The following letter is being released shortly after Easter 2005, and sent by e-mail to as many anthroposophists, in America and elsewhere, as will receive it and hopefully forward it.  This letter is intended to support an understanding that in the future the wise expression of Anthroposophy needs to come from the periphery, not the center; and, that Fifth (Consciousness Soul) Epoch social forms are meant to work from the bottom up, not the top down (hierarchical social forms are Third Epoch and no longer valid).




In August of 2005, from the 11th to the 14th, a meeting will take place in Ann Arbor, Michigan that holds out much hope, for not only the future of Anthroposophy, but for whether or not Spiritual Science will be able to contribute its particular gifts to the urgent dialogs now faced by all of humanity. [See addendum, note 21, for commentary on the planned content for this meeting.]

The situation is grave.  Anyone awake to modern political and social realities understands this.  What is less understood is how it is that Spiritual Science can meet this crisis out of the yet slumbering forces of spirit residing in human nature.  What is to be our contribution, as a part of the whole, in helping draw forth these slumbering forces of spirit?

During the 20th Century the forces of opposition were in the main successful.  They caused the early death of Rudolf Steiner, and by this means kept the social center of the much needed new planetary culture from its birth.  Central Europe was pushed toward the dark, not toward the light.  (1)

Even the Anthroposophical Society was not immune to the work of the opposing forces, and remains lamed, and undeveloped, from its true spiritual potential.  Yeats was right: "...the center cannot hold..." and even the Vorstand in Dornach is not what it needs to be.  (2)  When Rudolf Steiner died, the Vorstand, as an esoteric Center, fell from Grace.  Nothing since has changed that, and today this fallen social organ is possessed by the opposing powers. (2a)

Some will of course doubt the above statements.  The problem for many is not unlike that failure which allowed a very dangerous political impulse possession of the American Presidency.  People live in denial of the truth, and would rather cling to their beliefs than make the needed effort of will-in-thinking to face reality.

[Since this letter first was released, there has been some comment.  Some felt I was being overly harsh and negative, and the best critique suggested that I fill in some of the background detail regarding this statement: "and today this fallen social organ is possessed by the opposing powers."  At first I balked, because I felt such a digression would have to be too elaborate and confuse the main theme, but upon reconsideration, I will do as asked, and hope the reader will forgive me from making an already long letter, much longer. 

In order to understand:  "and today this fallen social organ is possessed by the opposing powers" it is necessary to elaborate on the Mystery of Evil in both its macro and micro aspects.  This is a theme Steiner wove very carefully and to which others have added, while at the same time its main nuances are not spoken of within the Society with the care and experience this Mystery deserves.  I have given a full rendering of the social meaning of this Mystery in my book "the Way of the Fool", whose url can be found at note 12 in the footnotes.

Most people familiar with Steiner will also be familiar with his many sided examination of the three dark powers: the fallen Seraphim Lucifer, the dark near-God Ahriman, and the yet mysterious Asuras.  This is macro evil, but macro evil cannot be understood without first  appreciating even more the nuances of micro evil, or what I call in my book: the double-complex.  Christ introduces us to this problem in the Sermon on the Mount when He teaches concerning the mote and the beam.

Before we can understand the mote - the evil in the other, or outside us - we must first understand the beam, the evil within the own soul.  In modern spiritual practice, this problem comes before us in the double-complex.  I say "complex" because in reality there are three aspects to the double: a luciferic aspect, an ahrimanic aspect, and a human aspect (which human aspect is found in the failures that lead to the opening needed by the Asuras).  The personal introspective study of this inner trinity of evil is where we must go if we wish to really begin to understand the role of evil in the world.  We forego judging others (the mote) and instead concentrate on seeing how we ourselves introduce evil into the world (the beam).

