Gary Lachman on Rudolph Steiner

[Humming]

Daniel, I wonder if you're familiar with Gary Lachman? Apparently he's publishing a book this year on Steiner through your same publisher for "2012".

Unfortunately I don't subscribe to FT so I can only get the first page of this article.

Dweller on the Threshold
http://www.forteantimes.com/articles/205_steiner1.shtml

On the 80th anniversary of Rudolf Steiner's death, Gary Lachman celebrates the life, work and enduring legacy of one of Western esotericism's most ambitious and unusual thinkers. All images of Steiner and his work courtesy of Rudolf Steiner House library.

THE DOCTOR

The most enigmatic figure to emerge from the 'occult revival' of the early 20th century was also the most successful: the Austrian 'spiritual scientist' Rudolf Steiner (1861-1925). Although many of his contemporaries and near-contemporaries were outwardly more eccentric – think of Madame Blavatsky, the founder of Theosophy, or of the inimitable GI Gurdjieff, or the scandalous 'magician' Aleister Crowley – it's precisely Steiner's sobriety that is so striking, even making him seem out of place in the often flamboyant world of the esoteric.

We generally associate ideas of the occult, higher consciousness and spiritual worlds with exotic, extraordinary characters with something of the trickster about them; Blavatsky, Gurdjieff and Crowley would certainly fall into this category. Steiner, though, was precisely the opposite. Standing at the lectern with his pince-nez in hand, he projected an image of irreproachable rectitude. Steiner was earnestness incarnate, his one gesture of bohemian extravagance the flowing bow ties he was fond of wearing, a remnant of his early student days. Where Blavatsky, Gurdjieff and Crowley each took pains to present a formidable self-image, there was something simple and peasant-like about Steiner. Combined with this wholesomeness was an encyclopædic erudition; if we were to use an 'archetype' to describe Steiner, it would have to be that of 'the professor' – or, more precisely, the Doctor, as he was known by those around him. Commenting on her magnum opus, The Secret Doctrine, Madame Blavatsky once remarked that she "wrote, wrote, wrote," like the Wandering Jew "walks, walks, walks". Steiner, too, wrote a great deal, but his main mode of disseminating his ideas was lecturing, and in the years between 1900 and 1925 he lectured, lectured, lectured, delivering more than 6,000 talks across Europe.

In a dry and at times pedantic style, Steiner informed his audience of the results of his spiritual research, his "super-sensible" readings of the occult history of the world made available to him through what is called "the Akashic Record". In matter-of-fact terms, he introduced them to his teaching – 'anthroposophy', as he called it – telling them along the way about ancient Atlantis, life after death, astral and ætheric bodies, the true meaning of Christianity and much, much more. Yet this humble, self-effacing character became one of the most influential – and simultaneously vilified – forces in the spiritual and cultural life of early 20th-century Europe. And his ideas are still powerfully influential today. Steiner's efforts to lead "the Spiritual in the human being to the Spiritual in the Universe" have produced remarkably concrete results. Since his death, more than 1,000 schools around the world work with Steiner's pedagogical principles, not to mention the many "special needs" schools, working along lines developed by Steiner more than a century ago. There are also the hundreds of 'bio-dynamic' farms, employing Steiner's agricultural insights, developed decades in advance of our interest in ecology and organic foods. The practical application of Steiner's ideas have also informed very successful avenues in holistic healthcare, the arts, architecture, economics, religion and other areas.

So, given these achievements in the 'real world', which certainly exceed those of other 'esoteric teachers', why isn't Steiner better known? You would reasonably expect the average educated person to have some idea of who, say, Jung is, or Krishnamurti, or the Dalai Lama; possibly even Blavatsky, Gurdjieff and Crowley. But Steiner? He remains something of a mystery, a name associated with a handful of different disciplines and endeavours, but not solidly linked to any one thing. He remains, as one of his most eloquent apologists, the Inkling Owen Barfield, called him, "the best kept secret of the 20th century." It's certainly time that he was better known.

