Understanding Steiner's Philosophy

[Federica]

I went ahead and posted the following comment. I have a feeling that it will be written off as irrelevant immediately, but let's see.

Thanks - great treatment of the necessity to also provide one's own understanding of the spiritual phenomena, and their physical reflections. I actually also commented before you (and already quoted the entire passage from "The occult significance of blood"). My comment:

Nice - I didn't see that at first, but it's good you gave this exogamy aspect a deeper treatment. I suppose the main obstacle in this domain, as usual, is the ego and its firmly held convictions. Once someone gets to the point of writing an entire article expressing those convictions, it will feel like quite a painful experience to re-evaluate them, as if someone is trying to tear the roots of the hair out of the scalp. Hopefully, though, the interest in the deeper truth will eventually take the upper hand.

Exactly. One has gone with that to a conference at Harvard, and has received reinforcement from all sides.
However, I believe one must feel a little burn inside, when the decision is made, as a researcher, to quote out of context in that way.

[AshvinP]

However, I believe one must feel a little burn inside, when the decision is made, as a researcher, to quote out of context in that way.

Here is Ashton's response to me and my response. As is probably apparent, I doubt it's going much further.


"Thanks for your engagement, Ashvin. Yes it’s true I only shared a snippet, I had 20 minutes to present. But I don’t think the larger context of his theorizing around exogamy and endogamy invalidates what I said about that particular quote. My point was that it represents a form of racial essentialist thinking, suggesting that blood could limit the cognitive capacities of individuals. I don’t think race as Steiner uses it is actually a coherent or legitimate concept; the science of genetics bears this out by showing there are no meaningfully homogenous groupings that could be called “races” because there is more genetic diversity among groups than between them. I do think it’s important to acknowledge differences between genetic lineages, but this does not equate to racial typologies and are constantly transforming. Also, I don’t think Steiner’s narrative of exogamy and endogamy holds up for historians; there has always been mixing. I think today people even exaggerate about how much mixing happens; people today still tend to be drawn to partners who look like them. The quote you drew from me was in reference to Steiner’s claims about white skin and the Christ impulse. I wasn’t grouping these quotes together to try and show Steiner had a consistent teaching about race. One of my major points was that he was inconsistent about it. I disagree with you that it’s incumbent upon critics who only claim to be drawing on healthy reason (such as myself) to provide an alternative spiritual scientific account of race. I don’t know if it’s even possible. I have serious doubts about the whole enterprise. I don’t think phenomena like skin color necessarily have a clear meaning in the bigger picture of cosmic evolution. I did provide an alternative way to bring Steiner’s work forward though—that being an emphasis on Christ in ethics and epistemology, but that doesn’t seem to have landed for you? Or perhaps it’s implicit in your thinking?"


"Thanks for the response, Ashton. I'd like to clarify something in your thesis. The occult significance of blood has been observed and discussed by, not only Steiner, but practically all other esoteric thinkers since probably the dawn of esoteric thinking. Are you suggesting that they were all possessed by essentialist thinking and, in fact, that blood has no occult significance?

What I am also still confused about is why you would attribute racial or biological essentialism to Steiner, especially in light of the quote I shared. I suppose you explain that Steiner was inconsistent, and that sometimes he expressed completely novel and penetrating insights into the limitations of genetic determinism, but other times, he succumbed to the racial prejudices of his age and decided to lazily imbue all of his spiritual observations with that same determinism. But that seems to me like a catch-all explanation that we can use for any claim that we are trying to impute to someone, even if they suggested exactly the opposite throughout their life's work. If you feel that is a fair way of proceeding, and that it's outside of the realm of possibilities that you are simply misunderstanding his quotes and his method of research and expression, then I suppose there's not much more I could usefully add to the topic.

I would only add that we don't need clairvoyance to trace how Steiner's observations took shape, but precisely healthy and unprejudiced reasoning. We need to apply the latter to the spiritual scientific *method* of research, not only its finished content. We don't need clairvoyance to get a refined feeling for what clairvoyance is and the sorts of inner experiences that it explores, and how those inner experiences may be expressed through a corresponding intellectual lattice, as I described with the comet example. When that is not even *attempted*, it seems to me that the reasoning must be quite prejudiced, trying to fit Steiner's observations into a preconceived narrative.