Now someone might think, why didn't Steiner say what Wendt here is saying, and all I can reply is that people were not then ready.  But a full Century has passed and we enter upon a new one, which then calls for its own spiritual orientation.  For Americans especially, whose double is a far stronger aspect of their soul life than it is for Europeans in accord with our role in the overcoming of materialism, appreciating this problem is essential.  For hints and a few details, the reader should refer to Steiner's two lectures published under the title: Geographic Medicine.

To frame the question better, picture the plant, poised as it is between the Sun and the Earth - between the life or suctional forces of periphery and the concentrating materializing forces of the center.  Here manifest clearly forces from outside the plant that work upon it.   Yet, the human being is not a plant, such that for us even macro evil does not work upon us from the outside in the way anthroposophists tend to speak (except as either karma or a goad to moral action), but instead evil manifests from the inside, through and out of the own soul.  The entrance into human affairs of Lucifer, Ahriman and the Asuras comes from inside us, and from there enters our shared social and political existence.  We are the door through which macro evil influences civilization, which is also why we are the potential source out of which macro evil will be tamed.

So Christ says: "Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of thine own eye; and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother's eye."

This is why we frequently understand, socially and politically, that the individual is their own worst enemy and that most institutions succumb to decay from within.

With these thoughts in mind, let us consider the Vorstand and the meaning of my statement:  "and today this fallen social organ is possessed by the opposing powers."

Below you will find elaborated how it is that decadent third epoch hierarchical social forms are overseen by individual ahrimanic egregores - a demonic-like psychic parasite, which is a small copy of what Steiner called in the Challenge of the Times: the Spirit of Rome.   These are everywhere today whenever an institutional social form displays a lack of ability to respond to the social below, the place where the Consciousness Soul is most active.

For example, the United States has an ahrimanic egregore, as does the Catholic Church and many aspects of Islam.  These arise because individual human beings fail to think in a living way, and by the rigidity of their thought activity begin to worship something fantastic (Lucifer in the service of Ahriman), such that a false psychic Idol is created that becomes the object of veneration, and more and more absorbs the devotional life forces of those worshipers.

Out of this process comes fundamentalism, which is a dogmatic belief in an illusion, without the Grace of living faith.  No modern hierarchical institution is free of these spiritual dynamics, not even the Anthroposophical Society or the School of Spiritual Science.  For us, it is an Idol of Rudolf Steiner that is worshiped, along side a false and illusory view of what Anthroposophy really is, as a higher being, or as an aspect of the own soul life.  The result of this errant psychic activity is the creation of an ahrimanic egregore, which resides in what is sometimes called the Realm of the False Holy Spirit, a nearby region of the spiritual world where we wander, when in any act of morally undisciplined thinking we semi-consciously cross the Threshold without the right preparation.

Specters are everywhere, and we should expect them, instead of pretending they do not exist.

If the Consciousness Soul was active above - within the decaying third epoch hierarchical social form, either in full or semi-consciousness, this institutional hierarchy would be in the process of dissolving itself in favor of the social below, for its leaders would understand that in the cultural  present individual spiritual freedom is the most essential development, and all social forms need to "wash the feet" of the least within its structures.  Top down social form is antithetical to the spiritual freedom of the individual.

Such a dissolving process can take many forms, but at the least any truly awake social form would find itself moving more and more away from top-down structures, knowing through direct personal experience that spirits of inspiration are seeking to enter from the Consciousness Soul below.

So our first clues as to the absence of an awake Consciousness Soul understanding in the Vorstand are: 1) in its continued perpetuation of itself as an imagined viable social organ (which is really only justified as tradition - we did it before, no reason to think it anew); and, 2) from the lack of a clear teaching of either the double-complex or the Consciousness Soul.  If the Vorstand was properly developed inwardly, it would display a primary interest in these three: spiritual (inner) freedom, individual knowledge of the Good and the True via the Consciousness Soul, and the struggle with the double - which three are essentially that elementary trinity of the Good appropriate to the times so that now each I-AM can begin to manifest its personal creative forces in order to stand in balancing opposition to the inner trinity of evil (itself the vehicle by which macro evil reaches the outer social political world).