[Caprinardo Delirio]

for my birthday i bought myself steiner's 'the spiritual beings in the heavens and natural kingdoms' it looks pretty wild, with something like itzhak bentov's schemes from 'stalking the wild pendulum' really looking forward to reading it. maybe one should pick that one up as well..

[daniel]

For those interested in Steiner, there is an enormous electronic library of his talks and writings available, free of charge... I don't have the url in front of me, but it can be found quickly through google.

I know Gary Lachman. His book "A Secret History of Consciousness" is excellent - it introduced me to Gebser. I gave him a blurb for it. On the other hand I had a lot of problems with "Turn Off Your Mind" - a strenuously negative look at the occult currents of the 1960s, putting down Alan Watts, etc. (I reviewed it for BookForum). He is a very prolific writer, which has its negative and positive aspects. My understanding is that he doesn't know German, so his book will be all secondary sources. Colin Wilson also wrote a book on Steiner, which is not bad but not great either.

Ultimately, Lachman is doing great work trying to get a lot of occult ideas circulating in the culture in a very intelligent manner. He was also a former member of Blondie.

[Rob P]

.......

http://www.rsarchive.org/

.......

[Caprinardo Delirio]

why would ANYONE put down alan watts!? yes, he DID treat the occult movement with somewhat detached humour and negligence of it's potentially abracadabra for-realness, and he DID propose the idea that someone should help psychology on the right track by making a work he proposed could be called 'the spectrum of consciousness' - but i think he would have been just as dissapointed by the vain intellectual-spiritual über-achieving body-builder (gross/subtle/causal/aether/whathaveyou) that took that idea, and numerous others so very very literally, while still shooting the essence, as i am, which is quite a bit. i remember him calling gurdjieff 'that wonderful rascal' - isn't that just wonderful in itself? well, i don't know what to do now.

daniel, if you ever want to make business of your wish to make a critique of wilber, let me know, i'll hand you my cents...

i read some steiner last night. he's quite intoxicating!

thanks for the link, rob...

jeremy irons, anyone.. anyone??

[ April 12, 2006, 01:54 AM: Message edited by: Caprinardo Delirio ]

[Gary Lachman]

Hello Humming Bird and Daniel. I'm glad you enjoyed at least the beginning of my article on Rudolf Steiner; the book will be published by Penguin USA in 2007. I would like to clarify that I do know ein bisen deutsch, manchmal nur wenning, aber manchal genug. Also, fyi, my book on Swedenborg will be coming out in the UK later this year; the publisher is the Swedenborg Society. In this case, I do not know Latin or Swedish.

I'm sorry that Daniel did not think much of my book on the 1960s; my philosophy, however, is to challenge sacred cows and get people thinking, a needed endeavour at any time. This is what I did with my book In Search of P.D. Ouspensky, which investigates the relationship between Ouspensky and Gurdjieff. I stepped on many a corn with this one as well. Gadflies are always in short supply.

[daniel]

Hi Gary,

Great to hear from you on the board!

I am glad to learn that you know German (which I don't). Can you tell us if you have any breakthroughs to offer in your work on Steiner? I am a little curious about his personal life, as it always seems to be avoided as a subject.

Where do you think Steiner would have stood with psychedelics? I suspect he would have seen them as "Luciferic catalysts," and would not have been as negative as his followers tend to be.

I felt that attacking the 1960s was the style, defending them would be the gadfly position.

p.s. please ask Mitch to send you a copy of 2012, if he hasn't done so already.

[Piers]

I've always assumed that hallucinogens brought about a "Crossing of the Threshold" into the Etheric realm.

There is a great Anthroposophical book about drugs titled In Place of the Self. Its author, Ron Dunselman, describes LSD as a "poison" that effects a separation of etheric forces from the liver and kidneys. The etheric forces which usually permeate those organs are forced into the astral body which, in turn, gives rise to hallucinations. In other words, LSD "breaks through the boundary to the ethereal world, and does so with violence."

I loved the Secret History of Consciousness....