As for emphasizing Christ in ethics and epistemology, I think there is a big difference between doing that theoretically and doing it in practice, as exemplified by Steiner. The impulse of Christ is not only to order our thoughts and words in such a way that we can speak about "racial equality", but to actually bring that equality about through the evolutionary process."

[Federica]

Here is Ashton's response to me and my response. As is probably apparent, I doubt it's going much further.

Yes. Hopefully this will be valuable for others, if not for Ashton. You put it in clear and cogent terms. I refrained from speaking of preconceived narrative in my comments, but I'm glad you didn't, because that's what it is. For my part, I was equally stunned by: "I also don’t assume that he is absolutely correct or the final say on the super sensible makeup of the human being". Overall, from these exchanges it appears to me that at this point he's confused about spiritual science. He also implicitly conceives philosophy as an armchair job. Let's hope this will change going forward.

[Federica]

In response to my comment:


Hi Federica. The quote from me regarding my inference about Steiner’s concern about blood mixing was referencing what he said about French culture, not the quote from the lecture you cited. My point about the quote from the lecture on exogamy and endogamy was that it qualifies as a form of racial essentialism by limiting cognitive capacity to the blood. So there two distinct quotes here and two distinct inferences from me about them. I wasn’t presenting it as a coherent theory from Steiner, but sharing a list of moments from his corpus where he is inconsistent about his teaching that race and the generic are not constraining factors for the spirit. I don’t think all of Steiner’s statements are reconcilable. I think he contradicted himself as most humans do. I also don’t assume that he is absolutely correct or the final say on the super sensible makeup of the human being and so don’t think it’s incoherent of me to deny that environments wholly determine the blood of human groups.

-----

Thank you for replying, Ashton.

My comment applies just as well to the quote about France. Since the faculty meeting from which the quote is extracted contains no other words whatsoever about our topic (the meeting was about language teaching in Waldorf) one can hardly gather an interpretation from that laconic, incidental remark, and even less can one infer that there’s a notion that races should be kept separate. The text doesn’t support that, especially when one has another passage (the one discussed above from which the second quote comes) where Steiner does elaborate on his position, and from which it unambiguously emerges that he thinks humanity *needs* mingling of blood in order to advance “to a higher stage of development”, as he described it.

Also, there is no support in either of the quotes, for the idea that people are “limited by the character of their blood and cannot become civilized”. While we are all of course shaped to some extent by heredity, for Steiner, the blood is not a static element that is given at birth once and for all. That would be totally non reconcilable with his cosmology and world conception. Yes, as a human, Steiner made mistakes and spoke inconsistently at times, but inferring from that something like racial essentialism is just unwarranted.

Anyway, I believe I understand your position. Not your position on Steiner’s ideas on race, but on the supersensible makeup of the human being and the spiritual-scientific world view in general, which you prefer to remain fluid about, as a professional philosopher. Again, thanks for your reply.

-----

I think it’s obvious that one can infer the concern about blood mixing from the quote with the teachers and so it doesn’t matter if he spoke to the contrary elsewhere. Again, my point is to show inconsistencies and disrupt the totalizing worldview which keeps proponents from genuinely questioning Steiner’s veracity. You say Steiner was human and made mistakes, but your arguments seem to suggest the opposite view.

-----

One thing is to say that Steiner was concerned about blood mixing in what France was doing in Africa - which I agree he was, in the sense mentioned in my first comment - and another thing is to generalize and infer that "there is a notion that races should be kept separate" and that "people are limited by their blood". I don't think these latter conclusions can be inferred.

Besides, Steiner made various objective mistakes (an example is in Ashvin's comment, there are more) but here I don't think the quote about France is inconsistent with the longer elaboration in "The occult significance of blood". Rather, the former is a case, or example, out of the spectrum of possibilities illustrated in the latter.

Regarding Steiner's veracity, if by veracity you mean accurate rendering of the reflections of spiritual dynamics on the facts of the physical plane, any sensible proponent should agree that such veracity is not always present. But again, inferring racial essentialism seems to me a quite different endeavor.

