How are the two concepts of race
related?
From: Detlef Hardorp
Date: Sun Mar 14, 2004 3:11 pm
Subject: How are the two concepts of race related? was: Re: [anthroposophy_tomorrow]
Loose Threads
Dear friends,
I found this interesting in
the current dialogue between Daniel Hindes and Peter Staudenmaier:
D. Hindes:
Have you found the Polarian, Hyperborian,
Lemurian and Atlantean biological races?
P. Staudenmaier:
The Polarians and Hyperboreans didn't have
material form in the sense of biological races. The Lemurians
did. Both Steiner and Blavatsky taught that there are still remnants
of Lemurians and Atlanteans populating the earth today.
PS is quite right in saying that "Polarians and Hyperboreans
didn't have material form in the sense of biological races".
Also that the Lemurians did. Also that "there are still
remnants of Lemurians and Atlanteans populating the earth today":
we can read in Steiner how the origin of the classical five races
goes back to such times.
We have consensus thus far! Biological races have a lot to do
with what happened, in particular, in the Atlantean root-race,
to use the theosophical terminology. Or what happened in the
Atlantean main-race, to use another theosophical terminology.
Now all we still need to get clear about is the fact that there
are, according to Steiner, five biological main races on the
one hand, and seven evolutionary main races on the other hand
(two of which are indeed in the future). Using the word "main
race" or "root race" is a Theosophical terminology
for denoting periods of evolution, i.e. periods of time.
Steiner repeatedly said that to use the word in the latter sense
is not helpful, because it has little to do with what we usually
mean by race. So he stopped using the Theosophical terminology.
The concepts remain, but the concepts were never racial to begin
with! Read all the Blavatsky I sent you and show me where she
means classical races when she talks about root- or main-races,
and which classical race she means. Where does Blavatsky say
anything about the black, the yellow, the red, the white or the
brown race? She may have made some remarks in passing. I'd be
interested in them nonetheless, if anyone wants to search for
them. But she is talking almost exclusively of large cycles of
time that supersede one another. That, if anything, is the core
doctrine of Theosophy! If you miss that, you've missed everything.
Since everything on earth happens within time, also the development
of the classical races had to occur somewhere along the line,
i.e. within a certain "root-race" or "root-races".
But none of the classical races ARE root races! In spite of the
fact that Steiner talked about main races with regards to the
biological races (there are 5, see the colours enumerated above,
and they are related to certain planetary influences and geographical
centers) and that Steiner (elsewhere) talked about main races
with regards to the superseding time periods when speaking in
the Theosophical jargon. They are "main" each within
their specific context.
That these concepts are distinct concepts is about as clear as
anything can be if you allow yourself to think for just a second
or two. Anyone who tries to think otherwise must not think for
long, because that won't work! And I repeat my question: Where
does Blavatsky say anything about the black, the yellow, the
red, the white or the brown race? How does her concept of race
relate to the traditional concept?
Best regards, Detlef Hardorp
...................................................................................................................................
From: Peter
Staudenmaier
Date: Sun Mar 14, 2004 8:50 pm
Subject: Re: How are the two concepts of race related?
Detlef writes:
Using the word "main race" or "root race"
is a Theosophical terminology for denoting periods of evolution,
i.e. periods of time.
<snip>
The concepts remain, but the concepts
were never racial to begin with! Read all the Blavatsky I sent
you and show me where she means classical races when she talks
about root- or main-races, and which classical race she means.
Where does Blavatsky say anything about the black, the yellow,
the red, the white or the brown race?
<snip>
That these concepts are distinct
concepts is about as clear as anything can be if you allow yourself
to think for just a second or two. Anyone who tries to think
otherwise must not think for long, because that won't work! And
I repeat my question: Where does Blavatsky say anything about
the black, the yellow, the red, the white or the brown race?
How does her concept of race relate to the traditional concept?
Much of Detlef's depiction is erroneous. In volume I of the 1893
London edition of The Secret Doctrine, Blavatsky sometimes refers
to the root-races as "our Five Races", of which "two
more have still to appear" (261), and at several points
she writes simply of "five Root Races" without bothering
to add any mention of the other two (e.g. 150). Blavatsky discusses
the yellow, black, brown, and red races at length in volume II
of The Secret Doctrine; see, for example, pp. 366-367.
The notion that her racial terminoogy refers to time periods
instead of races is false, as volume II makes clear. She says
that each "Root-Race" consists of "sub-races and
innumerable family divisions and tribes" (462), and she
provides a "genealogical tree of the Fifth Root-Race"
(453). "The Human Races are born one from the other, grow,
develop, become old and die. Their sub-races and nations follow
the same rule." (463) She makes much of the "great
difference between the intellectual capacities of races"
(332).
Blavatsky describes how a minority of Atlanteans evolved into
Aryans and produced "the Northern stocks", while the
"yellow and red, brown and black" are merely "the
remnants of the Atlanteans", produced when the "undeveloped
tribes and families of the Atlantean stock fell gradually into
a still more abject and savage condition." (786) According
to her account, peoples with "more Aryan blood" conquered
those with less (789). She refers repeatedly to "the five
hitherto developed Races" (e.g. 207). "There are, however,
considerable numbers of the mixed Lemuro-Atlantean peoples produced
by various crossings with such semi-human stocks -- e.g., the
wild men of Borneo, the Veddhas of Ceylon, classified by Prof.
Flower among Aryans (!), most of the remaining Australians, Bushmen,
Negritos, Andaman islanders, etc." (206; all parentheses
in original, throughout this post.)