[Dna]

Hi Gary,

I only read something you wrote in the Guardian last month, - had no idea you wrote about this kind of thing though. I found the article clear and illuminating regarding Steiner. Thanks.

Humming, yes you can read the rest of that article online. You just have to register online with FT though. That's what I did.

There's a mountain of stuff I want to read now since joining this message board. I have hit a seam of gold here.

Dna.

[Rob P]

.......

I suppose that yet another re-introduction to Rudolf Steiner is a welcome opportunity for people who aren't familiar with his life.....

But for the curious newcomer, there about 80 years worth of books recalling firsthand impressions of the man and his life
and work. There are also worthwhile works by his contemporaries who lived and absorbed the ideas he was speaking about....

I recently met a woman, Marjorie Spock, who is now 101 years old, and she first met Rudolf Steiner in 1922...She is not finished with introducing new ideas into the art of eurythmy, which she first studied in the 1920's when Steiner was still alive.....

There will always be a new generation of Anthroposophists who will continue the esoteric beginnings which Rudolf Steiner
introduced at the dawn of the 20th century.....

New versions of the same old story become redundant without a re-enlivening of the message which was intended for humanity in the first place....

seeya
r o b

.......

[jtreg]

Hiya Gary... I asked you a question at Unconvention 2004 when you presented your book on Evola... anyway...

I find the Steiner people in their London HQ a bit creepy (even more creepy than the TS!) - Recently they had a meeting where they used a 'talking stick' - this was to avoid the constant interrupting that was prevalent in their group. They ended up hitting each other with the stick! hahaha - its true because two of the guys who were atthis meeting told me.

[ May 17, 2006, 11:39 AM: Message edited by: jtreg ]

[Dna]

If you have a different world view, as many of us to here, it wise not to shelter your ideas by joining a clique, like some of the TS or Steiner people spoken of in the last post.

It is better to cultivate the society of a broad range of people.

I am here because ther is a healthy dose of open-mindedness and genuine thirst for truth. This has nucleated around Daniel's spirit of rational enquiry and sincere search.

We are all from a broad range of backgrounds and age-groups. We have a lot of different and valuable experiences to add to the mix here. My feeling about a lot of other forums is that they tend to have more uniformity in their membership.

So a big shout to Daniel for keeping this particular forum rolling.

Thanks,

Dna

[Rob P]

.......
On the other hand...
at least there are groups of like-minded people
actually showing up somewhere to have conversations face to face!

Could you imagine all of us on this forum
in a room trying to discuss something?

We'd need a talking tree, never mind a stick.....

Here's Rudolf Steiner speaking in 1923:

If we look back over the twenty-one or twenty-two years of the Society's development, we will certainly discover that by far the greater number of those who approach the Society do so out of a sense of dissatisfaction with the spiritual, psychological and practical conditions they find surrounding them in life today. In the early days of the Society, which, when considered factually and not critically, might even be called its better days, something was taking place that almost amounted to flight from the life of the present into a different kind of life built on human community, a community where people could live in a way they felt in their souls to be in keeping with their dignity as human beings. This alienation from the spiritual, psychic and practical situation prevailing in the life around them must be taken into account as a factor in the founding of the Anthroposophical Society. For those who became anthroposophists were the first people to feel what millions and millions of others will be feeling keenly indeed in a not too distant future, that older forms have come down into the present from by-gone days in which they were not only fully justified but the product of historical necessity, but that they no longer provide what modern man's inner life requires and the dignity of full humanness demands.

http://wn.rsarchive.org/Lectures/AwComI_index.html

seeya
r o b

[Gary Lachman]

Hello Daniel, DNA, and all of you - not quite sure what the protocol is here with names and don't want to offend...

