Anthroposophy and Ecofascism 117

Continuing my commentary on the 36th paragraph of Peter Staudenmaier's Anthroposophy and Ecofascism.

In Steiner's pedagogy there are two major events, or milestones, in childhood development. Both indicate processes that culminate at that point, and both are referred to in Peter Staudenmaier's paragraph, though inaccurately. The first is the first dentition, or loss of the baby teeth, and the second is puberty. These two major milestones are roughly seven years apart, so that childhood and adolescence can be divided into roughly three seven-year periods. Now what these seven-year periods signify to Waldorf pedagogy is indeed important, and there is much talk of these seven-year periods in Waldorf education.
The first seven-year period, from birth to the beginning of the first dentition, is a period in which the physical body in particular is developing.* Now contrary to Peter Staudenmaier's belief, the physical body is not the only thing developing, for the etheric and astral bodies are also developing, and a fourth element, called the ego, is also present and active. However, of all the developments, Steiner considers the development of the physical body to be the most significant. Likewise, the second seven-year period is one in which the etheric body's development has especial significance. This is not to indicate, as Peter Staudenmaier does, that the physical body stops development, or that the astral body is inactive. Both continue to develop, but the etheric body's development is most important. The onset of puberty (which today is closer to age 12 than 14) signifies the start of a period of special development of the astral body. The etheric body and physical bodies continue to develop, as does the ego. In one poetic description, Steiner talked about a second, third and fourth "birth"; that at first dentition the etheric body was "born", at puberty the astral body was "born" and at roughly 21 the ego is "born". This is to be understood allegorically, since in Steiner’s view they are all present even before the child’s physical birth.

* The theme of seven-year periods in human development is quite common in Steiner's work, and he develops it in literally hundreds of lectures in dozens of books. A good overview can be obtained by reading Rudolf Steiner, The Child's Changing Consciousness. Hudson, NY: Anthroposophic Press, 1988.

Anthroposophy and Ecofascism 116

Continuing my commentary on the 36th paragraph of Peter Staudenmaier's Anthroposophy and Ecofascism.

Steiner called for an education based on a comprehensive understanding of the changes in development of the human being through childhood. This concept of "developmentally appropriate" education is hardly unique to Steiner. Steiner had additional perspectives on the development of the human being, and this allowed him to designate developmental stages and the appropriate pedagogical responses decades before mainstream educational theorists came to similar conclusions. Indeed, not all of the subtle developmental stages have yet shown up in non-Waldorf research (since Waldorf is so far ahead of developments in what is called "progressive" education, people in Waldorf circles often wonder when some researcher will "discover" yet another thing that has been done in Waldorf for the last 80 years). This is not to imply a contradiction between Waldorf and non-Waldorf child development theories. I will discuss Steiner's theory of child development tomorrow.

Anthroposophy and Ecofascism 115

Peter Staudenmaier writes in Paragraph 36:

The curriculum at Waldorf schools is structured around the stages of spiritual maturation posited by Anthroposophy: from one to seven years a child develops her or his physical body, from seven to fourteen years the ethereal body, and from fourteen to twenty-one the astral body. These stages are supposed to be marked by physical changes; thus kindergartners at Waldorf schools can't enter first grade until they've lost all their baby teeth.

The above paragraph displays all the subtlety and understanding of Conquistador describing the religious beliefs of the Inca. That is, a few of the details are recognizably related to some of the forms, but the whole is grossly mistaken and displays a serious lack of effort at understanding. Take for example the term "ethereal body". Peter Staudenmaier obviously means "etheric body" but is apparently not familiar enough with even the most basic terminology to use the correct word. One can hardly expect subtly of understanding from someone who has not even read closely enough to note the terms. I'll talk more about this tomorrow.

Anthroposophy and Ecofascism 114

Staudenmaier lackes an understanding of the anthroposophical understanding of karma and all its nuance. For example, it would indeed strain credulity to believe that every individual child in each class in every Waldorf School chooses every other student in the class and the teacher before birth. If nothing else, such a conception provides precious little space for the agency of free will. So it will probably surprise no one besides Peter Staudenmaier that this is not an article of faith for every teacher in every Waldorf School. Inasmuch as Waldorf teachers are students of Anthroposophy (and while many are, quite a few are not) they may take into consideration that karma might play some role in the interaction they have with their students. But this consideration applies equally to all other social interactions. And precious few Waldorf teachers pretend to a degree of karmic insight sufficient to know the pre-earthly intentions of all, or any, of their students. Instead the concept of karma helps the teacher respect the individuality of each student. Given the nature of the concept of karma – that in the course of repeated earth lives we learn in order to grow – it is hardly surprising that this relates to the very principle of education. Thus it is not incorrect that to one who believes in the concept, "karma is the basis of all true education". However it is mistaken to contend as Peter Staudenmaier and others do that this basic principle somehow translates into a rigid belief in the iron hand of fate determining classroom configurations.