In keeping with her remarkably inconsistent racial terminology
and numbering, Blavatsky also writes about the "three distinct
primeval Races," namely "the red-yellow, the black,
and the brown-white" (260). "Esoteric Teaching names
three great divisions, namely, the red-yellow, the black, and
the brown-white." (210) At the same time, she makes clear
that root races are biological categories: "The Malays and
Papuans are a mixed stock, resulting from the intermarriages
of the low Atlantean sub-races with the seventh sub-race of the
Third Root-Race. Like the Hottentots, they are of indirect Lemuro-Atlantean
descent. It is a most suggestive fact -- to those concrete thinkers
who demand a physical proof of Karma -- that the lowest races
of men are now rapidly dying out..." (824)
She then explains that as we approach the future emergence of
the sixth root race, there will only be three racial groupings
left: "the white (Aryan, Fifth Root-Race), the yellow, and
the African negro -- with their crossings (Atlanto-European divisions).
Redskins, Eskimos, Papuans, Australians, Polynesians, etc. --
all are dying out. Those who realize that every Root-Race runs
through a gamut of seven sub-races with seven branchlets, etc,
will understand the 'why'. The tide-wave of incarnating Egos
has rolled past them to harvest experience in more developed
and less senile stocks; and their extinction is hence a Karmic
necessity." (825)
Blavatsky explains that "The present yellow races are the
descendants, however, of the early branches of the Fourth Race,"
whereas the "degenerated Australians" are descended
from "the seventh sub-race of the Third." (209) In
contrast, "the 'cream' of the Fourth Race gravitated more
and more toward the apex of physical and intellectual evolution,"
eventually yielding "the nascent Fifth (the Aryan) Race"
(209). "Sub-races, guided by Karmic Law or destiny, repeat
unconsciously the first steps of their respective mother-races.
As the comparatively fair Brahmans -- when invading India with
its dark-coloured Dravidians -- have come from the North, so
the Aryan Fifth race must claim its origin from northern regions."
(812)
Her general approach is nicely summed up in the following disquisition
on "the Australian savages": "The survivors of
those later Lemurians, who escaped the destruction of their fellows
when the main Continent was submerged, became the ancestors of
a portion of the present native tribes. Being a very low sub-race,
begotten originally of animals, of monsters, whose very fossils
are now resting miles under the sea floors, their stock has since
existed in an environment strongly subjected to the law of retardation.
Australia is one of the oldest lands now above the waters, and
in the senile decrepitude of old age, its 'virgin soil' notwithstanding.
It can produce no new forms, unless helped by new and fresh races,
and articifical cultivation and breeding." (207)
Peter Staudenmaier
...................................................................................................................................
From: holderlin66
Date: Mon Mar 15, 2004 9:30 am
Subject: Re: How are the two concepts of race related?
Peter Staudenmaier wrote:
Those who realize that every Root-Race
runs through a gamut of seven sub-races with seven branchlets,
etc, will understand the 'why'. The tide-wave of incarnating
Egos has rolled past them to harvest experience in more developed
and less senile stocks; and their extinction is hence a Karmic
necessity." (825)
<snip>
"Sub-races, guided by Karmic Law or
destiny, repeat unconsciously the first steps of their respective
mother-races. As the comparatively fair Brahmans -- when invading
India with its dark-coloured Dravidians -- have come from the
North, so the Aryan Fifth race must claim its origin from northern
regions." (812)
Bradford blinks;
So the problem is what? Peter you think the
soil of heredity is more important than the use each spirit makes
of it. That the fact is we flower when we flower. MLK Jr. did
a type of flowering of the Intellect, and managed to contribute
back to culture, wonderfully clearly, something that was stolen
from the African Americans. Indeed, if I was silly enough to
imagine it, the Martin Luther of the ancient Church and the social
forces of the Martin Luther King Jr. that we know, are both interesting
forms of flowering and each caused a startling revolution of
sorts.
Now Flowering of the Spirit is a well known
term. It doesn't mean remaining submerged in the instincts, it
doesn't mean that everyone flowers out of the soil that they
were given or that they decided to incorporate in. What we need
to show you, is how so many great souls flower in the various
7 to 9 fold structure, that outlines where the I AM is located
in the psychological structure. But observation remains secondary
as to the racial soil that the Spirit Grows from, even when the
gift is returned in Mandela and King and Gandhi. Their gifts
were for all mankind and had a distinct message of brotherhood.
Firstly, the I AM is not located at the change
of teeth. The capacities of the I AM have not yet ripened, at
all. Next the I AM is not at puberty, here again the I AM has
not ripened yet. Now there is a delicate area where Columbine
and suicide configure, this is around 18 1/2 to 20, where, something
that really is not part of your understanding or maturity yet
happens, at 18 1/2 to 20 odd, the first meeting comes with all
the potential capacities that the I AM is bringing with it into
incarnation. It's hopes, dreams and potential hindrances.
Now the flowering of the I AM reveals where
in the I AM psychological conditions from 21 - 28 as sentient
soul, or intellectual soul or consciousness soul, all the way
to 42 reveal where the mature I AM is working with all or most
of its faculties.
Now this, I AM strata, defined by Steiner,
is not a static system. Why? Because Intellectual Soul activity
or Sentient Soul activity reveals behavior and behavior itself
can remain stuck in one of these capacities, or working in one
of these areas, well over an extended number of years. Steiner
used to say that some people never grow up beyond the soul state
of 28 years of age. In other words, sentient soul moody dysfunction
and a minimal interest in the intellect of the times as well
as simple love of sports, t.v. and raising a family, does not
indicate someone is going out beyond development to capacities
higher than the sentient soul. So it is not static by age, but
by observation of the soul development, the thinking development
and the spirit maturity.
