Observation, logic, folklore and presuppositions

[Cleric K]

So we can appreciate that Steiner is very emphatic that he can explain with his clairvoyance why red is the cause for the bull's wild reactions. And he can also use his clairvoyance to assure us that white skin can not appear when the Christ Impulse is being rejected. Both are claims that all of us can approach with our own experiences. Or not. We can also pop away into justifications for why Steiner's bull comments were really about X and Y and his comments about non-white skin don't really imply that this must wait for another 1,500 years.

The ways he could be shortsighted and the ways his clairvoyance could be applied to his wrong assumptions (red/bulls or skin color/Christ) are very worthwhile subjects of contemplation and mediation. And worthwhile conversations amongst his students who might think there are other emerging Anthroposophical paths. Over the last ten years these alternative students have been slowly but steadily growing in really interesting ways. Of course there will always be a stream that defends him as being only misuderstood or treated with ill-will. But when you love and respect Steiner you sort of know it. You can't make a person from another very different stream 'feel' or 'know' it. But one possible sign of maturity is if you can see that even a stream you have serious concerns about is acting from an honest place within their hearts. I see the old and original stream as being very very earnest and trying their best to preserve what they think is being damaged. And that's a true impulse. And important.

First I would like to thank FB for sending me the above quoted lectures months ago.

As it may be imagined, even at the time of Steiner, it was impossible to speak of certain topics without someone being offended. After the lecture which FB quoted, understandably people began whispering and talking. These things, of course, reached Steiner so he was forced to address the issues again. I'll provide here the beginning of the next lecture (after the one FB quoted) and hopefully see in wider context what things are really about.

Stuttgart, 14th February, 1915

I can easily imagine that someone may have drawn the conclusion from yesterday’s lecture that those people who belong to the national groups are only to receive their special mission in the sixth culture-epoch - because, as we saw yesterday, they belong to a time in which evolution takes a descending line, - are of less account than those who belong to groups in an ascending evolution. I repeat - I can easily conceive of someone's drawing this conclusion. In other words: I can easily imagine that from certain statements made yesterday someone draws conclusions as to values, impelled to do so through all sorts of emotions and feelings. This would be an example of just what I pointed out, namely, that what was especially said about these things at one place must be misunderstood in other places. Not that it is coloured in any way to suit a special place or people, but because it is not understood with the necessary objectivity, but with strong feelings and all sorts of national aspirations. Someone might then say that I had only used words to flatter Central European culture and that they who belonged to the Eastern European culture felt themselves deeply injured by what had been said. Well, my dear friends, if such a judgment is formed it only shows the entry of something that I discussed yesterday. I sought yesterday to point out how purely theoretical, abstract thinking must be transformed into direct experience, how what has formerly been only a matter of knowledge must be imbued with feeling and real experience. If someone were to form the judgment that has just been indicated he would only be judging theoretically, abstractly. For how would a concrete, living judgment sound in such a case? It would recognise that if what had been explained was true, then we were approaching a time when those who want to follow the advance of civilisation must no longer merge in merely national life. The peculiarity of the fifth cultural epoch was such as allowed of the fact that its members merged into a national feeling and again personally struggled out of it. The sixth and seventh culture-epochs will be of such a nature that those who wish to be merely national will lag behind the tasks of humanity. But this is just the reason for presenting the world­ conception of spiritual science, namely, that humanity struggles out of merely national feeling, out of what is not common human feeling. The conclusion to be drawn, therefore, from yesterday’s remarks is something quite, quite different. It is that the Central European national cultures have impulses in them that coincide with the great mission of the post-Atlantean culture, but that then cultures come which make it necessary for men to grow out of national impulses. And that it does not do for those who are the vanguard of later cultures to merge completely in their national experience, even in an exaggerated way, as is the case with the population of Eastern Europe. In other words: since this living in their nation shows that they have not yet comprehended their mission, they are directed to take into them­selves what has been created as spiritual science, and so grow out beyond the national. Living understanding is also necessary there.

