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[Stranger]

It could only be because you assume it is impossible that you are misunderstanding the higher cognitive path, because you already encompass the ground-level reality from which it emerges and the only thing you may be missing are the details that are mostly worked out with intellectual thinking or some visionary capacities.

As Cleric has said a few times already on this thread, it is inevitable that this will be felt like a tyranny, a cult, a beatdown, because there is a fundamental misunderstanding of what is being spoken of. It is felt like we are trying to force our philosophical or visionary understanding of higher worlds onto everyone else, and arbitrarily telling people they have misunderstood, because it is simply assumed that's all spiritual science could be, just another spiritual framework among many others. Why would he keep emphasizing this point in every post if there wasn't some truth to it?

I meditate every day, test my understanding with direct meditative experiences and continuously question my understanding even including the most fundamental axioms. That is why I never fit into any philosophical or religious framework and even if I tend to adhere to some of them for some time, I never get stuck in them for too long. But for the same reason, I'm always open to consider and experientially try new approaches and insights. It's a living and ever-expanding process. But the ultimate test for me is always the direct introspective experience.

But just as a suggestion, if you guys want to engage more people in your explorations, you need to be more patient and to allow people to digest the material on their own pace without expecting them to understand everything and agree with everything that you try to convey in one big "aha". This stuff is really intellectually demanding and requires time to digest for ordinary people.

[AshvinP]

It could only be because you assume it is impossible that you are misunderstanding the higher cognitive path, because you already encompass the ground-level reality from which it emerges and the only thing you may be missing are the details that are mostly worked out with intellectual thinking or some visionary capacities.

As Cleric has said a few times already on this thread, it is inevitable that this will be felt like a tyranny, a cult, a beatdown, because there is a fundamental misunderstanding of what is being spoken of. It is felt like we are trying to force our philosophical or visionary understanding of higher worlds onto everyone else, and arbitrarily telling people they have misunderstood, because it is simply assumed that's all spiritual science could be, just another spiritual framework among many others. Why would he keep emphasizing this point in every post if there wasn't some truth to it?

I meditate every day, test my understanding with direct meditative experiences and continuously question my understanding even including the most fundamental axioms. That is why I never fit into any philosophical or religious framework and even if I tend to adhere to some of them for some time, I never get stuck in them for too long. But for the same reason, I'm always open to consider and experientially try new approaches and insights. It's a living and ever-expanding process. But the ultimate test for me is always the direct introspective experience.

But just as a suggestion, if you guys want to engage more people in your explorations, you need to be more patient and to allow people to digest the material on their own pace without expecting them to understand everything and agree with everything that you try to convey in one big "aha". This stuff is really intellectually demanding and requires time to digest for ordinary people.

So do you conceive it is possible that when your meditation reaches its limits, another sort of meditation can go further into the depths of spiritual reality? This isn't any philosophical or religious framework. It is about taking direct introspective experience to the next level of objective inner reality. From these deeper levels, we understand all the philosophical and religious and nondual frameworks, how they arose and what they are speaking of, but we don't identify with any of them.

[Stranger]

So do you conceive it is possible that when your meditation reaches its limits, another sort of meditation can go further into the depths of spiritual reality? This isn't any philosophical or religious framework. It is about taking direct introspective experience to the next level of objective inner reality. From these deeper levels, we understand all the philosophical and religious and nondual frameworks, how they arose and what they are speaking of, but we don't identify with any of them.

Oh, absolutely!

[AshvinP]

So do you conceive it is possible that when your meditation reaches its limits, another sort of meditation can go further into the depths of spiritual reality? This isn't any philosophical or religious framework. It is about taking direct introspective experience to the next level of objective inner reality. From these deeper levels, we understand all the philosophical and religious and nondual frameworks, how they arose and what they are speaking of, but we don't identify with any of them.

Oh, absolutely!

