entity [i.e., a spirit, a god, living on the astral plane] ... It is the destiny of our age to deny the existence of such beings as possess an actual life on the astral plane, and are not perceptible here on the physical plane. And we are at the very height of this materialistic evolution which prefers to deny such beings as Folk-souls and Race-souls.” — Rudolf Steiner, THEOSOPHY OF THE ROSICRUCIAN (Rudolf Steiner Press, 1966), chapter 11, GA 99.

The differences between the oversouls of various peoples has a profound effect on the meaning of life for individual human beings.

"The person belongs to a family, a nation, a race; his activity in this world depends upon his belonging to some such community ... Indeed, in a certain sense, the separate individuals are merely the executive organs of these family Group Souls, racial Spirits and so on ... In the truest sense, every individual receives his allotted task from his family, national or racial Group Soul." — Rudolf Steiner, KNOWLEDGE OF THE HIGHER WORLDS AND ITS ATTAINMENT (Anthroposophic Press, 1944), pp. 141-142.

Above is one of our eurythmy instructors.

Below is a scene from a high-school eurythmy class.

To preserve the privacy of my old schoolmates, I have

concealed their faces. 

Both images are from our 

school yearbook, THE PINNACLE.

(Color added.)

Here am I (on the right) with Mr. Gardner in about 1960.

We are posing for a photo representing instruction in biology.

(Other students were in the shot, but I have cropped them out.

I would crop out my jacket, too, if I could — 

I don't remember owning such a garment, but I guess I did.)

During an actual class, Mr. Gardner would have been standing

more or less where this photo shows him, at the front of the room,

but my classmates and I would have been seated at small desks

arranged in rows, facing Mr. Gardner (and with our backs to the camera).

I have reproduced the photo from THE WALDORF MAGAZINE,

a publication of The Waldorf School of Garden City, 2022, p. 24.

Ahriman as depicted in a bust

attributed to Rudolf Steiner.

See "Ahriman".

[R.R. sketch.]

For more on Steiner's racist remarks and racism in Waldorf schools, please go to:

"Atlantis and the Aryans"

"Negro"

"Races"

"RS on Jews"

"Steiner's Bile"

"Steiner's Racism"

For a report of racism discovered in Waldorf schools recently, in the USA, please use this link:

http://www.waldorfcritics.org/active/articles/Racism_McDermott.html

Rudolf Steiner.

[Portrait by R.R.]

Endnotes

[1] Rudolf Steiner, RUDOLF STEINER IN THE WALDORF SCHOOL (Anthroposophic Press, 1996), p. 156.

[2] Rudolf Steiner, FACULTY MEETINGS WITH RUDOLF STEINER (Anthroposophic Press, 1998), p. 495.

[3] Rudolf Steiner, EDUCATION FOR ADOLESCENTS (Anthroposophic Press, 1996), p. 60.

[4] FACULTY MEETINGS WITH RUDOLF STEINER, p. 118.

[5] In sensitizing a child to the supernatural, Waldorf teachers are at least partially trying to preserve what Anthroposophists say is the young child’s innate connection to the spirit realm. I quoted a portion of the following passage earlier; here is a more extensive excerpt:

“Childhood is commonly regarded as a time of steadily expanding consciousness.... Yet in Steiner’s view, the very opposite is the case: childhood is a time of contracting consciousness.... [The child] loses his dream-like perception of the creative world of spiritual powers which is hidden behind the phenomena of the senses. This is...the world of creative archetypes and spiritual hierarchies.

"In mastering the world of physical perception the child encounters difficulties in that he first has to overcome a dream-like yet intensely real awareness of spiritual worlds. This awareness fades quickly in early childhood, but fragments of it live on in the child for a much longer time than most people imagine.

"In a Waldorf school, therefore, one of the tasks of the teachers is to keep the children young.” — A. C. Harwood, PORTRAIT OF A WALDORF SCHOOL (Myrin Institute, 1956), pp. 15-16.

Think about the implications of keeping children young as opposed to helping them to mature. (One word that applies to keeping kids young is "infantilizing." Critics often accuse Waldorf schools of infantilizing students, even the older ones.)

[6] See "Prayers". 

[7] Concerning the significance of myths, Steiner said this, for example: 

“I have demonstrated to you the connection between a myth such as the Baldur myth and great all-encompassing manifestations of human evolution.

"Our scientific simpletons who conduct research into myths and legends can go no further than to maintain that they are an expression of creative folk imagination. In reality, however, they encompass deeply significant truths which are revealed particularly through the fact that they are truly worked out down to the last detail.” — Rudolf Steiner, THE KARMA OF UNTRUTHFULNESS, Vol. 1 (Rudolf Steiner Press, 2005), p. 276.