[AshvinP]

MS also commented, to which I responded (drawing on one of Cleric's previous comments):

"Hi Ashwin,

It seems to me that the issues Ashton is pointing to have to do with specific instances where Steiner appears to speak out of malice or simply racial anxieties, eg, the well-known instance (GA 348) when he ridicules the award-winning novel by Rene Maran, "Batouala," which was critical of French colonialism in Africa, and warns that pregnant white women who read the novel risk having their babies become mulatto. Perhaps this particular passage is not as well-known as it should be, given that when the Anthroposophic Press first published these lectures in the US (1981), the translation omitted the entire paragraph in the original German edition without comment. I suspect that the American anthroposophists responsible for preparing this translation were embarrassed by Steiner's comments. Maybe you would say they should not have been because there is some deeper explanation for the tone and content of his claims? Perhaps there is some reason that he decries the presence of Negro novels in Basel but not the presence of French colonizers in Africa? I mention this because it seems to me that, while Steiner may offer interesting and important geographic/climatic and esoteric accounts of skin color and other demographic differences, he may also on occasion have spoken not out of compassion and clairvoyance but out of an attitude quite normal for European intellectuals of his time.

Steiner does often emphasize that in our time, individuality is more important than genus. But he also indicates in many places that what he calls the white race is far less weighed down by generic characteristics than what he calls the black and yellow races."

"Hi Matt,

I am confident there is a deeper explanation than "malice" or "racial anxieties", but I don't think it's the kind of 'explanation' people usually seek on these topics, i.e., some critique or apologetic based on discursive rational argumentation. I think the deeper explanations will always involve a more imaginative effort to probe the relevant inner dynamics from the most varied angles.

For example, we can leave aside the particular novel and speak more generally. Just as a random example, we could use Agatha Christie's criminal novels or Stephen King's horror works. They are clearly white-skinned. It's not about who made them but about what kind of *ideas and feelings* pass through the mother's aura as the fetus develops. We can symbolically picture this as the way tree rings imprint the conditions of every season. Some authors call this spiritual galvanoplasty. Everything that the mother experiences during pregnancy - especially in the early weeks - has a strong influence on the child's etheric body, which forms the embryo. These effects may not be so strong as to alter gene expression in very unusual ways, at least not yet, but they certainly leave their imprint on the child's thinking and feeling substance. Reading criminal or horror novels during pregnancy won't remain without consequences for the growing baby. Imagine what it would be like to experience the growth of prenatal consciousness in an environment of horrific figures, subhuman desires, and the like. The baby really lives in this astral and etheric atmosphere, breathes it, and it leaves its imprints for the coming life.

Now, before we come to the question of whether any of that may apply to what Steiner was speaking of, particularly with respect to Maran and her novel, we have to honestly ask ourselves - do we actually consider this a *serious possibility* which can be investigated through higher cognition? I think many people attributing Steiner's observations to "racial anxieties" or "biological essentialism" are not pausing to ask themselves such questions and imaginatively explore them from various angles, before publishing their views. All too often, I think people are actually reluctant about the very possibility that these things can be inwardly investigated, but attribute their reluctance in this domain to Steiner's prejudices in one form or another.

On the other hand, if we seriously delve into these inner dynamics and their potential implications, we may gain a much deeper appreciation for Steiner's observations, for what he was *doing* when making those observations, even if we determine that their explicit content was erroneous in some way. In this way, even Steiner's errors will become a source of a much deeper esoteric education. We will be able to trace the errors to the deeper dynamics rather than simply attributing them to some myopic cultural prejudices and assumptions, and then feeling satisfied we have figured out 'what's going on with Steiner', which I believe is certainly a flawed and unproductive approach."

[Federica]

MS also commented, to which I responded (drawing on one of Cleric's previous comments):

Thanks. I can't find the passage MS refers to. Do you know where it is?
Anyway, I think it's good that all this is coming out. It teaches us something about the soul form from which these propositions originate.

I'm only finding this paper:
https://e-learningwaldorf.de/wp-content ... iculum.pdf
Taking a look at the table of contents feels like a déjà vu.

[Federica]

To be noted, these discussions have happened on Rudolf Steiner's birthday, February 25.

In GA 121, speaking of folk souls and differentiated earthly forces, Steiner said:
"I beg you not to misunderstand what is now being said, it only refers to man in so far as he is dependent upon the physical organizing forces, not upon those forces which constitute his essence as a human being but the forces in which he lives".

Without a non notional, unitary understanding of the constitution of man (one's own constitution) and the earthly and cosmic forces reflected in man - without the genuine attempt to pursue it - these words point to a bleak void and mean nothing. The literature on Steiner's racialism showcases some of that void from the inside out.

