Rudolf Steiner's Fifth Gospel by John David Ebert

[AshvinP]

JDE has started a video series on Steiner's Fifth Gospel lectures (18 lectures between 1913-14), which has been very insightful so far and seems promising (I have only finished Part 1). He starts by differentiating Steiner from the more 'extravagant' and 'materialistic' claims of Theosophy with Madame Blavatsky and Annie Besant (such as a permanent atom remaining when our physical bodies die and decompose). Jung also shared this critique of Theosophy, but unfortunately lumped Steiner into their movement without realizing he was on a much different path.

JDE says that Jung was the foremost expert of the "Soul" (psyche) while Steiner was the expert of the "Spirit". He also remarks that Steiner was interested in discussing Christianity from within its own tradition and perspective while theosophists were increasingly aligning it with and discussing it from the perspective of Eastern philosophy and religion. JDE concludes with the Steiner's introduction of the lectures, which already brings in a fair amount of concepts most Christians would balk at

[Cleric]

which already brings in a fair amount of concepts most Christians would balk at

Yeah, I wouldn't recommend The 5th Gospel easily. Simply because there are things that must first be well understood and lived through.
It's like being a mathematician in a world where math is nonexistent and you begin to talk directly about Calculus You'll immediately be ridiculed and proclaimed for mad man speaking in tongues The worst thing is that people get conditioned and next time the hear "differential", it'll evoke scorn entirely as reflex. It becomes very difficult then to be taken seriously. On the other hand, if one goes in step by step manner, through numbers, addition, subtraction, etc. then differentials would sound quite understandable. It is similar in Spiritual Science. One finds his way only gradually, through inner effort.

[SanteriSatama]

It's like being a mathematician in a world where math is nonexistent and you begin to talk directly about Calculus

Sounds like my foundational approach to math.

[AshvinP]

which already brings in a fair amount of concepts most Christians would balk at

Yeah, I wouldn't recommend The 5th Gospel easily. Simply because there are things that must first be well understood and lived through.
It's like being a mathematician in a world where math is nonexistent and you begin to talk directly about Calculus You'll immediately be ridiculed and proclaimed for mad man speaking in tongues The worst thing is that people get conditioned and next time the hear "differential", it'll evoke scorn entirely as reflex. It becomes very difficult then to be taken seriously. On the other hand, if one goes in step by step manner, through numbers, addition, subtraction, etc. then differentials would sound quite understandable. It is similar in Spiritual Science. One finds his way only gradually, through inner effort.

Yeah I understand and agree, my impatience just gets the better of me. I am also kind of hoping that, 100 years or so on from Steiner, Jung and others laying out these paths, our collective subconscious has evolved so that they are more readily absorbed by myself and others who are genuinely seeking. The latter is key, though... if there is no voluntary orientation towards inner transformation, it will all seem like a huge moralistic imposition and burden that we are being oppressed and victimized by.

[Cleric]

our collective subconscious has evolved so that they are more readily absorbed by myself and others who are genuinely seeking

Nicely said. Yes, there's change in the last 100 years. In certain sense the water level in the room is constantly rising and it is decisive for humanity to know where the outlet is, as it approaches the ceiling. In other words, is the "I" going to face its own reality or it will continue to resist it with all its might by theorizing about its reality, dreaming about it, sleeping it away - everything else except approaching it face to face and tracing its own true origins.

So yes. Facts of genuine higher cognition must at least be known, must be accessible, must be mentioned. Not in order to advertise them and push them in the face of people but because there are many honestly seeking souls who are lost in the thick astral smog and simply don't know that such a path exists. And it's not widely known simply because it doesn't "sell" well. There's a much more appetizing profusion of .... excuse the expression but spirit-porn, that is so sweet and so lulling.

[SanteriSatama]

In other words, is the "I" going to face its own reality or it will continue to resist it with all its might by theorizing about its reality, dreaming about it, sleeping it away - everything else except approaching it face to face and tracing its own true origins.