Note that Steiner extends his assertion beyond myths to legends (he said much the same about fairy tales, as well). Note also his explicit opposition to the findings of science and the insults he often heaped on scientists ("simpletons"). Another example, again asserting the truth of myths: 

“We must not look merely for astronomical facts in such a myth as the myth of Osiris, but we must see in it the result of the deep clairvoyant insight of the wise priests of ancient Egypt. They embodied in this myth what they knew concerning the evolution of earth and man. [paragraph break] Actual facts concerning the higher Spiritual Worlds lie at the foundation of all myths....” — Rudolf Steiner, UNIVERSE EARTH AND MAN IN THEIR RELATIONSHIP TO EGYPTIAN MYTHS AND MODERN CIVILIZATION (Kessinger Publishing, 2003), p. 94. 

Steiner here extends his claims to “all myths.” His endorsement of clairvoyance is also noteworthy.

A widely published Anthroposophist gives this sequence for the teaching of myths, legends, fairy tales, etc., in Waldorf schools: Kindergarten and first grade, fairy tales; second grade, legends; fourth and fifth grades, Norse and Greek myths; thereafter, Indian, Persian, and Egyptian myths. — Roy Wilkinson, THE SPIRITUAL BASIS OF STEINER EDUCATION (Rudolf Steiner Press, 1996), p. 87. Old Testament stories are told in third grade — Ibid., p. 62. Wilkinson prescribes much the same order in TEACHING ENGLISH (Rudolf Steiner College Press, 1976, reprinted 1997) — see my essay “Oh My Word”. Essentially the same order is prescribed by another Anthroposophist, with some interesting additional notes: first grade, fairy tales — “History is not a separate subject”; second grade, legends and stories about saints — “History is not a separate subject”; third grade, Old Testament stories — “History is not a separate subject”; fourth grade, Norse myths — history is finally established as a subject separate from fairy tales, legends, and myths; fifth grade, ancient history, including the myths of India, Persia, Egypt, Babylonia, and Greece — history and myths seem to overlap again here. — Eugene Schwartz, WALDORF EDUCATION (Xlibris Corporation, 2000), pp. 75-76. Think of the confusion that can arise in young minds when factual history is blurred with fabulous tales — or, to put this more strongly, when fantasies are presented as fact.

[8] See "Sneaking It In" and "Dorm Dad".

[9] At our Waldorf school, we often employed wet-on-wet watercoloring (wet brushes spreading watery paint over wet paper), a technique that effectively prevents a young child from creating recognizable images of the real world. Instead, as elementary school students, my classmates and I produced colorful but blurred pictures that corresponded nicely to Steiner’s description of the spirit realm: rich in color but devoid of clean lines and clear-cut forms. (We inhabit the spirit realm during the intervals between our earthly lives, according to Steiner’s doctrine of reincarnation.) 

“You see, when the soul arrives on earth in order to enter its body, it has come down from spirit-soul worlds in which there are no spatial forms. Thus the soul knows spatial forms only after its bodily experience, only while the aftereffects of space still linger on.

“But though the world from which the soul descends has no spatial forms or lines, it does have color intensities, color qualities. Which is to say that the world man inhabits between death and a new birth (and which I have frequently and recently described) is a soul-permeated, spirit-permeated world of light, of color, of tone; a world of qualities not quantities; a world of intensities rather than extensions.” — Rudolf Steiner, THE ARTS AND THEIR MISSION (Anthroposophic Press, 1964), p. 23.

Steiner said the various art forms have metaphysical effects — which is a major reason that students at Waldorfs paint and sculpt and make music, and so forth, as much as they do. Thus, the paints we used in our watercoloring were, from an Anthroposophical perspective, magical: Their hues provided entree into the spirit realm. If we would but open our souls — as through painting or music — we could begin to participate in an interchange between the physical and spiritual worlds:

“We have seen that colours and musical notes are windows through which we can ascend spiritually into the spiritual world, but life also brings us windows through which the spiritual enters our physical world.... If we fail to perceive the fact that spirit descends to us through such windows, it is like someone who cannot read opening a beautiful book. He has the same thing in front of him as someone who can read, but if he cannot read he sees unintelligible scribbles.... A person who cannot read world phenomena is like a cosmic illiterate where these phenomena are concerned.... In the time of ancient clairvoyance human beings were far less illiterate in the spirit.” — Rudolf Steiner, ART AS SEEN IN THE LIGHT OF MYSTERY WISDOM (Rudolf Steiner Press, 1996), pp. 111-112.