At the present time, however, so beset with passion and prejudice, one will have difficulty in finding what is necessary in order that men can take their full stand on the ground of spiritual science and its striving for true objectivity, for the purely human. We pursue spiritual science precisely in order to spread something over the whole earth that transcends all differences. Those therefore who come from all nations to spiritual science should be able to gain an objective understanding for the things set forth in the Lecture-cycle "The Mission of Folk Souls"; it should be studied by all anthroposophists. It has a special significance, too, for it was given years before this war (World War I) and cannot therefore be accused of originating from the atmosphere of this war. The point is not that what has been said in various places did not contain generally valid truths, the point is that one must comprehend that these truths are not tolerated everywhere. When I spoke here some months ago I pointed out that it is more or less easy for us in Central Europe to be objective, easier than for others. Why it is easier for us is set forth in that Lecture-cycle. All the deeper teachings received from our grave events show us that something must develop from all the various substrata of our present civilisation throughout the world that coincides with the aims of our spiritual science. In a certain respect one can say that these earnest events are a powerful pointer to the necessity of spiritual science in the world. They prove that this life of spiritual science must come. Naturally, therefore, the immediate feelings of a place can only be of secondary importance for us; our actual task is to bring into our soul-experience something that can be understood everywhere without causing offence, although there is prejudice in so many fields.

What we learn from spiritual science about the universally human in man is also a preparation for an objective view of all the conditions in which we are placed through earthly evolution. For the conditions in which we are placed is the soil, as it were, out of which we grow, and what brings about our growth are the impulses we receive through spiritual science. As a matter of fact we live in these differentiations extended over the earth with only half of our being, with our- physical and etheric bodies. We leave these behind on the earth when we enter another condition of consciousness that we can describe as sleep. With the ego and astral body we are then in the world which man otherwise enters when he goes through the portal of death, in the world where all earthly differentiations cease, in the world into which spiritual science teachings are to introduce us. Initiation knowledge protects us from giving any special preference to one or other of the Folk Spirits.

Even if we don't understand everything written, even if we don't find Steiner very agreeable, I believe that anyone who reads without prejudice can feel that the striving has always been towards the human universal. And actually this is also the reason why these things are rejected. Because tribes, social movements seek the universal only abstractly. They seek it in order to justify the fundamental difference of national feelings, racial feelings, gender feelings and so on. In other words they start with fundamental division and then try to build a kind of purely abstract conduct of tolerance.

It is very indicative that in the above quote it is mentioned that we're dual beings - with our physical and etheric bodies we belong to the world order, where we belong to a race, nation, family. With our more spiritual part we belong to a higher order where we are outside the worldly divisions.

In the other thread FB said that notions of etheric, astral body and so on are antiquated. He seeks something different which practically should explain away all these things as mere artifacts of imperfect perception. I hope those that are able to lift themselves from prejudice and least for a minute, can see how it is precisely this purely abstract intellectual attitude which flattens all spiritual depth and practically ensures that nothing can ever be solved. And this is so clear. FB awaits for something to happen in the world, something which should unveil the truth in a more perfect way but he doesn't even conceive as a possibility that penetrating the depth behind thinking, which leads to Imagination, Inspiration and Intuition, may have anything to do with it. Actually he expects new kind of knowledge, which will explain higher cognition as distorted visions. It's the same thing Eugene does. He said that he believes there's spirit time-depth behind our "I"/eye but he doesn't believe that it is anywhere near of the character that SS speaks of. So what do we do? Nothing. We just sit and wait in our abstract bubble for the next messiah to come and rescue us. Well, the messiah has already done what was needed - it's now our part. And even if he were to come again, those who wait for him will most likely crucify him when they hear a teaching that is hard to bear.

Without true depth-understanding of the human being we can never understand that there are two natures within ourselves which are sometimes opposed to one another. One is which belongs and identifies with the national, racial, cultural, religious feelings. The other is which seeks the human universal - the Spirit, which alone can bring the moral integrity needed for lifting above the forces that put souls within the layers of conditioning into opposition.

We must realize that every one of us is submerged in different degree in these layers. When it's said that the ascending line of evolution in such and such epoch is carried by such and such culture this is not to cause separation. Steiner makes it perfectly clear above. Whoever feels offended, simply identifies with the lower nature - with that which belongs to race, culture, nation. Whoever finds the spirit in him that thinks, no longer identifies with these layers but sees in them fertile soil which must be worked upon. So let that be clear. Those who rebel the most when it's said that the Christ impulse will be adopted only gradually in humanity and see that as a kind of discrimination, will be the first to reject that impulse when they understand what it is really about. At no point in history something new has been adopted overnight by the whole world. This is simply not how things work in evolution. It's an objective fact. The problem is that we're now at a point where we can be fully conscious of these processes, we must understand them. Thus we must understand that not everyone will embrace the impulse of freedom. But the key point is that this impulse will be rejected because of antipathy and not because they want it but Steiner has said that they're not eligible.

