Scientology vs. Anthroposophy
(Lafayette Ron Hubbard vs. Rudolf Steiner)
Background
In December 1996, my co-editors in the Norwegian anarchist magazine Gateavisa asked me to research the scientology internet war concerning their copyrighted holy scriptures that had been authored by Ron Hubbard and write an article about it. When my article had been published, I sent a copy of the magazine to ex-scientologist Steve Fishman in Florida, who had been one of the featured players in the drama. During the course of our ensuing correspondence, I mentioned that I had been an anthroposophist for three decades and that I had never felt drawn to scientology, but always had a certain aversion against it. On the other hand, I wondered if Hubbard had borrowed concepts from Rudolf Steiner as well as from Helena Blavatsky and altered them to fit his own system. This led to a request from Fishman to write an analytical comparison between anthroposophy and scientology. This project was started by me but never finished. The task is, after all, enormous.
Very recently I became aware of a fact that I find disturbing: Certain anthroposophists pendle Ron Hubbard's tech along with Rudolf Steiner's class lessons and Knowledge of the Higher Worlds. They even claim that representatives of The Anthroposophical Society should join forces with top brass scientologists to learn from each other for mutual benefit. In my personal opinion, this is very disturbing indeed. First, scientology represents a threat of spiritual pollution in the anthroposophical community if anthroposophists adopt and practice Hubbard's concepts and methods. Secondly, the Church of Scientology will undoubtedly exploit this opportunity to "gather intelligence" from the Anthroposophical Movement, especially its organized institutions. This intelligence may be used to harm, blackmail, or crush such organizations at any given moment. Anthroposophy is, after all, another "implant," another "lie,' as long as it is not identical with scientology.
The time must be ripe to publish my unfinished project on this website. The reader should keep in mind, however, that the following text was intended for an audience more or less familiar with Ron Hubbard's scientology but total strangers to Rudolf Steiner's anthroposophy.
- Tarjei Straume, december 1998
Introduction
Due to the instinct for truth in human nature, absolute lies are not as effective as some people think. With half-truths and quarter-truths, on the other hand, you can make people believe almost anything. This is my point of departure, and I will come back to it.
Mr. 'Source' borrowed his half- and quarter-truths from a variety of sources. Like several other cult leaders, he obviously read Helena Blavatsky (1831-91), Rudolf Steiner (1861-1925), or both of these.
Blavatsky founded the Theosophy Society in 1875. In 1902, Steiner was appointed president for the German section of The Theosophical Society, but in 1913 he broke off and established his own organization, The Anthroposophical Society. The major reasons for this break were:
1) that the Theosophical leaders had no understanding or sympathy for Steiner's Christian teachings, and:
2) that these Theosophical leaders brought a scandal upon their organization by claiming that the Indian boy Krishnamurti was the reincarnation of Jesus Christ and the saviour of the world. They founded a cult (in the twentieth century meaning of this word) on this idea, called 'The Star of the East', which Krishnamurti himself disbanded in 1930.
By this time, Theosophy had fallen into disrepute, but it continued to inspire innumerable new religions and cults (same definition as above) in America. New religious founders simply borrowed from Blavatsky's Secret Doctrine and Isis Unveiled, and called these their own 'revelations'. Ever since that time, U.S.-sponsored New Age religions have become increasingly infected by ufology and flying saucers, and Jesus Christ has been made into an astronaut who is supposed to 'return' in a space ship.
Thanks to popular unfamiliarity with Rudolf Steiner, his works were even easier to abuse than those of Helena Blavatsky. Not only is he much more comprehensible and digestible to read, but his works are extremely voluminous, covering the most diverse of topics. Anthroposophy is primarily based upon the enormous body of occult knowledge he developed, consisting of 50 written books and 6000 lectures, totaling 350 volumes in the original German.
Steiner was apparently an excellent source for 'Source' Hubbard. From this treasure, which is almost unknown in America, there were plenty of morsels to choose from in order to feed people all kinds of secret little half-truths and quarter-truths to use as baits for his sinister scheme.
For this reason, it may be interesting to take a closer look at some of Steiner's teachings in order to compare them to Hubbard's version of Anthroposophical ideas. But when we are doing this, it is equally important to analyze the differences, especially where they stand in diametric opposition. And the principles of RS and LRH clash most violently in the ethics, or moral, department. Beria, Crowley, and some other sources were perhaps relatively close to Hubbard's code of ethics. Steiner, however, represents an entirely different school of thought when it comes to morals.
Many skeptical readers, ultra-rationalists, atheists, agnostics, orthodox devotees of traditional religions etc., may conclude that L. Ron Hubbard and Rudolf Steiner were both spaced out in their heads and were equally off the wall with their respective cosmologies. I accept and respect reactions of this kind, and this sentiment is modified only by my responsibility to prevent misconceptions about Dr. Steiner's moral character, ideals and motives.
Steiner's spiritual-scientific genius is of secondary importance. The most impressive aspect of this man is his exalted moral standard and his unselfish, self-sacrificing way of life, plus his ability to communicate this high code of ethics through inference and personal example without ever coming across as moralistic. And on this particular point there must be no room for misunderstanding or untruth.
In order for the reader to appreciate an analysis of the differences and similarities between Scientology and Anthroposophy, it becomes necessary to treat the subject in such a way that the presentation also serves as an introduction to the latter. It is assumed that the reader has become familiar with Ron Hubbard, Dianetics, and Scientology, while knowing very little, or perhaps nothing, about Rudolf Steiner and Anthroposophy.
Information about Rudolf Steiner and Anthroposophy is all over the web, with links to libraries, book lists, colleges, etc. Thus it should be easy to supplement this study with additional literature.