See "Magical Arts".

[10] Of all the art forms, eurythmy has particularly great significance in Steiner’s system (see, e.g., ART AS SEEN IN THE LIGHT OF MYSTERY WISDOM, p. 41 and p. 50). One result is that Steiner’s statements concerning eurythmy are particularly arcane. To offer a quick rundown: Eurythmy enables the physical body to make direct connection with the spiritual realm. Our physical bodies are, in a sense, merely tools that enable us to do eurythmy. Eurythmy gives us access to aspects of our previous lives, and it creates — in our limbs — effects that will carry over into our next lives. (If the following quotation remains difficult to decipher, focus on the final sentence.)

“In a certain sense, we take from earthly life only the physical medium, the actual human being who is the tool or instrument for eurythmy. But we allow this human being to make manifest what we study inwardly, what is already prepared in us as a result of previous lives; we transfer this to our limbs, which are the part of us where life after death is being shaped in advance. Eurythmy shapes and moves the human organism in a way that furnishes direct external proof of our participation in the supersensible world. In having people do eurythmy, we link them directly to the supersensible world.” — Rudolf Steiner, ART AS SPIRITUAL ACTIVITY (Anthroposophic Press, 1998), p. 247.

See "Eurthymy".

[11] For more on literature and history instruction at Waldorf schools, see "Oh My Word". For more on copying — the "curse" of Waldorf education — see "His Education".

[12] For more on science instruction at Waldorf schools, see “Steiner’s Science", “Lesson Books”, and “Neutered Nature”.

[13] Platonism centers on the proposition that abstractions such as numbers and geometric forms have an objective existence apart from, and superior to, their reflections in the real world. Steiner credited geometry with fostering his knowledge of the spirit realm: 

“In my relation with geometry I must now perceive the first budding forth of a conception which has since gradually evolved in me ... [T]he reality of the spiritual world was to me as certain as that of the physical.” — Rudolf Steiner, THE STORY OF MY LIFE (Anthroposophical Publishing Company, 1928), p. 11. 

Steiner credited Plato with living on the ideal or spiritual plane. 

“The mood in which I came to Weimar was tinged by previous thorough-going work in Platonism ... How did Plato live in the ideal world, and how did Goethe?” — Ibid., p. 142.

For information about the mathematics curriculum in Waldorf schools, see "Mystic Math".

[14] I shouldn’t pass too quickly over the ordinary novels we were assigned — they help illustrate how our teachers were able to inculcate Anthroposophical values in us without explicitly discussing Steiner or his doctrines. For example, we studied Willa Cather’s MY ANTONIA, which deals with Manifest Destiny as enacted by a pair of Christian families: The forces of destiny want white people like them to take possession of the North American continent, and religious faith helps the families to overcome their difficulties.

We also studied CRIME AND PUNISHMENT, the story of a remorseless, apparently irredeemable murderer. The novel can be taken as depicting the soullessness of modern life and the need for spiritual redemption. Anthroposophists would embrace such themes, as they would the ending of the novel: The murderer clutches a New Testament while the author projects for him “a new story, the story of the gradual rebirth of a man, the story of his gradual regeneration, of his gradual passing from one world to another....” — Fyodor Dostoyevsky, CRIME AND PUNISHMENT (Penguin Books, 1951), p. 559.

I do not mean, of course, that Cather and Dostoyevsky were Anthroposophists — those authors would have been shocked by such a suggestion. But our teachers selected reading matter that was — or could be made to seem — congruous with Anthroposophical positions. [For more on this, see "Oh My Word".]

[15] Our teachers may have selected these three classics for distinctly Anthroposophical reasons. Steiner's followers find hidden, esoteric meaning in all three of these works. In some cases, they find confirmations of their beliefs in the texts; in other cases, they find cautionary examples of modern errors that need to be corrected. In any case, Steiner lectured on all three of these classics, and his words reverberate in the way Anthroposophists (including many Waldorf teachers) approach these texts. Thus, among Anthroposophists, THE ODYSSEY is generally seen as an account of occult initiation. Likewise, Anthroposophists tend to take THE DIVINE COMEDY as reflecting profound visions of the spirit realm as expressed by an occult initiate. As for PARADISE LOST, Steiner said — among other things — that Milton's poem recounts "a battle between Lucifer and Ahriman; only, Ahriman is endowed with Luciferic attributes, and the realm of Lucifer is endowed with divine attributes." From an Anthroposophical perspective, studying PARADISE LOST should enable us to understand the spirit realm properly, correcting the false dualism of modern thought. [For more, see "Three (Occult) Classics".]