Let me put it thus: it's not possible that one could say "I want to seek my higher nature but those and those say that because of my skin color or my nation, or my background, I'm ineligible to do so". This is nonsense. There's nothing which stands between us and our higher being except we ourselves. Those who won't seek their higher nature won't do it simply because they don't want to. Either they will say it is impossible (all thinking is conditioned and there's no such thing as thinking spirit). Or they'll have their own interests which simply don't coincide with the idea of human universal. Or they believe that from the level of the spiritual world, souls come in fundamentally different 'interest groups' and as such would reject the human universal. We see, there are many different reasons why people will reject to deepen their self-knowledge and none of them have anything to do with "I want it very much but I'm not eligible".

[Lou Gold]

So we can appreciate that Steiner is very emphatic that he can explain with his clairvoyance why red is the cause for the bull's wild reactions. And he can also use his clairvoyance to assure us that white skin can not appear when the Christ Impulse is being rejected. Both are claims that all of us can approach with our own experiences. Or not. We can also pop away into justifications for why Steiner's bull comments were really about X and Y and his comments about non-white skin don't really imply that this must wait for another 1,500 years.

The ways he could be shortsighted and the ways his clairvoyance could be applied to his wrong assumptions (red/bulls or skin color/Christ) are very worthwhile subjects of contemplation and mediation. And worthwhile conversations amongst his students who might think there are other emerging Anthroposophical paths. Over the last ten years these alternative students have been slowly but steadily growing in really interesting ways. Of course there will always be a stream that defends him as being only misuderstood or treated with ill-will. But when you love and respect Steiner you sort of know it. You can't make a person from another very different stream 'feel' or 'know' it. But one possible sign of maturity is if you can see that even a stream you have serious concerns about is acting from an honest place within their hearts. I see the old and original stream as being very very earnest and trying their best to preserve what they think is being damaged. And that's a true impulse. And important.

First I would like to thank FB for sending me the above quoted lectures months ago.

As it may be imagined, even at the time of Steiner, it was impossible to speak of certain topics without someone being offended. After the lecture which FB quoted, understandably people began whispering and talking. These things, of course, reached Steiner so he was forced to address the issues again. I'll provide here the beginning of the next lecture (after the one FB quoted) and hopefully see in wider context what things are really about.

Stuttgart, 14th February, 1915

I can easily imagine that someone may have drawn the conclusion from yesterday’s lecture that those people who belong to the national groups are only to receive their special mission in the sixth culture-epoch - because, as we saw yesterday, they belong to a time in which evolution takes a descending line, - are of less account than those who belong to groups in an ascending evolution. I repeat - I can easily conceive of someone's drawing this conclusion. In other words: I can easily imagine that from certain statements made yesterday someone draws conclusions as to values, impelled to do so through all sorts of emotions and feelings. This would be an example of just what I pointed out, namely, that what was especially said about these things at one place must be misunderstood in other places. Not that it is coloured in any way to suit a special place or people, but because it is not understood with the necessary objectivity, but with strong feelings and all sorts of national aspirations. Someone might then say that I had only used words to flatter Central European culture and that they who belonged to the Eastern European culture felt themselves deeply injured by what had been said. Well, my dear friends, if such a judgment is formed it only shows the entry of something that I discussed yesterday. I sought yesterday to point out how purely theoretical, abstract thinking must be transformed into direct experience, how what has formerly been only a matter of knowledge must be imbued with feeling and real experience. If someone were to form the judgment that has just been indicated he would only be judging theoretically, abstractly. For how would a concrete, living judgment sound in such a case? It would recognise that if what had been explained was true, then we were approaching a time when those who want to follow the advance of civilisation must no longer merge in merely national life. The peculiarity of the fifth cultural epoch was such as allowed of the fact that its members merged into a national feeling and again personally struggled out of it. The sixth and seventh culture-epochs will be of such a nature that those who wish to be merely national will lag behind the tasks of humanity. But this is just the reason for presenting the world­ conception of spiritual science, namely, that humanity struggles out of merely national feeling, out of what is not common human feeling. The conclusion to be drawn, therefore, from yesterday’s remarks is something quite, quite different. It is that the Central European national cultures have impulses in them that coincide with the great mission of the post-Atlantean culture, but that then cultures come which make it necessary for men to grow out of national impulses. And that it does not do for those who are the vanguard of later cultures to merge completely in their national experience, even in an exaggerated way, as is the case with the population of Eastern Europe. In other words: since this living in their nation shows that they have not yet comprehended their mission, they are directed to take into them­selves what has been created as spiritual science, and so grow out beyond the national. Living understanding is also necessary there.