Great! Then I imagine the next time we hear from you, after you have digested the material on this forum at your own pace, it won't be another video link to nondual awakening, which we have all agreed traps us at the threshold of true Self-lucidity, or commiseration about the past history of the forum, but comments and questions related to how we better orient toward the manifold and harmonic relations of spiritual reality and, even if we haven't attained clairvoyance ourselves, explore the clairvoyant experiences in our living thinking, which in truth already lives across the threshold of corporeal death and can therefore understand how the current Earthly life was prepared by and will prepare that Cosmic journey.

[Federica]

As this forum seems to be entering a Pralaya of its own, I’d like to express the wish that in the future it may be born anew from its ashes, maybe with a new name. Hard to say if views are real or reflect some form of bot activity, but in any case, to whomever this may concern, I want to seize the occasion of this phase to point to a less discussed deception threatening anyone who is engaged on a path of free spiritual development today. In this forum, we have often discussed the deceptions of misguided mysticism and non-dualism and, in comparison, the threats of materialism may have appeared less worrying, because well acknowledged by the many idealists, and, in a way, properly addressed and clearly debunked. However, in his last years, Steiner repeatedly called attention to the possible rise of a “new materialism”, less obvious and more dangerous than our familiar, all in all fairly respectable, good old materialism.

You know I do not normally go in for tirades; it is not my habit to moralize. Just for once, however, I really must discuss the facts that have become very obvious at this time, because the situation is serious. We are looking at undertakings that must not fail, that will have to succeed, and there can be no question of any kind of failure; we have to say today that they shall succeed. They must not however swallow up the original anthroposophical movement, and this means that everybody must do his share to ensure that the moral foundation established in the work of many years really exists. Everybody must do his part. It is really necessary for everybody to do their part.
It saddens my heart that I am unable to respond to almost all the many requests that are made to me. I had to keep refusing to help my friends because time cannot be used twice, and meetings go on not only from morning till night, but even well into the night. Quite obviously I cannot use the same time to talk to individuals. The membership in the widest sense must come to its senses and get rid of the things that play a role in all aspects of life here, the kind of thing I have just been mentioning. Every single member must reflect and see that here in this very place these things have to be done away with. Unless this is done—and these things are connected—it will not be possible to find the time to do real fundamental spiritual work. Everything arising out of anthroposophy will succeed. Yet, unless some things change, the original spiritual movement will be swallowed up. The will impulses of those who consider themselves the bearers of this spiritual movement would then lead to a new materialism, as the original spiritual movement will have been aborted. The spirit needs to be nurtured, or it will die. Materialism does not arise of its own accord; you cannot create materialism, just as you cannot create a corpse. A corpse is produced when the soul leaves the organism. In the same way everything created here on a spiritual basis, out of something that has soul, will become entirely material unless there is a genuine desire to nurture the spirit. It means that above all the moral and ethical basis which we have been able to establish is given careful attention. It is necessary above all to ensure that we do not become subject to illusion, that we do not think it is enough to accept certain views just because they are easy to accept. We must look at life without flinching.
It is really very bad for people to say things like: ‘The threefold order is a good thing; we must take it up.’ Feeling rather good about it they will say: ‘I am getting something organized and it is very much in accord with the threefold order; aren't I good! It makes me really feel good getting something organized that is a nucleus of threefoldness’. Licking your lips morally speaking, full of inner self gratification—you may feel like this when you are doing such things, but it does not mean that you have a sense of reality.

https://rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA197/En ... 24p01.html

This subtle form of new materialism that dresses spiritually, amplified by naive ignorance and/or collusive attitudes, requires the spiritual seeker to try twice as hard to remain focused on the true meaning of the spiritual scientific quest and protect one's independence from the easy appeal of “inner self gratification”, as Steiner calls it. More recently, and interestingly, Kühlewind echoed those early warnings. He wrote of an “occult temptation” connected with working with Anthroposophy:

