Diana wrote:

 

 

"I truly must be missing something, Daniel. He said nothing at all about their dying of disease! I understand you think that's what he *meant* but surely it is obvious even to you that to claim it's "exactly what Steiner said too" is preposterous."

 

 

I think that this actually is not obvious to Daniel, believe it or not. As far as I can tell, he really does think -- just like Detlef and Andrea et al. -- that his own inventive reading of the Steiner passage is what Steiner himself said. This is called an eisegetical interpretation: reading into the text content that is not there. One reason this approach seems sound to so many anthroposophists is that they believe their own personal understanding of Steiner's work as a whole sets the standard for all readings. Andrea, for example, writes:

 

 

"Anthroposophy is a" Symphony" and you can't discuss on and on only a single note or movement without a true knowledge of the whole!!"

 

 

Because Andrea mistakes himself for the conductor of the symphony, he thinks that his own perception of "the whole" determines what "true knowledge" is. Since anthroposophy as a whole simply cannot contain any jarring notes that do not fit onto Andrea's or Daniel's or Detlef's private copy of the score, it is a simple matter to declare that the false notes in Steiner's published works aren't really there in the first place. Such arguments are, in turn, remarkably persuasive with people who find something really weird about examining their own thought process. Thus does the auto-reinforcing cycle of anthroposophist misreadings of Steiner continue.

 

 

Peter