1. Control, lying, and religion
Let us take a look at the following two famous statements by Ron Hubbard:
1) 'The only way you can control people is to lie to them.'
2) 'Organized religion tries to control, so therefore must be lying.'
What is really being said here? Is lying to people really the ONLY way to control them? The answer would depend upon what is meant by control. We probably need some LRH 'word clearing' here. But it is obvious that Mr. 'Source' expressed one of his deepest convictions through these two statements. Because the point is that Hubbard must have desired to be in full control of himself. If you are going to control others, you must control yourself first. And if this megalomaniac wished to acquire control of himself, of humanity, of the planet and eventually the galaxy and the entire universe and be 'God Almighty', or 'Source' - well then he must have been lying to himself from the beginning.
This may appear to be a paradox. According to statement nr. 1, 'The only way you can control people is to lie to them.' Hubbard implies that a person who seeks to control people, DELIBERATELY lies to them. When you lie on purpose, you know that what you say is an untruth. But as long as you know this, you have not succeeded in lying to yourself, and according to LRH logic, you are not in control of yourself until you do.
Even if this does not necessarily explain why Ron believed his own lies, there is clearly a connection here. He obviously believed all of it -- not only his space opera, but even his bogus biography! In 1980, Gerry Armstrong found a lot of stuff that documented the true story of LRH. And how does the old chief react to this? With pride and enthusiasm, he tells Armstrong to go ahead and research his background and write his biography. When Armstrong discovers that the evidence at hand does not match the lie, he is expelled from the church and declared a Suppressive Person. So why hadn't Hubbard told Armstrong to burn the evidence and forget the research and the biography to begin with, UNLESS HE HAD BELIEVED IN HIS OWN LIES?
Why did Ron succeed in lying to himself? In order to be in self-control, of course.
What does Rudolf Steiner (1861-1925), the founder Anthroposophy or Spiritual Science, have to say about lying? Interestingly enough, 'der Doktor', which he was called, claimed that a lie in the physical world (or universe, if you prefer), represents a murder in the spiritual world. In other words, if what Steiner said is an objective truth, Hubbard committed spiritual suicide.
Let's move on to Hubbard's statement nr. 2: 'Organized religion tries to control, so therefore must be lying.'
Hubbard claimed that ALL established religions were bogus 'implants' based upon lies in order to control people. All of them. (Except certain aspects of Buddhism, that is, because Ron had also been Buddha, remember? - but that's beside the point here.)
Hubbard also claimed that the most evil, deceptive and vicious spirit ever to tread the earth was Jesus Christ (the reincarnation of Xenu, of course).
On both of these points, Hubbard is on a total collision course with Steiner. The essence of Steiner's teaching is that all religions are true! And not only all major religions like Hunduism, Buddhism, Judaism, Islam, and Christianity, but also all mythologies: Greek, Egyptian, Roman, Celtic, and Nordic! And fairy tales as well! In Steiner's view, a classical myth is a true story told in picture language. (He also called ancient astrology 'an absolutely true science', which later had degenerated into superstitious nonsense.)
Thus not only gods, angels, archangels, demons and cosmic spirits are for real, but also trolls, elves, undines etc. The earth, the solar system, the planets, the cosmos - everything is teeming with life according to Steiner, imperceptible to everyday sense-bound consciousness, but very real to clairvoyants and initiates. And all religions are true accounts of spiritual FACTS according to Steiner. These religions are very different, because each is a portrait of the same higher truth, seen from entirely different angles.
Still, Rudolf Steiner does have two distinct favorite religions: Christianity and Buddhism. If I had to attach a traditional religious label on 'anthroposophically oriented spiritual science' which he characteristically calls his system, I would have to call it 'Buddhist Christianity' or 'Christian Buddhism'. Yet many of Steiner's considerable contributions to Christian theology are so original that most people refer to it as 'Christology' rather than 'Christianity'.
The term 'Christology' is also an indicator of Steiner's thoroughly Christ-centered cosmology. He claimed that our account of time (years) since the birth of Christ was very appropriate because 'the Mystery of Golgotha' was the central, the pivotal, and the most awe-inspiring supernatural event in the entire evolution of the earth: A sacrifice by the the most exalted of beings, the Sun-God or the Sun-Spirit, who was worshipped in various pre-Christian cults ('cult' meaning 'holy communion with the spiritual world', of course), incarnated in the body of Jesus of Nazareth in order to redeem mankind, to enable man's gradual reunion with the gods through the course of future incarnations.
This 'Mystery of Golgotha', which is defined by the events recorded in the Gospels, beginning with the Betrayal and ending with the Ascension, - this was, according to Rudolf Steiner, an act of unconditional love and the most profound mystery of all time. In his analysis of history, Steiner traces the effects of the Mystery of Golgotha on humanity, which he calls 'the Christ-impulse'. By this 'Christ-impulse' is meant the evolution of compassion, love, tolerance, the capacity for individual self-sacrifice, and the emergence of new ideals such as 'Liberty, Equality and Fraternity'. In other words, all the noblest, purest and dearest capacities of the human soul that are evolving on earth, are, according to Steiner, the fruits of the Christ-impúlse, regardless of which particular religion or philosophy an individual may confess to.
In addition, Rudolf Steiner also claimed that all healing forces in nature, everything that contributes to health in plants, animals and humans, combatting and healing illesses, beneficial advances in the art and science of medicine etc., proceed from the Christ Being, or 'the Risen One', because this Christ Being is also the creator of our existence.
It should be obvious from the above that Steiner's cosmology was very Christ-centered indeed, and thoroughly Christian, though he is shunned and condemned by orthodox theologians because of his support of the reincarnation-idea and his positive views on pre-Christian Mystery-religions (paganism).