So that is one of the chief areas of problem,
you have not schooled your observation but only the dry aspects
of your intellect. That all observations are not Politically
Correct or even, or equal, and in case you haven't heard, Humans
are not equal. This general theory that we are all created equal,
applies to a five pointed star and a biological construct, but
not spiritual development and individual karmic flowering. This
is exactly why the I AM discernment is different than racial
observations.
However, setting the standard of culture,
race and cosmic development meant that somebody had to take something
serious. Research on the phases of Earth Development, Human incarnation
time periods and Planetary contributions to specific capacities,
all have to do with developing a clear picture of how the I AM
is ripening in time and evolution.
Steiner took the Christ Event as a serious
shift in the direction of humanity. The statement of John the
Baptist about this Change that was needed, was indicative of
the cosmic shift that Steiner observed. The fact that a certain
Race, say the ability to track, trace, follow, as the Native
American ability as hunter had in the realm of nature, to that
which the Germanic Thinking capacity had, in the realm of pure
Thought, and tracking, tracing and following the I AM, was very
specific. It didn't mean that everyone would flower or become
a super example of such higher development in either the Native
Americans or Germanic Thinking capacities. But one set of focused
tracking abilities could also flow into another. Native Americans
could find the higher I AM tracking capacity of the Germanic
soul, something they could be attracted to.
Now it is fairly clear to most of us in the
Michael School that we can measure where someone has risen to
the level of profound Consciousness Soul understanding, Intellectual
Soul understanding and Sentient Soul understanding. Each of these
are very different, but they all entail the study of how the
I AM is developing, not how the race is developing. How the I
AM is developing.
So in the realm of the Consciousness Soul,
Joseph Campbell, Shakespeare, Martin Luther King Jr. and Gandhi,
Desmond Tutu and Mandela, and countless other examples arise.
Where Chief Seatlle left off, he knew the
wisdom of the Sentient Soul and nature with all the generosity
of heart, that brought him to the brotherhood of all things.
This is a real high level of Sentient Soul and certainly as a
soul he would have no trouble with any of the other phases. These
capacities sit in different races but their I AM's flower at
their own rate and in their own time, much depends on circumstances
surrounding each individual and family. We don't blame an individuals
flowering on their race, we give credit to the individual for
their own specific growth and development. That does not mean
that Afro-Americans do not supply a wonderful surge of refreshing
childhood forces, fresh etheric forces to depleted souls who
might need just that after ripping their brains out with false
dialectical materialism.
So this is where the most retarded, glaring
errors in thinking have mixed you up and lost you in the strange
structure of Theosophy and Anthroposophy. That is why it takes
study, not hot gun opinions. That is why it takes humanity. To
build the understanding that there were even etheric regions
of the Earth that delivered certain forces, is like looking at
the top or bottom of an orange and see how vortex forces exist.
The same vortex forces exist in Tomato, or plum. The Earth has
had central etheric vortexes and to get to these regions of research,
Steiner had to cover the details of geographic distribution of
qualities.
Now we could extend all this into the races
coming up locked in the mineral kingdom.. the 7 metals of lead,
silver, copper, gold, iron, zinc, mercury. The Trees and what
they might be in the future according to their seven fold development
might also develop prime tree spirit and unknown, deep root races.
Thinking is so impressively shocking as to
how humanity has attempted to think into the revelation of What
happened from Noah and the earlier recapitualations of Ancient
Ssturn, Sun and Moon evolutions and the history of our elder
Angelic brothers, in real terms, all the way to now.... that
I don't blame you for taking the cowards way out. It really does
take study. You get most of these things wrong but your ego can't
admit it. As the Tree Ents would say, "musn't be too hasty".
Of course one of the most impressive Flowerings
ever recorded, at least two flowerings, are Buddha, flowering
out beyond anything we ever imagined. A classification of Buddha
that is truly something that has higher educational Academia
of the Spirit and certainly is less linked to the race than the
Individual of Buddha. Let me pin point exactly for your Politically
correct failure to grasp the shool of humanity, the actual graduation,
the matriculation that awaits all humanity, is one phase called
Buddhahood. These are real Academic degrees, the rest of our
university training is just making excuses for not facing how
humanity graduates with honors and how it fails and calls down
cosmic catastrophe on it's own head.
The Italians got St.Frances and his flowering
is nearly as monumental as Buddha's except that St. Frances wasn't
a world wide teacher, he became a living revelation of that Flowering
beyond the normal Itaalian. What happened in the specific case
of St. Frances revealed a highly accelerated process, and in
a sense, more selfish, more introverted and linked directly to
Buddha's future mission.
We could list hundreds of women and men, all
of them reaching a crescendo of development in certain phases
of the I AM. Noam Chomsky is very distinct in that he is a far
wiser and more developed Intellectual Soul Being than you are
at present. That is very clear because Chomsky has a very refined
and sharply distinct intellect and an enormous seed of fair,
humanitarian interest. This intense humanitarian interest will
bring she/he to the highest phase of the Consciousness Soul.
Examples are everywhere one just has to grow
up. In other words one has to grasp what I implied here.
Saturn=Saturday
Sun=Sunday
Moon=Monday
[now these entail the Saturn-Sun-Moon Evolutionary
periods.]
Mars=Tuesday
Mercury=Wednesday
[Those complete the descending Mars forces
of the I AM and the upward turning, Healing and Mercury forces
- ALL OF WHICH STAND FOR CURRENT EARTH EVOLUTION]
Jupiter=Thursday
Friday=Venus
Everyone flowers and awakens in whatever place
and time and at whatever phase of sentient soul, intellectual
soul and consciousness soul. These various Rainbow forces act
as the base, the flower pot and soil out of which the soul grows
higher capacities.
However people flower, ripen and arise in
various phases of their experience on Earth. The various conditions
act merely as the pot and soil out of which the I AM flowers.
Bradford
...................................................................................................................................
