American Anthroposophy

- an
introduction -
a celebration of the American Soul's unique
ability to contribute to the future of Anthroposophy,
and to the future of world culture
by Joel A. Wendt
social philosopher...and occasional fool
"...one can say that we in Europe develop Anthroposophy
in a spiritual way; the American develops it in a natural way..."
Rudolf Steiner, from a talk to the workmen
at the Goetheanum, Dornach, March 3, 1923
cover art bead-work by the author
Dedication
This book is dedicated to you, immortal spirit, who were
at one time known as Rudolf Steiner, and without whose presence on this
Earth for about 64 years, the essays in this book could not have been
written. I am grateful to you for wearing that name and bearing
the burden of being thought of as a great initiate. Thank you old
friend and may you continue to sail on to ever greater wonders and
delights, with as little suffering as necessary. Hopefully, the
content of this book may over the years of the future, serve to break
the chains by which great aspects of your spirit are currently bound to
the Earth, due to your having chosen to join your karma to ours.
In all our names, I beg your forgiveness for our many
errors and numerous follies connected to our having misunderstood much
of the essence of your teachings. With greatest affection and
love, your pupil, Joel A. Wendt
the Contents of this Book
introductory
materials
forward by the author - what is meant by American Anthroposophy?
preface for the neophyte - for the readers to whom Anthroposophy is quite new.
an apology (of sorts) - to the more experienced anthroposophical reader
introduction
the main
themes of this book
The Challenge
American Anthroposophy begins to come to
maturity in the situation of a given place and a given time. The
dominant characteristic of this time, outwardly,
is the Incarnation of Ahriman. As a
consequence the first essay concerns Ahriman's Incarnation:
Outrageous Genius - Discovering the in-the-Present
Incarnation of Ahriman in America through the Signs of the Times (Michaelmas* 2007)
*[The dates of writing here and below are
the time at which the original essay was produced out of the thinking
described in the essay: In Joyous Celebration...]
Orientation
The dominant characteristic of this time, inwardly,
is the Second Coming of Christ.
"From the kingdom served by Michael himself Christ descends to the sphere of the Earth, so as to be there when the intelligence is wholly with the human individuality. For man will then feel most strongly the impulse to devote himself to the power which has made itself fully and completely into the vehicle of intellectuality. But Christ will be there; through His great sacrifice He will live in the same sphere in which Ahriman also lives. Man will be able to choose between Christ and Ahriman. The world will be able to find the Christ-way in the evolution of humanity." R.S. Anthroposophical Leading Thoughts.
The Meaning of Earth Existence in the Age of the Consciousness Soul (winter - spring 2006)
In Joyous Celebration of the Soul Art and Music of
Discipleship (late summer 2006)
The Methodology Necessary for a New Social Science - a
brief introduction (written for this book
during the Season of Michaelmas, 2007)
The Natural Transformation of the Anthroposophical
Society in America (Michaelmas 2007)
The Mystery of Macro and Micro Evil: the relationship of
the Shadow (the double-complex) to the American Soul (Michaelmas 2007)
Encountering
the Mystery of America
What
distinguishes the now emerging natural Anthroposophy of the American
Soul, from the anthroposophical work of the Twentieth Century
Present Day American Culture - four archetypal
personalities
Recollecting the True Roots of the American Soul - America's aboriginal
Peoples and the Hopi Prophecy
Anthroposophy and the Russian Soul - a lesson from life:
instruction for all three world-aspects of Anthroposophical activity,
in the West, the Center and the East - (written
over Christmas Eve and Day 2006)
The New, and profoundly human, Mysteries of the Earth (written in the remaining Holy Nights just after
Christmas 2006)
Rudolf Steiner's Own Path - The Philosophy of Freedom or
Spiritual Activity - a brief re-imagination (written
for this book after the Holy Nights 2007-8)
a letter to a young anthroposophist (2003)
The Redemption of Eros: - Seeking Comfort and
Companionship in a time of increasing Social Chaos - or, Sex and the
Single Anthroposophist (Michaelmas 2007)
End Stories
America: The Central Motif (by Patrick Dixon)*
*reprinted
without permission (haven't been able to contact him), but at the same
time it must be shared,
so with a great deal of gratitude that this exists, I dare to offer it
anyway...
Bicycles: a Children's Christmas Story
for Adults
some final
verse: the Gift of the Word
***************************************
Ultimately, all questions of truth and goodness come down to the application of individual art and imagination - that is the creation of beauty. It isn't so much that the Universe has or is an answer that we seek and struggle to find, but rather that the Universe is an unfinished symphony in which we are one of the creative sources. Each individual I-am is a song continually knowing itself only in the moment of its becoming...
forward by the author
- what is
meant by American Anthroposophy -
To place the modifier "American" in front
of the noun Anthroposophy, may seem to some a rather curious, perhaps
even defective, construction. What about Anthroposophy,
apparently authored by Rudolf Steiner and mostly taught in Europe,
could ever be called American? Even so, the problem comes in
large part from Steiner himself, who said a great deal about America,
including suggesting this very idea - that there is to come an American Anthroposophy. Having gathered together much of
what he wrote and spoke about America, I'll just start with some of
this material and basically leave it to Dr. Steiner to help us begin to
understand why there could be something quite real about an American Anthroposophy. I'll also weave among the comments
of Steiner various other materials as seems appropriate [these will be
in brackets so as to not confuse anything].
One last introductory point...
There is an excellent question as to what is truly America and/or American, given that there is a North and South and Central America of which we routinely speak. I would say that in general most of what is indicated by Steiner, and explored more deeply by me in this book, refers principally to the United States of America. To look at the wider questions has not really been attempted here, although in the appendix in Patrick Dixon's essay: American: the Central Motif, an introductory perspective on some of these wider questions is given. Hopefully - in the future - others, native to these wider regions of the Western Continents, will be inspired by what is here to add their insights and their voices, for no one should doubt that all the Peoples of the Western Continents have a great deal to offer to the world.