A proper understanding of the anthroposophical conception of Karma is critical for forming a basis for understanding how this does and does not effect Waldorf education. The essential point that so many critics seem to miss is the fact that karma does not equal pre-destiny. In the anthroposophical conception, karma is like a checklist of to-do items for a lifetime – a list that may be completed along with many additional adventures, or that may not have even one item completed. Because of the existence of free will and the forward-looking as well as backward-looking nature of karma, many unplanned things may happen in any life (with consequences for the future) and no one can tell what is karmic, and what is the result of free will. Thus no true anthroposophist (or Waldorf teacher) will go around claiming that this or that event or tendency is "karma". Absent clairvoyance, which very few claim for themselves, no one can tell one way or the other.

Anthroposophy and Ecofascism 113

Continuing my commentary on the 35th paragraph of Peter Staudenmaier's Anthroposophy and Ecofascism.

Peter Staudenmaier's fumbling to formulate statements concerning things about which he knows very little becomes evident in phrases like "classical Anthroposophy". There is no "neo-Anthroposophy" or anything similar to stand in contradistinction to "classical" Anthroposophy. Peter Staudenmaier has coined the phrase to appear knowledgeable, but it is meaningless, as is most of his argument here. While he is directly claiming that 'root races' and 'national souls' are taught secretly in the Waldorf school, the claim is utter nonsense, firstly because nobody in Anthroposophy talks about 'root races,'* second because 'national souls' do not exist,** third because Anthroposophy as such is explicitly withheld from the curriculum on Steiner's insistence, and fourth because few Waldorf schools have even a majority of teachers who are actual anthroposophists. Anthroposophy does serve as a source of inspiration to many Waldorf teachers.*** This fact is, of course, quite explicit in the brochures of almost every Waldorf School on five continents, so Peter Staudenmaier can hardly claim credit for "discovering" this startling fact. But his claims go way beyond this: Peter Staudenmaier claims that Anthroposophy itself is a hidden subject in the curriculum. For support of this claim he cites two works, one by a German ex-Waldorf teacher openly hostile to the schools she formerly worked in, and another by a German left-wing radical journalist with a stated goal of destroying the European Waldorf school movement; neither are known for their scholarly depth. What Peter Staudenmaier has not done is read any actual primary source material on Waldorf education, pedagogy, or curriculum, or interviewed anyone actively involved in the field. The result is about as accurate as a description of Judaism written by a polemical 19th Century anti-Semite.

* What in Blavatsky's Theosophy were known as 'root races' are known in Anthroposophy as 'epochs'. Steiner felt that the term 'root race' was incorrect to emphasize racial aspect of the progression of time and civilizations, and that cultural development was of primary significance. So he explicitly rejected the term, and replaced it with "epoch" (the related term 'sub-race' he renamed "cultural epoch"). This happened in 1906, in the fourth year of 25 years of lecturing on esoteric subjects. The old term 'root race' appears only in a few of Steiner's very early Theosophical writings, and is simply not used at all among anthroposophists. Indeed, it has never been used among anthroposophists, as anthroposophists only broke from Theosophy in 1913, seven years after Steiner stopped using the term. I have written an article on the subject, online at http://www.defendingSteiner.com/misconceptions/r-race.php

** The term in German is "Volksseele" or "Folk Soul", and not "National Soul". A Folk Soul is a designation to represent the essence of the culture of a people. In one form, the concept goes back to the German romantic philosopher Johann Gottfried von Herder (1744-1803), though Herder wrote of a "Volksgeist", or Folk Spirit, and differed from Steiner in a number of important ways. Peter Staudenmaier might consider consulting the excellent description of Herder's conception of a Volksgeist in George Mosse's book Toward the Final Solution: A History of European Racism, which he cited earlier. Herder and the idea of the Volksgeist are discussed on pages 34-36. Peter Staudenmaier's constant confusion of culture and nation allows him to emphasize a nationalism in Steiner and Anthroposophy that simply does not exist.