From: holderlin66
Date: Mon Mar 15, 2004 10:07 am
Subject: Re: How are the two concepts of race related?
holderlin66 wrote:
The Italians got St.Frances and his flowering
is nearly as monumental as Buddha's except that St. Frances wasn't
a world wide teacher, he became a living revelation of that Flowering
beyond the normal Itaalian. What happened in the specific case
of St. Frances revealed a highly accelerated process, and in
a sense, more selfish, more introverted and linked directly to
Buddha's future mission.
Bradford swings to Tarjei and Andrea;
The immaturity of the observations aimed against
Steiner gain clarity when you look at the Italian Renaissance.
The warmth and sentient visual forces, the sentient ability to
hold images, to adore the body, the soul, the spirits and all
that the warmth of heart delivers to the painting of color and
vision of seeing, what stirs the soul, either Mono Lisa or the
sculpted David, needed the Italian Soul condition to bring that
warmth into vision. This was an extension of the Greek vision,
sort of the inner forces that moved the Greek in Phidias and
Athens.
So I agree with Tarjei, my most beautifully
observed eyes were Giraffe's and next to that were women of India.
But I saw the depth of compassion that is in something of the
Raphael Madonna. There is a profound warmth and nature motherliness
that fed into the fact that my observations were partly based
on my search for the deepest feelings I had about my own mother
who died when I was three.
This led me to the deeper experiences of what
women showed me. But I was given a karmic wrinkle, both to lead
me beyond the midwest mind set and set me on my own quest against
anything that was in my step parents paradigms.
When we take the Italian forces and take the
Native American ability to read nature and track, animal, human
and read subtle conditions, we also suddenly see in bold highlights
that the I AM conditions in the Germanic Thinking gave Steiner
the opportunity to do what Steiner himself said his chief growth
mission was. Tracking I AM's, tracing in the Karma Lectures the
tracks of the human spirit. This Steiner reserved last, but as
I have pointed out, this was a distinctly new capacity that is
coming towards humanity. Not based on the Race and biological
memory in the blood, but the actual experience of the New I AM
in the blood.
Diana, Dan, Peter, Walden...well a whole lot
of people are not even out of their knickers yet. When I tell
you that Steiner demands that we advance our thinking ever deeper
and that the depth that Anthros are able to look at things is
stunning, this is well over the top of true and they are well
over the brim of deluded.
Take for instance El Greco and the Spanish
Soul experience.
http://www.spanisharts.com/prado/greco.htm
Here we see a difference in how the blood
and language of spain also flow into art. Our problem, not our
problem, but the problem Diana, Dan etc.. etc.. is that they
have failed in an education that didn't allow them to see deeply
into things and compare the different styles of language, eyes,
culture, painting.. and therefore they attempt to level things
with a Politcally Correct Brush and fail to see humanity and
fail to understand reality and this is supremely sad because
the lack the requisite depth to see clearly.
...................................................................................................................................
From: Detlef Hardorp
Date: Mon Mar 15, 2004 11:49 am
Subject: Re: How are the two concepts of race related?
Hello everybody,
I find the most recent mail by Peter Staudenmaier quite helpful.
He has read Blavatsky more recently than I had and was able to
answer my question: "Where does Blavatsky say anything about
the black, the yellow, the red, the white or the brown race?
How does her concept of race relate to the traditional concept?"
He writes, among other quotes: "Blavatsky describes how
a minority of Atlanteans evolved into Aryans and produced "the
Northern stocks", while the "yellow and red, brown
and black" are merely "the remnants of the Atlanteans",
produced when the "undeveloped tribes and families of the
Atlantean stock fell gradually into a still more abject and savage
condition." "
Here is the passage form Blavatsky in the original ( THE SECRET
DOCTRINE, Vol. 2, Page 743f - PS has an edition with different
page numbers!):
"You do not know which
was the best and most handsome generation of men which has ever
lived on this earth," said the priests of Sais to Solon,
according to Plato. "Only a weak seed of it, of which you
(Greeks) are the descendants, is all that remains." "Their
books," they added, "preserved the records of a great
nation, which emerging from the Atlantic sea had invaded Europe
and Asia (Timaeus). The Greeks were but the dwarfed and weak
remnant of that once glorious nation. . . ." What was this
nation? The secret doctrine teaches that it was the latest, seventh
sub-race of the Atlanteans, already swallowed up in one of the
early sub-races of the Aryan stock, one that had been gradually
spreading over the continent and islands of Europe, as soon as
they had begun to emerge from the seas. Descending from the high
plateaux of Asia, where the two Races had sought refuge in the
days of the agony of Atlantis, it had been slowly settling and
colonizing the freshly emerged lands. The emigrant sub-race had
rapidly increased and multiplied on that virgin soil; had divided
into many families, which in their turn divided into nations.
Egypt and Greece, the Phoenicians, and the Northern stocks, had
thus proceeded from that one sub-race. Thousands of years later,
other races -- the remnants of the Atlanteans -- "yellow
and red, brown and black," began to invade the new continent.
There were wars in which the new comers were defeated; and they
fled, some to Africa, others to remote countries. Some of these
lands became in course of time -- owing to new geological convulsions
-- islands. Being thus forcibly separated from the continents,
the result was that the undeveloped tribes and families of the
Atlantean stock fell gradually into a still more abject and savage
condition. Did not the Spaniards in the Cibola expeditions meet
with WHITE savage chiefs; and has not the presence of African
negro types in Europe in the pre-historic ages been now ascertained?