[16] To delve into Norse myths and their place in the Waldorf curriculum, see "The Gods".

[17] I will not presume to speak for my old classmates and friends. I know that some of them were powerfully affected by the Anthroposophical messages woven through our schooling; and I know that some were far less affected. The susceptibility of our souls (to put this as an Anthroposophist might) varied. I turned out to be highly susceptible, although a flicker of saving rationality blinked, intermittently, within me. [See "My Sad, Sad Story".]

[18] E.g., John Fentress Gardner, “MELVILLE’S VISION OF AMERICA: A New Interpretation of Moby Dick (The Myrin Institute, 1977). This booklet appeared several years after my class graduated from Waldorf, but it is representative of Mr. Gardner’s work. Mr. Gardner considered MOBY DICK a precursor to Rudolf Steiner’s teachings. His analysis of the novel ties into such Anthroposophical tenets and subjects as reincarnation (p. 31), Ahriman (p. 30), opposition to intellect (p. 40), affirmation of imagination (p. 24), affirmation of Goethean science (p. 27), the rulership of the archangel Michael (p. 41), and so forth. In many instances, his interpretations are implausible stretches — Mr. Gardner’s interpretation has found very little acceptance among Melville scholars.

The essence of the booklet later reappeared in Mr. Gardner’s book, AMERICAN HERALDS OF THE SPIRIT (see the next endnote), in which Mr. Gardner quietly acknowledges his admiration of Rudolf Steiner — a reference tucked into an appendix. For discussions of Steiner’s teachings on reincarnation, Ahriman, etc., see relevant entries in The Brief Waldorf / Steiner Encyclopedia.

The Myrin Institute was devoted to spiritualism, in particular Anthroposophy. On p. 3 of MELVILLE’S VISION, the Institute describes itself as believing “that a genuine reconciliation of the modern scientific attitude with a spiritual world-concept is the most essential need of modern man.” Rudolf Steiner’s claimed that Anthroposophy fills precisely that need, although Steiner’s work was in fact profoundly antiscientific. [See “Steiner’s 'Science'”.]

[19] 

“[In] the thick darkness, there are not wanting gleams of better light...miracles in the earliest antiquity...the history of Jesus Christ...prayer....” — Ralph Waldo Emerson, THE SELECTED WRITINGS OF RALPH WALDO EMERSON (Random House, 1940), p. 40.

Emerson was a leader of the American Transcendentalists, a loosely allied group whose religious quest sought truth through subjective insight rather than through experience and rationalism. Emerson affirmed man’s ability to transcend the world described by science and thus to attain a direct personal revelation of God.

Mr. Gardner contended that Emerson and certain other American writers of that period were spiritual antecedents of Rudolf Steiner. After resigning due to the scandal reported in the NEW YORK TIMES, Mr. Gardner wrote AMERICAN HERALDS OF THE SPIRIT (Lindisfarne Press, 1991), about the Emerson, Walt Whitman, and Herman Melville. The third appendix deals with “Rudolf Steiner’s extensive and immensely fruitful research.” Mr. Gardner’s thesis is that Emerson et al. anticipated — in somewhat vague form — spiritual doctrines that Steiner would sharpen and perfect, “lending them the clarity of something fully experienced....” (p. 298). Theosophists have similarly claimed Emerson as a predecessor to Helena Blavatsky, a founder of their faith. [See THEOSOPHY, Vol. 24, No. 1, 1935.] Emerson drew on some of the same sources mined by Steiner and Blavatsky, but the actual parallels between his work and theirs go little beyond affirmation of human transcendent potential and a conception of the divine influenced by Eastern religions, especially Hinduism.

To understand what Mr. Gardner meant by Steiner’s “research,” it is important to realize that Steiner conducted precious little research in any ordinary sense. Steiner denied that his doctrines derived from his reading, and he was not an experimenter in any of the true sciences or conventional scholarly fields: physics, chemistry, biology, history, and the like. Steiner’s “research” consisted of references to mystic and occult texts, and — especially — his purported use of clairvoyance to ascertain spiritual "realities.” Mr. Gardner cites, as a reflection of Steiner's research, Steiner's occultist book, STAGES OF HIGHER KNOWLEDGE, first published in 1905. 

[20] 

“Paganism emblemed chiefly the Operations of Nature ... Christianism emblemed the Law of Human Duty ... What a progress is here....” — Thomas Carlyle, ON HEROES AND HERO-WORSHIP {published in the same volume as Ralph Waldo Emerson, REPRESENTATIVE MEN} (Doubleday & Company, undated), p. 99. Carlyle was known for his idiosyncratic language. “Christianism” is Christianity viewed from a somewhat oblique angle. “Emblemed” means “was emblematic of” or "represented."