In my book on Steiner I ask quite a few questions that tend to get avoided in most of the literature on him. Sadly, most books on Steiner tend to be hagiographical, or, to go to the other extreme, set him up as a nut case. Steiner plays his cards close to his chest when it comes to his private life, and most of his biographers simply state that his private life is not the readers' business. I raise questions about his sexuality, his opportunism, regarding both his early career as a lecturer in history and his relationship with the Theosophical Society, his first marriage, his encounter with Elizabeth Forster Nietzsche and several other items. I also make clear what I can accept of his ideas - especially those on education - and what seems debatable. I also make clear what I find most important about his work, such as his early Gothean writings and his Philosophy of Freedom.

It's true that there is a truckload of books about him and his ideas, but that in itself is the problem for many people. They have no idea where to start, even people, like some I know, who have children in a Steiner school. I make no bones about how unbelievable many of his claims are - such as the stuff about Atlantis, etc. - but am also very firm on how important many of his ideas on epistemology are. So, all in all, I think I do him justice, and am sympathetic but critical.

As for Steiner and psychedelics, well, he was teetotal, and pretty much regarded drugs as a wrong path, mostly because for him they induced a state like that of an earlier state of consciousness that we have evolved beyond. For Steiner, anything that interfered withe clear thinking was detrimental and to be avoided. Madame Blavatsky, on the other hand, was quite fond of hashish, but for Steiner, this only proved his point. Blavatsky's clairvoyance was a manifestation of what Steiner saw as a once necessary but now superceded form of consciousness...

AS for attacking the '60s, I don't feel that I attacked them, simply looked at them in a different way and asked some uncomfortable questions. There's been quite a lot said and written about how good they were, and rightly so. But I thought it was also good to try to see them differently. Personally, I love the '60s. I was a kid then and have a great many fantastic memories, a point I make in the book. But I do think it is misguided to feel that we need to get 'back' to them in some way. I think we can learn from the mistakes that were made then, and also benefit from the important insights many of the people I wrote about had. But we should also not blind ourselves to their faults. Sadly, Alan Watts strikes me as a classic example of someone who confused the pursuit of the spiritual with a justification for avoiding his personal responsibilities, and I think an unbiased reader of his autobiography would feel the same.

[Rob P]

.......

Hi Gary-

I look forward to your book!

Before I started reading any of Steiner's lectures,
I decided to read about his life first, and so I read
the excellent bio by Henry Barnes. Even now I find
it interesting to see different perspectives on his
life and who he was......

Speaking of Philosophy Of Freedom,
I would like to recommend a most fascinating
book about that book,
called The Ultimate Communion of Mankind. It's
written by Karen Swassjan, and was published
by Temple Lodge in 1996.....

seeya
r o b

PS- thanks for writing one of Blondie's best songs!
.......

[Piers]

Rob & Co,

Swassjan's book is excellent....Another good one is Otto Palmer's, Rudolf Steiner On His Book The Philosophy of Freedom....

I think Steiner would hold that the danger of psychedelics lies in their "unlawfulness". They allow one to "cross the threshold" without the requisite preparation. The Anthroposophical psychiatrist, Rudolf Treichler, likens the psychedelic experience to psychosis in that both involve "a partial death process; not only does the astral body leave the physical body, the way it does in sleep, but powers of the ether body do so as well, transferring their life into the soul sphere."

Treichler goes on to note that "trips" do indeed give insight into the world of Spirit. The problem lies with the drugs "mobilization" of the forces of the individuals metabolism (liver and kidney). This connection distorts the experience, making it "clouded" and "distorted".
Finally, he asserts that there ego lacks the "control" that is achieved through spiritual training. Of course, a shaman have achieved a high degree of spiritual training....

[Rimbaud]

Hello Gary Lachman, since you were involved in the early history of punk rock I was wondering what you think about gothic rock, which is more heavily into the occult and the dark corners of the mind?

I've just finished reading Goth Chic by Gavin Baddeley which surveys dark culture; films, novels, music, fashion, etc. It covers everything that the goths take their inspiration from. He makes the interesting point that Goth leans towards the feminine, especially the anima as the shadow of male consciouness.

[Dna]

What findings were these. I'm interested.