Back to Hubbard. Let us take one more look at his statements about lying and control:
1) 'The only way you can control people is to lie to them.'
2) 'Organized religion tries to control, so therefore must be lying.'
Are these two claims by Hubbard one hundred percent untrue? Of course they are not. They are both half-truths, which proves my theory: Ron succeeded in lying to himself and in believing his own lies by mixing them with half-truths.
2. Right-handed vs. left-handed initiation
I never knew what Scientology was about before December 1996, when I collected and read all the Internet-documentation I could get my hands on in order to write my article on the subject for Gateavisa.
The first thing that struck me as very interesting was the concept of 'body thetans'. This is advanced occult stuff, I thought to myself. Where in the world did he get THAT from? It made me wonder what kind of man Ron Hubbard really was, how he acquired such concepts, and whether or not he had indeed succeeded in developing some kind of clairvoyance for himself by means of a 'left-handed initiation'. (I'll get back to Ron's BTs later.)
'Left-handed' and 'right-handed' are technical terms borrowed from Western occultism, and they warrant some clarification. Let's try to please Mister Source by doing our word clearing properly, shall we? Better not rush by any Misunderstood Words here!
Western occult tradition speaks of a right-handed and a left-handed occultism, which means, strictly speaking, white and black magic. The right-handed path, which it is called, is an extremely difficult and time-consuming approach, requiring enormous patience and endurance. It is based upon the moral purification of body, soul and spirit and the cultivation of total harmlessness and unconditional selfless love toward all living creatures. Because of the very lofty and difficult demands the candidate must make upon himself, it takes many life-times, or incarnations, to develop such spiritual-moral capacities to the point of intitiation, or modern clairvoyance.
(Additional note: The technical terms outlined here should not, and must not, be confused with an individual human being being right- or left-handed in the literal sense. This preposterous and brainless suggestion has recently (i.e. in 2002) been made by one of the so-called Waldorf Critics on the WC list. See the article Diana Winters about black and white magic.)
All religions and idealistic philosophies that foster and encourage qualities of this kind, contribute to the preparation for a right-handed initiatory development.
According to Rudolf Steiner, such a right-handed occult development, or initiatory path, is entirely dependent upon the Christ-impulse, or the Risen One (the Resurrection Body). For this reason, it is also known as the Christian Initiation. The best tool, or technique, for this development - to Mr. Hubbard's fan club we could say, 'the standard tech' or 'the proper religious technology' - this is Buddha's Eightfold Path, according to Steiner. He claimed that Buddhism was the religion of the future, that would be properly understood by the mainstream culture only in the future. For this reason, it is very interesting to compare Rudolf Steiner's book, 'Knowledge of the Higher Worlds: How is it Achieved?' with Buddha's Eightfold Path. They are strikingly similar.
The advanced stages of this Christian initiation involve inner experiences with close ties to the events in the Gospels designated as the Mystery of Golgotha. 'The Crowning of Thorns' for instance, means that the candidate patiently endures the blaspheming and ridicule of everything that he holds most sacred. 'The carrying of the Cross' signifies that the candidate begins to feel his physical body as a cross which he carries around on earth. (This latter is an interesting idea to contemplate when we approach old age and the body becomes heavier to move.)
By 'initiation' is meant the awakening of latent clairvoyance and clairaudience as a result of inner development. There are many different stages of these supernatural conditions. In order to perceive non-material phenomena in such an objective way that research by the scientific method is made possible, an extremely high level of initiation is required.
Rudolf Steiner frowned upon the methods employed by the Theosophical Society. They used trance, hypnosis, crystal balls, mediumship and other spiritualistic methods. Steiner said that these techniques helped to re-awaken so-called atavistic clairvoyant faculties, and he implied that this kind of practice was a hindrance to the progressive spiritual evolution of mankind because they depended on reduced or suppressed awareness of self. Trance mediums, the most gifted among whom was the Russian-born Helena Blavatsky who founded the Theosophical Society, would become unconscious and enter a dream-like state. The 'revelations' thus received would have to be recalled from memory. Blavatsky had an exceptionally accurate power of recollection.
A major drawback with this technique was that it was subject to errors which could not be checked as long as loss of consciousness excluded the application of the scientific method. Besides, Blavatsky's books were rather badly written, and interspersed with all kinds of temperamental outbursts, especially against Christianity, for which she had no understanding whatsoever.
Still, Rudolf Steiner praised Helena Blavatsky as a scrupulously honest and highly gifted woman who turned out to be a pioneer. He endorsed her major outline of planetary evolutions, to which he added many clarifications and corrections through the years while applying the spiritual-scientific method.
Steiner's concept of 'atavistic clairvoyance' was rooted in his view of evolution. In so-called pre-religious times, i.e. in very ancient epochs prior to the emergence of religions based upon FAITH, man had no need for religion because his spiritual senses were wide open. With the development of self-consciousness due to the luciferic influence symbolized in the Bible as the Fall, these higher senses were gradually closed, thus enabling the evolution of logical reasoning faculties, or rational thinking.
Rudolf Steiner opposed the re-awakening of ancient clairvoyance through the use of methods that eliminated self-conscious, rational thinking. He claimed that modern clairvoyance should be developed in full consciousness by means of self-dependent initiation. Hypnosis was especially repugnant to Steiner, because according to him, the individual human will was inviolable and sacrosanct. Nobody should let himself be subjected to the will of a hypnotist or of any other human being.
Sexual magic was another technique which was adamantly opposed by Rudolf Steiner. This is a very important point, because the false rumors about Rudolf Steiner's involvement with sexual magic have their origin in the smear campaigns from his opponents during and after World War I. What has survived from this is the erroneous belief that he accepted an honorary membership of O.T.O. (Ordo Templi Orientis) for a limited time. This is not the case; Rudolf Steiner was never a member of O.T.O. -- the organization associated with Aleister Crowley.