*** In any group of Waldorf teachers you will find a large range of opinions and attitudes towards Steiner and Anthroposophy. Some merely find it interesting, other embrace it completely in the spirit intended, and a few others perhaps too dogmatically. There are even those who find the whole thing stupid, yet like the way the schools are run, and for that reason choose to work there.

Anthroposophy and Ecofascism 112

Peter Staudenmaier writes in Paragraph 35 of Anthroposophy and Ecofascism:

Classical Anthroposophy, with its root races and its national souls, is the "covert curriculum" of Waldorf schools. [Footnote: See Charlotte Rudolph, Waldorf-Erziehung: Wege zur VerSteinerung, Darmstadt 1987. No systematic surveys of Waldorf schooling are available. In this section I have relied chiefly on the work of former Waldorf teachers like Rudolph as well as the excellent critical study by Bierl.]* Anthroposophists themselves avow in internal forums that the idea of karma and reincarnation is the "basis of all true education." [From an international Waldorf teachers conference in 1996, cited in Bierl, p. 204.]** They believe that each class of students chooses one another and their teacher before birth. Steiner himself demanded that Waldorf schools be staffed by "teachers with a knowledge of man originating in a spiritual world.[Rudolf Steiner, The Spiritual Ground of Education, London 1947, p. 40.]*** Later anthroposophists express the Waldorf vision thus:

"This education is essentially grounded on the recognition of the child as a spiritual being, with a varying number of incarnations behind him, who is returning at birth into the physical world, into a body that will be slowly moulded into a usable instrument by the soul-spiritual forces he brings with him. He has chosen his parents for himself because of what they can provide for him that he needs in order to fulfill his karma, and, conversely, they too need their relationship with him in order to fulfill their own karma."[Footnote: Easton, p. 388]****

First some notes to the text. In the following days I will comment further on the text.

* I find it amazing that Mr. Peter Staudenmaier was unable to find any trace of "systematic surveys" of Waldorf schooling. Perhaps it is a question of definition, for there is not single book or series that combines every aspect of Waldorf education in one volume. However, there are two excellent surveys of the entire curriculum in English (Rawson, Martyn and Richter, Tobias, eds. The Educational Tasks and Content of the Steiner Waldorf Curriculum. Forest Row, UK: Steiner Waldorf Schools Fellowship, 2000 and, Cradock, Stephen and Stockmeyer, Karl, eds. Rudolf Steiner's Curriculum for Waldorf Schools. 4th Revised edition. Forest Row, UK: Steiner Waldorf Schools Fellowship, 2001.), as well as books on every aspect of Waldorf education and Waldorf Schools, from each specialized subject in the curriculum to school administration. Including books in German, the total exceeds a thousand volumes, and then there are numerous periodicals in many languages. Rather that attempt to cite them all, I will simply refer to one publisher: www.steinerbooks.com. The excuse for relying on two blatantly biased and highly inaccurate German sources is simply not credible.

** Bierl's text cites Stephan Leber as saying this in a Dornach conference of Waldorf Teachers in 1996. Bierl's cited source is a book edited by Heinz Zimmermann, titled Reincarnation und Karma in der Erziehung (Reincarnation and karma in education) published in Dornach, 1998. The fact that Anthroposophy is the basis of Waldorf education is hardly a secret; it is announced in all the schools, and every book on the subject.

*** Steiner hardly “demanded“ that Waldorf schools be staffed only by anthroposophists. Such an attitude would be fundamentally out of character for him. He simply explained that he could not have founded the first Waldorf school without the help of a group of dedicated anthroposophists. In lecture quoted by Peter Staudenmaier, given at Manchester College in Oxford, England on August 20th, 1923 at the invitation of professor (of Education) Millicent Mackenzie, Rudolf Steiner said:

"Thus I may say: when my little booklet The Education of the Child in the Light of Anthroposophy appeared [in 1909], I was speaking on education there as one who disagrees with much in modern education, who would like to see this or the other treated more fundamentally, and so on. But at the time this little book was written I should not have been able to undertake such a thing as directing the Waldorf School. For it was essential for such a task to have a college of teachers with a knowledge of man originating in the spiritual world. This knowledge of man is exceedingly hard to come by to-day; in comparison it is easy for us to study natural science. It is comparatively easy to come and see what the final member of organic evolution is. … Now in order to educate we need a human science, - and a practical human science at that – a human science that applies to every individual child. And for this we need a general human science." (Reproduced in: Rudolf Steiner. The Spiritual Ground of Education. Blauvelt, NY: Garber Communications, 1989. Page 40.)

