Theos-Talk Archives (March 1995 Message tl00126)

>
>In his LIFE BETWEEN DEATH AND REBIRTH,
>Steiner mentions "the Mystery of Golgotha"
>and stresses its importance about 26
>zillion times per page, without ever really
>telling us what it is.

I looked up what the Mystery of Golgatha was about.  It is
nebulous to be sure but in an acknowledged Anthroposophical
primer by Stewart Easton it remarks, " The incarnation, life,
death, resurrection, and ascension of Christ Jesus and the coming
of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost are are all part of the same
mystery that we call the Mystery of Golgatha." So in my reading
it is the basic Christian story that is the mystery.  But as I
read further I discover a rather eclectic blend of ideas giving
meaning that story that I have never heard before.  Steiner holds
that work of Christ involves the freeing of our consciousness
enabling humankind to be free..This occured according to him by
the incarnation of a plantetary Sun being called Christ who came
to earth through two Jesus' in the first century one called a
Solomonic Jesus the other Nathan Jesus.  One is a highly evolved
being (Solomonic) the other a backward person who received the
Christ and confounding the wise of his era.  In a former
incarnation the Christ was supposedly Zarathursra.

I don't really know how to unravel this myth but it is
intriguing, if convoluted.  Just a note: I was eltated to read
that the goal of a Christian was to be free, that it does not
meaning having to associate with the Church on the downside
however he says that Christianity will replace all religions.
This could be misunderstood to be very paternalistic and
imperialist but if he is using Christianity as a metaphor of a
free consciousness which is evolving then I suggest another word
be taken up, perhaps Theosophy.  Theosophy as I have encountered
it doesn't have the exclusive overtones that Steiners
Christianity however reconfigured does.  I can speak very
comfortably within the Christian metaphor but a new language is
necessary when trying to communicate interreligiously or
inter-philsophically.

  Some He
>simply replaces Mahatma with Christ.

That is really no problem language wise for me but the issue of
the source of this knowledge is.  He claims to have an Akasha
Chronicle which seems a hidden history of the world.  I like the
experiential emphasis but "revelations" are difficult things for
me to figure out.  It is difficult to discern from where these
ideas come the psyche, some extreterretrial source of where?

>THEOSOPHY, he carefully dissociates himself
>with the TS movement started by Blavatsky.
> He wants us to believe that he has nothing
>whatever to do with the TS.

Yes, I have even read where he think HPB was basically correct
but had a distorted soul.  What was going on there?

"concerning this writing , through, it must be said that the
great truths revealed in it are rendered in a rather distoreted ,
and often even caricatured form ...  The explanation for this is
that the truths themselves are inspired by the great Intitates of
the West, who are also the inititators of Rosicrucian wisdom.
The distortion is caused by the discordant manner in which these
truths were taken up by the soul of Blavatsky....  Sinnet's work
distorts the lofty revelations of the intiates by subjecting them
to his philosophically inadequate intellectualism, and
Blavatsky's Secret Doctrine distorts them through the sheer chaos
of her own sould." Essential Steiner.  20 21 Autobiographic
Sketch.

It is the lack of what he calls the Christ Principle that he
finds limiting.  He says,

Yet without this principle the Theosophical movement must remain
without any decisive effect on Western Culture, which has the
life of Chirst as its point of origin...

Arthur writes: While I don't understand much here I do think that
I like the idea that Steiner has evolutionarily reinterpreted the
Christ Event and has reintroduced ideas of Karma and Freedom etc
into his spirituality.  I also recognize the importance of the
Christian Myth or as he says the Mystery of Golgatha.  What I
don't like is his rejection of Theosophy and his disassociation
with it.  Is not Anthroposophy a possible integration point for
Westerns learning the beings of Theosophy or is it too exclusive?
What is your take on this Jerry?

  I have to take his
>concepts of the ego and "new-born ego" with
>a rather large grain of salt.  I am sorry
>folks, but the theosophical arrangement of
>bodies and principles seems to make a lot
>more sense to me.

Jerry could you spell out the difference here a bit more
thoroughly and simply for the novice here.

>
>I hope that this helps you, Arthur.  When
>you study Steiner, just remember to take
>what you feel comfortable with, and leave
>the rest alone.

Thanks Jerry I will do that but I am not too confident yet to
make out what is bullsgeschitche and what is authenticating.

Art