3. Was L. Ron Hubbard a black magician?
I have ponted out that Western occult tradition speaks of a right-handed and a left-handed occultism, which is equivalent to white and black magic. I also explained that the right-handed path is based upon very demanding and time-consuming moral purification of body, soul and spirit and the cultivation of total harmlessness and unconditional selfless love toward all living creatures.
Throughout Rudolf Steiner's life and work, it becomes clear that this was the path and the method which he himself had chosen. But 'der Doktor' also gave some very interesting descriptions of left-handed occultism, or black magic. The levels he described appear to be quite advanced. (I believe that the proper Scientological term here is 'high gradient'.)
When Steiner approached a topic of this kind, he always put a great deal of emphasis on the inner spiritual experiences of the person concerned; external techniques were secondary. A right-handed occultist, who is cultivating the power of selfless love for all creatures, will from time to time feel himself projected, so to speak, into the inner life of another being. This other being can be a loved one, a friend, an animal, or an invisible living spirit (a departed soul or an angel, for instance). The practitioner outgrows his self-interest through the fire of love and compassion for other creatures while yet retaining his self-dependent consciousness and rational thinking. This rational thinking has been acquired through the experience of egoism. Egoism has thus served its purpose, which the right-handed occultist, or white magician, no longer needs. This development will eventually open his higher faculties in relation to the spiritual world.
What external techniques are concerned, the role of the anonymous benefactor may be mentioned. The idea is to give anonymously, to individuals or to society, to benefit others, to relieve suffering etc. by any available means in such a way that detection of the benefactor or well-doer is impossible. It may also be a good idea to claim responsibility for the misdeeds of others if one is better able to take the heat than they are. ('Secret agents of Christ' perhaps?)
The black magician, or the left-handed occultist, seeks to strengthen the power of egoism. When he succeeds in doing so, he experiences an increase in his separateness from his fellow creatures, from the rest of life. It is important, therefore, that he learns to desensitize himself from the inner experiences of others and thus acquires the capacity to ignore, or to take pleasure in, the sufferings of fellow creatures. By using advanced techniques for this purpose, the black magician may acquire tremendous power. This may culminate in a left-handed initiation which gives him clairvoyance.
One of the techniques utilized for this purpose, also mentioned by Steiner, consists of deliberately causing pain and suffering to another creature in a deliberate, conscious, and technically prescribed way. (This is pro 'tech', folks.) The practitioner experiences an increased isolation of his ego and a new inner strength parallell with a radical cooling of his feelings.
One of the best known methods in this kind of black magic consists of stabbing a sharp object like a knife into very special spots in the victim's body and combine such actions with certain exercises in breathing and concentration. In this way, the practitioner may acquire enormous power and extract deep secrets of esoteric knowledge.
During the first world war, Rudolf Steiner began to speak about his conspiracy theory. (He did not call it a theory, however.) He spoke about the 'secret brotherhoods of the West' and their behind-the-curtains manipulation of spiritual, cultural, and political developments. He claimed to be able to prove that the map of Europe that was drawn in 1918, had existed in England in the 1890's, and that the same secret brotherhoods had engineered the Bolshevik revolution in Russia as a 'social experiment'.
Steiner spoke openly about occult knowledge that these secret brotherhoods allegedly possessed. He said that possession of this same esoteric knowledge was the only possible protection from such sinister groups.
By the same token, a thorough investigation and increased public dissemination of L. Ron Hubbard's ideas, where they come from, and how they have been distorted and falsified in order to control, exploit and abuse people, should provide the best possible protection from Religious Technology Center, the Church of Scientology, Narconon, Criminon and all other brainchildren of LRH.
For this reason I wish to make it perfectly clear that my purpose in writing this text is NOT to turn readers into Anthroposophists, but to expose Rudolf Steiner's ideas in such a way that an increased understanding of Ron Hubbard and his organization may result from it. If the reader can discover such connections by reading this text, it will contribute to the potential solution of LRH as a riddle.
Lafayette Ron Hubbard was a paranoid psychopath who dabbled in the practice of black magic. He suffered from psychotic spells and suicidal depressions. His followers have left an unending trail of psychoses, suicides, murders and bizarre deaths.
I am very curious about whether Hubbard's flirtation with black magical practices were exclusively amateurish and elementary, or if he was a somewhat more advanced master of left-handed occultism. It would be very helpful to our common research of Scientology if anybody can contribute with clues or information of this kind.
4. Cosmic memory. The origin of man
'Writing for a penny a word is ridiculous,' said L. Ron Hubbard in 1949, 'If a man really wants to make a million dollars, the best way would be to start his own religion.'
Compare this utterance with the one already mentioned, 'Organized religion tries to control, so therefore must be lying.'
Concluson? Try this: Religion is a business. Religion is lying. Lying is business. The best way to make a million dollars is to start lying for a profit.
With this in mind, Hubbard concocted a highly original 'creation story' which he called a 'space opera'. As a religious myth, a space opera is highly original, though not necessarily for a science fiction story. Nevertheless, a 'creation story' is a misnomer, because thetans have never been created. They have always existed, and they leave no room for benign beings of a higher rank. Scientology has eliminated the concept of spiritual parenthood which is common to all other religions. Scientologists only talk about cannibalistic cosmic space-psychiatrists who used to breed thetans in order to eat their bodies.
The thetan who has not been created is an idea very akin to the traditional Roman Catholic idea about Christ. Those Christians who were influenced by Gnosticism and who believed that Christ was a created being, were persecuted as heretics.
