Nationalism / Decline of humanity

Someone who speaks of the ideal of race and nation and of tribal membership today is speaking of impulses which are part of the decline of humanity. If anyone now considers them to be progressive ideals to present to humanity, this is an untruth. Nothing is more designed to take humanity into its decline than the propagation of ideals of race, nation and blood. Nothing is more likely to prevent human progress than proclamations of national ideals belonging to earlier centuries […]. The true ideal must arise from what we find in the world of the spirit, not in the blood.

Source: Rudolf Steiner – GA 177 – THE FALL OF THE SPIRITS OF DARKNESS: 12. The Spirits of Light and the Spirits of Darkness – Dornach, 26 October 1917

See also: The most unchristian impulse

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Nationalism / Universal humanity

A passion, a violent eruption of nationalism has come upon humankind, and that is as damaging to the social life on earth as is materialism for the life of thinking. So, in the same way that humanity is to work itself out of materialism in order to reach freedom and life in the spirit, it must work itself out of all nationalism, in any form, towards universal humanity. Without that, there can be no progress.

Source (German): Rudolf Steiner – GA 191 – Soziales Verständnis aus geisteswissenschaftlicher Erkenntnis – Dornach, October 23, 1919 (page 191)

Translated by Nesta Carsten-Krüger

Previously posted on October 10, 2019

On Nationalism and Internationalism

Whereas we grow into our own nation because we are, so to speak, members of it, we learn to know other nations. They work on us indirectly through our knowledge of them, our understanding of them. We learn little by little to love them with understanding; and in proportion to our learning to love and to understand mankind in its different peoples in their various countries,  does our feeling grow for internationalism.

There are two absolutely distinct sources in human nature from which arise, respectively, nationalism and internationalism. Nationalism is the highest development of egoism. Internationalism is that which permeates us more and more, as we give ourselves to a wide understanding of human nature. 

Source: Rudolf Steiner – GA 332a – The Social Future: Lecture 6 –  Zurich, October 30, 1919

Translated by Henry B. Monges

See also: The most unchristian impulse

Previously posted on January 14, 2017

National ideals / Decline of humanity

Someone who speaks of the ideal of race and nation and of tribal membership today is speaking of impulses which are part of the decline of humanity. If anyone now considers them to be progressive ideals to present to humanity, this is an untruth. Nothing is more designed to take humanity into its decline than the propagation of ideals of race, nation and blood. Nothing is more likely to prevent human progress than proclamations of national ideals belonging to earlier centuries which continue to be preserved by the luciferic and ahrimanic powers. The true ideal must arise from what we find in the world of the spirit, not in the blood.

Source: Rudolf Steiner – GA 177 – Fall of the Spirits of Darkness: Lecture 12: The Spirits of Light and the Spirits of Darkness – Dornach, 26 October 1917

Translated by Anna R. Meuss

The most unchristian impulse

The most unchristian impulse of all took effect in the 19th century. The first impulse which came to the fore and gained an ever stronger hold of men’s minds and emotions, was that of nationalism. […]

The Christian impulse towards universal humanity was completely overshadowed by the principle of nationalism, because the new way to bring this element of universal humanity to its own had not been found. The anti-Christian impulse makes its appearance first and foremost in the form of nationalism. […]

We see a revolt against Christianity in the nationalism of the 19th century, which reached its apex in Woodrow Wilson’s phrase about the self-determination of nations, whereas the one and only reality befitting the present age would be to overcome nationalism, to eliminate it, and for men to be stirred by the impulse of the human universal. 

Source: Rudolf Steiner – GA 198 – The Festivals and Their Meaning – II – Easter – THE BLOOD-RELATIONSHIP AND THE CHRIST-RELATIONSHIP – Dornach, 3rd April 1920

Translated by D. S. Osmond, A. P. Shepherd & C. Davy

Previously posted on August 22, 2016