Spiritual Science Digital Library

Anthroposophy (Wisdom of Man)

This website dedicated to the dissemination of spiritual truth crucial to our current age^*. It is based primarily on the works of Rudolf Steiner, a man who left an indelible mark on humanity, not the least of which is knowledge of the spiritual realms that our age is now due to become acquainted with as much as we choose to involve our efforts and energies.

The term Spiritual Science describes the method through which Rudolf Steiner (and others since his time) acquired the knowledge presented here. The term most commonly used for the "movement" behind the learning and dissemination of this spiritual knowledge is Anthroposophy. Rudolf Steiner, regarding this spiritual research, maintained that every human being (Anthropos) has the inherent wisdom (Sophia) to solve the riddles of existence and therefore transform ourselves as individualities by taking into our souls this knowledge that reconnects us with our spiritual roots. By doing so, we also change our society and build the future that was meant for humanity.

"Anthroposophy is a spiritual philosophy and spiritual science that speaks to the deep questions of humanity, to our basic needs and the need to develop a relation to the world in complete freedom. It strives to develop not only natural scientific, but also spiritual scientific research and to bridge the divisions between the sciences, the arts and the spiritual strivings of man as the three main areas of human culture.

"Anthroposophy is also an impulse movement to nurture and honour the life of the soul in the individual and in society and is active in the world as applied or practical anthroposophy in various initiatives such as: Waldorf education, Biodynamic farming, Medicine, Curative education Eurythmy, The Christian Community, Architecture, etc.

"The term 'anthroposophy' predates Rudolf Steiner. The word ‘anthroposophy’ comes from the Greek (anthropos meaning 'human' and sophia meaning 'wisdom'). It can also be translated as ‘wisdom of the human being’ or understood as 'consciousness of one's humanity'.

Anthroposophy is a spiritual philosophy; not a religion. It is a pathway to developing a conscious awareness of one's humanity. It recognizes the inherent 'wisdom of the human being' to support a lifelong quest for spiritual self-development."

Source: Sydney Rudolf Steiner College

If you are new to Anthroposophy, we might suggest our 'Start Here' page. If you are curious about the man Rudolf Steiner, you can read about him and his contributions to humanity on his bio page.

If you would like a comprehensive overview of Spiritual Science, we highly recommend the work of Urs Schwanderner, available in the following:

• Fundamentals of Spiritual Science
• The Supersensible World

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"Anthroposophy is a path of cognition, to guide the spiritual in the human being to the spiritual in the universe. It arises in people as a need of the heart and feeling life. Anthroposophy can be justified only to the degree that it satisfies this inner need. It may be acknowledged only by those who find within it what they themselves feel the need to seek. Therefore, Anthroposophists are those who experience, as an essential need of life, certain questions on the nature of the human being and the universe, just as one experiences hunger and thirst."

Rudolf Steiner, Anthroposophical Leading Thoughts, 1924

Often when the difficulty and incomprehensibility of anthroposophy is spoken of, it is not because the understanding itself is so difficult, but because the modern world of thought feels alienated by what is said by the anthroposophists. And then the listeners or readers don’t say that these things are unusual for them, but they simply say: we don’t understand this. Not pre-education, but open-mindedness is what is often lacking in this respect. For anthroposophy says nothing that is not in fact deeply inscribed in every human soul. And to bring that out, it is not scholarship that is needed, but goodwill above all.

Source: GA 34 (German)

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A Note on the Term "Theosophy"

At first glance the use of the term "theosophy" as it might appear in the material on this site may be somewhat misleading for the English reader. It may suggest to him associations with Anglo-Indian Theosophy and the Theosophical Society founded by H. P. Blavatsky.

Rudolf Steiner, however, uses the term independently and with different and much wider connotation. In earlier centuries, particularly in Central Europe, "Theosophy" was a recognised section of Philosophy and even of Theology. Jacob Boehme was known as the great "theosopher". In English the term goes back to the seventeenth century.

Ultimately it leads us back to St. Paul who says (I Cor. ii, 6-7): "Howbeit we speak wisdom among them that are perfect: yet not the wisdom of this world ... But we speak the wisdom of God (Greek 'Theosophia') in a mystery, even the hidden wisdom which God ordained before the world unto our glory."