*
"...America is the place at which races or civilizations die." R.S. The
Mission of the Folk Souls, lecture 6.
[This phenomena is discussed more fully
in an essay below.]
"The Indians then took over with them to the West all that
was great in the Atlantean culture. What was the greatest thing
of all to the Indians? It was that he was still able dimly to
sense something of the ancient greatness and majesty of a period which
existed in the old Atlantean epoch, in which the divisions of the races
had hardly begun, in which men could look up to the Sun and perceive
the Spirits of Form penetrating through a sea of mist. Through an
ocean of mist the Atlantean gazed up at that which to him was not
divided into six or seven, but which acted together. This
co-operative activity of the seven Spirits of Form was called by the
Atlanteans the Great Spirit...He clung firmly to the Great Spirit of
the primeval past." R.S. Lecture 6
above.
[While we might think that the Native
Americans have a degenerate spirituality as a consequence of this, it
would be a mistake to take this view. A Mohawk healer (a woman
friend of mine) is also a seeress, and it is clear to her vision that
when she holds a healing circle it is Christ in the form of an Angel
who does the actual healing. Another Native acquaintance of mine
described her first experience of a most sacred ceremonial enacted by
her Chief and spoken in the Cherokee language. In this ritual he
had used the word Christ several times, and she asked him following
this ceremony why he had mixed that particular word in with the
Cherokee in this way. His reply was that Indians had always known
there was an Earth Spirit, but now they know His Name.
The Saturn (Native American) Mysteries
still produce initiates (as it were), whose development takes a course
similar in kind to the Symbol in Tarot of the Hanged Man. Their visionary capacity comes from having given
over their will (which is why the Hanged Man is pictured upside down)
to the Celestial Influence. It is a spiritual capacity based upon
voluntary obedience to the Sky People (the ancestors and spirit guides of
the Native Americans) before whose judgment the seers, Chiefs and
healers tend to place all crucial questions of life. It is not a
blind obedience, but something more on the order of recognizing that
the Sky People have a superior vision of matters, and that as a result
their wisdom is to be given great weight in reference to all
significant questions.
Many anthroposophists treat Steiner in
the same way, and with the same dangers to our personal and individual
development of inner freedom.
The potential marriage, within the free
choices of the individual American Soul of this veneration of all that
was great in the primeval past of Atlantis, with the New Sun Mysteries
(in its initial form as Anthroposophy) is very important for the future
(for details see the essay below: Recollecting
the True Roots of the America Soul - America's aboriginal
Peoples and the Hopi Prophecy).]
America was discovered in order to
provide a counter-balance to the Asian Great Spirit (luciferic
lightness). America leads man to heaviness and materialism.
(R.S. paraphrased from Lecture 2, Inner
Impulses Working in the Evolution of Mankind)
"...American civilization, on
account of the special organization of its people, is particularly
exposed to the temptation offered by what the eagle speaks (1)....Central
Europe...is particularly exposed to what is uttered by the lion (2)...Oriental civilization is preeminently exposed to what is
uttered by the cow (3)."
(1) "I give thee the power to create a universe in thine own head"
(2) "I give thee the power to embody the universe in the radiance of the encircling air."
(3) "I give thee the power to
wrest from the universe measure, number and weight." R.S. Lecture 8, Man as a
Being of Sense and Perception
[Not surprising then the importance of
the Eagle as a symbol both to Native Americans and the United States of
America.]
If European and American civilization
retain their present character, a materialistic cosmogony will cover
over the Christ Event. (R.S. paraphrased from lecture 9, Man as
Hieroglyph of the Universe.)
[The antidote to this is the Christ
centered cosmogony presented in my book: the Way of
the Fool: the
conscious development of our human character and the future* of
Christianity - both to be born out of the natural union of Faith and
Gnosis.]
The past brings fermentation that leads "Europe to the brink of the
Abyss, which will array Asia and America against each other." R.S. Lecture 3, The
Mission of Archangel Michael
Emigration to America is greater than all
other movements of peoples. (paraphrase, R.S. Lecture 4, Mystery
Centers)
[The People of Peoples (the Beacon of
Hope) continues to draw the world to itself, even during times of great
distress (witness Latino movements in the present, and Asia movements
following the Vietnam War).]
The Anglo-American victory over Europe in
WWI will lead to a domination of European spiritual-cultural life in an
external fashion. (paraphrase R.S. lecture 3, The
Mysteries of Light, Space and Earth.)
The threefold social order is needed in
order to overcome the influence of Anglo-American secret societies
(paraphrase lecture 4 above).
"...I believe that in the future my book [The Threefold
Social Order] should be read in the West and in Russia, but that it has
no chance of becoming effective in Germany. The West, for
instance, can learn much from this book, for in a non-utopian manner it
simply states how the three spheres co-exist and should interact.
For the West the moment in time does not matter, for much is still to be done
for the right interaction of the three currents, the spiritual life,
the economic life, the political-legal life."
R.S. Threefolding as a Social Alternative. [emphasis added]
In 1924, for a time, some in America showed that stars were hollowed out spaces (paraphrase, R.S. lecture 3, The Evolution of Earth and Man and the Influence of the Stars)
Following the American way of thinking,
an attempt was made to extend the mechanical over human life itself.
It will be an American Mystery to make use of the magnetism of
the Earth, its double-ness. (paraphrase, R.S. lecture 12, The
Reappearance of Christ in the Etheric.)
"Europeans prove, Americans affirm"
R.S. lecture to workmen 3 March 1923.