For the record, Rudolf Steiner subscribed to the Gnostic concept on this point. Even though he supported the idea of higher hierarchies (angels, archangels, archai or time spirits, elohim og exusiai, cherubim, seraphim, etc.), he was a total evolutionist who voiced the opinion that non-created beings were an absurdity. All life, from the minerals to the Seraphim, has evolved from lower to higher levels of existence, including the Christ. Just like we love children because we have also been children, so it is with the relation of higher hierarchies to man.
Scientology does not appear to leave much room for love, empathy, compassion, or genuine affection, in spite of Hubbard's adoption of the idea that we choose our parents prior to conception. This is a view held by Rudolf Steiner. He asks his listeners to pay attention to how many young people begin to resemble their parents physically at age 17-20, when the adult ego is beginning to awaken, because of the special affection they have for them - a love which has been embedded deeply within the subconscious in the spiritual world before conception and birth.
Steiner does point out that we have known our parents from previous incarnations, but such personal relationships are not the only factors involved in our choosing. Preceding each incarnation, we seek out a particular heritage, and in some cases we may be in touch with our ancestors several generations back, participating in our geneology, especiallly when specific talents and abilities are required for a given task. These preparations are done in conjunction with the higher hierarchies and karmic law. (Additional comment about this topic, as a response to an objection, can be found in my article Karma between parents and children. )
According to both Blavatsky and Steiner, we spend considerably longer stretches of time in the spiritual world, or 'on the other side of the threshold,' than we do between birth and death. In addition, we cross the threshold into the spiritual world each time we go to sleep. So if we live to be 75 years old, we have spent about 25 years among the gods.
If we live long enough to collect our pension, the average period of time between two incarnations is between 400 and 600 years. A child is no adult in a small body (like Scientology has construed it), but a newborn being completely tranformed and renewed by the higher hierarchies. During the first years of life, the child continues to live in this higher, spiritual world before the awakening of self-consciousness, whereupon the hierarchies withdraw.
6. What is exteriorization?
In the aggregate, the amount of time we spend in the physical world, entrenched within the confines of our five senses and logical reasoning faculty, is only a small fraction of the time spent on the other side of the threshold. Still, claims Steiner, this physical condition is indispensible to our spiritual evolution.
This is a very important point, because it does not only establish the contrast between Steiner and Hubbard, but also between Theosophy and Anthroposophy on the one hand, and New Age on the other. New Age is primarily based upon 'exteriorized Theosophy'. In Anthroposophy, exteriorization does not mean 'leaving one's body' like in Scientology, but externalization of spiritual concepts, giving these a materialistic clothing.
As an example of this, let's take a look at two events spoken of in the New Testament. The first of these is the Ascension of the Risen One; the other is the foretold 'Second Coming' of Christ. In earlier centuries, before the onslaught of materialistic science and technology and its effect on our life of thought, this was understood in such a way that the Christ had departed from the domain of man in his physical condition on Earth to be with 'His Father' on the other side of the threshold. (Steiner came to the conclusion that the term 'Father' in the New Testament was a euphemism for death.) But ever since the emergence of flying saucers and UFOs in the pulp fiction of the 1940's, popular Christianity and popular Buddhism alike have undergone radical exteriorizations. The gods have been made to be astraunauts, space travellers. The Resurrection Body, or at least the cloud that Christ disappeared in, has become the star ship Enterprise, where Jesus is Captain Kirk. The Ascension just meant that Scotty or Gabriel beamed the captain onboard, and Christian ufologists are expecting a Spielberg-style Second Coming.
The New Age exterorization of Buddhism and Theosophy has vulgarized the idea of reincarnation to such an extent that 'spiritual' Americans and their followers believe they simply jump in and out of bodies, spending virtually no time in the spiritual world. The short story, 'The Reincarnation of Peter Proud,' was a perfect example. In this way, the sci-fi religious systems of New Age are akin to atheism in their exclusion of the spiritual world and the higher hierarchies, of the Christ of the Spiritual Sun, and the reduction of higher beings to technologically super-advanced and spiritually stagnated humanoids. Take a look at the bizarre 'Unarius' cult in California, which is nothing but extremely exteriorized Anthroposophy. 'The Urantia Book' was another interesting sci-fi exteriorization, though not quite as materialistic as 'Unarius'. The most interesting aspect of this book is its rejection of reincarnation.
This rejection of reincarnation is an old policy which was initiated by certain occult fraternities in the nineteenth century. The attempt was made to prevent the idea of reincarnation from becoming rooted in Western culture. One of the sources of this opposition was the so-called High Church of England.
7. The spiritual schizophrenia in Western culture
These occult fraternities did their best to silence Helena Blavatsky. When she refused to keep quiet about her cognitive achievements, they succeeded in subjecting her to something that is called spiritual imprisonment, which made it impossible for her to continue those activities. Because of this, Blavatsky had to seek help elsewhere. Another occult fraternity, this one in India, restored her creative powers, but there was a catch. Just like the American and the English fraternities had a vested interest in maintaining dogmatic Christianity as the dominant cultural force, so did this Indian fraternity wish to combat Christianity by promoting a one-sided Buddhism.
Both of these two mutually opposing manipulations of the spiritual life of the West appear to have been successful in America. All New Age religions and cults that adopt traditionally Eastern concepts like karma and reincarnation have excluded the Mystery of Golgotha completely. At the same time they are becoming increasingly exteriorized under the influence of science fiction and materialistic technology, producing ufologies and physical travels in space.
On the other hand, we have the Religious Right, the Protestant Vatican we may call it, which clings to the Gospels in an irrational and illusory manner, brutally condemning all aspects of Oriental wisdom, Gnosticism, and the like. This wisdom is badly needed for the understanding of Christianity, just like the Mystery of Golgotha is needed for New Age. Yet the opposing interests involved here have pulled out the teeth from both. The result is a decadent, superficial, confused and materialistic gee-whiz teenage culture where anything goes what sci-fi religions are concerned. This is an excrellent raw meat garden for the $oS.