At the present time, however, so beset with passion and prejudice, one will have difficulty in finding what is necessary in order that men can take their full stand on the ground of spiritual science and its striving for true objectivity, for the purely human. We pursue spiritual science precisely in order to spread something over the whole earth that transcends all differences. Those therefore who come from all nations to spiritual science should be able to gain an objective understanding for the things set forth in the Lecture-cycle "The Mission of Folk Souls"; it should be studied by all anthroposophists. It has a special significance, too, for it was given years before this war (World War I) and cannot therefore be accused of originating from the atmosphere of this war. The point is not that what has been said in various places did not contain generally valid truths, the point is that one must comprehend that these truths are not tolerated everywhere. When I spoke here some months ago I pointed out that it is more or less easy for us in Central Europe to be objective, easier than for others. Why it is easier for us is set forth in that Lecture-cycle. All the deeper teachings received from our grave events show us that something must develop from all the various substrata of our present civilisation throughout the world that coincides with the aims of our spiritual science. In a certain respect one can say that these earnest events are a powerful pointer to the necessity of spiritual science in the world. They prove that this life of spiritual science must come. Naturally, therefore, the immediate feelings of a place can only be of secondary importance for us; our actual task is to bring into our soul-experience something that can be understood everywhere without causing offence, although there is prejudice in so many fields.

What we learn from spiritual science about the universally human in man is also a preparation for an objective view of all the conditions in which we are placed through earthly evolution. For the conditions in which we are placed is the soil, as it were, out of which we grow, and what brings about our growth are the impulses we receive through spiritual science. As a matter of fact we live in these differentiations extended over the earth with only half of our being, with our- physical and etheric bodies. We leave these behind on the earth when we enter another condition of consciousness that we can describe as sleep. With the ego and astral body we are then in the world which man otherwise enters when he goes through the portal of death, in the world where all earthly differentiations cease, in the world into which spiritual science teachings are to introduce us. Initiation knowledge protects us from giving any special preference to one or other of the Folk Spirits.

Even if we don't understand everything written, even if we don't find Steiner very agreeable, I believe that anyone who reads without prejudice can feel that the striving has always been towards the human universal. And actually this is also the reason why these things are rejected. Because tribes, social movements seek the universal only abstractly. They seek it in order to justify the fundamental difference of national feelings, racial feelings, gender feelings and so on. In other words they start with fundamental division and then try to build a kind of purely abstract conduct of tolerance.

It is very indicative that in the above quote it is mentioned that we're dual beings - with our physical and etheric bodies we belong to the world order, where we belong to a race, nation, family. With our more spiritual part we belong to a higher order where we are outside the worldly divisions.

In the other thread FB said that notions of etheric, astral body and so on are antiquated. He seeks something different which practically should explain away all these things as mere artifacts of imperfect perception. I hope those that are able to lift themselves from prejudice and least for a minute, can see how it is precisely this purely abstract intellectual attitude which flattens all spiritual depth and practically ensures that nothing can ever be solved. And this is so clear. FB awaits for something to happen in the world, something which should unveil the truth in a more perfect way but he doesn't even conceive as a possibility that penetrating the depth behind thinking, which leads to Imagination, Inspiration and Intuition, may have anything to do with it. Actually he expects new kind of knowledge, which will explain higher cognition as distorted visions. It's the same thing Eugene does. He said that he believes there's spirit time-depth behind our "I"/eye but he doesn't believe that it is anywhere near of the character that SS speaks of. So what do we do? Nothing. We just sit and wait in our abstract bubble for the next messiah to come and rescue us. Well, the messiah has already done what was needed - it's now our part. And even if he were to come again, those who wait for him will most likely crucify him when they hear a teaching that is hard to bear.

Without true depth-understanding of the human being we can never understand that there are two natures within ourselves which are sometimes opposed to one another. One is which belongs and identifies with the national, racial, cultural, religious feelings. The other is which seeks the human universal - the Spirit, which alone can bring the moral integrity needed for lifting above the forces that put souls within the layers of conditioning into opposition.

We must realize that every one of us is submerged in different degree in these layers. When it's said that the ascending line of evolution in such and such epoch is carried by such and such culture this is not to cause separation. Steiner makes it perfectly clear above. Whoever feels offended, simply identifies with the lower nature - with that which belongs to race, culture, nation. Whoever finds the spirit in him that thinks, no longer identifies with these layers but sees in them fertile soil which must be worked upon. So let that be clear. Those who rebel the most when it's said that the Christ impulse will be adopted only gradually in humanity and see that as a kind of discrimination, will be the first to reject that impulse when they understand what it is really about. At no point in history something new has been adopted overnight by the whole world. This is simply not how things work in evolution. It's an objective fact. The problem is that we're now at a point where we can be fully conscious of these processes, we must understand them. Thus we must understand that not everyone will embrace the impulse of freedom. But the key point is that this impulse will be rejected because of antipathy and not because they want it but Steiner has said that they're not eligible.