Steiner is clearly not “demanding” that all Waldorf Schools only ever be staffed by anthroposophists. He did explicitly found Waldorf pedagogy on the Anthroposophical conception of the human being, and said as much in numerous places. Peter Staudenmaier’s liberties in paraphrasing serve to distort both the tone and the content of the passages he is citing.

**** This description by Easton is essentially correct, as strange as it may seem absent the supporting background given in earlier pages that details how karma operates in the anthroposophical understanding. I would recommend Easton's chapter on Waldorf Education, on pages 382-407 as an excellent overview of the aims of the movement. I find it odd the Peter Staudenmaier cites this paragraph without giving any indication of having read the rest chapter from which it is taken. Stranger still is the earlier claim that no comprehensive overview of Waldorf education exists when he is citing one here.

Anthroposophy and Ecofascism 111

Continuing my commentary on the 34th paragraph of Peter Staudenmaier's Anthroposophy and Ecofascism.

It is true that Waldorf pedagogy has proven itself to be on the forefront of progressive trends over the last century. But this is not, as Peter Staudenmaier supposes, because Steiner picked and selected from among the best trends of his day. Rather, Steiner founded a pedagogy based entirely on what he felt was best for the education of children – often with quite detailed explanations – and these same general trends subsequently and quite independently entered into the general “progressive" stream of education in bits and pieces. It is not uncommon for ideas to enter the world simultaneously and independently (for example, the gasoline engine) and this appears to be the case with many of the techniques of Waldorf that are now common among "progressive" schools. So the causality Peter Staudenmaier offers is false: trends in progressive education did not "create" Waldorf in Steiner's mind. Indeed, in most cases where there is a demonstrable link the direction is the reverse: progressive education borrows from Waldorf.

Anthroposophy and Ecofascism 110

Peter Staudenmaier writes in Paragraph 34 of Anthroposophy and Ecofascism:

Anthroposophy in Practice: Waldorf Schools and Biodynamic Farming
The school in Stuttgart turned out to the anthroposophists' biggest success, along with the nearby pharmaceutical factory that they named after the mythical Norse oracle Weleda. Waldorf schools are now represented in many countries and generally project a solidly progressive image. There are undoubtedly progressive aspects to Waldorf education, many of them absorbed from the intense ferment of alternative pedagogical theories prevalent in the first decades of the twentieth century. But there is more to Waldorf schooling than holistic learning, musical expression, and eurhythmics.

Peter Staudenmaier offers an interesting thesis, here not defended, that Waldorf schools are an amalgam of techniques "absorbed" from the general pedagogical milieu of the first decades of the twentieth centuries. It is an attempt to minimize Steiner's substantial contributions to the field of education, a polite way of claiming he stole all of Waldorf's good ideas from his contemporaries.

Now I am not sure by what means Peter Staudenmaier feels himself such an expert in the history of pedagogy as to make such a sweeping generalization. But then, to speak in authoritative, dismissive generalizations without any background knowledge or any sort of substantiation seems a typical gesture of Peter Staudenmaier’s towards Anthroposophy and Rudolf Steiner. Once again Peter Staudenmaier gets the essential points wrong, as I will show in the next several days.

Anthroposophy and Ecofascism 109

Continuing my commentary on the 33rd paragraph of Peter Staudenmaier's Anthroposophy and Ecofascism.

Peter Staudenmaier writes, “Soon after the revolutionary upsurge of workers across Germany was crushed, Steiner was invited by the director of the Waldorf-Astoria tobacco factory to establish a company school in Stuttgart.” Staudenmaier has the basic chronology correct, but the reasons implicit in his formulation are wrong. Emil Molt had been working fervently to implement the Threefold Social Order in the entire state of Württemberg. The same forces that crushed the revolutionary upsurge of workers across Germany also prevented Molt from realizing his goal, so he turned to a more modest endeavor, founding a school for his worker's children. If he couldn't improve society through political means, then he aimed to do so through education. So Molt invited Steiner to be the director of the school he wished to establish. The primary focus of the school was from the start to realize and model a particular pedagogy (since named Waldorf Education) and not to be a company school. As such, starting in the second year the school separated itself administratively from the Molt's company, and financial subsidies ended in the seventh year of the school when the company went under, a victim of the German economy, then in hyperinflation. The school continued until it was shut down by the Nazi's in 1938 for - I'm not making this up - educating students to be too independent! The school reopend after WWII and spawned an entire movement: Waldorf Education. Today there are over 1000 schools operating with Waldorf methods.