[AshvinP]

MS also commented, to which I responded (drawing on one of Cleric's previous comments):

Thanks. I can't find the passage MS refers to. Do you know where it is?
Anyway, I think it's good that all this is coming out. It teaches us something about the soul form from which these propositions originate.

I'm only finding this paper:
https://e-learningwaldorf.de/wp-content ... iculum.pdf
Taking a look at the table of contents feels like a déjà vu.

It's weird - I distinctly remember reading it before, but now I can't find it either (perhaps I had read it somewhere other than the archive). I found the passage indirectly through this source - https://epublications.marquette.edu/cgi ... t=hist_fac

Recently I went into a bookstore in Basel and found an example of the latest publishing agenda: a Negro novel, just as the Negroes in general
are entering into European civilization step by step! Everywhere Negro dances are being performed, Negro dances are being hopped. But we
even have this Negro novel already. It is utterly boring, dreadfully boring, but people devour it. I am personally convinced that if we get more
Negro novels, and give these Negro novels to pregnant women to read during the first phase of pregnancy, when as you know they can sometimes develop such cravings, if we give these Negro novels to pregnant women to read, then it won’t even be necessary for Negroes to come to Europe in order for mulattoes to appear. Simply through the spiritual effects of reading Negro novels, a multitude of children will be born in Europe that are completely gray, that have mulatto hair, that look like mulattoes!74

Footnote 74:

74 Rudolf Steiner, Über Gesundheit und Krankheit [On health and illness] (Dornach: Rudolf Steiner Verlag, 1994), 189:

Neulich bin ich in Basel in eine Buchhandlung gekommen, da fand ich das neueste Programm dessen, was gedruckt wird: ein Negerroman, wie
überhaupt jetzt die Neger allmählich in die Zivilisation von Europa hereinkommen! Es werden überall Negertänze aufgeführt, Negertänze
gehüpft. Aber wir haben ja sogar schon diesen Negerroman. Er ist urlangweilig, greulich langweilig, aber die Leute verschlingen ihn. Ja, ich
bin meinerseits davon überzeugt, wenn wir noch eine Anzahl Negerromane kriegen, und wir geben diese Negerromane den schwangeren Frauen zu lesen, in der ersten Zeit der Schwangerschaft namentlich, wo sie heute ja gerade solche Gelüste manchmal entwickeln können—wir geben diese Negerromane den schwangeren Frauen zu lesen, da braucht gar nicht dafür gesorgt zu werden, daß Neger nach Europa kommen, damit Mulatten entstehen; da entsteht durch rein geistiges Lesen von Negerromanen eine ganze Anzahl von Kindern in Europa, die ganz grau sind, Mulattenhaare haben, die mulattenähnlich aussehen werden!

This passage was omitted, without indication, from the authorized English translation of the book. See Rudolf Steiner, Health and Illness, vol. 2 (Spring
Valley: Anthroposophic Press, 1981); it would have appeared on page 16. The passage was also excised, without indication, from the second English translation Staudenmaier: Race and Redemption 31 of the book. See Rudolf Steiner, From Comets to Cocaine (London: Rudolf Steiner Press, 2000); it would have appeared on page 160. The “negro novel” Steiner ridicules was Rene Maran’s award-winning Batouala. For background see Brent Edwards, The Practice of Diaspora (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2003), 70–106, 171–79; and Femi Ojo-Ade, Rene Maran, the Black Frenchman (Washington: Three Continents Press, 1984).

***

MS only replied:

"I am far from satisfied that I have understood, but I will say I very much agree with you that Steiner's errors will become a source of a much deeper esoteric education!"

I followed up with this, but no response yet:

And how do you feel about my question? Is it a serious possibility that can be further investigated? Again, we can take this possibility in the context of a novel written by a white-skinned person, so you don't have to be worried about one of your colleagues using the response to accuse you of racial anxieties : )

[Federica]

MS also commented, to which I responded (drawing on one of Cleric's previous comments):

Thanks. I can't find the passage MS refers to. Do you know where it is?
Anyway, I think it's good that all this is coming out. It teaches us something about the soul form from which these propositions originate.

I'm only finding this paper:
https://e-learningwaldorf.de/wp-content ... iculum.pdf
Taking a look at the table of contents feels like a déjà vu.