Let me put it thus: it's not possible that one could say "I want to seek my higher nature but those and those say that because of my skin color or my nation, or my background, I'm ineligible to do so". This is nonsense. There's nothing which stands between us and our higher being except we ourselves. Those who won't seek their higher nature won't do it simply because they don't want to. Either they will say it is impossible (all thinking is conditioned and there's no such thing as thinking spirit). Or they'll have their own interests which simply don't coincide with the idea of human universal. Or they believe that from the level of the spiritual world, souls come in fundamentally different 'interest groups' and as such would reject the human universal. We see, there are many different reasons why people will reject to deepen their self-knowledge and none of them have anything to do with "I want it very much but I'm not eligible".

In the simple literal approach of the Lakota it is Mitakuye Oyasin or We are all Relatives.

And in a Santo Daime hymn it is expressed as:

We Are All Equal

So I want to be
And forever I want to be
Right next to my Master
Learning to love

So I want to be
And forever I want to be
Right next to my Master
Learning to love

Loving my brothers and forgiving
Loving my brothers and not judging

To live in this world
With pleasure and joy
It is necessary to understand
Humanity is a family

To live in this world
With pleasure and joy
It is necessary to understand
Humanity is a family

We are all equal before the Holy Light
The Light that comes from the heart of King Jesus

The Key of Harmony
It is in our hands
It is to live the day to day
With Love in the heart

The Key of Harmony
It is in our hands
It is to live the day to day
With Love in the heart

Only unity can bring Peace
The Holy Peace of Love that comes from our Father

But, yes, one can practice that one and the Father are separate or that one and the Father are in union and this is the difference that makes the difference. As you say, There's nothing which stands between us and our higher being except we ourselves. And as Pogo has said, without a bunch of words...



Practice is the way it is along all the paths of evolution and it is important to point out whenever the talk does not promote union.

[AshvinP]

So we can appreciate that Steiner is very emphatic that he can explain with his clairvoyance why red is the cause for the bull's wild reactions. And he can also use his clairvoyance to assure us that white skin can not appear when the Christ Impulse is being rejected. Both are claims that all of us can approach with our own experiences. Or not. We can also pop away into justifications for why Steiner's bull comments were really about X and Y and his comments about non-white skin don't really imply that this must wait for another 1,500 years.

The ways he could be shortsighted and the ways his clairvoyance could be applied to his wrong assumptions (red/bulls or skin color/Christ) are very worthwhile subjects of contemplation and mediation. And worthwhile conversations amongst his students who might think there are other emerging Anthroposophical paths. Over the last ten years these alternative students have been slowly but steadily growing in really interesting ways. Of course there will always be a stream that defends him as being only misuderstood or treated with ill-will. But when you love and respect Steiner you sort of know it. You can't make a person from another very different stream 'feel' or 'know' it. But one possible sign of maturity is if you can see that even a stream you have serious concerns about is acting from an honest place within their hearts. I see the old and original stream as being very very earnest and trying their best to preserve what they think is being damaged. And that's a true impulse. And important.

First I would like to thank FB for sending me the above quoted lectures months ago.

As it may be imagined, even at the time of Steiner, it was impossible to speak of certain topics without someone being offended. After the lecture which FB quoted, understandably people began whispering and talking. These things, of course, reached Steiner so he was forced to address the issues again. I'll provide here the beginning of the next lecture (after the one FB quoted) and hopefully see in wider context what things are really about.

Yeah, but... if my friend eventually said he heard whispers about how others had misunderstood him, and gave another lecture clarifying exactly what he thinks and where the misunderstanding arose, I'd still be interested if he could help me understand both how he failed to perfectly convey his thoughts in the first lecture and I'd then love to also know what his experience was like when he gave the first lecture, how was he seeing the audience and their facial expressons when he spoke these things. I would tell my friend it's ok because we are all humans and to err is human, but then I'd start wondering if everything my friend has ever thought or said that I disagree with or I don't like should be cast in doubt and eventually discarded.

[Soul_of_Shu]

Yeah, but... if my friend eventually said he heard whispers about how others had misunderstood him, and gave another lecture clarifying exactly what he thinks and where the misunderstanding arose, I'd still be interested if he could help me understand both how he failed to perfectly convey his thoughts in the first lecture and I'd then love to also know what his experience was like when he gave the first lecture, how was he seeing the audience and their facial expressons when he spoke these things. I would tell my friend it's ok because we are all humans and to err is human, but then I'd start wondering if everything my friend has ever thought or said that I disagree with or I don't like should be cast in doubt and eventually discarded.