When the sun is in Aquarius: "only then will the true
American Civilization come." (same lecture).
"We in Europe develop Anthroposophy out of the Spirit.
Over there they develop something that is a kind of wooden doll
of Anthroposophy. Everything becomes materialistic." (same lecture)
"But for one who is not a fanatic, there is something
similar in American culture to what is anthroposophical spiritual
science in Europe. Only everything there is wooden, it is not yet
alive. We can make it alive in Europe out of the spirit, those
over there take it out of instinct..." (same
lecture)
"The time will one day come when this American woodenman,
which actually everyone is still - when he begins to speak. Then
he will have something to say very similar to European Anthroposophy*. One can say that we
in Europe develop Anthroposophy in a spiritual way; the American
develops it in a natural way." (same lecture,
emphasis added)
*[here is where I told you that Steiner
clearly suggested there would come to be an American Anthroposophy.]
"The American is a young materialist...So too will the American's blatant materialism sprout a spiritual element." (when the Sun rises in the sign of Aquarius). (same lecture)
[As to the Sun rising in Aquarius, its
actual date is mostly anyone's guess. I asked an astrosopher, and
he suggested any where from 2376 to 3575, with lots of if ands and buts
and complicated details - I tried to get an exact answer, but sorry,
none could be had. Wikipedia says 2600, and if you get on Google
you can find just about anything. As we know, popular American
culture thought that this was happening in the 1960's (This
is the Dawning of the Age of Aquarius...
from the rock musical Hair). If we accept the role of spiritual inspiration
in the arts, then perhaps we can see that while Steiner referred to the
Sun rising in Aquarius, a dawning is something that
signals the coming rising of the Sun. I would place this book in
that category - the previously dark sky is gone, the stars recede from
sight, and bands of light illuminate the horizon, even though the Sun
has yet to fully appear. A transition of this kind, as is also
clear from Steiner's indications regarding the various epochs of the
post-Atlantean Age, is a gradual development that takes place over many decades if not a few
centuries. No fixed date has any real
meaning. The present then in America is a dawning, but the Sun has not yet risen.]
"But genuine Americanism will one day
unite with Europeanism, which will have taken a more spiritual path." (same lecture) [emphasis added].
[I have spent some time contemplating
Steiner's use of the adjective wooden in describing the
American's instinct for Anthroposophy. Clearly he could have used
an even more material metaphor, such as crystalline. That he did not, but chose instead to us a term
from the world of plants, particularly of the higher plant which is the
tree, can give us something to help our understanding. The tree,
while rooted in the earth, in making its wooden pillar makes the earth itself into a living form which
then raises the tree's leaves and blossoms much further in the
direction of the cosmos than those plants that remain nearer the earth
on the forest floor.
Our physical nature, as Americans, is of
the earth, and to the extent that we remain instinctive, so is our soul
life captured by this earth bound existence. Thus our
thinking is also earthly and material, unless we spiritualize it,
unless we bring moral forces into it consciously. The more our
native goodness penetrates our thought life consciously (instead of
instinctively), the more we do what the tree does when it spreads its
leaves and blossoms (on its way to bestowing its fruit for our benefit)
into the air far above the earth. Here is what I wrote in the
essay below on conscious thinking out of the American Soul (In Joyous
Celebration of the Soul Art and Music of Discipleship): The
purified will (an appropriately moral intention and attention) creates
heart warmth in the soul-soil of feeling, out of which the light and
life filled flower of thought is born. ]
Subterranean forces possess the American
body - a geographical force, not a spiritual force. They chain
man to the earth. Something from the human head streams toward
magnetic and electric currents, neutralizing them - this is the human
will. What overcomes these dependencies, which are part of karma,
so that our inner life (if not our outward form) can come to freedom?
The answer: the Mystery of Golgatha. (paraphrase of R.S.
long discussion lecture 1, Anthroposophical
Life Gifts.
*
[Not everything Steiner taught about
human inner life applies to Americans, and here again is what Steiner
said indicating the existence of something that has to be called American Anthroposophy: "The time will one day come when this American woodenman,
which actually everyone is still - when he begins to speak. Then
he will have something to say very similar to European Anthroposophy. One can say that we
in Europe develop Anthroposophy in a spiritual way; the American
develops it in a natural way." [emphasis
added].
Steiner was a very precise and exact
thinker, and as a consequence we can look carefully at his words,
expecting such characteristics. Here he has predicted a time when
the American would speak, and say something very similar to European Anthroposophy - not the same, but similar. He also points out that we develop anthroposophy
in a natural way, while the European develops it in a spiritual way.
What precisely and exactly does that mean?
We should not expect to answer such a
question by looking to Steiner, however. The answer to this
question is not his to give. The American has to speak the truth
and beauty and goodness of this question out of his own soul, and this
book is one American's answer to that riddle.
This in general can be added here.
The American is more of the Earth than any other people.
His culture is also of the future, whereas European culture is
mostly of the past.
Their individual limitations may be
overcome in the present by their mutual respect and cooperation.
At present, unfortunately, the spiritual potential of the
American Soul is not even decently respected in the circles of the
Anthroposophical Society and Movement here in America. How then
can the two work together without first raising into the light of consciousness the true soul
and spiritual nature of the American?
This condition of self-ignorance,
tragically fostered in anthroposophical circles, is strongly encouraged
by Ahriman through our unredeemed shadow nature, for
no people is more dangerous to his future plans than is the American.
Whatever my personal flaws that have influenced this work, I
offer it in full knowledge that Christ wishes for the American to find
his way to his own true nature, and from out of that discovery to
become, as is our task: the most formidable, spiritually endowed,
leader of the social healing gesture needed to counter the terrible
coming consequences of Ahriman's earthly reign.