The strong influence of those Indian occultists who used Blavatsky for their own aims and purposes, is one of the reasons why so many hostile attacks against Christianity are to be found in her works. They are probably also responsible for the scandalous 'Mahatma Letters,' which turned out to be fraudulent.
For those interested in further study of this topic, I would recommend 'The Occult Movement in the Nineteenth Century and its Relation to the Modern Culture', ten lectures given by Rudolf Steiner in Dornach, 10th to 25th October, 1915. (Original title: 'Die okkulte Bewegung im neunzehnten Jahrhundert und ihre Beziehung zur Weltkultur.' Gesamtausgabe Vol. No. 254.)
8. Who was Buddha?
Ron Hubbard claimed to have been the Buddha and thus have the monopoly on the key to the only true religion. This is an interesting twist. Buddhism was not an implant, and the Buddha was not, like the Christ, a competitor who had to be 'dead agented' as a hot tempered, pedophile reincarnation of an evil galactic emperor Xenu. How Ron could be the Antichrist, the Buddha, and Source Almighty all at the same time is a different matter, but the selection is eccentric - and totally absurd.
According to Buddhist tradition as well as Anthroposophy, the Bodhisattva in question lived his final physical incarnation as Siddhartha, when he became Gautama Buddha after his enlightenment under the Bodhi tree. He said so himself, that after many lifetimes as a Bodhisattva, he had reached Nirvana, and that he would never again incarnate in a physical body on earth.
Steiner pointed out that any claim to the contrary would be a misunderstanding of Buddhism. Anyone who said that Gautama Buddha had reincarnated or would be reborn, did not understand the Buddhist religion at all. By the same token, anyone who said that the Christ had appeared, or would appear, more than once on the physical plane, had no understanding of Christianity. The physical appearance of the Christ in the body of Jesus of Nazareth was a one time only event.
Yet Rudolf Steiner artfully and tastefully weaves these two religions together. In the first place, he portrays the Buddha as a forerunner of the Christ, explaining that the radically different characters of these two religions were due to the differences in the soul developments of the Indian and the Hebrew peoples. But the most important point was that the Buddha brought compassion into the world. This compassion was brought one significant step further by the Christ, who imbued it with love in action.
According to Steiner's interpretation, Christ spoke in the manner of Buddha whenever he used parables, or picture language, and like Socrates when he explained these parables to his chosen disciples, who had developed logical reasoning.
In Steiner's view, the gospel according to Luke is the most explicit link between Buddha and Christ. The angel who heralded the birth of Jesus to the shepherds in the field was none other than Buddha. Furthermore, Luke was himself a doctor, and his portrait of Christ is that of the compassionate healer. The entire gospel of Luke is saturated with love, compassion, and healing.
But what if Ron was Buddha and Antichrist at the same time? Well, then I guess he would have warned the shepherds against the birth of Xenu. But the Roman psychiatrists edited and censored the Bible, or Luke simply overlooked Ron's warning altogether.
9. Do we come from other planets?
According to Scientological cosmology, human beings are trapped in some kind of exile on Earth, or on Teegeeack as the planet is called, which is Marcabian for prison, having been involuntarily transported here seventy-five million years ago. Farther back in time, seventy-six trillion years ago to be exact, the first catastrophe occurred when humanity was tricked into occupying physical bodies. The only way out of this dilemma is to apply Ron's religious technology, or 'the tech,' to tread the Bridge to Total Freedom and clear the planet.
If we leave out the sci-fi space opera stuff, it is easy to find parallell concepts in various religious and occult traditions. Judeo-Christian lore speaks of the Temptation, the Fall, and the expulsion from Paradise. This Fall from Paradise, which is a euphemism for unencumbered spiritual existence, was the price to be paid for the knowledge or wisdom given by Lucifer, the Lightbearer. (Hubbard had aspirations about being Lucifer as well.) This Fall involved not only man, but all of nature, which meant a gradual densification or ossification. The evolving beings, called Monads by Helena Blavatsky, and Thetans by Buddha-Antichrist-Lucifer-Source-Hubbard, began to incarnate. In classical Greek parlance, these Monads or Thetans are called Entelechies.
The Vedic Scriptures of ancient India represent perhaps the oldest lore in the world, having been passed through generations for millennia by word of mouth before being recorded in written Sanscrit. This tradition speaks about how the souls of men and animals descended from the stars, 'the stars' meaning the planets in our solar system.
10. Is Theosophy racist?
Both Helena Blavatsky and Rudolf Steiner endorsed and elaborated Sanscrit lore. At a given time in its evolution, the Earth was almost uninhabitable, and only the sturdiest pioneers had descended. The rest of humanity used the other planets as spiritual habitats before they also descended and incarnated as the population increased. The continent where this took place has been given the name Lemuria. The development of different human races with distinct distinguishing physiological features, was partially due to the differences of the planets which had been inhabitated by the respective groups of souls in the spiritual world, and which continued to be inhabited during sleep and between death and rebirth.
This factor, combined with the strong influences of climatic conditions upon the human physiology in earlier epochs, contributed to the formation of the seven races of Atlantis, which emerged after the destruction of Lemuria. According to Rudolf Steiner, races as such (in the external, physiological sense) have outlived their purpose since Atlantis, and the idea of human races in our time is in reality atavistic and without significance.
This is a very important point about anthroposophical views concerning human evolution, because both Blavatsky and Steiner have unwittingly been accused of racism. A major reason for misconceptions of this kind is that in Theosophical terminology, 'Races' signify evolutionary epochs.