Carlyle’s book originally appeared in 1841. Influenced by German Transcendentalists, Carlyle in turn influenced Emerson. One significant difference between the two men, however, is that Carlyle was mordant and angry, whereas Emerson espoused idealistic hope. The hallmark of Carlyle’s spirituality was hatred of the Devil, not adoration of God.

Carlyle wrote that all contemporary forms of religion are outworn — that a new religious system is needed. For Waldorfers, it would be a short step to believe that the need Carlyle so presciently identified was filled by Rudolf Steiner’s Anthroposophy. (A central theme in Steiner's four "mystery plays" is the need for a new spiritual vision. [See "Plays".]) 

[21] Late in his life, Mr. Gardner wrote the booklet TWO PATHS TO THE SPIRIT: Charismatic Christianity and Anthroposophy (Golden Stone Press, 1990). On p. 8, he says 

“Both paths [i.e., charismatic Christianity and Anthroposophy] acknowledge Christ Jesus as the ultimate Shepherd of human souls, finding in His life the archetype of all human experience, and seeing in His Baptism, Crucifixion, and Resurrection the pivotal events of human history.” 

I cannot know how much Mr. Gardner’s beliefs may have changed since he ran the Waldorf School decades earlier. In the booklet, he writes that his interest in charismatic Christianity is newfound (pp. 1-2), but he maintains his advocacy of Anthroposophy — and he attributes the same Christian core to both “paths.” More importantly, the words I have just quoted and the sanctioned activities at Waldorf under Mr. Gardner are consistent with Rudolf Steiner’s heretical but insistent reverence for Christ: 

“What, then, is this mysterious impulse making its victorious way through the world?  ... It is the Christ himself. He goes from heart to heart, from soul to soul, living and working in the world regardless of whether he is understood as evolution progresses through the centuries.” — Rudolf Steiner, THE FIFTH GOSPEL: From the Akashic Record (Rudolf Steiner Press), pp. 11-12. 

Notice the reference to evolution. Steiner embraced an evolutionary theory that is at odds both with science and with the Bible. At our school, Christ was always emphasized, if only in passing. Apparently the school today remains devoted to Christ — perhaps more forthrightly so. In 2007, the school’s institutional Christmas card bore the inscription: 

“In deepest Winter Night

Is born the World’s Future Light." 

It is important to note, however, that the Anthroposophical conception of Christ is gnostic and, from the perspective of mainstream Christian denominations, heretical. [For more about Steiner’s views on Christ, see “Was He Christian?”, "Sun God", and "Prototype".]

[22] See R. J. Reilly, ROMANTIC RELIGION (Lindisfarne Press, 2006). Lewis’s Christianity lies near the surface of his fiction; Tolkien’s is more hidden. For analyses of the Christian message in Tolkien’s books, see Ralph C. Woods, THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO TOLKIEN (Westminster John Knox Press, 2003) and Kurt D. Bruner & Jim Ware, FINDING GOD IN THE LORD OF THE RINGS (SaltRiver, 2001). Tolkien’s enthralling Christian mythology, which does not immediately appear to be Christian, would have obvious appeal to a "Christian" school that wanted to appear nonsectarian. I remember Tolkien’s books being sold in our school lobby at Christmastime. (That’s where I got my copies — after which I reread THE LORD OF THE RINGS once a year until I graduated.)

Tolkien’s trilogy is better known, but Lewis’s “space trilogy” has perhaps been more influential. OUT OF THE SILENT PLANET, PERELANDRA, and THAT HIDEOUS STRENGTH are, in effect, anti-science fiction. In the first two volumes, the protagonist travels to Mars and Venus; in the final volume, he concludes his adventures back on Earth (with the help of Merlin, whom he summons from suspended animation). The cosmology of the novels is a reworking of the ancient great chain of being. [See ENCYCLOPÆDIA BRITANNICA, “Great Chain of Being.”] Lewis locates various gods on the planets, where they preside in the service of God and his Son, called “Maleldil” in the trilogy. The following comes from the chapter “Descent of the Gods.” To set the scene: The “gods," who go by the names of the planets they rule, are visiting Earth to help in the battle against demonic powers. 