All "theosophy" implies a knowledge of the spiritual world, and such knowledge has been attained in different ways at different epochs of man's history.

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Rudolf Steiner

Rudolf Steiner (Feb. 27, 1861-Mar. 30, 1925) was born in the small village of Kraljevec, Austria (now in Croatia) in 1861 and died in Dornach, Switzerland in 1925. In university, he concentrated on mathematics, physics, and chemistry. Having written his thesis on philosophy, Steiner earned his doctorate and was later drawn into literary and scholarly circles and participated in the rich social and political life of Vienna.

During the 1890s, Steiner worked for seven years in Weimar at the Goethe archive, where he edited Goethe's scientific works and collaborated in a complete edition of Schopenhauer's work. Weimar was a center of European culture at the time, which allowed Steiner to meet many prominent artists and cultural figures. In 1894 Steiner published his first important work, Intuitive Thinking as a Spiritual Path: A Philosophy of Freedom, now published as one of the Classics in Anthroposophy.

When Steiner left Weimar, he went to Berlin where he edited an avant-garde literary magazine. Again he involved himself in the rich, rapidly changing culture of a city that had become the focus of many radical groups and movements. Steiner gave courses on history and natural science and offered practical training in public speaking. He refused to adhere to the particular ideology of any political group, which did not endear him to the many activists then in Berlin.

In 1899, Steiner's life quickly began to change. His autobiography provides a personal glimpse of his inner struggles, which matured into an important turning point. In the August 28, 1899 issue of his magazine, Steiner published the article "Goethe's Secret Revelation" on the esoteric nature of Goethe's fairy tale, The Green Snake and the Beautiful Lily. Consequently, Steiner was invited to speak to a gathering of Theosophists. This was his first opportunity to act on a decision to speak openly and directly of his spiritual perception, which had quietly matured since childhood through inner development and discipline. Steiner began to speak regularly to theosophical groups, which upset and confused many of his friends. The respectable, if often radical scholar, historian, scientist, writer, and philosopher began to emerge as an "occultist." Steiner's decision to speak directly from his own spiritual research did not reflect any desire to become a spiritual teacher, feed curiosity, or to revive some ancient wisdom. It arose from his perception of what is needed for our time.

Rudolf Steiner considered it his task to survey the spiritual realities at work within the realms of nature and throughout the universe. He explored the inner nature of the human soul and spirit and their potential for further development; he developed new methods of meditation; he investigated the experiences of human souls before birth and after death; he looked back into the spiritual history and evolution of humanity and Earth; he made detailed studies of reincarnation and karma. After several years, Rudolf Steiner became increasingly active in the arts. It is significant that he saw the arts as crucial for translating spiritual science into social and cultural innovation. Today we have seen what happens when natural science bypasses the human heart and translates knowledge into technology without grace, beauty, or compassion.

In 1913, the construction of the Goetheanum in Dornach, Switzerland began. This extraordinary wooden building took shape gradually during the First World War. An international group of volunteers collaborated with local builders and artisans to shape the unique carved forms and structures designed by Steiner. Steiner viewed architecture as a servant of human life, and he designed the Goetheanum to support the work of anthroposophy drama and eurythmy in particular. The Goetheanum was burned to the ground on New Year's Eve, 1922 by an arsonist. Rudolf Steiner designed a second building, which was completed after his death. It is now the center for the Anthroposophical Society and its School of Spiritual Science.

After the end of World War I, Europe was in ruins and people were ready for new social forms. Attempts to realize Steiner's ideal of a "threefold social order" as a political and social alternative was unsuccessful. Nevertheless, its conceptual basis is even more relevant today. Steiner's social thinking can be understood only within the context of his view of history. In contrast to Marx, Steiner saw that history is shaped essentially by changes in human consciousness changes in which higher spiritual beings actively participate.

We can build a healthy social order only on the basis of insight into the material, soul, and spiritual needs of human beings. Those needs are characterized by a powerful tension between the search for community and the experience of the human I, or true individuality. Community, in the sense of material interdependence, is the essence of our world economy. Like independent thinking and free speech, the human I, or essential self, is the foundation of every creative endeavor and innovation, and crucial to the realization of human spirit in the arts and sciences.