"Egypt and Greece, the Phoenicians, and
the Northern stocks" proceed from "the latest, seventh
sub-race of the Atlanteans, already swallowed up in one of the
early sub-races of the Aryan stock". "Thousands of
years later, other races -- the remnants of the Atlanteans --
"yellow and red, brown and black," began to invade
the new continent." These fled to remote countries which
became islands. "Being thus forcibly separated from the
continents, the result was that the undeveloped tribes and families
of the Atlantean stock fell gradually into a still more abject
and savage condition." The latter seem to also include "WHITE
savage chiefs", if I read Blavatsky correctly.
It is all a bit convoluted. But it does show show that Blavatsky's
root races do have a biological component. I suppose this is
why she called them "races" to begin with. And she
calls them "root races" because they are the roots
to other offspring races.
This does, of course, not negate the fact that her 7 principal
root races were each assigned to consecutive time periods. The
Theosophist Sinett takes this up and intellectually systematises
the idea into a mechanical clockwork. With Blavatsky, it is still
somewhat chaotic.
I think we are probably in agreement thus far.
I had written some more paragraphs, going on to Steiner. I will
wait, however, before I post them, because I still would like
to get clear about one thing with Blavatsky. That is the following:
We have seen
that Blavatsky writes of the "yellow and red, brown and
black" races. (An aside: does anyone know why she puts these
in quotation marks?) We have also seen that she speaks of root
races. She speaks of the latter as "remnants of the Atlanteans",
which is the fourth root race according to Blavatsky. We seem
to all agree that, for Blavatsky, "main race" and "root
race" mean the same. The question remaining is: were the
"yellow and red, brown and black" races ever "main
races" for Blavatsky?
I will proceed with my train of thought when this question is
answered.
Best regards, Detlef Hardorp
...................................................................................................................................
From: Detlef Hardorp
Date: Tue Mar 16, 2004 1:52 pm
Subject: Re: How are the two concepts of race related?
Strange. Noone has reacted to my posting,
although it's been posted for more than 24 hours - unusual for
this list. Would anyone care to answer my question? It was (see
below): were the "yellow and red, brown and black"
races ever "main races" for Blavatsky?
I'd appreciate a response from someone who might know! Thanks!
Detlef Hardorp
___________________________________________________________
Here is the post I am referring to again for easy reference (#3400):
Hello everybody,
I find the most recent mail by Peter Staudenmaier quite helpful.
He has read Blavatsky more recently than I had and was able to
answer my question: "Where does Blavatsky say anything about
the black, the yellow, the red, the white or the brown race?
How does her concept of race relate to the traditional concept?"
He writes, among other quotes: "Blavatsky describes how
a minority of Atlanteans evolved into Aryans and produced "the
Northern stocks", while the "yellow and red, brown
and black" are merely "the remnants of the Atlanteans",
produced when the "undeveloped tribes and families of the
Atlantean stock fell gradually into a still more abject and savage
condition." "
Here is the passage form Blavatsky in the original ( THE SECRET
DOCTRINE, Vol. 2, Page 743f - PS has an edition with different
page numbers!):
"You do not know which
was the best and most handsome generation of men which has ever
lived on this earth," said the priests of Sais to Solon,
according to Plato. "Only a weak seed of it, of which you
(Greeks) are the descendants, is all that remains." "Their
books," they added, "preserved the records of a great
nation, which emerging from the Atlantic sea had invaded Europe
and Asia (Timaeus). The Greeks were but the dwarfed and weak
remnant of that once glorious nation. . . ." What was this
nation? The secret doctrine teaches that it was the latest, seventh
sub-race of the Atlanteans, already swallowed up in one of the
early sub-races of the Aryan stock, one that had been gradually
spreading over the continent and islands of Europe, as soon as
they had begun to emerge from the seas. Descending from the high
plateaux of Asia, where the two Races had sought refuge in the
days of the agony of Atlantis, it had been slowly settling and
colonizing the freshly emerged lands. The emigrant sub-race had
rapidly increased and multiplied on that virgin soil; had divided
into many families, which in their turn divided into nations.
Egypt and Greece, the Phoenicians, and the Northern stocks, had
thus proceeded from that one sub-race. Thousands of years later,
other races -- the remnants of the Atlanteans -- "yellow
and red, brown and black," began to invade the new continent.
There were wars in which the new comers were defeated; and they
fled, some to Africa, others to remote countries. Some of these
lands became in course of time -- owing to new geological convulsions
-- islands. Being thus forcibly separated from the continents,
the result was that the undeveloped tribes and families of the
Atlantean stock fell gradually into a still more abject and savage
condition. Did not the Spaniards in the Cibola expeditions meet
with WHITE savage chiefs; and has not the presence of African
negro types in Europe in the pre-historic ages been now ascertained?
"Egypt and Greece, the Phoenicians,
and the Northern stocks" proceed from "the latest,
seventh sub-race of the Atlanteans, already swallowed up in one
of the early sub-races of the Aryan stock". "Thousands
of years later, other races -- the remnants of the Atlanteans
-- "yellow and red, brown and black," began to invade
the new continent." These fled to remote countries which
became islands. "Being thus forcibly separated from the
continents, the result was that the undeveloped tribes and families
of the Atlantean stock fell gradually into a still more abject
and savage condition." The latter seem to also include "WHITE
savage chiefs", if I read Blavatsky correctly.
It is all a bit convoluted. But it does show show that Blavatsky's
root races do have a biological component. I suppose this is
why she called them "races" to begin with. And she
calls them "root races" because they are the roots
to other offspring races.
This does, of course, not negate the fact that her 7 principal
root races were each assigned to consecutive time periods. The
Theosophist Sinett takes this up and intellectually systematises
the idea into a mechanical clockwork. With Blavatsky, it is still
somewhat chaotic.
I think we are probably in agreement thus far.