Jessiah Ben-Aharon did not write his book
on America (America's Global Responsibility: individuation,
initiation and the threefolding) on a lark.
Nor did Rudolf Steiner point to this place, this people and this
time, in any kind of superficial way.
In the end, we come upon a second riddle
to add to the one of just what it means to come to Anthroposophy in a natural way. At its core, Anthroposophy is an act of
service to others. Who then is American Anthroposophy to serve? Our instinct, which even
Emerson would find correct had he known formally of Anthroposophy, has
so far been to be devoted to Rudolf Steiner and to the cultural forces
streaming from Europe.
We understand through Rudolf Steiner that
in this moment in Time the cultural Center of the world is weakened,
the two poles of East and West are too polarized, and as a consequence
the whole is unable to find their right inter-relationships precisely
because the attack on the Center in the 20th Century has been so
successful. Out of our freedom as Americans then we can continue
to follow our instinct in support of the spiritual insight pouring over
humanity from the Center. At the same time, however, we need to
not do this while living in a state of confusion as to our own yet
unrealized soul forces and potentials. If Americans want to truly
foster Anthroposophy as a working partner in a threefold world, they
have to come to far greater self knowledge than is presently the case.
This book seeks to serve that effort.]
a preface for the neophyte
- for the
readers for whom Anthroposophy is quite new -
If you are new to Anthroposophy, or if
this is one of the first books related to Rudolf Steiner you have
picked up, then you need to realize that in certain degrees the book
you hold in your hand was written mostly for serious students of Rudolf
Steiner, and further that it represents a view of Anthroposophy not
common among most anthroposophists. At the same time this book
might be quite useful, for ithopes to restore the essential
foundational impulse to anthroposophical spiritual science from the
confusion into which it fell in the 20th Century, after its founding
spirit had died - had crossed over into the world of pure spirit.
As a consequence, each essay below will
have its own brief introduction for the neophyte, by which words I hope
to make it more accessible to those to whom most of anthroposophical
thought is new. For example, the term Anthroposophy is a kind of
unnecessary affectation - given that what it refers to it could
possibly be expressed using many different words. Generally
speaking if we look at the root meanings we have anthropos (man) and sophy (wisdom), thus: the
wisdom of man.
Among Steiner students this itself has
been poorly understood, and as many new to this discipline may have
already discovered there is a certain kind of unnatural worship, among
the members of the Anthroposophical Society and Movement, of all the
Rudolf Steiner said and wrote. The fact is that Steiner was not
(ultimately) grounding Anthroposophy in the results of his research
into spiritual reality, but instead referring to a latent capacity
potential in all human beings. We
could, therefore, also speak of Anthroposophy as the new cognition, for it refers to what happens when any individual, with
a more or less intact mind, seeks to transform, through
their own will,
their given cognitive ability. With our will we take hold of our
cognitive faculty and cause it to undergo a profound metamorphosis, not unlike the transition from caterpillar to
butterfly. Our ordinary or given capacity for thinking, seemingly
bound to the brain and to physical causes, can out of our own
inner-will-activity become transformed into a capacity for direct
spiritual knowledge - what at one time was called: gnosis.
This is why Rudolf Steiner, near the end
of his life, wrote a summary of his work which was called: Anthroposophical
Leading Thoughts. In this work the very
first Leading Thought begins: "Anthroposophy is a path of
cognition from the Spiritual in the human being to the Spiritual in the
universe." Anthroposophy then is a
spiritual Way, rooted in the will of the individual, yet when well
understood it (the path or Way) is entirely empirical and objective
(scientific). The main text for this science of the new cognition is the book called: The
Philosophy of Spiritual Activity (or Freedom),
and the neophyte will find the significance of this book discussed
extensively below.
Now among the various translations of Anthroposophical
Leading Thoughts you will find that German
word Erkenntnis often translated as knowledge, not as cognition.
This has led to great confusion, for many today in the movement
mistake this indication as one connected to the requirement in Knowledge
of Higher Worlds for study. Thus the unceasing study of Steiner's writings,
rather than the objective and scientific introspection of one's own
mind, soul and spirit - that is the thinking about thinking or the
cognition about cognition.
This also means that in that
Anthroposophy is also the wisdom of man, it is
not a content given forever by Steiner to
which everyone must owe allegiance (thus the mistaken impulse to over
emphasize the study of this content), but
rather a method of active and awake
thinking-cognition that shows each individual how to be wise. Would that the leaders
of the Anthroposophical Society and Movement better understood this in
practice, which lead us next to....
an apology (of sorts)
- to the more
experienced anthroposophical reader -
It is possible that certain portions of
what is in this book might be seen as potentially critical of
individual efforts within the Anthroposophical Society and Movement.
Such is not really the mood in which this book's essays were
written. My principle studies and research have concerned the
social world, and in support of this it became necessary to learn, from
Steiner's writings on the science of objective philosophical
introspection (A Theory
of Knowledge Implicit in Goethe's World Conception, and The
Philosophy of Spiritual Activity or Freedom), how to properly discipline my soul and spirit in order
to achieve the best results for this research goal. At the same
time, the Anthroposophical Society and Movement are systems of
complicated and multiple social forms, and so it was natural for me to
look at them out of the impulses connected to my social research.
In addition, it became obvious over the years of these studies
that very few in the Society and Movement had penetrated deeply into
true introspective life. The absence of success in that endeavor
has enormous consequences for the ability of the Society and Movement
to incarnate the New Mysteries via the New Thinking.
Here is Steiner himself, from Awakening
to Community (lecture three), on the
consequences of failing (which has happened) to take up The
Philosophy of Spiritual Activity (or Freedom): "The way it should be read is with attention to the fact
that it brings one to a wholly different way of thinking and willing
and looking at things....The trouble is that The Philosophy of Freedom
has not been read in the different way I have been describing.