Without spiritual freedom, culture withers and dies. Individuality and community are lifted beyond conflict only when they are recognized as a creative polarity rooted in basic human nature, not as contradictions. Each aspect must find the appropriate social expression. We need forms that ensure freedom for all expressions of spiritual life and promote community in economic life. The health of this polarity, however, depends on a full recognition of the third human need and function ó the social relationships that relate to our sense of human rights. Here again, Steiner emphasized the need to develop a distinct realm of social organization to support this sphere one inspired by the concern for equality that awakens as we recognize the spiritual essence of every human being. This is the meaning and source of our right to freedom of spirit and to material sustenance.

These insights are the basis of Steiner's responses to the needs of today, and have inspired renewal in many areas of modern life. Doctors, therapists, farmers, business people, academics, scientists, theologians, pastors, and teachers all approached him for ways to bring new life to their endeavors. The Waldorf school movement originated with a school for the children of factory employees at the Waldorf-Astoria cigarette factory. Today, Waldorf schools are all over the world. There are homes, schools, and village communities for children and adults with special needs. Biodynamic agriculture began with a course of lectures requested by a group of farmers concerned about the destructive trend of "scientific" farming. Steiner's work with doctors led to a medical movement that includes clinics, hospitals, and various forms of therapeutic work. As an art of movement, eurythmy also serves educational and therapeutic work.

Rudolf Steiner spoke very little of his life in personal terms. In his autobiography, however, he stated that, from his early childhood, he was fully conscious of the invisible reality within our everyday world. He struggled inwardly for the first forty years of his life not to achieve spiritual experience but to unite his spiritual experiences with ordinary reality through the methods of natural science. Steiner saw this scientific era, even in its most materialistic aspects, as an essential phase in the spiritual education of humanity. Only by forgetting the spiritual world for a time and attending to the material world can new and essential faculties be kindled, especially the experience of true individual inner freedom.

During his thirties, Steiner awakened to an inner recognition of what he termed "the turning point in time" in human spiritual history. That event was brought about by the incarnation of the Christ. Steiner recognized that the meaning of that turning point in time transcends all differences of religion, race, or nation and has consequences for all of humanity. Rudolf Steiner was also led to recognize the new presence and activity of the Christ. It began in the twentieth century, not in the physical world, but in the etheric realm of the invisible realm of life forces of the Earth and humanity. Steiner wanted to nurture a path of knowledge and cognition to meet today's deep and urgent needs. Those ideals, though imperfectly realized, may guide people to find a continuing inspiration in anthroposophy for their lives and work. Rudolf Steiner left us the fruits of careful spiritual observation and perception (or, as he preferred to call it, spiritual research), a vision that is free and thoroughly conscious of the integrity of thinking and understanding inherent in natural science.

Steiner's last years were spent in sowing as many seeds as possible for future work; they were also darkened by his belief in a coming world conflagration, when the archangel Michael, overseer of the current stage of human consciousness, would face off against the power of Ahriman, a spiritual being who seeks to prevent humanity's development. Steiner spoke ominously of the incarnation of Ahriman, an Antichrist-like figure, whose display of miraculous powers would precede a catastrophic "war of all against all." Steiner believed this unavoidable destiny would take some time to unfold – Ahriman is scheduled to arrive in the 3000s – yet many of his followers suspect that in recent years the process has been speeded up. Steiner himself had grave doubts about the growing pace of technological development, warning his followers that materialist science gains its great power through unwittingly releasing Ahrimanic entities. In his last communications, Steiner called on his followers to develop their consciousness in order to rise above nature to the same extent that technology sank below it. He also gave series of lectures about karma and its work in human history.

Steiner died on 30 March 1925 in Dornach, Switzerland. He had been ill for at least a year with an undisclosed stomach ailment, although there is some speculation he had been poisoned. He continued lecturing until it was physically impossible for him to do so, and his followers were astounded when, on the evening of his last scheduled lecture, they found a note saying that it had to be cancelled because of the Doctor's health. Nothing like this had ever happened before. The Doctor, they believed, was invulnerable.