Now I'm sure there's an echo in Here .. Here .. Here .. Here ...

[findingblanks]

Anyway, I personally don't think red causes a bull to go wild and I think there are reasons that Rudolf Steiner did believe that. I also believe that when he applied his clairvoyance to discover why red causes a bull to go wild, he honestly did perceive the dynamics he describes and those were distorted by some of the filters that caused him to make the cognitive errors in the first place.

I also think that Rudolf Steiner was wrong about non-white skin not incorporating the Christ impulse for another 1,500 years. I think he was wrong about white humanity's so-called mission. I think he was wrong that the Earth's destinty will require white humanity to 'impregnate' non-white people with The Christ.

And yet I don't think he was racist and I don't think his errors (from the bulls to non-white people) are simply delusions.

And, what's might be most surprising: Steiner is more than happy to have students exploring his lens, his errors, and all the ways Anthroposophy will be adapting as it attempts to incarnate in more and more appropriate and accurate ways. Nothing 'wrong' as happened. This is life.

And I'm more than happy that there might always be a stream of Anthroposophists who believe that he is only ever being misunderstood when people point to other observations that refute some of his claims. That is natural.

[Soul_of_Shu]

For what it's worth, here are the links that Eugene felt were so important to bring to everyone's attention, assuming they have not been informed of similar opinions before.

After I decided to leave the forum I felt that people sympathising with anthroposophy should also be informed about its racist views so that their choice to subscribe to anthroposophy would be fully informed. Below are the links to the two academic papers in my topic that was deleted exposing the Steiner's racist views:
Anthroposophy and Ecofascism | Institute for Social Ecology (social-ecology.org)
Race and Redemption: Racial and Ethnic Evolution in Rudolf Steiner's Anthroposophy (marquette.edu)

The only thing I now ask you is not to delete this current thread. I will not be participating in the forum anymore since there is nothing else I can add to the topic.

[Cleric K]

For what it's worth, here are the links that Eugene felt were so important to bring to everyone's attention, assuming they have not been informed of similar opinions before.

After I decided to leave the forum I felt that people sympathising with anthroposophy should also be informed about its racist views so that their choice to subscribe to anthroposophy would be fully informed. Below are the links to the two academic papers in my topic that was deleted exposing the Steiner's racist views:
Anthroposophy and Ecofascism | Institute for Social Ecology (social-ecology.org)
Race and Redemption: Racial and Ethnic Evolution in Rudolf Steiner's Anthroposophy (marquette.edu)

The only thing I now ask you is not to delete this current thread. I will not be participating in the forum anymore since there is nothing else I can add to the topic.

Eugene, would you like to discuss anything about these topics or you simply wanted the 'truth' not to be censored?

[AshvinP]

Anyway...

"...I am just going to ignore everything that Cleric wrote in response so I can retain my dogmatic beliefs about Anthroposophy".

Can we at least be honest that is what you are doing? Just like Eugene, Justin, and Jim. I don't need to speculate on a conspiracy to explain this, because it is perfectly explainable by the fact that 4 people refuse to consider and discover their own Thinking as an integrating spiritual activity co-creating the phenomenal world, under any circumstances, due to the great responsibility - especially the responsibility for humility and truth-seeking - which would be laid at their feet if they ever chose to do so.

As it has been brought to my attention that Eugene is now messaging other forum members with his cult-warning nonsense, after he's got his knickers in a knot about being put into pre-moderation mode, and trying to post yet another rant about Steiner being tantamount to a racist nazi, which I disallowed, as it's a topic blatantly intended to provoke another shit-storm with Ashvin, that has already been done to death before in the forum, to no avail, and only serves to perpetuate more antagonism, counterproductive to any genuine dialogos. Alas, as he is now trying to undermine my credibility as the moderator, emailing BK with his woke-mode whining, I'm now asking if there should be a vote of confidence about how I'm moderating the forum? Please feel free to speak frankly, as I assure you it will not be taken as a reason to make me less respectful of anyone here.

I've had no problem with your moderation. I ignore the Steiner threads anyway since it is more of a cult than a philosophy or science so I missed most of the controversy anyway. I would think racism would be fair topic to consider for any view if it is structurally built into the view. I have enough reasons to ignore anthroposophy already to bother consider whether it is not just crackpot but also racist.

True... so let's see how racism is structurally built into your physicalist view.

