The Anthropology of Performance (IV)

(You can read it all in spanish at http://www.bramidointelectual.blogspot.com

Indeed, for Steiner, man has a determinant role in the economy of the universe. His position of interface between the visible and the invisible manifests itself in the 'Name'. Naming the creatures of Creation man lays a spiritual bridge that helps them to continue their spiritual development. [19] From this point of view, Steiner's Mystery-Dramas would illustrate a genuine 'qualitative performance' of cosmic language where the protagonists perform their inner world reality (thought, feeling and will) in its intrinsic rapport with a triple universe.
In relation to the ontological principle of the Word which rules all Steiner's work we must add that, besides being the description of the transition between an outdated form of initiation - related to mediumnism and the inferior levels of conscience - and a new one based on individual freedom, the Mystery-Dramas are entirely based on an artistic perspective of language where the physical aspect (gesture, sonority, rhythm, rime, etc) predominates over its intellectual content. [20] This is mostly evident in the case of eurhythmy ( a visible language).
In conclusion, according to the model of performance here enunciated which by manifesting the action of free man performs the temporalisation of space (time=psyche) the goal or destiny of man according to Steiner would be the performance of the language of universal reality. This implies the fact that cosmic reality is a language of macrocosmic proportions whose competence is integrated to human nature (Cf. 'cosmosophy').
It is in his condition of microcosm that free man performs his living experience of cosmic reality at the particular level of meaning determined by his individual intelligence. This total performance would execute the great transformation of the spatial-temporal limits of the universe (Cf. Rosicrucianism) inherent to the role of man as an universal interface. [20]
Then, the theme of this work partly concerns the vision of the world of Rudolf Steiner and the fundamental role played by art in his system of thought. A vision of history inasmuch as a dialectical process (thesis-antithesis-synthesis) between the inner world of man (through a process of self-awareness) and the measurable outer physical world of material reality, the object of experimental science. A dialectical process that condenses the whole of the human phenomenon.

The Anthropology of Performance (III)

From his side, Turner stated the same when he spoke of a 'social drama' performed by a Homo performans (the free individual performer of himself) inasmuch as a fundament of socio-cultural dynamics. [13] This conflictive, anti-establishment atittude of Turner (anti-fit, anti-congruence) perfectly agreed with the 'ethical individualism' of Steiner. The main difference between them being the frontier of the limits of knowledge.
According to Steiner, Western Culture had tended to establish 'Columns of Hercules' (Non Plus Ultra) to human knowledge. On one side, the frontier of thought (psychic inner world), on the other side the barrier of physical world ( the 'in itself' or essence of Kant). [14] Approached from Steiner's angle, Performance would concern a Homo performans who would face the limits of knowledge. [15] Then, this would determine two kinds of action: the one limited to the plane of inmediate and concrete material appearance which derives from ordinary language in its sole abstract and fonctional context; the other one expanded to the qualitative plane of ternary universal conscience (body, soul, spirit) whose ideal model would the (forgotten) art of speech as in Steiner's eurhythmy. [16] Between the one and the other would take place the free man who does or does not confront the limits of knowledge. In the first case that man must go over an 'initiatic path'.
According to Rudolf Steiner's evolutionist conception of history man would have evolved from inferior levels of conscience in relation to the holistic power of the image up to a state of rational conscience linked to the development of written language (the fragmentation of reality). The Myth of Osiris would describe this transition in the image of the death of Osiris (cut into pieces) at Biblos: the craddle of the Phoenician Alphabet. Furthermore, Hebrew prophetism would have contributed to that evolution in its opposition to politheism and ancient mantics (sybyllism, mediumnism, whichtcraft, devination, magic, astrology, etc).
Based on the principle of Goethe's metamorphosis, the 'Tragedy of Karma' would relate to an in extenso notion of language where we could distinguih two categories: the microcosmic, concerning human psyche and time; the macrocosmic referring to spirit and universal space. In its macrocosmic acception, Steiner distinguishes what he calls 'celestial writing', capable of being red by ancient initiates like the Three Kings (magi) of the Christian tradition. In some of his cycles of conferences such as the one concerning the Holly Grial Steiner develops the question of a cosmic christian ritual. [17]
Allways according to Steiner, man would be intrinsically united to the cosmic Whole body-soul-spirit. That is how the living or affective experience of the man conscient of his position in that Whole would naturally lead him toward the revelation of ternary reality. [18] The opposite approach, rationalist abstraction, would tend to separate man from universal nature to isolate him in the material rapports among the phenomena and to distance him from the balance that he must establish between the opposite poles of the cosmic reality.