The endless teaching of Steiner-thought, without any real original contribution is the greatest phenomena revealing the spiritual emptiness in the institutional hierarchy above.

Decadent hierarchical social forms tend toward a socially induced unity of thought and other soul activity (e.g. let's all read the Soul Calender before we start our group, without seeking first to know the individual impulses present).  We have too much of leaders and followers, and thus make no fertile social ground for the individual creative impulses to manifest.

Absence this development, the Vorstand is incapacitated, and lamed - that is, unable to hold back the movement of evil from out of their own double-complex and into their activities.  Instead, the Vorstand and the School are mainly places where a theology (no spiritual freedom) of Steiner-thought is taught, and with the penetration of this circle by a particular personality - someone who acts as if he possesses the highest teaching abilities, and who simultaneously demonstrates he knows nothing through experience of the Consciousness Soul, the Mystery of Evil in its macro and micro aspects, or spiritual freedom, as can be seen in what he wills (see again note 2 and 2a).

Now some will find this disquieting, and I can't blame them, for we are all human beings and all serve as an entrance through which evil can manifest to the extent we inwardly sleep.  Further, it will be obvious to those who think about it, that the fall from Grace of the Vorstand was entirely predictable (or as Steiner indicated: "karma will hold sway").  All the same, nothing is being said here but this - that in a spiritual sense, as regards the Vorstand and its most popular member: the emperor has no clothes.]


It might seem to some that the healing of such tragic circumstances is beyond human will.  This is not so.  There is a single gesture, if carried out, which can begin much that will serve our Movement and the whole of Earth evolution.  The opposing powers cannot subvert us if we shine the light of truth on them, which light then puts them in their proper place in the balance.

What must* occur is that the American Spirit (3) begins to be make its presence known at the meeting in Ann Arbor.  To those remaining living forces still flowing out from the Center, and still inspired by the ideals laid in so many hearts with the Foundation Stone Meditation, another quality, this out of the true West, needs to manifest its yet hidden nature.  In this way we begin that work of joining together the threefold nature of humanity, of East, Center and West, which our teacher so long ago advised needed to be brought about.  The America Spirit (in part the spirit of egalitarian brother and sisterhood) must begin to manifest itself at the meeting in Ann Arbor, which at least some of the Vorstand (at this point) plans to attend.

[*Throughout this text the word "must" is used in a causal sense.  It in no way means to limit someone's freedom, but rather points out that if event B is to happen, it "must" be preceded by action A.  The reader will themselves have to "think" the causal relationships, but for purposes of an example, the above "must" means that for a healing to occur, a certain action needs to be taken.]

How to do this is very simple, and is quite consistent with the nature of the time, the spiritual differences between Center and West (4) , and as well is firmly rooted in the Age of the Consciousness Soul.

The act itself is very straight forward.  Instead of the usual social form to the meeting in Ann Arbor, wherein leading personalities (of the Vorstand and the various Councils in America) would lecture and seek to guide, we must have a totally different form.  The lecture social form is sun - moon, wherein the thinking of a so-called leading personality shines its light out into the reflecting consciousness of the listening audience.   Instead, we need to have a sun - sun form, a circle conversation, in which no speaker is assumed or seen to be more highly developed or more knowledgeable.
 
Simply by changing how we meet, we change the whole dynamic, in that then from the world of inspiration, a whole other quality is now able to enter in.  We sacrifice our past dependence on certain individual intuitions, for that which can only arise from the whole, out of a group process - one which Steiner himself spoke to us of in his lectures on Awakening to Community, and called: the Reverse Cultus.

The meeting in Ann Arbor must be an awake activity fully rooted in the New Mysteries. (5)

Americans must come to this meeting prepared to speak to each other, and to be listened to by those who have by their own karma come to be placed in leading positions.  The leaders must listen, and those below must speak.  The leaders must say nothing - even if asked questions (6), and there will even be those others (myself included), who wisely understand that they will themselves best contribute by silence and attention.  The inspiration from above must be allowed to find its connection with the most ordinary heart felt thinking of the members and friends who have come to the gathering to discover the mystery potential of their own I, when it is allowed to blossom in a social environment no longer dominated by the thoughts of the imagined leading personalities.