Anthroposophy and Ecofascism 108

Continuing my commentary on the 33rd paragraph of Peter Staudenmaier's Anthroposophy and Ecofascism.

That the Munich communists denounced Steiner is hardly surprising; communism has an extraordinarily fractious history and denouncing each other and the world at large is something of an art form in those circles. Steiner was certainly no communist, and openly hostile to the Bolsheviks, so the fact that he earned their distain is to be expected.

For Staudenmaier, it is pity that the basic facts ruin the otherwise smooth flow of polemic. It is a nice picture to imagine a cabal of industrialists huddling around Steiner while the proletariat spit on the group of them. Steiner's idea of the Threefold Social Order was taken very seriously in the broader society for a short time. Working-class audiences by the thousands turned out to hear him speak, and his book was reviewed in a generally favorable light as far away as the Times of London and the New York Times. But that popularity faded under the attack of right-wing groups, and Steiner died five years later, in 1925. His Threefold Social Order became a historical curiosity.

Anthroposophy and Ecofascism 107

Continuing my commentary on the 33rd paragraph of Peter Staudenmaier's Anthroposophy and Ecofascism.

"Industrialists, on the other hand, showed a keen interest in Steiner's notions."

"Industrialists" is perhaps technically not incorrect; there were, after all, two of them involved. Both had been connected with Steiner and Anthroposophy for over a decade. One was Emil Molt, the other Carl Unger. Both were longtime personal students of Steiner's, and both enthusiastically embraced the Threefold Social Order. They were both industrialists in that they owned small-scale factories that employed workers numbering in the low hundreds, Molt making cigarettes, and Unger making machinists tool dies. It is misleading to imply that Steiner's Threefold Social Order attracted widespread interest among the malefactors of great wealth.Those most interested were those already familiar with Steiner's work. This, more than any other factor explains why the Threefold Social Order did not succeed on a large scale.Trying to paint Steiner as popular among the oppressors of the German working class is just silly.

Anthroposophy and Ecofascism 106

Peter Staudenmaier writes in Paragraph 33 of Anthroposophy and Ecofascism:

Though Steiner tried to make inroads within working class institutions, his outlook was understandably not very popular among workers. The revolutionaries of the 1919 Munich council republic derided him as "the witch doctor of decaying capitalism." [Footnote: Cited in Peter Bierl, Wurzelrassen, Erzengel und Volksgeister: Die Anthroposophie Rudolf Steiners und die Waldorfpädagogik, Hamburg 1999, p. 107] Industrialists, on the other hand, showed a keen interest in Steiner's notions. Soon after the revolutionary upsurge of workers across Germany was crushed, Steiner was invited by the director of the Waldorf-Astoria tobacco factory to establish a company school in Stuttgart. Thus were Waldorf schools born.

It appears that Peter Staudenmaier cannot even cite works favorable to his own position properly. The sentence from which Peter Staudenmaier has drawn his statement "The revolutionaries of the 1919 Munich council republic derided him as 'the witch doctor of decaying capitalism'" runs as follows:

Ziemlich treffend ist die Warnung, die im selben Monat [August, 1919] in der von Kurt Eisner gegründeten Münchner Neuen Zeitung erschienen. Unter dem Titel Der Seelendoktor des verelendenden Kapitalismus wurde die Dreigliederung zerpflückt und Steiner-Anhänger als Personen beyeichnete, die nach 'alkoholfreier Umnebelung schmachteten'. (107)

In English:

Quite appropriate is the warning that appeared the same month [August, 1919] in the Munich-based newspaper "Neuen Zeitung", founded by Kurt Eisner. Under the headline "The soul-doctor of misery-causing capitalism", threefolding was torn apart and Steiner's followers described as people who 'yearn for an alcohol-free haze.'

Getting "witch-doctor" out of Seelendoktor ( soul-doctor) requires taking considerable creative license with the original, and the word verelendenden does not translate to 'decaying' ('misery-causing' is probably the closest approximation – the word is a creative adjective construction based on the root elend – meaning misery). Nor is it clear how this article is supposed to represent all or any of the revolutionaries of the 1919 Munich council. The author or authors of the article are not listed in Bierl's text, only the founder of the paper, Kurt Eisner, who was assassinated in February 1919, six months before the article was published. So either Peter Staudenmaier has additional sources he has failed to cite on the particulars of the article whose title he has mistranslated, or he has simply made an unsupported logical leap and simply assumed that because of the paper in which it was published, it must therefore be an official position of the entire Munich council.

There are further problems with this paragraph, which I will detail tomorrow.