Our cosmic planetary evolution consists of seven Planetary Conditions, which in Sanscrit are called Manvantaras. We are now living in the fourth Manvantara, called Present Earth Condition. This Manvantara is again divided into seven Rounds, or Life Conditions. We are presently in the fourth Round, i.e. the Present Mineral Kingdom, which consists of seven Globes, or Conditions of Form. The fourth Condition of Form in which we live, i.e. the Present Physical-Etheric State, consists of seven Root-Races, or Great Epochs.
We are now living in the fifth Root-Race, the third and fourth Root-Races being Lemuria and Atlantis. Each Root-Race consists of seven Sub-Races, or Cultural Epochs. On Atlantis, these Sub-Races or Epochs produced the seven human races that later populated the continents of Africa, Europe, Asia, and the Western Hemisphere.
The Sub-Races, or Cultural Epochs, of the present fifth Root-Race have nothing to do with physiological human races as such. They are:
1. The ancient Indian Epoch
2. The ancient Persian Epoch
3. The Assyrian-Babylonian-Chaldean-Egyptian Epoch
4. The Graeco-Roman Epoch
5. The present European-American Epoch
Two future Cultural Epochs will follow before the present Root-Race, or Great Epoch, has run its course.
According to Anthroposophy, the laws of reincarnation and karma work in such a way that each individual will have varying life-experiences in respect to social and economic status, gender, culture, nationality, etc. in order for all people to reap every imaginable kind of human experience. What this entails is that we may have one life in Africa, another one in China, and the next in America. This concept in itself may be far-fetched and unacceptable to many readers, but it is certainly inimical to racism of any kind.
The Nazis adopted the basic structure of Blavatsky's concept of evolution, which they perverted beyond recognition. They mixed it with Ariosophy and pronounced European Aryans to be the master race of the earth, claiming that Nordic men had founded every civilization that had ever existed on the face of the planet. This 'Aryan Theosophy' which it was called, has later prompted allegations of racism against Helena Blavatsky and Rudolf Steiner.
Christian fundamentalists have taken deliberate advantage of these misconceptions by portraying Blavatsky as a Satanist whose evil philosophy prompted the Holocaust. Their main reason for going after Blavatsky is her praise of Lucifer at Jehovah's expense. Yet Rudolf Steiner makes a clear distinction between Lucifer on the one hand, who gave man his wisdom, his pride and his egoism, his independence and his freedom, and Ahriman or Satan on the other, designated in the New Testament as the Prince of this world, who gave man his intellect, his materialism and his atheism. Ahriman is 'the liar and the father of lies,' and the adversary of Christ, who is endeavoring to capture the planet for himself by seducing man through his intellect.
According to Rudolf Steiner, man has been given the task of capturing the intellect from Ahriman without being misled by his lies. By the same token, I believe it to be our task here to dissect, analyse, understand and expose Scientology in order to protect people from being seduced by this cult unwittingly and unprepared.
11. Ron Hubbard's war against Jesus Christ
A day of the week is a 24-hour period, based upon how long it takes the earth to spin in relation to the sun. A calendar year is the period of time it takes for the earth to make one complete circle around the sun. Our measurement of time is in other words dependent upon the mutual movements of heavenly bodies in our solar system.
For this reason, it is absurd to imagine that the six days of creation in the first chapter of Genesis designate 24-hour periods, because no sun or moon existed before the fourth 'day.'
By the same token, Ron Hubbard's idea about human beings beginning to incarnate seventy-six trillion years ago in a different galaxy, is a totally absurd contradiction in terms by any standard of logic or common sense. Our measument of time is completely inapplicable beyond the surface of this planet.
At the next space-operatic apocalypse 'only' seventy-five million years ago, the evil galactical emperor Xenu transported his freeze-dried victims to Earth in space vehicles resembling commercial DC-9 airplanes, whereupon he thawed them by throwing them into fiery vulcanoes and blasting them with hydrogen bombs. When the tough and resilient Thetans had survived this, Xenu proceeded to fill their souls with all kinds of implants, which in Ron's terminology is a euphemism for false and illusory images and concepts.
The most pernicious and damaging of all implants was Christianity. Xenu had incarnated as the obnoxious pervert Jesus Christ in order to enslave humanity even more with his preposterous religion. For this reason, the Church of Scientology has always endeavored to win as many converts from Christianity as possible. In Scientology, Christ is Zenu the seducer, enslaver, and liar, and Buddha-Antichrist-Lucifer-Source-Lafayette-Ronald-Hubbard is the liberator, the savior, and 'the best friend man ever had.' It's as simple as that.
Steve Fishman was made to believe while in trance that he had sired Jesus by masturbating in such a way that his sperm floated into Mary's womb while she was taking a bath. Having a pregnant, unwed damsel in the family was so scandalous that the proper solution was to blame the insemination on God. In this way, the Church of Scientology had solved the mystery of the Immaculate Conception.
Rudolf Steiner's approach to this mystery was a different one. In the first place, if Joseph had not been the biological father of Jesus, his elaborate genealogy all the way from Adam, which is recorded in the Bible, would make no sense. Neither would the Old Testament, where the hereditary lineage of Jesus on his father's side is the central theme.
The mission of the Hebrew people, according to Steiner, was to provide the purest and the most highly developed physical vehicle to receive the Christ. And when the time drew near, when the seers and the initiates perceived that the God of the Spiritual Sun was approaching the Earth, a very special and unusual kind of conception had to be prepared for.