[This letter was read by some before being sent.  Of all the questions asked, that which was the most significant concerned the idea of the freedom of those who came to the Conference to listen to the Vorstand and/or other leading personalities speak.  Did they not have a right to come and hear leading personalities and their contributions?  This observation really begs the question being raised here.  The real question is not about freedom, but about whether such a so-called free act supports the New Mysteries or not.   People are free to do whatever they want.  The problem has been that the Society roots itself in Third Epoch hierarchical social forms, which are no longer appropriate for modern humanity.  For anthroposophists to gather in situations where the dominant social form was listening to presumed higher authorities speak, is to live a decadent and atavistic spiritual life.  We must do the work out of ourselves.  Without that effort, we remain the creatures of spiritual inspiration sent from retarded hierarchies.  For details see below.]

We all must trust that by such means (circle wise social interaction), that which we all need to hear will manifest Itself.

For those who may not understand how the above need is rooted in the teachings of Spiritual Science, I will write the following additional material.  For those to whom the above is obvious, the following will be a mere curiosity.

We now live in the Age of the Consciousness Soul, what Steiner called the Fifth post-Atlantean epoch.  This Fifth epoch is the involution (inside out opposite) of the Third post-Atlantean epoch.  The Third epoch's characteristic social form was hierarchical - the Mysteries proceeded out of mystery centers, via the priest-initiate's teachings.  The Fifth epoch's characteristic social form is to be circle-wise, and means that the mysteries must come from the social below upward (or out of the horizontal as against the vertical), - out of the cooperative activity of individual ego's, as they learn themselves to manifest the Consciousness Soul.

This is why some are correct in seeing Steiner as the last great initiate.  Only Christ now is the initiator of those who travel the path of the Consciousness Soul into the future, and the tendency in the Society toward having leading personalities as teachers (the Vorstand and Council members who love to lecture) is a dead and useless remnant of Third epoch social forms.

Keep in mind that Conferences, and Branch and Group meetings are social forms, wherein the point is to meet the I of those gathered.  When the dominate social activity is the listening to lectures, followed by asking the lecturer questions, then the World of Ideas drawn toward the social form is only able to manifest qualities of the Intellectual Soul.  This was true when Steiner lectured, but something he had to accept and work with, since the Consciousness Soul had yet to manifest in any active way.

We only have this dead hierarchical form today because, like all other present-day hierarchical social forms, an unrecognized ahrimanic egregore (7) sits astride our Society.  These egregores are the seed-children of the Spirit of Rome, with its hierarchical social order and legalistic rules.  (8)  They are everywhere today, and the emerging Consciousness Soul is likewise everywhere confronted by this opposition to the individual i-AM's initial expression of the Christ Impulse, whose first forms of manifestation are to be found in the uniting of the soul with the eternal - with the good and the true. (9)

The meeting in Ann  Arbor then is a battle ground between the Consciousness Soul and the ahrimanic egregores inhibiting the ability of the Society to manifest the New Mysteries for the benefit of all humanity. (10)

This healing will not happen however, unless American personalities begin now to insist to the Vorstand, and the Councils in America, that this sun - sun circle-wise social form be the structure of the coming Ann Arbor meeting.  This only happens if the Consciousness Soul recognizes the moral question being expressed by this situation, and chooses to respond to it, out of the own I.  A demand must arise from below upward, which seeks to realize the true spiritual freedom in any social form that is necessary for the appearance of the New Mysteries.

This healing gesture from below will draw downward from luciferic heights, that excessively Euro-centric aspect of the Society which presently is ungrounded in America, and finally seat it firmly on the Earth.  It is only out of a firmly seated Consciousness Soul activity, that the naturally Earth grounded America Spirit will be able to enter into the Society, and add its distinctive egalitarian voice to the whole Earth Michael Community.