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Introduction: Rudolf Steiner — A Biographical Sketch

From the Introduction of Christianity as Mystical Fact

One spring day in 1860, an autocratic Hungarian magnate, a certain Count Hoyos, who owned several large estates in Austria, dismissed his game-keeper, because this game-keeper, Johannes Steiner wanted to marry Franziska Blie, one of the Count's innumerable housemaids. Perhaps the old Count had a foreboding as to what a great spiritual revolution would be born of this marriage. (The baroque palace of Hom, where it happened, is still in the possession of the Hoyos family, and stands today just as it was one hundred years ago.) So Johannes Steiner had to look for another occupation, and got himself accepted as a trainee telegraphist and signalman by the recently opened Austrian Southern Railway. He was given his first job in an out-of-the-way request stop called Kraljevic (today in Yugoslavia), and there his first child, Rudolf, arrived on February 27, 1861. On the same day the child was taken for an emergency baptism to the parish Church of St. Michael in the neighboring village of Draskovec. The baptismal register was written in Serbo-Croat and Latin, and the entry still can be read today as of one Rudolfus Josephus Laurentius Steiner. "Thus it happened," Rudolf Steiner writes in his autobiography, "that the place of my birth is far removed from the region where I come from."

In later life, particularly in his lectures on education, Steiner frequently made the point that the most prodigious feat any man achieves at any time is accomplished by him in the first two or three years of his life, when he lifts his body into the upright position and learns to move it in perfect balance through space, when he forms a vital part of his organism into an instrument of speech and when he begins to handle and indeed to fashion his brain as a vehicle for thought. In other words, when the child asserts his human qualities which set him dramatically apart from the animals.

This initial achievement the boy Rudolf performed in Kraljevic. Kraljevic (meaning King's Village) is situated in the western outskirts of the vast Hungarian plain, the Puszta. Even today endless fields of maize and potatoes extend in every direction, and the solemn monotony of the country is more enhanced than relieved by the lines of tall poplars flanking the primitive, dead straight roads. It is basic three-dimensional space at its severest, domed over by the sky, which local people say is nowhere else so high nor so blue as over the Puszta. One might almost say that nature provided laboratory conditions in which the boy learned to stand, to walk, to speak and to think. One could justifiably say of Rudolf Steiner what the biographer, Hermann Grimm, said of Goethe: "It seems as if Providence had placed him in the simplest circumstances in order that nothing should impede his perfect unfolding."

From the severity of the Puszta the family moved, when the boy was two years old, into one of the most idyllic parts of Austria, called "the Burgenland" since 1921. Comprising the foothills of the eastern Alps, it is of great natural beauty, very fertile, and drenched in history. It takes its name from the many Burgen, i.e. castles which at different times of history were erected on nearly every hill. During recent excavations coins bearing the head of Philip of Macedonia, the father of Alexander the Great, have been found near Neudörfl, where the Steiners now settled, and where a daughter and a younger son were added to the family.

The management of the Austrian Southern Railway seems to have taken a sympathetic view toward the promising boy, and agreed to move father Steiner as stationmaster to several small stations south of Vienna, so that the eldest son was able to attend good schools as a day student, and finally in 1879 could matriculate at the Technical University of Vienna, then one of the most advanced scientific institutions of the world. Until then Rudolf Steiner's school life had been fairly uneventful, except that some of his masters were rather disturbed by the fact that this teen-ager was a voracious reader of Kant and other philosophers, and privately was engrossed in advanced mathematics.

In his first year at the University Rudolf Steiner studied chemistry and physics, mathematics, geometry, theoretical mechanics, geology, biology, botany, and zoology; and while still an undergraduate two events occurred which were of far-reaching consequence for his further development.

In the train in which the young student travelled daily to Vienna he frequently met a curious personality, an herb-gatherer, who turned out to be a latter-day Jacob Boehme. He was filled with the most profound nature lore to which he had first-hand access. He understood the language of plants, which told him what sicknesses they could heal; he was able to listen to the speech of the minerals, which told him of the natural history of our planet and of the Universe. In the last winter of his public life, in December 1923, Steiner provided something of a historic background for this wisdom, notably in his lectures on the Mysteries of Eleusis. Steiner immortalized the herb-gatherer in his Mystery Dramas, in the figure of "Father Felix." But "Father Felix" was instrumental in bringing Steiner together with a still more important and mysterious personality.

"Felix was only the intermediary for another personality," Steiner tells us in his autobiography, "who used means to stimulate in the soul of the young man the regular systematic things with which one has to be familiar in the spiritual world. This personality used the works of Fichte in order to develop certain observations from which results ensued which provided the seeds for my (later) work ... This excellent man was as undistinguished in his daily job as was Felix."

