The Global Test and Its Results Gopi Krishna Vijaya Regarding the first question: The essential meaning of the Christmas Conference impulse, as I take it, is the establishment of a truly incisive cultural endeavor that can also be a practically effective organization in the everyday human sense. This meant that the organization of the Anthroposophical Society had to be suitably humanized and made flexible in direct opposition to the bureaucratic or militaristic tendencies prevalent in a subconscious way in all present-day organizations. To the extent that this humanizing, flexible impulse is still alive in small groups across the world, the impulse still exists, even if it is outside the Society. As far as I know, this impulse is barely alive as an effective force in everyday life, even though that does not take anything away from its possible latent spiritual effectiveness in the background. Cultural activities are still too hesitant, and anthroposophists are constantly either blocking or getting carried away by the waves of popular culture.
Regarding the second question: These three years were a loud wake-up call, which asked the globe to come to terms with all the pent-up antisocial impulses present in all our organizations. The dearth of organizations that simply refused to be swept along by the events, at a minimum, is a testament to this. The test was something like this: Are you ready to take up the tasks of the consciousness-soul era? Are you courageous and yet non-dogmatic in keeping a clear head and heart among the waves of “emergency” fear and panic? Are you able to recognize that there are systems set up that are completely at odds with the real soul-needs of people and violate them by simply existing? Are you willing to recognize and face evil disguised as good and “healthy”? And most importantly: Are you able to offer something better to rebuild in this context and intervene productively in life? In the first place, those who recognized the evil inherent in introducing force and punishment into what should be free activities—as was done with isolation, constraints, masks, and vaccines—passed part of the test. They recognized the inherent value of separating culture from state and economic forces—an essential aspect of 26 • being human
threefolding. Those who recognized that both the sickness and the “treatments/cures” were destructive of health and were created in a military fashion by a small group of people, passed part of the test by not quailing before a possibility of real evil, and not cushioning these actions with the hypothesis of “it was probably a mistake” or “it was well-intentioned.” If they recognized this weaponization of health, then, whether they knew it in these terms or not, such people recognized the reality of evil. Those who were able to avoid the baits of paranoia through the sensationalist conspiracy theories and actual disturbing events released from the Pandora’s Box of the last three years, and yet were able to keep a cool enough head to recognize the existence of a real conspiracy of materialism behind the play of divisive forces in public life, passed a key part of the test, in the same way that Rudolf Steiner showed us how to do it in The Karma of Untruthfulness lectures. And, most of all, those who were able to recognize the need for true cosmopolitanism and avoided the temptation to seek the solution in the authority of nation-state (country) institutions or a powerful combination of nation-states (United Nations), passed a critical part of the test, especially if they were able to reach out and work together with people of other nationalities and temperaments on productively intervening in the situation. Such people might be the only ones who may have been awake all the way to the tasks of the time, whether they were aware of anthroposophy or not. Those who were not able to pass these stages inevitably failed to come to full grips with the situation; and in terms of numbers, even among those who saw themselves as “awake,” it was probably a small percentage of people who were actually clear-sighted enough to intervene productively. But in terms of quality, their contribution is vital and immense. Future iterations are inevitable, and to come to terms with these requires a preparation based on dealing with all such past tumultuous events properly. What was done for World War I through Rudolf Steiner’s lectures on The Karma of Untruthfulness must also be done for all subsequent major world events, such as World War II, the Ho-