“Saturn...stood in the Blue Room. His spirit lay upon the house, or even the whole Earth, with a cold pressure such as might flatten the very orb of Tellus [i.e., Earth] to a wafer ... Suddenly a greater spirit came — one whose influence tempered and almost transformed to his own quality the skill of leaping Mercury, the clearness of Mars, the subtler vibration of Venus, and even the numbing weight of Saturn ... [H]is mighty beam turned the Blue Room into a blaze of lights ... For it was great Glund-Oyarsa, King of Kings...known to men in old times as Jove and under that name...confused with his Maker — so little did [man] dream by how may degrees the stair even of created being rises above him.” — C. S. Lewis, THAT HIDEOUS STRENGTH (Scribner, 2003), pp. 323-324. 

Jove, or Jupiter, is the highest god in Roman mythology. The Hebrew God — Lewis’s “Maker” — is Jehovah, or Jahve, or Yahweh, or Elohim. Lewis suggests that Jove and Jahve have been confused by some.

Steiner’s vision is, in various ways, similar to Lewis’s. 

◊ Both men locate “gods” on or in celestial spheres: planets, moons, and stars. Thus, Steiner places Jahve (Jehovah) on the Moon: “[The] further evolution of man has only been possible because one of the Elohim, Jahve, accompanied the separation of the Moon [from the Earth] — while the other six spirits remained in the Sun — and because Jahve cooperated with His six colleagues....” — Rudolf Seiner, THE MISSION OF THE FOLK SOULS (Rudolf Steiner Press, 2005), p. 99. For “Elohim,” see the ENCYCLOPÆDIA BRITANNICA, “Elohim” — it was a Canaanite plural noun that the Hebrews adapted as a single noun, a name for God. 

◊ Just as Lewis distinguishes between Jove and God, Steiner finds a difference between Jehovah and God or the Godhead. [See "God".] Note that, in the passage I’ve quoted, Jahve is only one of the “Elohim” and he must cooperate with his “colleagues” to achieve his benevolent purposes.

◊ Both Steiner and Lewis posit variants of the great chain of being, which begins some distance below mankind and stretches far, far above. According to Steiner, entities superior to humanity include Zeitgeists, Spirits of Form, Exusiai, Dynamis, Kyriotetes, and others; attendant nature-spirits include undines, sylphs, and fire spirits. “Abnormal” spirits are associated with planets and cause mankind’s five “root races” (Negro, Malayan, Mongolian, Caucasian, and Red Indian). [See THE MISSION OF THE FOLK SOULS, pp. 15-16, 65, 83-85.]   

◊ Both Steiner and Lewis tell of interplanetary journeys, Lewis in fiction, Steiner in “truth.” Indeed, Steiner recounts human migration to various planets: “[D]uring the Lemurian epoch of earth-evolution [i.e., long ago]...the majority of souls withdrew from the earth to other planets, continuing their life on Mars, Saturn, Venus, Jupiter, and so forth.” — Rudolf Steiner, OCCULT HISTORY (Rudolf Steiner Press, 1982), p. 36.

Lewis was an orthodox Christian who used fiction to express his beliefs in fanciful terms. Steiner often strayed far from Biblical teachings, asserting that his heterodox doctrines describe reality.

[23] See "Sun God" and "Was He Christian?". For more on Waldorf Christmases, see "Christmas".

[24] See "Future Stages".

[25] THE MISSION OF THE FOLK SOULS, p. 64.

[26] John Fentress Gardner, THE EXPERIENCE OF KNOWLEDGE (New York: The Myrin Institute Inc., 1962).

[27] Ibid., p. 19

[28] Ibid., p. 26 

Mr. Gardner later expanded this booklet, adding chapters. The latest edition of the resulting book is still available — under a different title — from its publisher: EDUCATION IN SEARCH OF THE SPIRIT (Anthroposophic Press, 1996).

[29] ART AS SPIRITUAL ACTIVITY, p. 256.

Imagination is far from being a reliable faculty. It can easily lapse into hallucination and insanity. See, e.g. James Phillips and James Morely, IMAGINATION AND ITS PATHOLOGIES (MIT Press, 2003). I am inclined to consider Steiner a charlatan, deceitful but rational. It is possible, however, that he was mentally unbalanced. If he actually had the astonishing “clairvoyant” visions he claimed, he almost certainly was hallucinating.

Hallucinations have at least five salient, overlapping characteristics. 

1) “[W]e should call hallucinating a paranormal activity” because the process does not make use of our five normal senses. 

2) “[A] hallucination must display sufficient vividness to allow it to enter into competition with our ongoing perceptual activity” — the vision is so strong that we give it at least equal weight with the reports of our senses. 

3) “Still another basic characteristic of hallucinations is that their contents are experienced as ‘out there’” — a hallucinator considers the vision to be outside the self, s/he does not recognize it as a subjective condition. 