The American Spirit is an I centered Consciousness Soul response to world conditions.  It is not just confined to the geographic America (11), but nonetheless needs to assert itself in Ann Arbor, through the heart felt longings of ordinary American anthroposophists.  No one must be an initiate or an adept to share into the circle-wise conversation their yearning questions and deep soul needs.  Yet, it is precisely such questions that will draw to our conscious efforts to bring alive the New Mysteries, via the Reverse Cultus, those Spirits of inspiration that desire to share in our communion - our shared Eucharist of Spirit.

Much fresh insight, that has wanted to appear to us, has been excluded precisely because we fell into the illusion that the New Mysteries were dependent upon a hierarchy of initiates, who were to sit above and teach all those below.  That is a very old and now decadent Way, and it must be set aside if Rudolf Steiner's legacy is to enter fully in service to the needs of humanity at the Dawn of the Third Millennium.  In point of fact, it would be a very great gift were the Vorstand  and Council members to choose to fully stand behind this gesture, pledging their own sacrifice and restraint in order that this long awaited meeting between the Consciousness Soul and the Spirits of inspiration could manifest.

In this way, what was a centric Rite in the Christmas Conference will now find out how to re-appear everywhere on the periphery; and, new content directly related to the deep questions facing all of humanity, will now began to come forth.  But instead of coming from an initiate at the top, it will now come from the Consciousness Soul at the bottom, fully renewing the Anthroposophical Society and Movement from within.

Then this renewed experience of the New Mysteries will find out how to express itself in ever widening circles, so that in all those places, where there is yet only an instinctive sense of the Consciousness Soul, and the meaning of the I in Earth evolution, inspirations of the Spirit will find entrance such that the newly born Community of Humanity will find its true voice as it seeks to face the present crisis of spiritual maturation out of which the whole of the Third Millennium is destined emerge. (12)

Nothing less is at stake here.  Nothing less.

We can also come at the whole situation from an entirely different direction.  Let us consider contemporary events.

At present an American President, whose thinking is rooted in an apocalyptic vision, and whose family background makes him a member of the lords of finance, controls the enormous power of the American Presidency.  This power is used mainly to stand behind the world-rule of the lords of finance. (13)

Allied against these well established world powers is the emerging Consciousness Soul, appearing in what we call Civil Society.  Free moral deeds are struggling to find a way to liberate humanity from the near tyrannical rule of the lords of finance. (14)

Complicating this whole picture is the dominate world view - scientific materialism, which influences deeply the thinking of most of humanity, in spite of the faith of many.  Modern religious beliefs are poor weapons with which to oppose this powerful (and no longer necessary)  tyranny over our minds that is rooted in the Ahrimanic Deception.

Knowledge of the New Mysteries is mostly unavailable, and this includes knowledge of the true nature of the I, of the centrality of Christ in support of the I's course in Earth evolution, and of the present emergence of sources of new knowledge concerning the reality of spiritual aspects to all organic life, human health, our true social nature and much else besides.

The struggle between the rich and the poor is occurring in a context in which knowledge of the spirit is withheld.  The I knows itself not, nor has it a healthy way in which to appreciate its biography or the moral realities of its existence.

Humanity struggles against the Dark, in the dark.  Its need is great.

Rudolf Steiner and the New Mysteries were to reveal to the I the light within.  This did not happen in the Twentieth Century, and these treasures are still largely the possession of those few connected to Spiritual Science. who managed not to succumb to the temptations placed before the Is of the membership of the Society.  The non-anthroposophical world is not the only place where human beings struggle against the Dark, in the dark; and, where the need is great.

If we can accept the humility that comes from realizing that we too share the struggles of yearning humanity - if we can place ourselves on the first step of the Seven Stages of the Passion of Christ - the washing of the feet - we will find from this moral place (15) those questions regarding service, that lets us perceive the true nature of the treasures for which we are the stewards.