Peace,

Dna

[Caprinardo Delirio]

hi gary,

i haven't read his autobiography, but i think that representation of watts' person only in a very biased way represents the points watts was presenting.

though i could imagine he would say that politicizing the spiritual could be a course of just as much avoiding personal responsibility as any existential relativist recluse's could, the zeitgeist of the last century of blitzkriegs and the dying of birth dosen't give one to give too many points to the quantity of ethical activism on behalf of his attitude and morally configurative messages, yet i really feel one must do so in terms of the quality.

it's an intersting discussion, and of course springs like so many others from matters of definition, in this case it seems to be the notion of personal responsibility.

that is, if i understand you correctly. would you care to illustrate?

[Gary Lachman]

Dear Rimbaud and Caprinardo,

Sadly, I'm fairly ignorant regarding Goth Rock, although in my neighborhood here in Camden Town there is a popular Goth pub and the look is pretty prevalent. I did read Gavinn Baddley's book on satanism a while back - reviewed for the Fortean Times, I think - and enjoyed it, although I did think it made some heavy weather out of the satanist philosophy, which I must admit I thought a bit overdone. It had some chapters on the Scandinavian goth bands who had got into some nasty business, with shootings and such. Not my bag.

As for Alan Watts and personal responsibility: I define it pretty simply. When you abandon your family in order to pursue your spiritual destiny and are actually whooping it up with other women and hitting the bottle, then you've pretty much jettisoned your responsibilities and are just rationalizing your behavior. Sadly, this is not an uncommon trait among many counter-culture icons. Take Crowley as a key example. Best.

[Rimbaud]

I've just finished reading "King Of An Empire To The Shoes Of A Misfit" by Myke Hideous. It is the memoirs of the singer for the obscure goth band The Empire Hideous.

This book led me to discover the visionary work of John Santerineross. The Neo-Symbolist Photography of John Santerineross

Most visionary art is just psychedelic but his photos are genuinely eerie. I've ordered his book because he really seems to know how to capture the essence of a dream on film.
Dream: The Dark Erotic Photographic Visions of John Santerineross

[drew hempel]

I gotta ditto Gary on Alan Watts. There's something of an expose on him by a son of a family that housed Watts -- I think that's right. Anyway Watts openly stated he just made things up in his lectures (because I guess that's zen or something) and that he felt spiritually inclined to take bodily advantage of the baby-sitter.

But then I feel similarly about Steiner and Jung, etc.

If you read the biography of H.W.L. Poonjaji -- "Nothing Ever Happened" (published around 1998) -- he toured Europe and tried to seek out saints, mystics, etc. and basically concluded:

Well Europe lost the yoga and there you have it.

There's a great outlook on Steiner by the physicist Michael Shallis in his book "On Time" -- Shallis taught at Oxford but wasn't afraid of paranormal experiments. Shallis basically argues that modern technology is evil a la Steiner.

Again I don't believe in progress -- if we take a truly global approach, as any cyber-geek should, then, as Mike Davis so well documents, we need to confront the acceleration of hypercity slums -- 20 million plus with no sanitation.

Science creates just as many problems as it solves and that leaves esoteric philosophy as the alternative.

For real esoteric philosophy nothing beats Vedic analysis -- H.W.L. Poonjaji was a follower of Ramana Maharshi but the "yoga" proper really utilizes either extreme isolation (in Ramana Maharshi's case, nine years) or extreme body-pressure (full-lotus for 28 days straight, no food and water).

Wilhelm Von Humboldt gave a series of lectures on Vedic philosophy which in turn influenced Hegel greatly. That little connection gets passed over -- even by Chomsky (a follower of Von Humboldt) and Zizek (a follower of Hegel). Newton, of course, turned back to Vedic philosophy, with great racist results.

And thus eurocentric apocalpytic philosophy continues.

Gotta love it!

drew hempel, M.A. (U of Minnesota)

[drew hempel]

I knew something was fishy when I was typing that reply. Alan Watts made things up in his lectures as he went along but it was Paul Brunton who "weighed in" on a babysitter he found to be "spiritually" necessary. Anyway it's all quite similar.