4) A hallucination is usually “beyond our conscious control” — we’re not aware of creating or fabricating it. 

5) A hallucination causes “belief in the empirical reality of its content” — the vision is felt to be true, the objects “perceived” are experienced as fully real. — IMAGINATION AND ITS PATHOLOGIES, pp. 73-77. 

Steiner’s purported “clairvoyant” visions seem to fit most of these criteria. This does not prove that Steiner was hallucinating — as I’ve said, I doubt he did — but it is suggestive. The more important question, however, is whether Waldorf education, emphasizing nonrational “thought,” may lead children into dangerous territory where the distinction between the real and the unreal is lost.

[30] Anthroposophists claim that intellect is not neglected at Waldorf schools, it is simply nurtured in a different way. 

“In spite of — or rather, because of — the attention paid to the realms of feeling and will, thinking receives a stronger development in a Waldorf school than elsewhere.” — A. C. Harwood, PORTRAIT OF A WALDORF SCHOOL, p. 24. 

This brings us back to a decisive concern about Waldorf education: the kind of “thinking” that is taught.

According to Steiner, children pass through three stages of development, which he said recapitulate stages of human evolution. [See. e.g., Earl J. Ogletree, “Rudolf Steiner: Unknown Educator,” THE ELEMENTARY SCHOOL JOURNAL, Vol. 74, No. 6. (Mar., 1974), p. 347.] The stages are described this way by A.C. Harwood:

“During the first seven years a child approaches his environment through the activity of his will. What he sees he must manipulate.” — PORTRAIT OF A WALDORF SCHOOL, p. 17. 

During the second seven years, “the inward life of feeling” is paramount." — Ibid., p. 18. 

The third seven-year period finally produces the dawning of “intellectual thought.” — Ibid., p. 24.

The claim that Waldorfs foster the intellect is, at best, moot. Waldorf-style “intellectual thought” is intended to be moderated by the faculties of intuition and/or imagination and/or clairvoyance. Taught that logic (i.e., methodical reasoning) is insufficient, the Waldorf student is directed toward “spiritual experience” that is notionally “self-evident” (i.e., no proof required). It is questionable whether this is genuine thinking at all or merely a form of wishfulness: 

“To what extent will [a child’s] thinking become purely logical and colorless, unenriched by imagination, uninformed by experience?  ... More than ever, therefore, should the attempt be made with our adolescents to preserve from the earlier stage of childhood those capacities which are natural to it, and to unite them with the new gift of intellectual thought. For this means to transform thought from what it is at present — the capacity for abstract hypothesis — into the capacity for self-evident spiritual experience.” — Ibid., pp. 23-24.

Ask yourself whether an education aiming at such a form of “thought” is likely to equip individuals for life in the real world. In brief: Should we teach our children to live rationally in the real world or should we teach them to have unsubstantiated intuitions of unseen worlds?

Here is a quick summary of relevant Steiner doctrines: Humans used to possess greater clairvoyant powers than is common now [a]. In order to evolve properly, humanity has to pass through a phase of materialism and material-brain thinking (while striving, of course, to avoid the snares of these) [b]. Blonds have the best brains [c]. Thinking is the Aryans’ special field of endeavor [d]. Germans (Aryan) are enabled by their mythology to understand human evolution particularly well [e], and Germans’ mission now entails comprehending the world from many angles [f]. Austrian-German Rudolf Steiner took upon himself what may be considered an extension and fulfillment of the German national/racial mission, to create in Anthroposophy a system that organizes spiritual wisdom gleaned from around the globe. (His task was greatly simplified by the prior work of the Russian Helena Blavatsky [g], but let’s not quibble. Steiner claimed that his work was entirely the result of his own clairvoyant visions [h], not research or borrowings.) Our future evolution will enable us to gain greater clairvoyant capacities than ever before [i]. Waldorf schools shepherd students toward “pictorial” thinking [j] such as intuition and imagination [k], which are associated with clairvoyance [l]. In some instances, “pictorial” thinking may be indistinguishable from clairvoyance [m]. Some of the “thoughts” that we intuit or imagine come to us from our previous existence in the spirit realm [n]. 

