Three Evils and Dark Dialectics

Rudolph Steiner's malevolent trinity offers us a way to isolate and confront the reality of evil, both in the world and within ourselves.

Recall the three confrontations: change, evil, and death. We shall linger on the second, for it will surely linger on us.

The first appeared as a raven-haired succubus, blades for eyeteeth, and hips on a swivel.
The next appeared as an undead soldier standing at attention.
The final appeared as a wraith with an angry torch and zeroes for eyes.

Evil exists, and one can become more attuned to it, whether in classification or intensity. As with the other confrontations, she must begin in equipoise. Otherwise, she risks being swallowed up. Attunement is as much about recognizing evil in others as in oneself. Our capacity for cruelty, indifference, and exploitation is part of our species’ nature, which means it is part of your nature and mine.

Thoughts and words steeped in malevolent secrets will eventually spawn misdeeds. We must take a few steps into the Shadow to reveal the hidden source of such secrets, though that process can arouse unexpected resistance. It is unflattering, if not frightening, to recognize in oneself everything she hopes to avoid in others.

Yet from the grounded awareness of equipoise, we can become more attuned to our darker impulses. And we ought to become so attuned, for these linger as magma building pressure beneath the surface. Explore the Shadow as a physician would an abscess, a priest would a confession, or an explorer would a cave.

Then hold three simultaneous truths:

1. Evil lives within me;

2. I can respond in wisdom instead of anger, fear, or disgust.

3. I can face it all with centeredness and courage, and it will not consume me.

By accepting that we are born with both Light and Shadow—capable of creation and destruction, unbound freedom and rigid order—we integrate within the fullness of being. Integration provides the stability to face evil without letting it consume us.

Now let us identify evil beyond mere abstraction, in three embodied forms.

Luciferic

Luciferic Evil is characterized by its rebellious, anti-authoritarian nature, exemplified by an angel who defied God. It represents evil driven by wantonness, unchecked desire, or the rejection of order. This form of evil can be seductive, as it is associated with pursuing pleasure, risk, and adventure—none of which are evils per se. Evil lies in their dangerous admixture, whether one descends into decadence or lets consequences be damned.

Can she indulge without indulging to excess?
He succeeded, but was someone innocent harmed in the process?
What is the difference between sleeping with your spouse and your sibling’s spouse?

In experiencing the Tiers of Joy, we must remain attuned to differences of degree and kind, as good things taken too far become evil.

Ahrimanic

Ahrimanic Evil, by contrast, is not about decadence but control. Named after Ahriman, the Zoroastrian spirit that opposes the divine, this evil grows out of a desire for order but brings about oppressive, even totalitarian circumstances.

Can we manipulate the masses with propaganda?
How shall we use violence to gain power?
How can we exploit vulnerable populations for profit?

Ahrimanic evil also tends to invert values. Practitioners treat vices as virtues and promote lies as truths, as long as doing so gives one control. Only in politics could the following be considered a list of virtues:

1. Violence—Initiate harm, through violence, theft

2. Corruption—Dishonor commitments, self-deal

3. Callousness—Show cruelty or indifference to suffering

4. Monomania—Adhere zealously to The One True Way

5. Negligence—Fail to care for one’s property or offices

6. Casuistry—Apply fallacy or deceptive reasoning

And these are the vicious mirrors (inversions) of:

1. Nonviolence — Initiate no harm or threat

2. Integrity — Be true to self, others; honor your word

3. Compassion — Discover suffering, help relieve it

4. Pluralism — Respect differences, seek understanding

5. Stewardship — Leave property or offices better off

6. Rationality — Think critically in pursuit of truth

The list of vices is not, of course, exclusive to Ahrimanic evil. One needs only learn the objectives of its practitioners.

Ahrimanic evil practitioners treat people as parts in a machine or instruments of some greater good, so these systems are marked by soullessness and despair. As this evil seeks to replace freedom with control, the powerful sit atop rigid hierarchies in which everyone is formally systematized, top to bottom.

Where Luciferic Evil risks chaos or decadence, Ahrimanic Evil risks stifling the spirit.

Sorathic

Sorathic Evil is the purest form of evil. Driven by states such as fear, resentment, and hatred, Sorathic Evil seeks neither freedom nor order. Sorath, a demon from the Book of Revelation, seeks to annihilate all creation. The demon embodies a profound nihilism expressed as a desire to extinguish everything. Thus, Sorathic Evil takes Thanatos Masculine to deadly extremes.

Can we set the people against each other?
Shall I detonate a dirty bomb?
Can I engineer and release a deadly virus?

In other words, Sorathic Evil aims to destroy the risky delights sought by Luciferic practitioners and annihilate the oppressive order sought by Ahrimanic practitioners. Sorath initially fragments the world in fear, victimization, and resentment. But as these forces are unleashed, the factions turn on each other in an escalating cycle of reprisals. Some view Sorathic Evil as the ultimate evil for this reason, because hatred of the other conscripts all sides into obliterating one another, and ideally, all existence.

Rudolf Steiner, credited with this threefold typology, takes liberties in adapting the traditions from which he draws. It is perhaps unfair to Zarathustra that Ahriman represents a hierarchical society, as Zoroastrians understand Ahriman as an entity more like Sorath. Indeed, Ahriman represents destruction and dissolution, which oppose life’s creative energies and the generative forces associated with Ahura Mazda. Yet Steiner’s trinity of evil is useful even as it takes some liberties, with all respect to Zarathustra.

Dark Dialectics

A tension exists between Luciferic and Ahrimanic evils. Certain ideologues love this tension because they can exploit it, calling the others evil and themselves good. If Luciferians want more freedom and Ahrimanics want more order, their drift into ideological zeal can obscure the reality that freedom and order are mutually constraining—and good will be found in the balance.

But the blood moon rises when Luciferic and Ahrimanic evils become locked in conflict. Greedy Luciferians seeking paper profits encounter Ahrimanic functionaries ready to impose order. Initially, their encounter is oppositional, but eventually they discover the benefits of collusion. Lucifer’s lucre finds Ahriman’s authority.

All that’s left is to ask who wins and who loses.

The colluders win, of course, and society pays. Luciferians find that legislatures are auction houses. Wealth concentrates among the powerful and power concentrates among the wealthy in a grotesque orgy. A perverse, corporatist order is ascendant. The rest of society—taxed, controlled, indebted, and immiserated—grows resentful. Resentment turns to hatred. Hatred inspires violence. Violence escalates, only now the conflict is between the people and the elites.

Sorath laughs.

Today, Luciferic Evil sits at Sorath’s left hand, and Ahrimanic Evil sits at his right. Until Sorathic Evil finds the means to extinguish us all for good, he will let the other two rut in that unholy bed while resentful hordes tear through cities with angry torches and zeroes for eyes.