The occult temptation of speaking about what one has not experienced continually blends into the first temptation, the egotistical use of spiritual science. This happens when people seek recognition, position, power, or their living through spiritual science or knowledge of spiritual science. They forget the way of life of the old Rosicrucians who, besides cultivating their spiritual origins, had a profession in life. When a person is unaware of abusing spiritual science for egotistical ends, this has consequences: there is a disorientation with regard to the relationship between spiritual science and everyday life; a loss of the capacity to distinguish, in judgment, between what one understands and does not understand; and the acquiring of the tendency to bluff with contents one has read, using these as arguments and quoting them dialectically in discussions. (...) Work with “contents” degenerates into speculation, combination, rhetoric and nominalistic usage. One begins to receive the contents is “sleepy ecstasy” and thereby increasingly loses one’s healthy feeling for the truth - which is then replaced by pride, superiority, and the air of knowing better than anyone else

Georg Kühlewind, Working with Anthroposophy, Ch. VI - Temptation

And so, reminded of what Steiner said in “The wrong and right use of esoteric knowledge”, I try my best to live up to the advice: "In this epoch we have to be fighters for the spirit: we must realize that our forces grow slack unless they are kept constantly in training for the conquest of the spiritual world. In this fifth epoch man is in the highest degree dependent upon his freedom, and he has to experience it to the full. And the idea of human freedom should be the criterion of whatever he encounters in this epoch. For if human energies were to grow slack, everything might turn to evil."

https://rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA178/En ... 19p02.html

[lorenzop]

I do check into this forum now and then, but haven't found a 'point of entry' in quite a while.
For Steiner, what is 'Materialism' vs 'New Materialism'?

[Federica]

I do check into this forum now and then, but haven't found a 'point of entry' in quite a while.
For Steiner, what is 'Materialism' vs 'New Materialism'?

Thanks for your question, Lorenzo.

For Steiner, materialism is the worldview that results when we participate in universal consciousness exclusively through the tool of our brain. When we do that, we think from within our body, our brain, using what’s external to it (the physical world) as essential support for our thoughts. In the materialistic mode, we use what we perceive in the world as a kind of template, and we produce thoughts that copy-paste that template. When we do that, we limit ourselves to physicality and we only produce thoughts that directly (through sensory observation) or indirectly (through mathematics and logic) mimic our perception of the physical world. This works well to find useful ways to interact with the physical world, but the materialist does that also when he thinks about immaterial things, like consciousness, spirit, awareness, etcetera. The materialist approaches that too with the templates provided by the evidence of the world. Consciousness is narrowed down to the limits of the physical brain, to what the brain can figure out when it uses the experience of the 5 senses, as constant support.

(As we know, Steiner - like many others - teaches us that consciousness is much larger than our brain and what the brain can work out using the templates provided by the 5 senses. We can't squeeze consciousness into our sense-based thoughts, if we want to really understand it, participate in it. Those thoughts are good for practical life, but we have to go beyond them, if we want to live as free human beings).


Now, when Steiner spoke of “new materialism” it’s because he was saddened by a development he was seeing happening within the Anthroposophical Society. He pointed to the degeneration that was happening inside it. Through the years, the Society had become more and more articulated, a bit like a corporation today, with various “departments”, “subject matters”, “experts” in charge of this or that area, this or that geographical branch. And pretty much like in a typical corporation today, some people were wasting time and focus in endless meetings, endless speculations. And they were becoming attached to their roles in the Society, more than to the necessary spiritual inner development, that an Anthroposopher must pursue. This ended up in a situation where many were using their roles as source of recognition and status, playing power games through their roles, investing energy in speculative discussions, but without true spiritual insight. Basically they were occupied in spiritual matters but in a completely brain-based way, that is, in a fully materialistic way.

Instead of coming to the Society from a place of inner practice and insight, developing thinking larger than the brain, through meditation/concentration, they were abusing Anthroposophy, by being active in the Society not so much to bring the light of Anthroposophy to the world, but to find their own egotistical satisfaction in Anthroposophy, losing track of the source of insight, that has to be grounded in silent spiritual work. In this sense, Steiner spoke of the risk of a new materialism.