The Anthropology of Performance (II)

According to Turner, the unbalance of the psychic life gave rise to the conflict, the dialectics between fixed norm -tradition and convention- and free individuality -the dynamics of the present- all of which he called 'Social Drama'. Out of this social drama interpreted by free man (Homo performans) were born the performative genres (ritual, carnival, literature, cinema, etc). From this perspective drama would be the origin of culture.
For Steiner, the balance of man's inner world meant his access to freedom. [9] But in freedom man trascended his inner demons which gave rise to tragedy. All of which implied the following: Would Steiner's access to freedom imply, from the philosophic-historical approach of Turner, the end of social drama and the regenerating process of culture?
The important for Turner was not the question of man's freedom but to approach the dynamics of the generating process of sense in the psychic chaos of individual thought, feeling and will. This social drama renewed culture but did not make man free. [10]
Freedom, Steiner's fundamental question, was the result of the balance, the harmony of the soul's inner world. According to him, this access to freedom led to a superior level of conscience: the universal culture whose reflection at the artistic level of human drama he called "the tragedy of karma". [11] The theme of this tragedy would be the learning process of the causes and the effects wich configured the cosmic trajectory or 'reincarnation' of the human soul. In conclusion, if for Turner the engine of culture was the existencial conflict of free individual in fight against the established order, for Steiner on the contrary the dynamics of history developed themselves at the cosmic scale and their dynamic principle was the Goethean notion of metamorphosis (evolution-involution). For Steiner this principle was hidden behind the enigma of reincarnation and molded the individual karma.
Recapitulating, the basis of our approach is the notion of Performance: the free individual capable of performing his inner world (thought, feeling and will) and expressing his own vision of the world which leads to a confrontation with conventional cultural norm (establishment). [12] For Turner, out of this conflict or social drama arises the process that regenerates the dynamics of culture. However, come to this point, it is necessary to precise the limits of knowledge which forcefully determine the limits of culture.
Regarding the opposition structure-fixed norm Vs. process-performance, which is the the axis of Turner's article, and going on with the development of the linguistic model competence-performance proposed by Noam Chomsky, it is necessary to precise that, according to Steiner's 'ethical individualism' each individual may know and have access to the highest universal reality. This reverts to say that free man carries in himself the total cosmic reality inasmuch as 'competence'.

The Anthropology of performance: a model to understand the work of Rudolf Steiner

