Some characterize anthroposophy as a religion and it can hardly be argued against, because these days anything even vaguely spiritual (or not) can be registered as such. But it should never become a dogmatic religion. There must always be a freedom of thought- this is what can be emphasized to any critics.
From the original statutes:
The purpose of the Anthroposophical Society will be the furtherance of spiritual research; that of the School of Spiritual Science will be this research itself. A dogmatic stand in any field whatsoever is to be excluded from the Anthroposophical Society.
There is one major difference between anthroposophy and religion, and that is one has to be prepared in one's Budhi/Manas capabilities in order for it to be understood properly. Therefore proselytizing is out of the question - same with theosophy.
Of course, our brothers and sisters will hold to their various dogmas; and this is not much of a problem as long as we uphold a spirit of brotherhood and tolerance - that, and the knowledge that our individual dogmas are only "place holders" on our journey towards ever more clarity.
“I have often been asked by people whether they would be able to join the Anthroposophical Society as they could not yet profess to the prescriptions of anthroposophy. I respond that it would be a sad state of affairs if a society in today’s context recruited members only from among those who profess what is prescribed here. That would be terrible. I always say that honest membership should involve only one thing: an interest in a society which in general terms seeks the path to the spiritual world. How that is done in specific terms is then the business of those who are members of the society, with individual contributions from all of them.
"I can understand very well why someone would not want to be a member of a society in which he had to subscribe to certain articles of faith. But if one says that anyone can be a member of this Society who has an interest in the cultivation of the spiritual life, then those who have such an interest will come.”
Rudolf Steiner, 1923
The Anthroposophic Movement
"And how can I achieve it? The one and only way is this: instead of taking an interest merely in my own way of thinking, and in what I consider right, I must develop a selfless interest in every opinion I encounter, however strongly I may hold it to be mistaken. The more a man prides himself on his own dogmatic opinions and is interested only in them, the further he removes himself, at this moment of world-evolution, from the Christ. The more he develops a social interest in the opinions of other men, even though he considers them erroneous — the more light he receives into his own thinking from the opinions of others — the more he does to fulfil in his inmost soul a saying of Christ, which to-day must be interpreted in the sense of the new Christ-language."
...
"“Through the fact of my birth I am a prejudiced person; only through being reborn into an all-embracing feeling of fellowship for the thoughts of all men shall I find in myself the impulse which is, in truth, the Christ Impulse. If I do not look on myself alone as the source of everything I think, but recognise myself, right down into the depths of my soul, as a member of the human community” — then, my dear friends, one way to the Christ lies open. This is the way which must to-day be characterised as the way to the Christ through thinking. Earnest self-training so that we gain a true perception for estimating the thoughts of others, and for correcting bias in ourselves — this we must take as one of life's serious tasks. For unless this task finds place among men, they will lose the way to the Christ. This to-day is the way through thinking."
http://wn.rsarchive.org/…/…/English/RSP1974/19190211p01.html
And this difference between the anthroposophical movement and other movements should be made clear to the world: its comprehensiveness, its impartiality, its lack of prejudice, its freedom from dogma: that it merely wants to be a method of experimenting with the generally human and the general phenomena of the world [...].
And so one would actually like anthroposophy to have a different name every week, so that people could not get used to all that follows from a name." (Lit.:GA 259, p. 173f)
4 comments:
Yeah! I totally agree with this conception of Anthroposophy as a collective of free thinkers who base their creative spiritual thought in the spiritual science of RS. Too often in certain forums it seems that if the Doctor said it everyone must agree.
So now I should like you to lay this to heart: that it is not anthroposophical to accept a statement as dogma because this or that person made it, but it is anthroposophical to let oneself be stimulated by, spiritual science, and to test what one receives by life itself.
http://wn.rsarchive.org/…/…/English/APC1929/19100617p01.html
"All these things are stated in Rosicrucianism in such a way that they can be tested by reason. Healthy human understanding can test all these things. Do not believe anything on my authority, but just take what I say as an indication and then test it for yourselves.
I am not perturbed, for the more you examine theosophy or spiritual science the more sensible you will find it. The less you take on authority, the more understanding you will have for Christian Rosenkreutz." (R. Steiner, ROSICRUCIAN CHRISTIANITY, Lecture 2, Neuchatel, 28th September 1911, GA 130). http://wn.rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA/GA0130/19110928p01.html
"You must take nothing on authority. The best Anthroposophists are those who take what is said as a stimulus in the first place, and then place it at the service of life, so as to prove it by life itself. For in life also, at every stage of it, you can test that which has been said out of the sources of Rosicrucianism. It is far from the intention underlying these lectures to set up a dogma and say: This or that is so and so, and must be believed. Test it by the healthy and mentally vigorous people whom you know, and you will yourselves find confirmed what has been said as a prophetic indication of the future manifestation of Christ. You need only open your eyes and without prejudice test it; we make no appeal to belief in authority. The test is a sort of basic attitude, which should, like a golden thread, run through the whole.
.........Then what ever might color our anthroposophical view from one quarter or another, will vanish away. Neither Eastern nor Western shades should color our views. One who speaks in the sense of Rosicrucianism knows neither Orientalism nor Occidentalism; both are equally sympathetic to him; he only states the truth according to the inner nature of the facts."
https://wn.rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA121/English/APC1929/19100617p01.html
In a lecture on April 15th 1923, Steiner made the following remark: “If I had my way, I would give Anthroposophy a new name every day to prevent people from hanging on to its literal meaning, from translating it from the Greek, so they can form judgments accordingly. It is immaterial what name we attach to what is being done here. The only thing that matters is that everything we do here is focused on life’s realities and that we never lose sight of them. We must never be tempted to implement sectarian ideas."
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