I had written some more paragraphs, going on to Steiner. I will
wait, however, before I post them, because I still would like
to get clear about one thing with Blavatsky. That is the following:
We
have seen that Blavatsky writes of the "yellow and red,
brown and black" races. (An aside: does anyone know why
she puts these in quotation marks?) We have also seen that she
speaks of root races. She speaks of the latter as "remnants
of the Atlanteans", which is the fourth root race according
to Blavatsky. We seem to all agree that, for Blavatsky, "main
race" and "root race" mean the same. The question
remaining is: were the "yellow and red, brown and black"
races ever "main races" for Blavatsky?
I will proceed with my train of thought when this question is
answered.
Best regards, Detlef Hardorp
...................................................................................................................................
From: at
Date: Tue Mar 16, 2004 2:08 pm
Subject: Re: [anthroposophy_tomorrow] Re: How are the two concepts
of race related?
So far I am with you. (I don't know why Blavatsky
put the race colors in quotes).
Daniel Hindes
----- Original Message -----
From: Detlef Hardorp
Sent: Tuesday, March 16, 2004 4:52 PM
Subject: [anthroposophy_tomorrow] Re: How are the two concepts
of race related?
Strange. Noone has reacted to my posting,
although it's been posted for more than 24 hours - unusual for
this list. Would anyone care to answer my question? It was (see
below): were the "yellow and red, brown and black"
races ever "main races" for Blavatsky?
<snip>
We have seen that Blavatsky writes of the
"yellow and red, brown and black" races. (An aside:
does anyone know why she puts these in quotation marks?) We have
also seen that she speaks of root races. She speaks of the latter
as "remnants of the Atlanteans", which is the fourth
root race according to Blavatsky. We seem to all agree that,
for Blavatsky, "main race" and "root race"
mean the same. The question remaining is: were the "yellow
and red, brown and black" races ever "main races"
for Blavatsky?
I will proceed with my train of thought when this question is
answered.
Best regards, Detlef Hardorp
...................................................................................................................................
From: Mike Helsher
Date: Tue Mar 16, 2004 8:21 pm
Subject: Re: [anthroposophy_tomorrow] Re: How are the two concepts
of race related?
Hey Peter!
Bradford and I quite often think the same
thoughts. It's just that he's about 20 or so years older that
I and is more experienced at articulating these thoughts and
expressing them into words.
I'm wondering why you didn't bother to reply
to his post?
And even more so I'm wondering why you have
ignored his posts entirly since you came to this list?
I'm re-posting this because I would like you
to try and respond to it.
Thanks
Mike
Peter Staudenmaier wrote:
Those who realize that every Root-Race
runs through a gamut of seven sub-races with seven branchlets,
etc, will understand the 'why'. The tide-wave of incarnating
Egos has rolled past them to harvest experience in more developed
and less senile stocks; and their extinction is hence a Karmic
necessity." (825)
<snip>
"Sub-races, guided by Karmic Law or
destiny, repeat unconsciously the first steps of their respective
mother-races. As the comparatively fair Brahmans -- when invading
India with its dark-coloured Dravidians -- have come from the
North, so the Aryan Fifth race must claim its origin from northern
regions." (812)
Bradford blinks;
So the problem is what? Peter you think
the soil of heredity is more important than the use each spirit
makes of it. That the fact is we flower when we flower. MLK Jr.
did a type of flowering of the Intellect, and managed to contribute
back to culture, wonderfully clearly, something that was stolen
from the African Americans. Indeed, if I was silly enough to
imagine it, the Martin Luther of the ancient Church and the social
forces of the Martin Luther King Jr. that we know, are both interesting
forms of flowering and each caused a startling revolution of
sorts.
Now Flowering of the Spirit is a well known
term. It doesn't mean remaining submerged in the instincts, it
doesn't mean that everyone flowers out of the soil that they
were given or that they decided to incorporate in. What we need
to show you, is how so many great souls flower in the various
7 to 9 fold structure, that outlines where the I AM is located
in the psychological structure. But observation remains secondary
as to the racial soil that the Spirit Grows from, even when the
gift is returned in Mandela and King and Gandhi. Their gifts
were for all mankind and had a distinct message of brotherhood.
Firstly, the I AM is not located at the
change of teeth. The capacities of the I AM have not yet ripened,
at all. Next the I AM is not at puberty, here again the I AM
has not ripened yet. Now there is a delicate area where Columbine
and suicide configure, this is around 18 1/2 to 20, where, something
that really is not part of your understanding or maturity yet
happens, at 18 1/2 to 20 odd, the first meeting comes with all
the potential capacities that the I AM is bringing with it into
incarnation. It's hopes, dreams and potential hindrances.
Now the flowering of the I AM reveals where
in the I AM psychological conditions from 21 - 28 as sentient
soul, or intellectual soul or consciousness soul, all the way
to 42 reveal where the mature I AM is working with all or most
of its faculties.
Now this, I AM strata, defined by Steiner,
is not a static system. Why? Because Intellectual Soul activity
or Sentient Soul activity reveals behavior and behavior itself
can remain stuck in one of these capacities, or working in one
of these areas, well over an extended number of years. Steiner
used to say that some people never grow up beyond the soul state
of 28 years of age. In other words, sentient soul moody dysfunction
and a minimal interest in the intellect of the times as well
as simple love of sports, t.v. and raising a family, does not
indicate someone is going out beyond development to capacities
higher than the sentient soul. So it is not static by age, but
by observation of the soul development, the thinking development
and the spirit maturity.
So that is one of the chief areas of problem,
you have not schooled your observation but only the dry aspects
of your intellect. That all observations are not Politically
Correct or even, or equal, and in case you haven't heard, Humans
are not equal. This general theory that we are all created equal,
applies to a five pointed star and a biological construct, but
not spiritual development and individual karmic flowering. This
is exactly why the I AM discernment is different than racial
observations.