(the numbers in brackets refer to footnotes)
All along the year 2000 I have tried to find a point of reference to approach the ensemble of the work of Rudolf Steiner. My first objective was to discern the rapport between this vast work and the Mystery Dramas. The impression left on me by the preliminary research (DEA) [1] was of coherence between the theory and the practice, the idea and the performance. But I had spent one whole year just to measure the limits of his work. I only had one more year scholarship to finish the Ph.D.
Drafting the first chapter on Steiner's cyclic notion of history I believed to have found the key that would permit me the panoramic vision of anthroposophy and its relation to art.
According to Steiner, men and history progress, evolve in a cyclic context. His metaphysical vision of man started in a sort of prehistoric state of grace in which man was united to the divinity and belonged to the unitary reality. For Steiner that state corresponded to what he called the Phase of the image which, in its integral nature, manifested the intelligence of the Unique reality. After this period of unity man would have separated from the divinity to develop language - the fragmentation of reality - and his own personal vision of the world.
The first phase was the one of the spirit who unifies the image, the integral vision of reality. The second period was the one of the matter, the language that shatters that unified vision. I became interested on this approach to human history. From this point of view, the Prospettiva of the Renaissance painters looked like an obvious natural extension of abstract thinking determined by language.
Prospettiva, as described by Victor Turner's citation of Jean Gebser, in his article "The Anthropology of Performance" (Zygon, 1987) would be the model that explained the deep nature of Western Civilisation: an impulsion toward the spacialisation of time.[2]
The ensemble of Western Civilisation and the nature's dominating scientific impulsion evoked on us the idea of a new Hybris [3] seeking to establish the autonomy of man before God and the powers of nature. All this was evident in that key epoch of European culture which is the Renaissance as in the posterior development of modern science since XVII century (from Giordano Bruno, Kepler and Galileo to Descartes, Kant and Newton).
The object of Steiner's work seemed to be to claim the primitive and original intimate impulse of human culture of all times: the temporalisation (humanization) of space, namely the progressively deeper knowledge of the inner world of the human soul.
The final goal of this impulse - symbolized in the original Rose-Cross - was a kind of a synthesis between the two poles of reality (body [nature] and mind) where the subjective became objective and real.
Inasmuch as a system, such a design should forcefully include progressive levels of meaning accessible through a coherent method. We found this progression in the first works of Rudolf Steiner: Goethe and his vision of the world, The Philosophy of Freedom and other works where this prolific author analyses Goethe's tale of The Green Snake and the Beautiful Lily.[4] This search of harmony between abstract thought and the spiritual mystery of nature would lead to a philosophy of nature in the first part of an iniciatic path.
Goethe's ideas, in particular his notions of entelechy and metamorphosis were for Steiner the basis of a new Weltanschauung (vision of the world) capable of surpassing so what he called the "truncated platonicism" (the question of dualism in the Republic, Book IV, the Myth of the Cavern) [5] the fundament of kantian dualism, as the nominalism which caracterised western culture's science. "Goetheanism" - the basis of anthroposophic thinking - was therefore a mean to understand the pole of nature.[6] Regarding the limit of knowledge it is in the Philosophy of Freedom that Steiner hoped to find the key to the resolution of the apory of the senses' independent thought.
Regarding Turner, his "metacultural" or philosophic-historical approach to the creating process of "sense" contained a series of universal elements wchich visibly contextualized Rudolf Steiner's Weltanschauung. Behind the Turnerian notions of Performance, Social Drama and Sense lied the same fundamental subject of Steiner: the opposition between the fixed rule and the science, on the one hand, and personal experience, the inner world of the soul (thinking, feeling and will) on the other hand. These dialectics between the subjective - the Performance - and the objective - the established rule - gave rise to the generating conflict of culture or Social Drama. Turner saw in the social drama the key to the generating process of sense which gives life and perenniality to culture (the performative genres). For Steiner, the harmony of the inner world of the soul trascended social and cultural conflicts inasmuch as a first step towards a superior level of culture or Iniciation.
In synthesis, if Turner talked about a Body, Brain and Culture, Steiner in turn spoke of body, soul and spirit.[7] If for Turner the core of the problem was the generating process of sense (crystallised mentality or Geist) [8] which regenerates culture, for Steiner the essential was the freedom of the soul and his access to a superior level of Sense.

