December 19, 2003

Interesting Screed on Waldorf Schools / Theosophy

from RageBoy (hat tip Doc Searls) bq. The reason the author is important to our purposes in today's outing is that Steiner (pictured at the right) was also the founder of a little number called Anthroposophy, referred to in the right-panel (stage down-a-tad) text, which is taken from the official site of the Association of Waldorf Schools of North America, of which there are currently 800 internationally, with 150 in North America, and seven within a 30-mile radius of where I sit tonight typing this as a public service to an unsuspecting world. The question is (aside from an unnatural fondness for run-on sentences): Why? Well, because Rudolf Steiner -- whose notions about education, and much else, are revered and applauded here in Boulder, CO, Land of the Free -- was, in point of fact, a seriously deluded head case. Don't believe me? Read on... and more: bq. Well, it turns out that Rudy was a Theosophist until 1913 or thereabouts, when he got cheesed off at Annie Bessant, who had taken over for The Madame after she prematurely discorporated a decade short of fin-de-siècle (and several bricks shy of a load), and had, with the help of some other dude who was very likely gay as a pagan maypole, dug up this East Indian pretty-boy whom we would later come to know (those of us who did) as Krishnamurti. Krishnamurti was supposed to be the new messiah. They raised him to believe he was, anyway, and packed his head with some of the weirdest shit you can imagine (some taste of which I'm attempting to convey here). However, possibly third, when it came time for Krishnamurti to take over as Messiah, he threw the match, telling people, basically, don't follow leaders / watch your parking meters, and more basically, that he wasn't any messiah, didn't believe in em, and more basically still, that he wasn't having any. This tasteless display of independent thought cast Theosophy into quite the little dither, as you can imagine. The cheek! It's a hoot... Check the entire site - this guy does not post often but when he does is't good. Posted by DaveH at December 19, 2003 1:34 PM