Devil of the community

the original version tu be found at: andresius.pise.cz/25-spolecnost-a-jeji-demoni.html

Every decent religion has its own devil.  Anthroposophy has been rather scraping the bottom of the barrel in this respect, which is self-evident: A worldview which is that complicated and based upon "multisource” ancient wisdom can explain more of that which seems to other religious views unexplainable and can absorb into its picture of world a lot of things, which other religions may perceive as disturbing or evil. It is rather simple: For every sage or esoteric there is always more wisdom in the world than evil. But closest to the classical religious demonology may be the anthroposophic teaching about so called double-gangers: They are two characters, or half-independent beings, who accompany everyone, being something like two halves of his shade – one of the lucid, the other dark. It is an ingenious teaching; however to somebody it may look a bit strange that someone's lucid shape could be noisome to its bearer. It is a doctrine which has been deeply many times elaborated, so I am not going to explain basic principles thereof here. As a response to the objection it can be told that without the bright virtue of dr Jekyll there would be no nasty Mr.Hyde; if you eliminate one extreme of your personality, the other one necessarily emerges. It has been written much about that how to recognise these characters, how to get into dialogue with them and bring them eventually in integrity and master them. Notwithstanding that, they can only partially answer to our quest of the devil in anthroposophy. Not that they weren't enough spiritual: Steiner gave them names of an angel and a god – both of Persian origin. The dark wraith was called by him Ahriman and the lucid double a little more intelligibly for the European context as Lucifer. But the problem is that neither of these two is really independent nor bad enough, because they are after all still but a part of our selves.  Another problem is their connectedness to an individual fate of a human. Is it so then, that there are only some "private imps” in anthroposophy and no real devil? This is an interesting question. And since there is no binding doctrine of faith in the Christian Community, also answers to in will differ considerably. I'll try a hypothesis of my own. Let's assume that there really are certain beings, who can bear the names of Lucifer and Ahriman and that they may influence mankind as a whole and consequently every singular person too. Even avoiding details, of which the history of religions is abundant, there can be stated there activity of particular of two characters, of which one bears the features of a "seducer” and the other of an "adversary” or "violent enemy can be proved in many holy texts, which have nothing in common with the Iranian religion.

But if such characters exist and their efficacy spreads over the whole world, nobody being protected from them and all humans are susceptible to be enchanted and subdued by them, I do not see any reason why shouldn't they act upon large bodies of humans too, and why their influence couldn't be visible in the society and demonstrate itself in specific social phenomena.

Here I must take one step back and describe briefly how – according to anthroposophy - the influence of these wraiths (or individual double-gangers) manifests in an individual. A person who is under the influence of an Ahimaniac delusion will see the world black. He or she will take for granted that the world is bad and the conditions even worse, that you must protect and defend yourself against it in every respect, that you must struggle for every piece of meal, living, wealth or fame against everybody under the stars. He will also mirror this attitude of his towards the world in his own personality seeming to the others close, rough, selfish or downright aggressive. On the other hand, someone who stands under influence of Lucipherian powers will seem to himself very good and beautiful. While the first one believes, that he must take from the world his due part by force, this one will assume that the world owes him his due respect for his own beauty and kindness.  Everyone must fit somehow to so "harmonic” view of the world, too, and if they don't, if they are "problematic”, he/she will ignore them entirely and wipe them out of his/her consciousness. He/she will smile at everyone and everything will be simply "nice”.

So far a rough description of working of these forces upon an individual. Having said that, we won't have much problem to discover a significant influence of either of the principles on people within this or that social group. An example: Hard rock, or right extremism on one hand, and new-age psychotherapy, or even mainstream modern pedagogic on the other. But couldn't be found even more general features of the whole community, were their influence would be prominent? The question hides the solution in itself.  Community is what people consider as common and general. (Attention: They are always people of a certain period, which means that even their general and common must depend on the overall development of human mind with all forms thereof – and are thus variable.) So how do we in modern times imagine the common social arrangement? There are various political theories concerning this subject, but two of them have been within several last decades extensively implemented in large parts of Europe and World, which gives us a singular opportunity of comparison.