Here's a little theorizing, dreaming and sleeping inspired by how Tolle characterized 'ego' when talking with the comedian celeb who looks a bit like Jesus. Ah Now I remember, Russel Brand his name.

1) more, <, ego
2) less, >, the subverted other of ego
3) both more and less, <>, self, pleroma
4) neither more nor less, ><, anatman, kenoma

5) both both-and and neither-nor; neither both-and nor neither-nor. Spirit.

PS: Half of square root of 5 plus one is the golden ratio. Maximal irrationality:

[AshvinP]

our collective subconscious has evolved so that they are more readily absorbed by myself and others who are genuinely seeking

Nicely said. Yes, there's change in the last 100 years. In certain sense the water level in the room is constantly rising and it is decisive for humanity to know where the outlet is, as it approaches the ceiling. In other words, is the "I" going to face its own reality or it will continue to resist it with all its might by theorizing about its reality, dreaming about it, sleeping it away - everything else except approaching it face to face and tracing its own true origins.

So yes. Facts of genuine higher cognition must at least be known, must be accessible, must be mentioned. Not in order to advertise them and push them in the face of people but because there are many honestly seeking souls who are lost in the thick astral smog and simply don't know that such a path exists. And it's not widely known simply because it doesn't "sell" well. There's a much more appetizing profusion of .... excuse the expression but spirit-porn, that is so sweet and so lulling.

True, and I can't help but think of veganism and Gaia-style environmentalism in the context of spirit-porn. That stuff sells like hot cakes! Somewhere down the line you happen upon antinatalism, which is the most fetishistic of them all.

[Cleric]

Here's a little theorizing, dreaming and sleeping ...

These things are necessary. We can't have consciousness in a physical body without them
The important thing is to trace their origins.

In this sense, one of my favorite domains of purely abstract thought is non-linear systems, recursion, IFS, fractals
Spiritual activity that is preoccupied with its thought-fruits (as in abstract thinking) can't come to terms with itself, as long as it wants to form a thought and say "This is the truth!". It's like playing with broken mirror pieces, rearranging them in the most clever ways and finally, when we are more or less satisfied with what we see (even if the picture is so fragmented that we don't recognize ourselves) we say "Now this, what I perceive, is the truth".

When I find myself drifting into a direction where I'm trying to absolutize a thought, I bring a picture of a fractal.



Not so much the recursive process of its generation but its pictorial appearance. Than we can ask "What is the fractal made of"? The answer is "more stuff like itself". And if we thus try to follow the process we find that we never reach a point for which we say "Now this is the fundamental atom, the building block". Instead we find only relations between something unknown. So it is with the human "I". We can never point at something and say "Now this is my fundamental being". Clearly, it cannot be my fundamental being because the thought does not contain in itself, the thing looking at it.

In this way we see that no thought can ever exist as something absolute in itself. Take even the most trivial example: a "pen". I see it and I have a clear concept of it. But the meaning of the concept would never be what it is if I didn't also have all my other concepts and ideas. After all, what meaning could it have in a blank cosmic mind with a single pen at its center? The pen has the meaning that it has only because it lives in relation with every other idea and concept - like ink, writing, alphabet, language, paper, etc., etc. In this sense every concept is not an atomic, indivisible entity but if we "zoom in" to examine its structure we find it's made of its relation to all other concepts. In the same way, every other concept would not be what it is, if "pen" was not reflected in them.

So that's how we reach the idea of the fundamental unknown or nothing. The Unknowable experiencing its relations to itself on all scales.

The question is if we consider this realization as the final revelation, as if we have now truly reached the grounds of existence. In other words, the mind, because it has found a way not to be confused by the endless reflection of concepts, decides that is now "larger than life" and can think away all existence.

Or this realization is only the starting point? The point of departure for our Cosmic Journey? Spiritual activity has solved one mystery - its confusion between the thought reflections of the Microcosmic mind. But now has to understand how this Microcosmos is embedded within the Macrocosmos.