It's weird - I distinctly remember reading it before, but now I can't find it either (perhaps I had read it somewhere other than the archive). I found the passage indirectly through this source - https://epublications.marquette.edu/cgi ... t=hist_fac

Recently I went into a bookstore in Basel and found an example of the latest publishing agenda: a Negro novel, just as the Negroes in general
are entering into European civilization step by step! Everywhere Negro dances are being performed, Negro dances are being hopped. But we
even have this Negro novel already. It is utterly boring, dreadfully boring, but people devour it. I am personally convinced that if we get more
Negro novels, and give these Negro novels to pregnant women to read during the first phase of pregnancy, when as you know they can sometimes develop such cravings, if we give these Negro novels to pregnant women to read, then it won’t even be necessary for Negroes to come to Europe in order for mulattoes to appear. Simply through the spiritual effects of reading Negro novels, a multitude of children will be born in Europe that are completely gray, that have mulatto hair, that look like mulattoes!74

Footnote 74:

74 Rudolf Steiner, Über Gesundheit und Krankheit [On health and illness] (Dornach: Rudolf Steiner Verlag, 1994), 189:

Neulich bin ich in Basel in eine Buchhandlung gekommen, da fand ich das neueste Programm dessen, was gedruckt wird: ein Negerroman, wie
überhaupt jetzt die Neger allmählich in die Zivilisation von Europa hereinkommen! Es werden überall Negertänze aufgeführt, Negertänze
gehüpft. Aber wir haben ja sogar schon diesen Negerroman. Er ist urlangweilig, greulich langweilig, aber die Leute verschlingen ihn. Ja, ich
bin meinerseits davon überzeugt, wenn wir noch eine Anzahl Negerromane kriegen, und wir geben diese Negerromane den schwangeren Frauen zu lesen, in der ersten Zeit der Schwangerschaft namentlich, wo sie heute ja gerade solche Gelüste manchmal entwickeln können—wir geben diese Negerromane den schwangeren Frauen zu lesen, da braucht gar nicht dafür gesorgt zu werden, daß Neger nach Europa kommen, damit Mulatten entstehen; da entsteht durch rein geistiges Lesen von Negerromanen eine ganze Anzahl von Kindern in Europa, die ganz grau sind, Mulattenhaare haben, die mulattenähnlich aussehen werden!

This passage was omitted, without indication, from the authorized English translation of the book. See Rudolf Steiner, Health and Illness, vol. 2 (Spring
Valley: Anthroposophic Press, 1981); it would have appeared on page 16. The passage was also excised, without indication, from the second English translation Staudenmaier: Race and Redemption 31 of the book. See Rudolf Steiner, From Comets to Cocaine (London: Rudolf Steiner Press, 2000); it would have appeared on page 160. The “negro novel” Steiner ridicules was Rene Maran’s award-winning Batouala. For background see Brent Edwards, The Practice of Diaspora (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2003), 70–106, 171–79; and Femi Ojo-Ade, Rene Maran, the Black Frenchman (Washington: Three Continents Press, 1984).

***

MS only replied:

"I am far from satisfied that I have understood, but I will say I very much agree with you that Steiner's errors will become a source of a much deeper esoteric education!"

I followed up with this, but no response yet:

And how do you feel about my question? Is it a serious possibility that can be further investigated? Again, we can take this possibility in the context of a novel written by a white-skinned person, so you don't have to be worried about one of your colleagues using the response to accuse you of racial anxieties : )

Thanks, Ashvin. Yeah, it's really weird. I have your exact same impression. This passage is now absent even in Steiner Wiki and in this newly published German archive as well. That the bureaucracy of the Anthroposophical Society felt the urge to censor the passage is regrettable, to say the least. And who knows what other subtle or less subtle changes have been (or will be) operated. Let's let it land: The Anthroposophical Society is doing coordinated censorship. In 2026. The risk of alteration of the publicly available sources - which I warned about in the past - is now a reality. Fact is, by removing those lines, they have put themselves in the same position as the racial essentialism proponents - but as Anthroposophists. As it seems evident to me, this lets them in an ethically untenable position. These words should be assumed, not censored. Not because they are not discomforting and capable of offending us. They are. But if one is not able or willing to put things in perspective and consider what the situation was then, and is today, then one is not ready for Anthroposophy.