What we had here, in the Eastern part of Europe some twenty and more years ago was officially named socialism, but everyone called it communism, and not without reason. The latter word put well though the tendencies of that arrangement: Even as such communism was presented to be the final goal, to which the community should bear. Every moral ideal of such kind must necessarily manifest and implement itself in the real social arrangement. How, what are its prerequisites? First – "historical optimism”. A perfect society can be forged, moreover, even the evolution itself streams towards it (so we don't have to put much effort in achieving it?); all people are good in their substance (if we do in the bad ones); if they commit dishonest, anti-social acts, it is on account for the influence of the environment and/or education or anything else, and if we all unite and nobody goes on marring our efforts, we well be altogether happy. Is this not an impeccable picture of lucipherian delusion? Everything is nice and good, there is no need to put much efforts to achieve anything; the evolution will bring it with itself; but who doesn't feel that sacred bond of unity with us, has no place here, we aren't going to nourish or even tolerate him/her!

Older than communism (which is however quite old, too, its beginnings were somewhere round 1848) is the theory of liberalism. Adam Smith laid its foundations already in the 18-th Century and since then it has seen mighty increment and in many countries of the world it has become the most powerful force shaping the development of society. Its theory presumes that all people are (more or less) bad, that they act solely according to selfish motives and follow selfish purposes. Smith writes in his book: "It is not the modesty of a butcher, brewer or baker, to which we owe our midday meal, but we owe it to their regard to their own profit. We do not rely on their humanity, but on their self-regard and we do not put stress on our needs but on their advantage ensuing from it. (Smith A. 1910).

It seems likely that Smith himself, however viewing the society in this negative, black hue hoped rightly in the spirit of the Age of Enlightment that this innate human malignity can be used to the global profit of the whole society provided proper institutions are set to play which enable and guarantee its inner balance, i. e. that the "devil” can be tamed and set to work, and that he himself never ceased to aim at the community at whole. Practical application of his theory is much less scrupulous. "The invisible hand” which governs the market is exalted to a godlike standard. (But if a deity it is, it is a blind one, similarly as Roman Fortuna was blind. And if you deal with a kind of blind deity, there always remains a problem how to safeguard that such a splendid Fortune doesn't after some time transmute to an equally blindly devouring power of the giant Polypheme). So if we should any social trend label with the name of Ahriman it will be surely this one.

Our society cherishes now entire freedom and this is a great advantage. It warrants us than neither of the two tendencies will definitively prevail. Even a ferociously liberal establishment cannot restrain individuals from behaving not according the law of maximal profit (even if that is on his/her own expense and sometimes dearly paid) but steering one's behaviour according to other principles. We can thus make the conclusion that insofar the society inclines to the liberalistic delusion, assuming that human is a wicked creature and needs chastising, that all people are selfish, insomuch exercises its rule over it Ahriman; and insomuch it is generally accepted that everything can be managed and directed towards universal satisfaction – at the best without any considerable effort needed, and there is practically no need to work at all and that somebody will arrange it for us (this "somebody” may represent various thing: the state, god's will, the Party or even Big Brother) – insomuch it is in sway of Lucifer.

What one should do facing these two basic errors? Mainly one thing: Keep calm and retain a considerate, sensible and wise view of the world, which is on one side a beautiful work of God, further developed by the humans, but has also a lot of sore points. Why – for instance- nobody wants to see homeless people, as if they didn't exist at all? But terrifying is, how many people rashly and headlong cast themselves to the arms of one or the other ideology that it may seem that they comprise the major part of the community. Media certainly have their share in this business, because people trust now more to them than to their own eyes, which of course could tell them quite precisely, what is real and right. That is also a certain kind of Lucipherian error, when one wants to "enhance his or her capacities” somewhat, to be able to see further and "be there”, to know everything entirely and to the point. Do you wish this, man? Media will grant it to you. The price is just that you exchange your eyes for theirs. And people who do this do not contribute to the society's general capacity of knowledge any more; they are – in this respect – its burden. If they are many, society suffers from them like from some disease. If we consider now the fact that a vast bulk of people votes exactly for the two large parties which may be identified as vehicles for these principles and that the political life of the society has been to large extent overruled by them and is so controlled by this pair of ideologies, it is certainly a reason for concern. Maybe, knowledge of these "devils” of ourselves and of their influence upon the society in whole can help to regain some common sense and a clearer view of the life of the community.