However, setting the standard of culture,
race and cosmic development meant that somebody had to take something
serious. Research on the phases of Earth Development, Human incarnation
time periods and Planetary contributions to specific capacities,
all have to do with developing a clear picture of how the I AM
is ripening in time and evolution.
Steiner took the Christ Event as a serious
shift in the direction of humanity. The statement of John the
Baptist about this Change that was needed, was indicative of
the cosmic shift that Steiner observed. The fact that a certain
Race, say the ability to track, trace, follow, as the Native
American ability as hunter had in the realm of nature, to that
which the Germanic Thinking capacity had, in the realm of pure
Thought, and tracking, tracing and following the I AM, was very
specific. It didn't mean that everyone would flower or become
a super example of such higher development in either the Native
Americans or Germanic Thinking capacities. But one set of focused
tracking abilities could also flow into another. Native Americans
could find the higher I AM tracking capacity of the Germanic
soul, something they could be attracted to.
Now it is fairly clear to most of us in
the Michael School that we can measure where someone has risen
to the level of profound Consciousness Soul understanding, Intellectual
Soul understanding and Sentient Soul understanding. Each of these
are very different, but they all entail the study of how the
I AM is developing, not how the race is developing. How the I
AM is developing.
So in the realm of the Consciousness Soul,
Joseph Campbell, Shakespeare, Martin Luther King Jr. and Gandhi,
Desmond Tutu and Mandela, and countless other examples arise.
Where Chief Seatlle left off, he knew the
wisdom of the Sentient Soul and nature with all the generosity
of heart, that brought him to the brotherhood of all things.
This is a real high level of Sentient Soul and certainly as a
soul he would have no trouble with any of the other phases. These
capacities sit in different races but their I AM's flower at
their own rate and in their own time, much depends on circumstances
surrounding each individual and family. We don't blame an individuals
flowering on their race, we give credit to the individual for
their own specific growth and development. That does not mean
that Afro-Americans do not supply a wonderful surge of refreshing
childhood forces, fresh etheric forces to depleted souls who
might need just that after ripping their brains out with false
dialectical materialism.
So this is where the most retarded, glaring
errors in thinking have mixed you up and lost you in the strange
structure of Theosophy and Anthroposophy. That is why it takes
study, not hot gun opinions. That is why it takes humanity. To
build the understanding that there were even etheric regions
of the Earth that delivered certain forces, is like looking at
the top or bottom of an orange and see how vortex forces exist.
The same vortex forces exist in Tomato, or plum. The Earth has
had central etheric vortexes and to get to these regions of research,
Steiner had to cover the details of geographic distribution of
qualities.
Now we could extend all this into the races
coming up locked in the mineral kingdom.. the 7 metals of lead,
silver, copper, gold, iron, zinc, mercury. The Trees and what
they might be in the future according to their seven fold development
might also develop prime tree spirit and unknown, deep root races.
Thinking is so impressively shocking as
to how humanity has attempted to think into the revelation of
What happened from Noah and the earlier recapitualations of Ancient
Ssturn, Sun and Moon evolutions and the history of our elder
Angelic brothers, in real terms, all the way to now.... that
I don't blame you for taking the cowards way out. It really does
take study. You get most of these things wrong but your ego can't
admit it. As the Tree Ents would say, "musn't be too hasty".
Of course one of the most impressive Flowerings
ever recorded, at least two flowerings, are Buddha, flowering
out beyond anything we ever imagined. A classification of Buddha
that is truly something that has higher educational Academia
of the Spirit and certainly is less linked to the race than the
Individual of Buddha. Let me pin point exactly for your Politically
correct failure to grasp the shool of humanity, the actual graduation,
the matriculation that awaits all humanity, is one phase called
Buddhahood. These are real Academic degrees, the rest of our
university training is just making excuses for not facing how
humanity graduates with honors and how it fails and calls down
cosmic catastrophe on it's own head.
The Italians got St.Frances and his flowering
is nearly as monumental as Buddha's except that St. Frances wasn't
a world wide teacher, he became a living revelation of that Flowering
beyond the normal Itaalian. What happened in the specific case
of St. Frances revealed a highly accelerated process, and in
a sense, more selfish, more introverted and linked directly to
Buddha's future mission.
We could list hundreds of women and men,
all of them reaching a crescendo of development in certain phases
of the I AM. Noam Chomsky is very distinct in that he is a far
wiser and more developed Intellectual Soul Being than you are
at present. That is very clear because Chomsky has a very refined
and sharply distinct intellect and an enormous seed of fair,
humanitarian interest. This intense humanitarian interest will
bring she/he to the highest phase of the Consciousness Soul.
Examples are everywhere one just has to
grow up. In other words one has to grasp what I implied here.
Saturn=Saturday
Sun=Sunday
Moon=Monday
[now these entail the Saturn-Sun-Moon Evolutionary
periods.]
Mars=Tuesday
Mercury=Wednesday
[Those complete the descending Mars forces
of the I AM and the upward turning, Healing and Mercury forces
- ALL OF WHICH STAND FOR CURRENT EARTH EVOLUTION]
Jupiter=Thursday
Friday=Venus
Everyone flowers and awakens in whatever
place and time and at whatever phase of sentient soul, intellectual
soul and consciousness soul. These various Rainbow forces act
as the base, the flower pot and soil out of which the soul grows
higher capacities.
However people flower, ripen and arise
in various phases of their experience on Earth. The various conditions
act merely as the pot and soil out of which the I AM flowers.
Bradford
...................................................................................................................................
From: Detlef
Hardorp
Date: Wed Mar 17, 2004 1:32 am
Subject: Peter Staudenmaier: How are the two concepts of race
related?