The Anthropology of Performance - Introduction

I have decided to use tel quel the introduction of my thesis on the Mystery Dramas of Rudolf Steiner (Paris 8 Saint Denis, 2002, Summa Cum Laude) which is a brief synthesis of Victor Turner's article The Anthropology of Performance. In my thesis on Steiner's dramatic art, contextualized in the frame of his universal vision of the world and the art, this introduction at the expense of the brilliant work of Turner provided me with the bridge I needed to get a close-up of the vast work of Steiner starting from the notion of 'Performance'.
The essence behind Turner's work is the universality of human thought. The universality of the Nous, the human reason that makes each human being an individual, independent intelligence. All individual intelligence has access to the highest reality or truth. By virtue of the nature of the human thought. This is the principle behind the idea of the 'Social Drama'. It is because of this universality that we now take his work as the starting point of our conception of the world whose motto is: 'the real history of man only exists from man himself inasmuch as an evolving rational animal'. Because, before having access to the highest truths it is necessary to untie the Gordian Knot of the animal instinct and the 'mythical thought'.
This sudden awareness transforms the animality of the rational being into a song that comes to be a part of the universal concert. Our humble work is therefore placed under the sign of the 'Socratic Method' (Irony and Mayeutic). To humiliate man to force him admit his more than evident animal nature with the purpose of helping him to give birth to the 'Mother Idea' of the human Culture. From that evolving Purgatory which hides, metamorphosed in deep brain tissue, under the weight of his proud intellect, a creator both of progress as of destruction.

The Idea behind Bellow of the intellect song of the instinct: a poem

Madre...
Asciendo por la altiva Torre de Babel de mi intelecto
Y cada paso que doy me aleja me embriaga y me sofoca
Me corta del más bello placer
De la risa ingenua de tu boca.
Edipo soy huyendo de Corinto
Recreando el mundo lejos de mi instinto
Creo crear con mi pensamiento
Pero ladro aúllo y bramo de contento.
Triste parádoja de mi ser humano
Que se cree una estrella en el firmamento
Cuando es la feróz comadreja la que me brinda mi sustento.
Por eso clamo: instinto, alma, sentimiento...
¿Donde estás noble animal, donde buscarte?
Ingenua obra de arte del Logos infinito,
Sálvame, oh Madre, del feróz estandarte
de mi ser finito.

End of the Resumé

The cosmosophy of Rudolf Steiner is a sort of blueprint of what should be the "Universal Culture" also outlined by Goethe. The work of Steiner is a total commitment to join the two sides of a river. The universe is the last adventure of man, and viceversa (microcosm and macrocosm); 'durable thoughts'; 'free imaginations' and cycles of history; christianity as a cosmic ritual; the inner living experience of the universe; the importance of the notion of karma.
But the universal culture dreamed by Nietzsche and imagined and outlined by Goethe and Steiner may not be possible without the harmony between instinct and intellect. The following are important steps in the process which leads to 'Culture': Delphi and Eleusis; the Socrates Musician of Nietzsche; the sacrifice of intellectuality; Goethe's tale of the Green Snake and the Beautiful Lily; Mythos-Logos.
The universal culture of the third Millennium arises from the synthesis between instinct and intellect which is the essential meaning of Mary in its natural attribute of Mother Goddess of humanity. The anthropology of our times must first start studying man from the zero degree of science: the real nature of the human soul.

End of the synopsis

The importance of the cultural proposal of Rudolf Steiner (cosmosophy, goetheanism, etc.,) goes beyond any prejudice or cultural convention.
The highway to a Universal Culture is already traced since Delphi and Eleusis and declines the harmony between instinct and intellect.
Beyond the appearances, the real aristocracy of man lies in its soul. The nature of the human soul is the first letter of the human alphabet.

Resumé.
There exists a rational intelligence. But there also exists an intelligence of the soul deeply related to the subconscient and the instinct. Man may harmonise reason and instinct renewing personal communication with active feelings deeply rooted in his subconscient. The most powerful sentiment of this kind concerns his filial relationship with Mother Earth. This instinctive feeling took man out from the caverns to a nomad life to finally settle him in the first urban centers in the dawn of civilisation.
Contemporary man is called to perform history counterclockwise: from his inner world toward the threshold of the Universal Culture which is open in certain myths concerning the soul and the Universal Eternal (Divine) Feminine.
Victor Turner provides us with the theoretical frame that fits perfectly in with our universalist vision of the world. Performance and the 'creating process of sense' (Body, Brain and Culture), according to Turner.

Suite of the outline.