The reason for this is that according to the laws of heredity, we adopt not only certain physiological characteristics, but also soul-spiritual ones like temper, inclinations, etc. At the moment of conception, we adopt a piece of soul-substance from each parent. Because we are in a state of passion during the hedonistic pleasure of lovemaking, inherent selfish tendencies enter the soul of the embryo as soon as sperm and egg unite. This is what 'hereditary sin' is all about, and why it has been associated with sensuality and sexuality.
In order to provide an untainted soul-substance for the Christ, it was necessary for the conception to happen in an unorthodox way. Joseph and Maria were so spiritually advanced that they were capable of an Oriental technique which provides for sexual intercourse without passion or hedonistic pleasure. On the contrary, it is experienced as a sacrifice. In this way, the purest body and soul-substance was provided for the birth of Jesus in Bethlehem. In this manner, the Saviour was born 'without sin.'
The picture of the Holy Spirit miraculously inseminating the Virgin Mary was a beautiful means of helping simple-minded people understand the Immaculate Conception and its supernatural significance. But unless the Christian mysteries are approached in a more mature way in the future, they will eventually become the exclusive property of irrational zealots and fanatical fundamentalists. And if that happens, Buddha-Anticrist-Lucifer-Source-Lafayette-Ronald-Hubbard will be one big step closer to clearing the planet.
12. Ron Hubbard's Body Thetans vs. Rudolf Steiner's Elemental Spirits
Rudolf Steiner had a great variety of concepts that are very parallell to Ron Hubbard's BTs. The most important of these to mention, is the activities of the higher hierarchies when man is asleep. When we have been awake for an extended period of time, we must leave our bodies. We are tired, exhausted. We must leave our bodies in order for the angels and archangels to take over. They revitalize our bodies, healing various damages we cause with our lifestyles and our imperfect souls and spirits. Thanks to these invisible nurses and doctors, we wake up refreshed and invigorized. These Anthroposophical BTs are the invisible servants of Christ the Healer. Plants and animals, fishes and insects, all living beings that require sleep, are renewed in the same say.
Steiner also spoke of elemental spirits in nature, that have been portrayed in myths and fairy tales as elves, gnomes, undines etc. Some of these are linked to our physical and psychic existence in various ways. On the basis of his clairvoyant observations, Steiner described spirits who are attracted to cleverness and gather in libraries and universities, and who are vital to our clever thinking. He also described spirits who are quite hideous in appearance, but who cause us to be moved to the depth of our being, to tears in fact, by something beautiful. He explained how those muscles that we cannot ourselves move, such as those of digestion and similar bodily functions, are the activities of higher hierarchies.
There are so-called fallen spirits involved with our bodies as well, or demons as they are called in traditional religions, causing imbalances and illnesses, during which there is a struggle going on between retarded and progressive gods. (The conditions, or evolutionary stages, of cosmic beings are related to former planetary epochs, the descriptions of which are also to be found in the Vedas, or the Hindu Scriptures.)
This is why I was at first a little startled at Hubbard's system of body thetans, especially when I was confronted with his detailed description of how they should be talked to, how they should be 'blown', how they gather in 'clusters,' etc. Now I have come to recognize that Scientology auditing brings about som kind of schizophrenia, or multiple personalities called 'valences'. This makes it extremely difficult to analyze the BT phenomenon in Scientology by using Anthroposophical concepts as a tool of investigation. (I would welcome contributions to this.)
13. The Guardian of the Threshold.
(Written January 1999)
I have received a mail from Michael Friedjung in France, an anthroposophists who has been involved with the Church of Scientology. He shares some interesting insights, and the most crucial is this:
"As far as I can see the process of becoming "clear" which involves the destruction of the "reactive mind" by "dianetics", that is the destruction of different sorts of unconscious inhibition, is in fact a destruction of the lesser guardian of the threshold. This is clearly an illegitimate way of crossing the treshold; other illegitimate ways involve doing something wrong with the guardians."
Rudolf Steiner describes a "Doppelganger," a "guardian of the threshold," as an obstacle to supersensible perception (clairvoyance and initiation) that must be conquered through proper spiritual training before the world of soul and spirit becomes manifest to wide awake consciousness. The "threshold" is what separates us as waking, rational beings from the realms of dreamless sleep and of death. The Guardian prevents our immediate access to these realms until we are thoroughly prepared through many years, even lifetimes, of spiritual training. In his written books to guide aspiring students, Rudolf Steiner emphasizes the development of lofty morals and the strengthening of a healthy soul condition.
Most people who possess a spiritually inquisitive and seeking nature have experienced this guardian of the threshold in one way or another, and one is inevitably led to the cognition when one grows older, that our mental health and well-being is wisely being protected by this arrangement, pretty much the way we prevent a child from running out in a dangerous street with heavy traffic.
If this be true, it is obvious that destroying this Guardian in order to force oneself into a claircoyant perception of the spiritual world must entail serious damage to sanity, to mental health. (Isn't that what emperor Caligula did?) If this is indeed what the scientologists are doing, it explains not only why fear and hatred of psychology, psychiatry, and all "psych words" is so prominent among them . (75 million years ago, Thetans were eaten by cannibalistic psychiatrists, Christ is the Evil Psychiatrist, etc.) It also explains why ex-scientologists who were involved for very many years, have sued the CoS for causing them permanent psychological damage. This sheds a new light on the disturbingly high rate of psychoses, suicides, and strange deaths that haunt scientologists, especially when undergoing crucial OT-initiations.
For this reason, I have posted an extensive excerpt from Rudolf Steiner's "Outline of Occult Science." The passage is taken from the fifth chapter: "Cognition of the Higher Worlds. Initiation," and explains the basic things about the "Guardian of the threshold," also called the Doppelgänger.
But as Michael Friedjung also says: More research is needed! Contributions welcome!
Tarjei Straume
Click to join anthroposophy_tomorrowRudolf Steiner: Herald of a New Epoch