That is the point, and a point that must be sharply stressed if
the development of the Anthroposophical Society is not to fall far
behind that of anthroposophy itself. If it does fall behind,
anthroposophy's conveyance through the Society will result in its being
completely misunderstood, and its only fruit will be endless conflict!"
Let me make this last a bit more explicit
with a little symbolism (only partially presented), based on my 35
years of introspective self observation:
sense world < soul < A/d (i-AM) L/d > soul > spiritual world
human double (or karma of wounds)
I have kept in the threefold Shadow
elements (the double-complex):
< A/d L/d >
human double (or karma of wounds)
as it is very much an aspect of American
Anthroposophy to need to face the Shadow in a fully objective fashion.
A/d above refers to the ahrimanic double and L/d to the luciferic
double. Steiner describes the reason for this in Lucifer
and Ahriman, at page 21: "...the very purpose of our
Fifth Post-Atlantean epoch is that man should become increasingly
conscious of what takes
effect through him in earthly existence. [emphasis added]
What this means is that the opposing
forces enter into the social world of humanity only through the human soul, which then makes it such that
the real struggles involved in the Mystery of Evil take place within our souls, and only indirectly in the outer world.
Our souls are also the doorway through which the Good enters the
social world, and understanding this reality and our related freedom on
the Earth, in practice, is a core necessity for the future development
of Anthroposophy in the 21st Century (as to the manner of the entrance
of the Good, see the essay in this book: The
Meaning of Earth Existence in the Age of the Consciousness Soul).
Rudolf Steiner has made it clear that
there is a considerable difference between his personal path (The
Philosophy of Spiritual Activity, or Freedom), and the path outlined in Knowledge
of Higher Worlds. In the latter we make
our passage toward the spirit through the sense world [sense world < soul < A/d (i-AM)] , and in the former we enter
directly into the spiritual world [(i-AM) L/d > soul >
spiritual world], through a highly
disciplined introspection. In the practice of a scientific
objective philosophical introspection, we begin already in the
soul/spiritual world as an active spirit.
Both the New Thinking and the New
Mysteries are extraordinary treasures much needed by humanity.
Because of this reality, it becomes necessary to ask how well the
Society and Movement are doing in bringing to incarnation the New
Mysteries and the New Thinking, given that only a very few are actually
seriously and successfully following the path of cognition (The
Philosophy of Spiritual Activity or Freedom) that Rudolf Steiner himself discovered and followed: [(i-AM) L/d > soul >
spiritual world]. Does this mean
something is being missed?
Here is Steiner on some of the
differences between the two paths (indirectly through the sense world
and directly through the soul/spiritual world), from near the end of
the 5th Chapter of his book Occult
Science: an outline:
The path that
leads to sense-free thinking by way of the communications of spiritual
science is thoroughly reliable and sure. There
is however another that is even more sure, and above all more exact [emphasis added]; at the same time, it is for many people more difficult.
The path in question is set forth in my books The Theory of
Knowledge Implicit in Goethe's World-Conception and The Philosophy of
Spiritual Activity. These books tell what man's thinking can
achieve when directed not to impressions that come from the outer world
of the physical sense but solely upon itself. When this is so, we
have within us no longer the kind of thinking that concerns itself
merely with memories of the things of the sense; we have instead pure
thinking which is like a being that has life within itself. In
the above mentioned books you will find nothing at all that is derived
from the communications of spiritual science. They testify
to the fact that pure thinking, working within itself alone, can throw
light on the great questions of life - questions concerning the
universe and man. The books thus occupy a significant intermediate
position between knowledge of the sense-world and knowledge of the
spiritual world. What they offer is what thinking can attain when
it rises above sense-observation, yet still holds back from entering
upon the spiritual, supersensible research. One who
wholeheartedly pursues the train of thought indicated in these books is
already in the spiritual world; only it makes itself known to him as a
thought-world. Whoever feels ready to enter upon this
intermediate path of development will be taking a safe and sure road,
and it will leave with him a feeling in regard to the higher world that
will bear rich fruit in all time to come.
It is because of the practical
understanding from experience, of this quality of surety and exactness
in the thinking developed along the following of Steiner's own path,
that I urge the reader (if they have not already) to renew their
interest in The Philosophy of Spiritual Activity or Freedom. Also, as a result of the practice of this
discipline on the nature and quality of thinking, when I turn my
attention as a spiritually oriented social scientist to the status,
nature and structure of the Anthroposophical Society and Movement,
certain difficulties become apparent. Some of these observations
enter into the work below.
All that said, this should be made clear.
While some of what is here can be interpreted (and will be by
some) to be negative and against this or that, the fact is that what is
in this book is not against anything. It is for
the truth about the history of the Society in the 20th Century.
It is for the truth about our real tasks as regards inner
development. It is for understanding the Love
which surrounds us in earthly social existence. It is for
preserving Rudolf Steiner's true legacy. It is for
helping American anthroposophists find freedom of spirit in the soul.
It is for illuminating the Mystery of America. And, mostly
it is for moving the Anthroposophical Movement forward toward its
real potential role as the serving-the-Thou source of the
New Thinking and the New Mysteries so desperately needed by humanity.
Then, in being for
and in serving, we are on our way to becoming one with the Good.