To know of Rudolf Steiner, and of the possibilities of the New Mysteries is to be the recipient of a remarkable Grace.  Yet we do not own these treasures, nor are we to be the sole teachers of these truths.  Instead we are to stand with others, in awe of what has been and will be given.  We can in no way stand above suffering humanity, but must bow down before it in shame for the failures of our stewardship in the 20th Century.  For the terrible truth is that the opposing powers succeeded in their goals, as regards the holding back of the anthroposophical impulse, only through us.

We did not take in deeply enough what was offered.  We were told of the doubles, and led to the water of true introspective life (16), but did not pay attention and did not drink.  Unconscious before our personal inner demons, we slept on the treasures, and like the boy in C.S. Lewis's second Narnia book, we became the dragon ourselves.

The opposing forces have no sway in these events without our consent to their temptations.  We failed our teacher, and confession of this fact is where we must begin if we are to have any hope of taking the next steps on the right basis (17).  All of us know this.  Who can say, in looking back over their lives, that they rigorously mastered the epistemological works, then faithfully meditated and did all the exercises Rudolf Steiner offered, or that they took all those social risks connected to always acting morally in the moment (learned of and embraced the first task of the Consciousness Soul - knowledge of the Good).  I certainly cannot.

Again and again we failed to distinguish the essential from the non-essential and spent too much of our time in the pursuit of sterile pleasures (such as the endless reading of lectures), and little time in the exercise of the practices of Spiritual Science.  We read about it, but did not do it.  We leaned on Steiner, but did not offer him the true support of our own willed-thinking.  Yes, there was Karma, and yes we are meant to fail, but these truths do not excuse us from acknowledging the consequences of our defects, and our responsibility.

First then we must confess, and then we must make amends (18).  And this is why we must face each other in circle-wise conversation, with those who were the highest, becoming the lowest.  Those who have been speaking, must fall to their inner knees in listening.   Matthew 23:11 "The highest person among you is to be the servant of you all, so those who exalt themselves will be humbled and those who humble themselves will be exalted." (19)

Only the most profound moral acts will let new life into the Society, and transform it into that which struggling humanity needs - a true place where the New Mysteries can be found, and which when one mets it, one has the sense of coming home, just as the prodigal son is to come home.

No one is to come to anthroposophy feeling that they have to learn much and to study much and to be just like those who lecture and all the time teach.  Each I should find, in meeting Spiritual Science in practice, that such an I brings gifts for which we who welcome them hunger.  Their arriving is to be cause for deep celebration, and we can hardly wait to hear the tales of their journey through life.  What a gift they will be to our circles, with their truths and their questions.  Then, when they are sated from the repast we have offered them, and rested from their journeys, who knows what questions they might ask that any one of us, including them, could answer.

Only in service, can the New Mysteries flower.

This is then the whole point of this letter.  Humanity struggles in the dark against the Dark, and the knowledge of this, while understood instinctively in Civil Society, remains yet hidden precisely because the ahrimanic egregores (seeds of the Spirit of Rome) are hovering over anthroposophical activities, and are not confronted.  Every step taken by anthroposophists, however small, to face the doubles and rediscover the true nature of the New Mysteries, is a step in service to humanity and to the world of Spirit.

The so-called leadership cannot take us on this journey as long as we place our own thinking in a co-dependent relationship with the Vorstand and the various Councils.  Only from the social below can true Fifth Epoch spiritual impulses appear.  Hierarchical social forms can no long manifest what must come out of individual Is via the Consciousness Soul.   The true anthroposophical impulse lies in chains, and will only be freed when we, as individual anthroposophists, take up our freely chosen responsibilities. 

*       *       *

If you find this message to be important, or dangerous (20), please share your views and pass it on to others, with any comments you feel necessary.

In support of those who may wish to offer their personal voices to an effort to organize the meeting in Ann Arbor such that it is sun - sun circle wise, here are the names and e-mail addresses of the Vorstand and the members of the Councils in America.  Non-Americans, who come upon this message, should also feel free to share their views, for the Society, if it is to become healthy, must belong to all; and, what happens in America is therefore the concern of all.

