I should make a list of all the instances where steiner talks about this and present it to Wouter
We must therefore take our stand on the principle of following attentively what is brought forward, but not allowing it to be said that it is accepted among us out of belief in authority.
Never should the phrase be heard that truths are accepted simply because I have voiced them!
We should sin against the truth were we to say any such thing.
One thing or another may be grounded on confidence; but that can never be made into a principle. Someone else may perhaps be better able to tread the path; but the rule to which every individual should adhere is this: not to accept things on authority, but to put them to the test.
It is by testing that confirmation will be found. Whenever the word “confidence” has been used among us it has been a danger signal; it has been a sign that we have entered a period when dangers threaten us. The attitude hitherto prevailing among us must cease, for Spiritual Science is grounded, not upon authority, but upon knowledge. The time for being easy-going about presenting Spiritual Science is over. Enemies will be on the look-out everywhere and we shall have much to combat; we shall have to make ourselves equal to the battle, and whenever confused minds feel compelled to throw themselves into the combat this will make it especially possible for the forces working against our spiritual-scientific Movement to develop.
These things must be regarded as resulting from the nature of the subject itself. We shall have to resolve to take account of all of them. For Movements with a particular bias find acceptance and adherents simply because there are always groups of human beings here and there whose interests are suited by one-sidedness. Humanity consists, does it not, of groups of human beings. If, now, an occultist attaches himself to a group, he finds it a means of support, he has a foothold from which he can start, because this group helps him. Therefore everyone who starts from a one-sided, biassed outlook may expect some measure of agreement and good-will. But he who starts from truth itself has, to begin with, all humanity against him. Truth has to conquer its domain with complete disinterestedness. That is why, at bottom, nothing is more hated than the truth, the unvarnished truth. And so there may be many adherents here and there who actually cherish hatred deep down within them. No wonder that this hatred sometimes cuts through the force that builds a wall against it — cuts through this force because the hatred has been accumulating for so long. Such hatred is far more widespread than is imagined and it is a factor that must be reckoned with. Wherever truth is trying to assert itself endeavours are made to transform and re-cast it in such a way that it can somehow serve the opposing Powers. And various endeavours cropping up among us at the present time must be regarded as an effort to distort truth as presented here and apply it in a different sense. The craftiest way of doing this is to declare: the teaching itself is good, the teacher—worthless. The teaching is stolen from the teacher and efforts are made to apply it to some other aims. — What Lucifer and Ahriman would love to do is to be able to take the wisdom of the Gods lock, stock and barrel and transfer it to the Eighth Sphere.
Endeavours such as those I have mentioned are directed to changing a Society in which freedom can prevail into a Society of slaves. That is the method which can serve Ahriman, for he sets out to make such activities useful to himself. — That is the more esoteric side of the matter, which we must now also consider with the necessary earnestness from the exoteric aspect—in the other dialect.
I would beg you not to lose sight of the fact that we are standing at a crucial point in the development of our Spiritual Science.
http://wn.rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA254/English/RSP1973/19151018p01.html
Qilin Egostasie 