*
*
*
[readers of the previous edition of this
work, which bore the title "Dangerous
Anthroposophy", will by now have noted that
there have been substantial changes. These changes are due in no
small part to the many thoughtful comments I received during the early
stages of the publication of this book, such that I reconsidered a
great deal of that material and made significant changes. Because
I am self-publishing this book (which is only printed when ordered
on-demand), it was then possible to update the file and make many
corrections. I here want to thank those who were so generous with
their observations of various weaknesses and excesses in the original
text (and I am grateful for the many kind things that were said, as
well).]
introduction
I must begin by confessing that I don't like the way that Dornach and the Councils in America model Anthroposophy (for the most part, the Central Regional
Council in America is an exception, but seems not properly supported by
the rest). Don't like is of course a sign
of antipathy, but not all antipathy is unredeemed, some comes from
discernment. Recently, in conversation with a friend (Tom Last)
concerning observations of Rudolf Steiner in the lectures collected
under the title: Awakening
to Community, I came to understand that
Steiner had seen that significant differences existed at that time and
would continue among the members and friends, which led him to
providing us with a metaphor to aid our understanding. I have
interpreted it to mean today that we should think of each other as
sister souls, finding it necessary to travel different but parallel
paths, hopefully toward the same end: the bringing alive for the future
the New Mysteries and the New Thinking.
At the same time, I am confronted by a
peculiar moral dilemma, one that was faced by Irina Gordienko, when she
wrote her book: Sergei O.
Prokofieff: Myth and Reality. First,
after carefully presenting her version of the same argument as above,
concerning the significance of Steiner's science of knowledge
(objective philosophical introspection), she said next in her Author's
Forward:
"When a false or non-proven assertion appears in the
scientific press, this is taken as a signal for the opening of a
scientific debate, which continues until the matter is resolved, even
if further research has to be carried out. It is quite a
different situation in the Anthroposophical media. There one can
write whatever one likes, provided no interests are put at risk and the
familiar terminology is used. Any
attempt to criticize such printed assertions is condemned out of a
false ethical principle: tolerance towards a person is confused with
tolerance of his mistakes. The ideal of brotherly love comes to mean little
more than the maintaining of 'diplomatic relations' with ones neighbor,
while remaining indifferent to his spiritual destiny.
"This is, in our opinion, by no means a sign of
irresponsibility - this is only secondary - but is rather the
expression of a materialism that is deeply rooted in the unconscious [the Shadow, see above and below, ed], inclining one to experience
inter-personal relations in the present as absolutely real, while the
working of the counter-forces which stand behind every lie is ignored
or is at best passed off as an abstract theory, about which one can
hold clever discussions, but which, as soon as one returns to the
reality of life, will be forgotten. ' "An
incorrect result of research in the spiritual world is a living being.
It is there; it must be resisted, it must first be eradicated" ' (22.10.1915, GA 254)" [emphasis added]
The consequence for me then is this: If I
discern flaws (errors of thought) in the work of the Society and
Movement, what is my obligation toward that work and toward those
personalities who make such errors of thought? This has been made
all the more acute by the fact that during the period in which several
people had opportunities to review the earlier version of this work, it
was common to hear expressed some form of: Don't you think you need to
treat in a more kind way, those who. in your opinion, have made errors
of thought.
The consequence of such a "materialistic" (as suggested by Gordienko) approach is twofold: First, we collectively deny that Anthroposophy has anything to do with science - that is, there is no real meaning for us to exactness and rigor in the processes of cognition, and certainly not in holding each other to such standards. And second, that we actually do each other a kindness by treating so politely each others statements that clash with our own understanding, particularly when such statements are publicized throughout our communities as the expression of those presumed authorities, who hold positions of trust in our institutional social forms (Dornach, the Councils in America and so forth).
When I first read this in Gordienko, I
realized that she was emphasizing the Truth
as the sole ideal, which is understandable given that she was a
practicing mathematician. I even wrote in that moment in the
margin of my copy of her book this question: What about Beauty and Goodness?
It is my view that the latter ideals, in
practice, do justify temperance with regard to how we treat each other
when we find ourselves convinced of an error of thought living in the
other. In terms of The
Philosophy of Spiritual Activity or Freedom, we enter here the realm of moral technique - that problem which follows after we have practiced moral imagination and moral intuition. This
comes down to: What do we actually say (or write or do - what is the moral art or our technique), when we are
convinced our brother or sister in Anthroposophy is in error?
There is an aphorism from the
Middle-East, as follows: There are three gates to speech: Is it true?
Is it necessary? And, is it kind? Where below I have felt
it necessary to concern myself with the errors of thought in others, I
have tried to follow this advice.
Now suppose, for example, that I correctly discern that what is encouraged among the membership, by those in leadership positions, is a misleading (erroneous) path. Suppose that the general direction of the Society, in how it understands and practices Anthroposophy, is weak, lame and mostly inadequate. Suppose the practices that are encouraged cause us to miss our real tasks. Suppose that the Society got so far off the track during the 20th Century that we are not even close to truly bringing alive the New Mysteries.
Let us pause for a moment and consider
what I mean by the above term: lame. In a nutshell it
comes down to this: Those who do not know, cannot teach what they do
not know. If the vast majority of those in leading
anthroposophical positions do not know what lives within the experience
that comes from truly penetrating the meaning and significance for our
inner life of a proper study of The
Philosophy of Spiritual Activity or Freedom - of Rudolf Steiner's own Path (see essay far below),
and, if in this sense they don't know, again as an experience, true and exact living thinking (the New Thinking), then
they cannot teach that which can be learned in no other way.
Further, if they do not know that, then they logically also do
not appreciate what the absence of that understanding will mean for their comprehension
of the rest of what Steiner gave to us.
Let us repeat this last point, in a
slightly different way. Steiner's books on the science of
objective philosophical introspection lead to an understanding of the
inner life of the human being that cannot be obtained in any other way.
Certainly one can travel such paths without these books, but to
acquire the near mathematical precision and exactness of introspective
knowledge that Steiner himself developed through "...introspective observation
following the methods of natural science",
means something those who have not succeeded at this cannot imagine or
understand. There are considerable consequences to the thinking
of any individual not self-trained in this fashion, which consequences
will often lead to errors of thought.