These are questions that should be pondered in absolute freedom

[David_Sundaram]

Yeah I understand and agree, my impatience just gets the better of me. I am also kind of hoping that, 100 years or so on from Steiner, Jung and others laying out these paths, our collective subconscious has evolved so that they are more readily absorbed by myself and others who are genuinely seeking. The latter is key, though... if there is no voluntary orientation towards inner transformation, it will all seem like a huge moralistic imposition and burden that we are being oppressed and victimized by.

One of the 'problems' which your idea of 'voluntary' doesn't grapple with, IMO Ashvin, is the phenomenon of 'cultism' - people often join/follow group-think 'tanks' quite 'voluntarily'. Witness our current social-media 'scene'.

Not only that, individuals tend to not be 'open' to considering the relevance of 'new' information because they 'voluntarily' adhere to their own (obviously 'crazy' to others) previously derived belief-n-thought-n-feeling patterns.

In relation to Steiner adulators, I wonder what 'they' make of his less well publicized beliefs and pronouncement in terms of what said pronouncements imply about his thought-feeling-n-belief-process, IOW his soul's developmental status? Take this, for example - from https://morningstaronline.co.uk/node/43618 :

"It was only when I started to study Steiner’s incredible racist ideas I realised why they would be reluctant to make them public.
Steiner believed that black people had an instinctive approach to life while white Caucasian people approached life intellectually.
Every race, he believed, had a natural geographical homeland where they should live — black people in Europe were a nuisance, he wrote.
Steiner argued there was also what he called a hierarchy in races. Inferior races were at the bottom of an evolutionary staircase he helpfully sketched out in one of his books."

[Cleric]

True, and I can't help but think of veganism and Gaia-style environmentalism in the context of spirit-porn. That stuff sells like hot cakes! Somewhere down the line you happen upon antinatalism, which is the most fetishistic of them all.

Yeah. Many of these movements emerge from half-understood sentiments.

Veganism is interesting because it has many good points. I'm grateful that movies like Earthlings exist. Also good unbiased information on whole food plant based diets, environmental impact on factory farming and so on. But things are much more complicated than that and trying to force the world to go vegan can't really work.

Humanity has developed dependence on meat consumption - and not at all just on taste or economics. Things go way deeper than that. The average human ego consciousness would not be what it is without it. The whole fear based culture depends on that. But even this had its evolutionary goals. Nevertheless, on the ascending path of evolution, breeding, killing and eating animals, will become more and more a hindrance, first and foremost for spiritual development. The pain and terror within the astral bodies of the animals, as they meet they grim fate, fills the astral world and forms a kind of atmosphere that we breathe and live in. One day it will be revealed that many of the psychic diseases that trouble more and more humans today, stem from this. We recognize that we get sick when breathing the smog of the cities but humans still not recognize that they become sick in the soul by breathing the pictures of death, pain and terror that are released in the astral world with each murdered animal.

So these things will change one way or another but focus should be on understanding our soul and spiritual nature. Then all these things as preserving plant and animal life and even family planning, will come as natural consequences.

For example, if I strive for developing higher cognition, I come to a point where my soul contents become spread out before me. Then if I still consume animal flesh, I understand that I'm constantly pumping my astral body with fear that only weighs me down and clouds my consciousness. Then I know what to do. I'm not doing it of compassion for animals. I'm doing it for purely egoistical reasons! I want to walk consciously on the path of development and integration.

The Cosmos is so wisely interconnected that when one being pursues its highest aspirations, even if it doesn't look for it, it benefits all life. Here we just need not mistake highest aspirations for highest pleasure. That would be tragic. The high ideal truly leads to unconditional Love but this Love comes only through sacrifice. When I quit meat I have to sacrifice a simple pleasure in my taste buds but through that I benefit and the Whole benefits. The time for physical animal sacrifices is gone. Now man should sacrifice his inner animals - greed, envy, anger, hatred, lust. Only in this way he can become free.