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General Council in America: Joan Almon, General Secretary: joan.almon@verison.net ;  Mari Jo Rogers, General Secretary: marijorogers@anthroposophy.org ; Linda Connell, Western Representative: linconnell@aol.com ; Gayle Davis: galyepd@juno.com ; Terry Howell, Eastern Representative: wthowell@comcast.net ; Lori Barian: lbarian@myexcel.com ;

Eastern Regional Council in America: Terry Howell: terry.howell@elinc.com ; Herbert O. Hagens: hohagens@aol.com ; Edward Scherer: edward.scherer@ny.frb.org or
emschere@optonline.net
 
Central Regional Council in America: Robert Karp: robert@practicalfarmers.org ; S. Bart Eddy: barteddy@hotmail.com ;  Margaret Runyon: m-runyon@msn.com ; Michael Holdrege: mholdrege@hotmail.com ; Lori Barian: lbarian@myexcel.com ;

Western Regional Council in America:  Linda Connell: linconnell@aol.com ; Joan Treadaway:
joanaway@msn.com ;  Elizabeth Wieting: (at the Goetheanum) ; Bruce Laurelin: brucelaurelin@yahoo.com ; Bill Camp: bcamp22@aol.com ;

The Collegium of the Goetheanum (the Vorstand and company) Werner Barfod, Nikolai Fuchs, Bodo von Plato, Cornelius Pietzner, Georg Glöckler, Christof Wiechert, Michaela Glöckler, Paul Mackay, Elisabeth Wirsching, Martina Maria Sam, Virginia Sease, Heinz Zimmermann, Johannes Kühl, Sergei Prokofieff and Elizabeth Wieting of the Western Regional Council seem to be available at:  Goetheanum Rüttiweg 45 CH-4143 Dornach 1 Tel. +41 (0)61 706 42 42
Fax +41 (0)61 706 43 14, or e-mail: sekretariat@goetheanum.ch           

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At the same time, and even perhaps more necessary, those who would have us remain a Third Epoch hierarchical social form, should also express their views and their reasoning.  I can be contacted at: hermit@tiac.net.

*       *       *

(1) See the Jarna lectures of Jesaiah Ben-Aharon in late Feb. of 2004, notes of which can be found on line at: http://www.antroposofi.org/benaharon0204.html

(2) See Irina Gordienko's book: Sergei O. Prokofieff: Myth and Reality.  The problem is not just what is in this remarkable book, but more in the fact that it has not been taken seriously.  It has asked very hard questions - questions that must be faced and settled.  That the Vorstand has not led an open and honest effort to face these questions reveals a fatal flaw in their processes of deliberation.  If the Center cannot hold, then the Periphery will have to act.

(2a) For those unfamiliar with this issue, let me provide some background.  Irina Gordienko is a Russian born and trained mathematician and anthroposophist (now deceased), who discovered that the works of S. O. Prokofieff had diverged significantly from the teachings of Rudolf Steiner. Her book is not only a detailed illumination of these divergences, but a clear discussion of how this happened and what it signifies for the Society that so many have uncritically accepted these alterations of the basic teachings of Spiritual Science.

(3) This is a complex Idea - the American Spirit.  It has not been well studied or articulated in anthroposophical circles.  Hints can be found in this open letter, and as well in the essay American Culture - a first look: http://ipwebdev.com/hermit/americanculture.html

(4) The East will have to find its own true voice, and decide itself how it wishes to participate in the coming harmony of voices seeking expression from all over the world.

(5) See my essay: Concerning the Renewal of Anthroposophy: rediscovering the true meaning of the New Mysteries, at: http://ipwebdev.com/hermit/concerning.html

(6) The asking of questions of leading personalities is an invitation to spiritual co-dependence.  Questions should come forward, but they need to be addressed to the whole circle. 