[a] e.g., NATURE SPIRITS (Rudolf Steiner Press, 1995), p. 63

[b] e.g., AN OUTLINE OF ESOTERIC SCIENCE (Anthroposophic Press, 1997), pp. 386-387

[c] e.g., HEALTH AND ILLNESS, Vol. 1 (Anthroposophic Press, 1981), pp. 85-86

[d] e.g., COSMIC MEMORY (SteinerBooks, 1987), p. 46

[e] e.g., THE MISSION OF THE FOLK SOULS (Rudolf Steiner Press, 2005), p. 17

[f] e.g., THE CHALLENGE OF OUR TIMES (SteinerBooks, 1979), pp. 207-209

[g] e.g., WHAT IS ANTHROPOSOPHY (Anthroposophic Press, 2002), p. 19

[h] e.g., AN OUTLINE OF ESOTERIC SCIENCE, p. 6

[i] e.g., AN OUTLINE OF ESOTERIC SCIENCE, pp. 388ff

[j] e.g., THE FOUNDATIONS OF HUMAN EXPERIENCE (Anthroposophic Press, 1996), p. 62

[k] e.g., AN OUTLINE OF ESOTERIC SCIENCE, p. 385

[l] e.g., ART AS SPIRITUAL ACTIVITY (Anthroposophic Press, 1998), p. 256

[m] e.g., INTUITIVE THINKING AS A SPIRITUAL PATH (Anthroposophic Press, 1995), pp. 1-257

[n] e.g., THE FOUNDATIONS OF HUMAN EXPERIENCE, p. 37

In general, Steiner downplayed or even dismissed the importance of the brain, brainwork, and intellect. 

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

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

[See "Thinking" and "Steiner's Specific - Thinking Without Our Brains".]

[31] In 1974, the Anthroposophic Press published THE BRIDGE OVER THE RIVER, an account of communications between a dead German soldier and his living sister. The book reports that Rudolf Steiner read transcripts of the soldier’s messages, which he pronounced “absolutely authentic communications from the spiritual world.” — p. vii. The book’s Introduction explains that the messages were different from those sent by dead persons who “are still earth-bound [sic], ‘just beyond the thin veil’ that separates them from those of us living on earth.” — p. viii, Introduction by Joseph Wetzl.

[32] According to a letter I received from Jamie L. Gigolo, Assistant Registrar at Teachers College, Columbia University, John Fentress Gardner received a BA with a major in “Curriculum & Teaching — Childhood Education — Older Children” on Feb. 26, 1947, and an MA with a major in “Rural Education” on Dec. 17,1947.

In June, 1974, Adelphi University (Garden City, NY) awarded Mr. Gardner an honorary degree of Doctor of Letters. [See John Fentress Gardner, THE IDEA OF MAN IN AMERICA (The Myrin Institute, 1974), p. 3.]

[33] Mr. Gardner misrepresented Steiner’s views slightly, perhaps because he wanted to affirm America and Americans. According to Steiner, blacks are childish, Asians are adolescent, whites are adult, and “red Indians” are senescent. See, e.g., Toos Jeurissen, “Waldorf Salad with Aryan Mayonnaise?” 

[34] Rudolf Steiner, THE UNIVERSAL HUMAN: The Evolution of Individuality (Anthroposophic Press, 1990), p. 75.

Ahriman is, originally, an evil spirit posited by Zoroastrianism. His main characteristics are greed, envy, and anger. [See ENCYCLOPÆDIA BRITANNICA, "Ahriman."] Steiner taught that Ahriman tries to limit humans to their physical bodies and the materialistic, brain-centered thinking of which these bodies are capable. [See Rudolf Steiner, THE INCARNATION OF AHRIMAN: The Embodiment of Evil on Earth (Rudolf Steiner Press, 2006).]

In re Atlantis: According to Steiner, Atlantis and its predecessor, Lemuria, actually existed. [See “Atlantis" and "Lemuria".]

Occultists have many reasons for keeping secrets from the uninitiated. One of the simplest and most human reasons can be simple embarrassment. Anthroposophists may wish to believe every statement Steiner ever made, and undoubtedly many do attain this highest degree of belief — and yet some of them may recognize that admitting various details of their faith could prove awkward. Admitting to Steiner’s racism and his belief in Atlantis [see "Atlantis and the Aryans"] may well fall into this category.

Racism can be subtle. It may show itself in abusive treatment, but it may also show up as patronization. Some Waldorf schools now include many nonwhite students in the photos and videos they offer for public relations purposes. Racism is present when a person is judged — positively or negatively — on the basis of race instead of personal attributes. [For more on the racism that may arise in Anthroposophy and Waldorf education, see, e.g., "Steiner's Racism" and "Embedded Racism".]

[35] KNOWLEDGE OF THE HIGHER WORLDS AND ITS ATTAINMENT, p. 149.

[36] You can begin making such comparisons by consulting such pages here as "Say What?", "Who Says?", "Waldorf Now",  and "Today" (1-8).