New materialism is more dangerous than materialism. The "normal" materialist thinks and speaks of matter, and is openly materialist, believing it's the right approach to all knowledge. He is limited, but at least he does work that turns out useful for everyday life in the physical. By contrast, the new-materialist pretends to be spiritual, discusses spirituality all day long, and even believes to be very good and very spiritual, while in fact he uses the same limited, brain-based thinking than the materialist, applied to spiritual topics. This is the sneakiest thing, detrimental not only to the person who dwells in such attitude without realizing it, but also to the naive ones who are influenced by the new materialist. Also, this new materialism is dangerous since it promotes power games and collusive attitudes, in which many get entangled, promoting "untruths", losing sight of what is right, losing what Steiner called "the sense for truth".

[lorenzop]

Thanks. So 'new materialism' is a reference to what Steiner was seeing occurring within Anthroposophy. Some variation of 'new materialism' happens to every teaching . . . including Christ's Message. Christian Prosperity being on of the more preposterous examples. One hopes it doesn't begin when the Teacher is still alive and actively teaching.

[Federica]

Thanks. So 'new materialism' is a reference to what Steiner was seeing occurring within Anthroposophy. Some variation of 'new materialism' happens to every teaching . . . including Christ's Message. Christian Prosperity being on of the more preposterous examples. One hopes it doesn't begin when the Teacher is still alive and actively teaching.

Yes. I don't know Christian Prosperity, but I certainly agree that every teaching, every spiritual impulse, is at risk of falling into the clutches of evil forces. Possibly, Anthroposophy is a priority target for those forces of evil, because of the enormous potential for salvation that Anthroposophy opens up for humanity in our times.

I was just reading on "The Way of The Heart" Newsletter about the purpose of these evil forces - what their plan is for humanity:

...
And these forces of evil have a project all their own.
What is that project? To take us backward through the kingdoms of nature until we become stones. (...)

They want to forever extinguish the tremendous light of a grace-filled human being. They want to turn us into lifeless stones, for they love darkness rather than light. How is this project accomplished?

The human person contains within ourselves the fullness of the four kingdoms of nature. First, the mineral kingdom lives in the dense and solid substance of our bones. Second, the kingdom of the plants exists in the fact that we are living—that is, we have a soul, for the soul, as Aquinas teaches, is but the life of the body. Third, we have the animal kingdom present within us in our ability to experience sensation and act instinctively. And finally, we contain a rational intellect in common with the incorporeal angels. (I will add as an aside, that this intellect does not merely consist of our rational faculties, which are the lower part of the intellect, but also the higher faculty of the intellect which is capable of intuitive cognition. For angels know things directly in themselves. They are not bound by our limitations of stepwise logical reasoning. We too have this capacity for direct intuitive knowledge, but in our fallen state, this is deeply impaired and must be developed.) Thus, we see that the human person is situated midway between the three lower kingdoms of nature and the angelic hierarchies.

Be that as it may, the forces of evil working against the development of humanity want to take us backward through these kingdoms, first of all into the animal state by erasing our reason and causing us to be ruled by forces of instinct alone. This is primarily done through manipulation of education, which is but the training of the intellectual forces. A person who cannot reason can only feel. That is, they are helpless before the instinctual soul-life. And as the eruptions of the mob have increased significantly in recent times, the forces of evil are largely succeeding. When reason, and the higher principles to which it appeals, is eliminated, what succeeds in its place is violence—a vicious class of instinctive forces battling for supremacy. Is it any wonder the world is in flames? We are returning to our animal state, and the law of the jungle reigns supreme.

The next stage in the regression....

https://substack.com/home/post/p-45586155

[lorenzop]

We don't need to introduce forces of evil, or 'targets' of evil . . . it's simply that disciples\students of great teachers hear the message from their level of understanding . . . and either slowly over a generation or two, or quickly, the message gets lost. It's inevitable.