According to Jim (not the tv sitcom): The races today reflect rigid physical chracteristics which have evolved over millions of years. They are passed on from generation to generation through genes. The ingroup-outgroup dualist mentality that we clearly see across racial (and ethnic, national, gender, etc.) lines is also a reflection of these evolved physical processes in the brain and will continue indefinitely, no matter how much effort people choose to put into their attempts to transcend these divisions. We can implement social policies to rearrange some deck chairs on the Titanic so we feel morally better about ourselves before it submerges completely, but hoping for anything more than that is cult-like religious superstition.

Now let's compare to Steiner's philosophy of Thinking as spiritual activity:

THE view that man is destined to become a complete, self-contained, free individuality seems to be contested by the fact that he makes his appearance as a member of a naturally given totality (race, people, nation, family, male or female sex) and also works within a totality (state, church, and so on). He bears the general characteristics of the group to which he belongs, and he gives to his actions a content that is determined by the position he occupies among many others.

This being so, is individuality possible at all? Can we regard man as a totality in himself, seeing that he grows out of one totality and integrates himself into another?

Each member of a totality is determined, as regards its characteristics and functions, by the whole totality. A racial group is a totality and all the people belonging to it bear the characteristic features that are inherent in the nature of the group. How the single member is constituted, and how he will behave, are determined by the character of the racial group. Therefore the physiognomy and conduct of the individual have something generic about them. If we ask why some particular thing about a man is like this or like that, we are referred back from the individual to the genus. The genus explains why something in the individual appears in the form we observe.

Man, however, makes himself free from what is generic. For the generic features of the human race, when rightly understood, do not restrict man's freedom, and should not artificially be made to do so. A man develops qualities and activities of his own, and the basis for these we can seek only in the man himself. What is generic in him serves only as a medium in which to express his own individual being. He uses as a foundation the characteristics that nature has given him, and to these he gives a form appropriate to his own being. If we seek in the generic laws the reasons for an expression of this being, we seek in vain. We are concerned with something purely individual which can be explained only in terms of itself. If a man has achieved this emancipation from all that is generic, and we are nevertheless determined to explain everything about him in generic terms, then we have no sense for what is individual.

It is impossible to understand a human being completely if one takes the concept of genus as the basis of one's judgment. The tendency to judge according to the genus is at its most stubborn where we are concerned with differences of sex. Almost invariably man sees in woman, and woman in man, too much of the general character of the other sex and too little of what is individual. In practical life this does less harm to men than to women. The social position of women is for the most part such an unworthy one because in so many respects it is determined not as it should be by the particular characteristics of the individual woman, but by the general picture one has of woman's natural tasks and needs. A man's activity in life is governed by his individual capacities and inclinations, whereas a woman's is supposed to be determined solely by the mere fact that she is a woman. She is supposed to be a slave to what is generic, to womanhood in general. As long as men continue to debate whether a woman is suited to this or that profession “according to her natural disposition”, the so-called woman's question cannot advance beyond its most elementary stage. What a woman, within her natural limitations, wants to become had better be left to the woman herself to decide. If it is true that women are suited only to that profession which is theirs at present, then they will hardly have it in them to attain any other. But they must be allowed to decide for themselves what is in accordance with their nature. To all who fear an upheaval of our social structure through accepting women as individuals and not as females, we must reply that a social structure in which the status of one half of humanity is unworthy of a human being is itself in great need of improvement. (see fn 1)

Anyone who judges people according to generic characters gets only as far as the frontier where people begin to be beings whose activity is based on free self-determination. Whatever lies short of this frontier may naturally become matter for academic study. The characteristics of race, people, nation and sex are the subject matter of special branches of study. Only men who wish to live as nothing more than examples of the genus could possibly conform to a general picture such as arises from academic study of this kind. But none of these branches of study are able to advance as far as the unique content of the single individual. Determining the individual according to the laws of his genus ceases where the sphere of freedom (in thinking and acting) begins. The conceptual content which man has to connect with the percept by an act of thinking in order to have the full reality (see Chapter 5 ff.) cannot be fixed once and for all and bequeathed ready-made to mankind. The individual must get his concepts through his own intuition. How the individual has to think cannot possibly be deduced from any kind of generic concept. It depends simply and solely on the individual. Just as little is it possible to determine from the general characteristics of man what concrete aims the individual may choose to set himself. If we would understand the single individual we must find our way into his own particular being and not stop short at those characteristics that are typical. In this sense every single human being is a separate problem. And every kind of study that deals with abstract thoughts and generic concepts is but a preparation for the knowledge we get when a human individuality tells us his way of viewing the world, and on the other hand for the knowledge we get from the content of his acts of will. Whenever we feel that we are dealing with that element in a man which is free from stereotyped thinking and instinctive willing, then, if we would understand him in his essence, we must cease to call to our aid any concepts at all of our own making. The act of knowing consists in combining the concept with the percept by means of thinking. With all other objects the observer must get his concepts through his intuition; but if we are to understand a free individuality we must take over into our own spirit those concepts by which he determines himself, in their pure form (without mixing our own conceptual content with them). Those who immediately mix their own concepts into every judgment about another person, can never arrive at the understanding of an individuality. Just as the free individuality emancipates himself from the characteristics of the genus, so must the act of knowing emancipate itself from the way in which we understand what is generic.