It is unsettling today to read the transcript of the passage. There's no question about that. We are repelled by that word (we all know which one) and rightly so. Because of the terrible brutalities and widespread abuses the word was associated with (and still is) we have tried to at least part ways with the word. That was and is absolutely necessary. Still, when reading such century old transcripts, we have to remind ourselves that, at the time, that was the most obvious and common way to refer to Africans. At Steiner's time the connotation we experience today was not there. So much so that René Maran, the author of the novel himself titled it "Batouala: veritable roman nègre" (NB: in French language, we do not capitalize nationality adjectives and people adjectives).


Would this be even imaginable today? Of course not. So we need to appreciate this big difference, and realize that there is no contempt or ridiculing of either the novel or the author, although we may understandably feel that there's contempt and ridicule, if we measure the meaning with reference to our present-day vocabulary. What is there is opposition to colonization and displacement in Africa (as described in my initial comment above) but there's no expression of contempt for Maran, just like there is none for Kant, von Hartmann, or Spencer, when Steiner sternly evaluates their works. Yes, he judged Maran's novel "deadly boring", without mincing words, as he usually did for any production he deemed not very valuable. He was never 'diplomatic' in the way many would prefer to have it today. Whoever is familiar with navigating the RS Archives, has felt that pointy straightforwardness at many other occasions. Therefore we don't have to necessarily deduce racism because of that hard judgment. Now, the hyperbole about the trend of African literature in Europe being at risk of influencing the pregnancy of expecting women is unfortunate. Clearly, we shouldn't hesitate to recognize that. It doesn't make anyone laugh today - luckily. It's hard to figure out how it may have sounded back then, among the group of workers at the Gotheanum, but we know for sure how it feels today. It does not signal, though, an underlying racist or racialist worldview - again, this possibility is simply empty of meaning for anyone who genuinely strives to grasp the spiritual-scientific worldview. But it surely is an unfortunate hyperbole.

This being said and recognized, we should also pay attention to what one is doing when chasing these very few and far between spoken expressions, which we are disturbed by today. What is one really doing when gathering such extremely meager material to build entire theories on such 'foundations', filling with them rounds of discussions, and presentations at conferences, while on the other hand there are tens of thousands of written pages and stenographic reports that consistently articulate a completely different story? As I said above, one problem here is that many have not yet developed - or are uninterested in developing - the appropriate inner tools to meaningfully read that story. But even so, it should be possible for everyone to realize that, when it comes to these one-in-a-million expressions, we are always dealing with spoken words, uttered in social contexts of various kinds. Steiner was not at his desk writing a book. He was going live, flowing within the character and limitations of the given social gatherings and presentation sets. We can't apply our present-day judgment to those extrapolated words, as if they were uttered in the abstract. Today - more than a century later - it's easy to forget this context, and just dive into this wealth of stenographic reports that make the streams of spoken words look like a book, if we are not careful enough. And so we may end up perusing these archives like a sort of time-travelling paparazzi, to clip those rare snippets, almost like a tabloid editor would do. Then, on that meager loot, we end up building entire articles, not as gossip sheets, but as academic discussions of the most refined level, while thousands of pages about the wisdom of man wait for us to pay attention, just besides.

With this focus, we seek to highlight mistakes and inconsistencies that, most likely, we ourselves are equally guilty of, for the most part of us, despite living in a time when these faux pas should be way more obvious than they were at Steiner's times. Hand on heart, who can affirm never ever having come out with anything racist, or slightly racist - jokes, comments, or reactions - perhaps without realizing it at first, perhaps driven by environmental circumstances - driven by what's called unconscious bias today? Harvard’s Implicit Association Test - Project Implicit - shows that over 70% of educated people today (only educated people, or highly educated people, take this type of voluntary self-assessments) demonstrate racial prejudices in their reactions. A share much higher still demonstrates prejudices of some sort, consciously or (most often) unconsciously. It’s called unconscious bias. It is mainly driven by environmental influences.

I am no exception. Some years ago I took the assessment. Anyone can take it. According to it, I have slight biases (although not a racial bias). I wonder if anyone among those who dedicate their efforts to discuss Steiner's racism, racialism, and unchristian views, can affirm that they have no biases, and that they never came up in speaking with an offensive gut reaction, or an unfortunate joke? I am in sincere admiration if anyone can. But if not, I wonder if anyone would like to be said to have a racist or racialist worldview because of that? So, I would deem that the most Christian thing to do here is to take a step back and really consider what one is doing - and what's being left aside instead - when engaging in these research propositions. And let him who is without sin cast the first stone.