Steiner gave us what he gave out of his
having himself first achieved the goal he sets before us in The
Philosophy of Spiritual Activity or Freedom and A Theory
of Knowledge Implicit in Goethe's World Conception. These are not books about some matter that has
nothing to do with Anthroposophy or Spiritual Science. On the
contrary, these books are the foundational heart and soul of everything
Steiner later did in his life. They are the Key to the Kingdom of
the New Thinking. In the absence of knowing the experiences to
which these books point, we simply cannot truly and fully understand, or appreciate, all the rest.
That failure then lames (in different degrees) all our work since Steiner crossed over. We stumble
around in an inner darkness of soul, that only the science of objective
introspective philosophy can illuminate. We do not know ourselves
as knowing doers, the first and
essential goal of spiritual development which enables it to be scientific. [In the essays in this book, the details of these
problems will be laid out from a number of directions and within a
number of different contexts.]
Where this leads is to the necessity of
our recognizing that the Shadow forces have been having their way with
us (from inside our own souls, via the three-fold double-complex),
while we've been trying to pretend that all the opposition only comes
from the outside. And, we also need to realize that this state of
being is exactly where karma was meant to lead us - to a fallen
condition. Rudolf Steiner crossed over, the Vorstand fell into
conflict, and the various National Societies took sides and split away
from the General Anthroposophical Society. Even though this split
was healed in a kind of political way on the plane of social existence
following the second Great War, it was not healed in a spiritual way.
Here is Ben-Aharon, from the forward to
his book on the Second Coming, The
Spiritual Event of the Twentieth Century: "...those forces of hindrance
that brought about Rudolf Steiner's premature death in the first third
came to an outward victory in the events of the twelve years 1933-45, both
in the Anthroposophical Society and the world at large."
[emphasis added]
Since this seemingly negative view is not being said by those who organize
events, and run around the world giving lectures or writing big long
books (none of which activities are socially permitted to be publicly
and critically examined), it would appear that what I discern seems
completely off the mark. Everyone acts as if what we are doing is
just fine, while over here in the corner, mostly ignored, Wendt (and
others - such as Gordienko, and Ben-Aharon) are saying things like: Wait a minute guys, this is
all wrong. Isn't it really possible that we are failing our
Teacher, we are failing humanity and we are failing Christ?
Couldn't be true, right?
Clearly people are trying to do the right thing. Or so it seems, if we put
the best face on it. Most of our publications are self
congratulatory, and my experience is that when you suggest they should
be otherwise (critically honest and scientific), people get very
defensive. And, of course, Christ does forgive us; and our
Teacher, well he joined his karma to ours, so that must mean something,
must it not? Then there is that famous near magical (and
fantastic and probably false) semi-consciously shared mental picture of
the Meaning of
the Christmas Conference we all speak of as
if in a dream, so we can't be all bad, can we? As for
humanity...well all kinds of folks are bringing their kids to Waldorf
Schools - that must count for something, yes?
Lets try this. Imagine Rudolf Steiner in
front of you and ask him if he thinks that its all peaches and cream in
the Society and Movement, nothing is wrong, everything is perfect and
there is no room for improvement. If you really believe he will
answer yes to this question, then don't buy or read this book.
If you know in your heart that he'll have
to say no, its not all right, its not fine and somebody needs to wake
up, then ask yourself: How do we know what next right thing to do is? Maybe this book can provide some of the answers to
that question, or if not that, then at least some better questions.
* *
*
Let me end this part of the introduction
by returning for a moment to an appreciation of what has been and is
being done. It is entirely possible and reasonable to look at
almost everyone working in the Society and Movement and find a
struggling and striving human being, often one full of a great heart,
who gives and bears much (something one can find all over the world in
many people, not just anthroposophists).
For example, all we have to do is to
think of the many Waldorf teachers, who work for so little for such
long hours. Everywhere in the Society and Movement we see much
that justifies our confidence and trust.
Yet, we are also required to cultivate
the ability to look at ourselves as a stranger (Knowledge
of Higher Worlds). Do we in the Society
and Movement practice such objectivity about our own activities?
Part of the purpose of this book is to do just that. I may
completely fail in such an effort, but not for want of trying.
Let me conclude by adding two
considerations to what I am certain are major matters of spiritual
import that are not yet clearly seen by our leadership and therefore
not brought as strongly as is necessary to our attention. These
are in addition to the errors that arise because so few have penetrated
to the kind of self knowledge only possible through a proper study of
the science of knowing (A Theory
of Knowledge Implicit in Goethe's World Conception, and The
Philosophy of Spiritual Activity or Freedom).
The second matter (besides the above books), left in the dust heap of our confusions following the split in the Society, and what followed, in the 20th Century, was the Reverse Cultus. It was not that this was presented to us by Steiner as an off hand remark, by the way. It came about this way. Almost immediately following the Burning of the Goetheanum, Steiner began giving a series of lectures (starting January 23rd, 1923) in Dornach and Stuttgart, which has been collected under the title Awakening to Community.
In Lecture VI, he takes up a significant
subject, which he begins to approach by discussing the need for
religious renewal that was to be met through the creation of the
Christian Community. He then paraphrases Dr. Rittelmeyer, who had
recently said that the development of community in the Christian
Community is potentially one of the greatest threats to the
Anthroposophical Society possible.
Steiner then describes how a rite (and certainly this includes the Rite of Consecration of Man that is to be celebrated in the Christian Community) brings down into those present in the Rite (cultus) a spiritual presence: "a shared comprehensive memory of spiritual experiences". This, he goes on to say, is a powerful community building force.