Only to the extent that a man has emancipated himself in this way from all that is generic, does he count as a free spirit within a human community. No man is all genus, none is all individuality. But every man gradually emancipates a greater or lesser sphere of his being, both from the generic characteristics of animal life and from domination by the decrees of human authorities.

As regards that part of his nature where a man is not able to achieve this freedom for himself, he constitutes a part of the whole organism of nature and spirit. In this respect he lives by copying others or by obeying their commands. But only that part of his conduct that springs from his intuitions can have ethical value in the true sense. And those moral instincts that he possesses through the inheritance of social instincts acquire ethical value through being taken up into his intuitions. It is from individual ethical intuitions and their acceptance by human communities that all moral activity of mankind originates. In other words, the moral life of mankind is the sum total of the products of the moral imagination of free human individuals. This is the conclusion reached by monism.

I really could have bolded and underlined the entire chapter quoted above. So we see yet again how those who hold views which lead to unending fragmentation and division between groups based on their physical characteristics (because the concrete reality of soul and spirit is practically denied at all levels which could possibly matter to our daily experience) - on this forum specifically, Eugene, FB, Justin, and Jim - cannot confront this terrible reality within themselves so they project it out onto those spiritual thinkers and thought-systems which they dislike. This makes them feel they have personally overcome the dark divisive forces operating within themselves, and now it becomes the rest of the world's problem to deal with that which they have ignored within, instead of their own. Now everyone else except themselves is forced to carry their cross and the burden of their inner sins, instead of each individual bearing a shared responsibility for the sins of the world. It does not take great spiritual experience, knowledge, or insight to see how this is a one-way ticket to bloody catastrophe of the sort witnessed routinely in the last 100 years, except at an even larger scale. When everyone points the finger at someone else to be responsible for the deepest economic and sociocultural problems, that is the only possible outcome.

[Jim Cross]

Ashvin,

Hilarious!

I specifically said I hadn't formed a view about whether anthroposophy was racist because I felt it was too crackpot to even bother to study. Your response is a totally erroneous representation of my views on race and a long Steiner quote that undoubtedly holds a lot of meaning for you but is close to nonsense to me.

My view - the contemporary anthropological view - is that the concept of race is meaningless. We are peoples of culture not race.

[AshvinP]

Ashvin,

Hilarious!

I specifically said I hadn't formed a view about whether anthroposophy was racist because I felt it was too crackpot to even bother to study. Your response is a totally erroneous representation of my views on race and a long Steiner quote that undoubtedly holds a lot of meaning for you but is close to nonsense to me.

My view - the contemporary anthropological view - is that the concept of race is meaningless. We are peoples of culture not race.

Jim,

I know and it doesn't matter to me what you think about Anthroposophy. As I mentioned to Dana elsewhere, I am under no illusion I can present arguments that you will actually contemplate, rather than project whatever antipathies you have into the words and sentences or ignore them altogether, like you did with Steiner's quote. This is for the benefit of anyone who still considers concrete Thinking and learning a worthwhile activity to engage in.

I am pointing out the natural consequence of physicalism and abstract dualistic thought-systems in general re: racial, ethnic, gender, etc. divisions. Hard national and cultural divisions are no different in their tragic consequences - they simply moving the division away from biological grounding one level, because there is no other choice. Modern thought has been funnelled in this direction from the outset by abstract thinking. Concrete spiritual thinking also recognizes that we are in an age of cultural division more than racial division, but the difference is that it views this as a natural evolutionary stage which can move towards healthy integration if sovereign individuals become more conscious of their innermost thoughts, feelings, and desires, thereby attaining Thinking degrees of freedom which allow for the bridging of cultural divisions through shared imaginations, inspirations, and intuitions.

“Our highest endeavor must be to develop free human beings who are able of themselves to impart purpose and direction to their lives. The need for imagination, a sense of truth, and a feeling of responsibility—these three forces are the very nerve of education.” - Steiner