[AshvinP]

It seems that MS may not share the same critique as Ashton based on the following comment and the fact that he liked my response. Whether he is willing to state that clearly, however, may be another story

***

MS: "I would not be interested enough in Steiner's work to risk publishing and presenting on his ideas unless I took the possibility of higher cognition seriously. It should be obvious that my concern here is not about whether pregnant mothers reading novels might have subtle effects on their child's development. That seems likely even from an exoteric point of view. My concern is about the way, the manner, in which Steiner spoke about this particular novel and its author. Maran's novel (he is a man, btw) is worth looking at more closely, as is the colonial historical context out of which it was written.

A few questions for you:

1) Why do you think the editors of Anthroposophic Press chose to suppress this passage?

2) Imagine you were the black parent of a new Waldorf student and you came across this passage: how would you feel? Do you expect such a parent would be satisfied with the answer that they just do not have the requisite inspired cognition to grasp what Steiner meant? That his comments (which I must say anyone with common sense would recognize reflect the widespread racial prejudice of his time and place) are really a product of deeper esoteric insight? I do not doubt that Steiner has something important to say about these questions that require cultivating methods of higher cognition to fully grasp, but at the very least, I would hope you recognize that the manner in which he expresses himself in the passage in question does not reflect a dispassionate scientific attitude."


"If the concern is only about the manner in which Steiner conveyed his spiritual observations, then I would gladly acknowledge that, once in a while, he expressed them in certain unfortunate ways. I'm actually surprised that, given his sheer output (and our heightened sensitivity to various terms), we don't find more such unfortunate expressions scattered throughout the lectures. To answer your questions directly:

1. I don't know, but probably because they felt it was too controversial or embarrassing. I don't agree with that editing choice, and I think all such passages should be left in so that we can contemplate them more deeply and trace their inner dynamics, as suggested before. They are nothing to be ashamed of. In fact, if we hide them, that means we have misunderstood them just as much as those who use them to bolster their accusations of "Steiner's racism".

2. I doubt they would be satisfied, just as most people aren't satisfied with any deeper esoteric answers to their questions, but I think the general aim of an esoteric education is exactly to stimulate deeper, dispassionate contemplation of the inner dynamics that are being expressed through such statements. The particular statements only serve as anchor points for that deeper exploration. I don't think we do the students or parents any favors by pretending that this was Steiner expressing racial anxieties and nothing more.

Is this also what Ashton was concerned about in his presentation? That seems very unlikely. He made quite clear that he was concerned that the 'spiritual observations' themselves were born out of flawed scientific assumptions of his time, such as biological essentialism. If you disagree with him on that point, it would be helpful to state that clearly now. The main theme of my comments on this topic has been to disentangle the confusions surrounding what Steiner was doing in expressing these various quotes, which are being intermixed into the critique.

I hope you agree with me that it is of utmost importance that we become clear on what these unfortunate expressions are fundamentally about and how they took shape. Yes, it is also helpful to think about how we would explain these things to offended parents or whoever, and update the expressions accordingly (as I tried to illustrate with the example above), but our primary responsibility is to the inner Truth. Steiner is trying to point our attention to critical inner dynamics that, if left ignored, will continue leading to terrible consequences for incarnating souls."

***

Federica, what you have expressed above makes a lot of sense. Perhaps you will consider posting it on that thread.

Now, the half-joke about the trend of African literature in Europe being at risk of influencing the pregnancy of expecting women is unfortunate. Clearly, we shouldn't hesitate to recognize that. It doesn't make anyone laugh today - luckily. It's hard to figure out how it may have sounded back then, among the group of workers at the Gotheanum, but we know for sure how it feels today. It does not signal, though, an underlying racist or racialist worldview - again, this possibility is simply empty of meaning for anyone who genuinely strives to grasp the spiritual-scientific worldview. But it surely is an unfortunate half-joke.

Instead of a 'half-joke', I may characterize it as an unfortunate exaggeration, which, however, is still rooted in genuine spiritual observation of the inner dynamics. We could consider, for example, if some gentrified white people set up an EDM club and pregnant women began immersing themselves in that scene. This could be considered a modern comparison to the trance-inducing, ritualistic dances of Aboriginal cultures, by which they sought to commune with the nature spirits. In the former case, surely no one would take too much offense at the suggestion that this exposure will have profound negative consequences on the unborn children.