Dear Mr. Staudenmaier,
it seems like none of the others on this list are Blavatsky experts.
I have had books by Blavatsky, Sinett, Leadbeater and Besant
in my library for decades and have read them all years ago, but
I do not profess to be an expert in Blavatsky and Theosophical
thinking. I will gladly defer to you, as you have probably read
Blavatsky more recently.
You were able to answer my last question (namely where Blavatsky
speaks of the black, brown, red and yellow race. That was very
helpful. Before I continue my argument regarding Steiner (where
I do consider myself an expert), I want to be sure that it is
well founded regarding the relationship to Theosophy and Blavatsky's
thinking. This is why am I would politely like to ask you to
be so kind and to respond to my last question: were the "yellow
and red, brown and black" races ever "main races"
for Blavatsky? I could, of course, equally well ask: were the
"yellow and red, brown and black" races ever "root
races" for Blavatsky?
As you seem to have a thorough overview over Blavatsky's thoughts
on races, I am sure you will be able to help me here.
One further point: Even though this is an English speaking list,
since we are both of German origin I would like to ask you politely
to also employ the German custom of using last names when conversing
with me, which I have done consistently. Using first names with
people you have never met would generally be considered rude
in the German tradition. Thank you for respecting this in future!
Best regards, Detlef Hardorp
P.S.: This is not a crucial question, but I am still wondering
why Blavatsky puts "yellow and red, brown and black"
in quotation marks!
___________________________________________________________
Here is the post I am referring to again for easy reference (#3400):
Hello everybody,
I find the most recent mail by Peter Staudenmaier quite helpful.
He has read Blavatsky more recently than I had and was able to
answer my question: "Where does Blavatsky say anything about
the black, the yellow, the red, the white or the brown race?
How does her concept of race relate to the traditional concept?"
He writes, among other quotes: "Blavatsky describes how
a minority of Atlanteans evolved into Aryans and produced "the
Northern stocks", while the "yellow and red, brown
and black" are merely "the remnants of the Atlanteans",
produced when the "undeveloped tribes and families of the
Atlantean stock fell gradually into a still more abject and savage
condition." "
Here is the passage form Blavatsky in the original ( THE SECRET
DOCTRINE, Vol. 2, Page 743f - PS has an edition with different
page numbers!):
"You do not know which
was the best and most handsome generation of men which has ever
lived on this earth," said the priests of Sais to Solon,
according to Plato. "Only a weak seed of it, of which you
(Greeks) are the descendants, is all that remains." "Their
books," they added, "preserved the records of a great
nation, which emerging from the Atlantic sea had invaded Europe
and Asia (Timaeus). The Greeks were but the dwarfed and weak
remnant of that once glorious nation. . . ." What was this
nation? The secret doctrine teaches that it was the latest, seventh
sub-race of the Atlanteans, already swallowed up in one of the
early sub-races of the Aryan stock, one that had been gradually
spreading over the continent and islands of Europe, as soon as
they had begun to emerge from the seas. Descending from the high
plateaux of Asia, where the two Races had sought refuge in the
days of the agony of Atlantis, it had been slowly settling and
colonizing the freshly emerged lands. The emigrant sub-race had
rapidly increased and multiplied on that virgin soil; had divided
into many families, which in their turn divided into nations.
Egypt and Greece, the Phoenicians, and the Northern stocks, had
thus proceeded from that one sub-race. Thousands of years later,
other races -- the remnants of the Atlanteans -- "yellow
and red, brown and black," began to invade the new continent.
There were wars in which the new comers were defeated; and they
fled, some to Africa, others to remote countries. Some of these
lands became in course of time -- owing to new geological convulsions
-- islands. Being thus forcibly separated from the continents,
the result was that the undeveloped tribes and families of the
Atlantean stock fell gradually into a still more abject and savage
condition. Did not the Spaniards in the Cibola expeditions meet
with WHITE savage chiefs; and has not the presence of African
negro types in Europe in the pre-historic ages been now ascertained?
"Egypt and Greece, the Phoenicians,
and the Northern stocks" proceed from "the latest,
seventh sub-race of the Atlanteans, already swallowed up in one
of the early sub-races of the Aryan stock". "Thousands
of years later, other races -- the remnants of the Atlanteans
-- "yellow and red, brown and black," began to invade
the new continent." These fled to remote countries which
became islands. "Being thus forcibly separated from the
continents, the result was that the undeveloped tribes and families
of the Atlantean stock fell gradually into a still more abject
and savage condition." The latter seem to also include "WHITE
savage chiefs", if I read Blavatsky correctly.
It is all a bit convoluted. But it does show show that Blavatsky's
root races do have a biological component. I suppose this is
why she called them "races" to begin with. And she
calls them "root races" because they are the roots
to other offspring races.
This does, of course, not negate the fact that her 7 principal
root races were each assigned to consecutive time periods. The
Theosophist Sinett takes this up and intellectually systematises
the idea into a mechanical clockwork. With Blavatsky, it is still
somewhat chaotic.
I think we are probably in agreement thus far.
I had written some more paragraphs, going on to Steiner. I will
wait, however, before I post them, because I still would like
to get clear about one thing with Blavatsky. That is the following:
We
have seen that Blavatsky writes of the "yellow and red,
brown and black" races. (An aside: does anyone know why
she puts these in quotation marks?) We have also seen that she
speaks of root races. She speaks of the latter as "remnants
of the Atlanteans", which is the fourth root race according
to Blavatsky. We seem to all agree that, for Blavatsky, "main
race" and "root race" mean the same. The question
remaining is: were the "yellow and red, brown and black"
races ever "main races" for Blavatsky?
I will proceed with my train of thought when this question is
answered.
Best regards, Detlef Hardorp
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
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