(7) An egregore is a human created demonic-like entity, which functions as a psychic parasite within the groups (or individuals) it "rides" (drug addicts know this as "the monkey on my back"). They are part of the Double complex all human beings share, and all modern social institutions have them, even the Anthroposophical Society.

(8) The battle over the Constitution which took place, mostly in Europe in the last years, is a social phenomena revealing this struggle between the Spirit of Rome and the Consciousness Soul.  To the extent that both sides saw spiritual value in the "changing of the rules", both sides succumbed to this egregorial spirit.  See my essay on The Law and the Spirit, at: http://ipwebdev.com/hermit/lawspirit.html, and see also Steiner's lectures published under the title The Challenge of the Times.

(9) See Steiner's Theosophy

(10) See note (5) above.

(11) See note (3) above.

(12) See my book: the Way of the Fool: Christian Enlightenment (initiation) and the Future of Christianity - some thoughts on the nature of human becoming (the evolution of consciousness) and the wise relationship of moral grace, freedom and love, which can be found on-line at: http://ipwebdev.com/hermit/twotf.html

(13) See Jesaiah Ben-Aharon's: Americas Global Responsibility - individuation, initiation and threefolding.

(14) See my essay: Civil Society - its potential and its mystery, at:  http://ipwebdev.com/hermit/civil.html

(15) Recall Steiner's advice in Knowledge of Higher Worlds - How to attain it, that for each step forward in inner development, one had to take three steps forward in moral development,

(16) The epistemological works: Truth and Knowledge; A Theory of Knowledge Implicit in Goethe's World Conception; and, The Philosophy of Freedom.  A symptom of the problem can be found in a Course booklet put out by the Rudolf Steiner Institute, where a summer 2005 course is offered with the following title: Meditation: the Core of Anthroposophy.  This is a deep error, for the Core of Anthroposophy is not found in Meditation, but rather in the introspection that comes from the study of the science of knowing elaborated in the epistemological works.

(17) See Ben-Aharon's The Spiritual Event of the Twentieth Century.

(18) Great wisdom lies in the open in the Twelve Steps of Alcoholics Anonymous - see my book referenced in note (12). 

(19)  My practice, wherever possible, is to quote from The Unvarnished Gospels, a rendering directly from the original Greek into ordinary English, whose virtue is that it lacks the
subsequent encrustations of interpretation made necessarily in order to make the Gospels consistent with later invented dogmas.  For example, the concept of sin nowhere appears in the Greek, which uses a word from archery, about missing the mark or making a mistake.

(20) See my essay Dangerous Anthroposophy, at http://ipwebdev.com/hermit/dangerous.html  about how the truth is dangerous to social forces rooted in impulses to conformity and full or semi- unconsciousness.

(21) Addendum note (now that the Being Awake conference material has been mailed and received).  Those who have received these conference materials can refer to them, or if not it can be accessed at: http://www.anthroposophy.org/Events/STD/ .  As expected, the dominant social process will be six lectures, somehow to be delivered by 12 people (two for each theme?).  Only in the closing Plenum, which is given one hour and 15 minutes for sun - sun encounter, do those coming meet together (except for casual conversation in between sessions).  Who knows what the "workshops" will involve, but (and lets be honest) they will probably tend to be sun - moon.  The total sun - moon time (the six "lectures")  will be about 12 hours.  This means that during the conference, the only time the New Mysteries will be practiced (sun - sun Reverse Cultus conversation), will possibly be during the plenum and maybe during one or two workshops, with the dominate social mystery gesture being lectures - that is atavistic Third Epoch hierarchically structured top down instruction, instead of Consciousness Soul, bottom up (from the social - horizontal) Fifth Epoch I meeting I encounters.  This means that those creating the conference are not themselves awake, so how can they possible lead a conference on Being Awake?

How does this come about?  Because the leadership does not practice the Philosophy of Freedom, and therefore does not understand how to support the development of spiritual freedom in others.