Steiner then adds: "The Anthroposophical Society
also needs just such a force to foster community within it". He then elaborates the underlying spiritual
principles that lead to the necessity for the Society to learn to enact
a reverse cultus, in which spiritual presence does not descend via the
Rite into the community, but the community learns instead to rise up to
spiritual presence through a
rite of its own, in the nature of its groups
and their cultivated feeling life and qualities of conversation.
Now an honest (as of a stranger)
appraisal of the Life of our Society reveals that in comparison with
the community feelings one can sometimes experience in the Christian
Community, the Society has not achieved the same level of
fellow-feeling. In fact, most of the goals Steiner set for us in
his collection of letters written to the Society members in 1924, and
published as The Life,
Nature and Cultivation of Anthroposophy, have
not been achieved.
As a place where one can find warm
fellow-feeling, the Christian Community succeeds where the Society does
not, and the danger to the Society predicted by Dr. Rittelmeyer almost
a century ago has come to pass. What is worse, in my view, is
that the priests of the Christian Community, at least among their
leadership, ought to have known this and apparently have done nothing
about it. In fact, it began to greatly disturb me about 10 years
ago, when I found more and more people in the Society who had never
heard of the reverse
cultus or of this most crucial problem for
the community life of the Society.
Now this error of thought (not
recognizing the need for the reverse
cultus) is in a very few places now being
overcome (the Central Regional Council in American is trying, for
example), but at the same time its significance has to be brought into
the foreground over and over again, until we understand our loss, and
our potential.
In addition to the loss of the
reverse cultus, there is a further
difficulty, one of which Steiner had warned of in so many places that
I'll not bother to quote him. This danger is the intellectualization of the
Michaelic Cosmic Intelligence.
When Steiner wrote and lectured,
Michaelic Cosmic Intelligence lived into the room. Where he was,
It was. But once this Intelligence entered the minds of his
readers and listeners, a difficulty was encountered over which Steiner
had little control. This Living Wisdom dies into words, and this
death can only be overcome by the inner activity of the reader and
listener. We have to meet what he offered in the right way, and
he spoke of this directly and indirectly over and over again.
If we look honestly back upon the work of
the 20th Century in the Society and Movement and see how it is
developed into its present form, we will not find this living
Intelligence, but mostly its lifeless intellectualized corpse.
Anthroposophy (the Wisdom of Man, which discovers how to
encounter and work with the Michaelic Cosmic Intelligence) has become
in far too many souls mere Steinerism, a philosophy (world view)
attributed to the authority of the Great Initiate and Genius, Rudolf
Steiner. Over and over again, in conversations with others (deep
sincere people) and on Waldorf websites etc. one finds something
similar to this form of expression (here taken from an actual Waldorf
website): Anthroposophy
is a spiritual philosophy that reflects and speaks to the basic deep
spiritual questions of humanity, to our basic creative needs, to the
need to relate to the world out of a scientific attitude of mind, and
to the need to develop a relation to the world in complete freedom and
based on completely individual judgments and decisions.
What could be wrong with this?
Well, its not true in a living way, although it is more or less intellectually (materialized) accurate. The flesh has been
stripped away, and all we have is the bones. Recall now what
Steiner wrote in the First Leading Thought:
"1. Anthroposophy is a path of cognition*, to guide the
Spiritual in the human being to the Spiritual in the universe. It
arises in man as a need of the heart, of the life of feeling; and it
can be justified only inasmuch as it can satisfy this inner need. He
alone can acknowledge Anthroposophy, who finds in it what he himself in
his own inner life feels impelled to seek. Hence only they can be
anthroposophists who feel certain questions on the nature of man and
the universe as an elemental need of life, just as one feels hunger and
thirst."
*[generally this is translated as knowledge, but it appears that the better English word for the
German is cognition.]
The two almost seem the same don't they?
But the fact is instead of quoting what Steiner himself wrote,
the mind of the writer on the Waldorf website intellectualized the
meanings, and lacking a connection to his own feelings on this matter,
then subtly and thoughtlessly took away the heart of it, probably
completely unconsciously and in connection with how the corpse of
this once Living Wisdom is taught among us today.
Like any error of thought, the whole
misstep starts right at the beginning, where "Anthroposophy is a path of
cognition..." becomes "Anthroposophy is a spiritual
philosophy...". Something that I do out of my will and feelings and needs (a path I walk), has become, as a consequence of the
intellectualization, a mere point of view - something that I study in books and learn as a content (a spiritual philosophy).
The core difficulty is rooted in the
absence of an appreciation in practice of The
Philosophy of Spiritual Activity or Freedom. For example, a scientific introspective life
comes to recognize that there is a considerable difference among those
activities of spirit that lead in the soul to such states as: belief, understanding and knowledge. In the
essay below: Anthroposophy
and the Russian Soul: a view from the true West, I
go into a number of details as regards this problem.
The consequence of this
intellectualization of the once Living Michaelic Cosmic Wisdom has led
to the displacement of the Living element of this stream of Wisdom,
away from the Society and Movement (what Ben-Aharon, in his remarkable
Imagination of the Second Coming: The
Spiritual Event of the 20th Century, calls
the conscious Michael Community to what Ben-Aharon calls there the
unconscious Michael Community). When I write in the essays
below on such themes as Civil Society, the Hopi Prophecy and the
Bioneers, it is this displacement to which I am referring.
The Anthroposophical Society and Movement, having lost a connection to The Philosophy of Spiritual Activity or Freedom and the reverse cultus, failed to find their own way to the Living Spirit and thus to true Michaelic Cosmic Intelligence. Since the movement among humanity of forces of the Living Spirit is not defeated by our failures, this wind or breath of [holy] spirit (see the Gospel of John) moved elsewhere. Mainly