Third the harmony between instinct and intellect:
3) A-. Apollon and Dyonysos at Delphi. B-. The Origin of Tragedy. C-. Troy, Iphigeny and the sacrifice of intellectuality. D-. Goethe's tale of the Green Snake and the beautiful lily. E-. Mythos - Logos.

Fourth the universal Culture of the third millennium:
4) A-. History has not yet begun. B-. The Aristocracy of the Soul. C-. The secret of the invisibility of the astral body: How I rediscovered the zero degree of science.

Synopsis.
Maternal instinct is one of the most powerful in the human subconscient. Since the night of times that feeling has inspired the best of human civilization because it has promoted the harmony between instinct and reason. Performance, and the dialectics between opposite poles are two basic concepts of this courant de pensée.

What is Bellow of the intellect, song of the instinct? The answer is: a vision of the world, a weltanschauung. A particular prism to join the fragments of the shattered reality of man.
A prism inspired by certain aspects of the work of Paracelse, Schiller, Nietzsche, Goethe, Ortega, Rudolf Steiner and Victor Turner, among others. A crystal that humbly pretends to be a theory of human history.

Here is the outline. First our theoretical hardcore:
1) A-. The counterclockwise direction of history: Mary as the genuine Mother Goddess of humanity. B-. The Anthropology of Performance (V. Turner). C-. Body, Brain and Culture (Turner) or the harmony between instinct and intellect.

Second the cosmosophy and weltanschauung of Rudolf Steiner:
2) A-. Is it necessary to be a rebel to understand the world? B-. The cyclic notion of history of Rudolf Steiner. C-. Goethe and the Knight Templars. D-. Kepler and his three astronomic laws. E-. The spiritual communion of mankind. -. The East in the light of the West.

Bellow of the intellect, song of the instinct

[You may also read this work in spanish at: http://www.bramidointelectual.blogspot.com

Foreword.

The purpose of this work is to denounce the destructive nature of scientific, rationalist thought which pretends to analize and define reality from the strict point of view of mathemathics. Reality is something more complex than a mathematical model. Man is the confluence of two dimensions: material and suprasensible, visible and invisible. Man is a complex creature capable of abstract thinking. But man is also an animal, an elementary being belonging to the cosmos and the kingdoms of nature. If modern urban consumer society is going to survive to the terrible consequences of extreme individualism then she is forced to take the path of compromise with instinctive wisdom.
My approach is schematic and my atittude pasionnée. Because I am convinced that behind this simple scheme lies human history's divine plan. Between this scheme that I paint (with such a few colors of my own) thanks to the loan of extraordinary writers - pieces of the puzzle of the cosmic destiny of man - and the ordinary person that likes to save ideas and words, the result is bound to be Spartan, to say the less. Lucky for me that - using the linguistic dichotomy of Ferdinand de Saussure signifiant-signifié - I am standing on human sense itself. The idea overcomes the imperfection of a poor vehicle. I could even say that the Idea which is the main impulsion of this work is self-sufficient and expresses alone. That is why I conceive a complete success in the diffussion of this message. The image that arises out of this pot-pourri of theories, citations and poetry belongs to what Rudolf Steiner has called "the spirit of our times".
An academic historian would define this work as naïf and superficial. A realistic approach of human history is bound to look naïf and even childish to the parched landscape of the academic elite's intellectuallism.
The spirit of our times is trying to say something to man, everywhere, anytime. But the urban consumer is blind and deaf to the elemental message of creative sense that hides behind everyday beauty. Because he is too busy taking care of his image before the demanding stare of his entourage and the mermaid's song of globalised consumer society. The spirit of our times is only heard by certain children and poets. Because his language is that one of the beauty of such simple and divine things as a luminous drop of water, the ineffable grace of a fast ant, the masterwork of a leaf, of a flower, of a rainbow. The spirit of our time wants man to perform that (secret) wish that he carries in the bottom of his heart. A wish veiled and forbidden by the tyranny of logic. That wish is to kiss one's mother in the cheeks, to solidly hug the Great Mother of all mothers, the Mother Earth,to form with her, during an eternal instant, a same being.