While these fateful meetings occurred on the inward field of life, a very consequential relationship developed on the outward field. The Technical University of Vienna provided a chair for German literature, which was held by Karl Julius Schröer, a great Goethe enthusiast and one of the most congenial interpreters of Goethe. Schröer recognized Steiner's unusual gifts, and anticipated that he might be capable of doing some original research in the most puzzling part of Goethe's works, i.e. his scientific writings.

Only two years ago, Dr. Emil Bock, of Stuttgart, Germany, one of the most eminent Steiner scholars, discovered the correspondence between Professor Schröer, Steiner, and the German Professor Joseph Kürschner, who was engaged in producing a monumental edition of representative works of German literature from the 7th to the 19th century. In the first letter of this correspondence, dated June 4, 1882, Schröer refers to Steiner as an "undergraduate of several terms standing." He says that he has asked him to write an essay on Goethe and Newton, and if this essay is a success, as he thinks it will be, "we have found the editor of Goethe's scientific works." Steiner was then twenty-one years of age. Schröer's letter is reminiscent of the letter Robert Schumann wrote to the great violinist Joachim, after he had received the first visit of the then twenty-one year old Brahms: "It is he who was to come."

The introductions and explanatory notes to the many volumes of Goethe's scientific works which Steiner was now commissioned to write were much ahead of their time. They blazed a trail into the less familiar regions of Goethe's universal genius which only today begins to be followed up by other scholars.

The young Steiner wrote these, his first works, in outward conditions of great poverty. The family lived in two rooms, which are still shown today. The larger one of the two was kitchen, dining, sitting and bedroom for the parents and his younger brother and sister, and off this larger room a few steps led into a narrow, white-washed, unheated cubicle where the young Steiner worked as in a monk's cell. No wonder that a Viennese celebrity of the time refers to him in his memoirs as one "who looked like a half-starved student of theology."

However, this first literary success led to Steiner's call to the central Goethe Archives at Weimar, where despite his youth he now became one of the editors of the great Standard Edition (Sophien Ausgabe) of Goethe's Complete Works. This concentrated occupation with Goethe, continued for seven years in Weimar, from 1889 to 1896, had a profound effect upon the unfolding of Steiner's own mind and philosophical consciousness. Goethe was the catalyst which released new mental and spiritual energies in Steiner s own personality. It was during these years that Steiner's fundamental philosophical works were conceived and written.

In 1886 he published An Epistemology of Goethe's World Conception. In 1891 his small concentrated thesis on Truth and Science earned him his Ph.D. In 1896 his comprehensive Philosophy of Spiritual Activity opened a completely new approach to the understanding of the human mind and the nature of thought. It represents the first really fresh step in philosophic thought and in the philosophic interpretation of the human consciousness since Kant. It is no wonder that in those years Steiner began to be looked upon in Germany as "the coming philosopher" upon whom before long the mantle of the dying Nietzsche would fall. But his genius led him a different way.

In his thirty-sixth year — "Nel mezzo del cammin di nostra vita," ("In the middle of the journey of our life") as Dante calls it, Steiner moved to Berlin, and the next seven years were perhaps the most dramatic period in his life. His new position in Berlin was that of editor of the weekly, Das Magazin für Litteratur, founded in 1832 (something equivalent to the London Saturday Review). He wrote the leading article and the dramatic reviews, occupying in Berlin a position somewhat similar to that of Bernard Shaw (who was five years his senior), with his weekly dramatic criticism in the Saturday Review. This assignment brought Steiner into close social contact with the intellectual and artistic élite of Berlin at the time, and for some years he pitched his tent among them. In the last years of his life, during rare moments of relaxation, he would at times tell stories of this exciting and often amusing period.

Side by side with these literary circles, or perhaps in polarity to them, Steiner was also drawn by objective interest and personal attraction into the camp of Haeckel and the militant monists. To move in this manner abreast of the spirit of the time would be a most interesting experience for anyone. For Steiner it was more. And I must now touch upon that side of his life about which I shall have to speak presently in greater detail. From childhood while for others such "being involved in this or that fashion of thought would be no more than an ideology," for anyone standing in the spiritual world it means, as Steiner says in his autobiography, that "he is brought close to the spirit-beings who desire to invest a particular ideology with a totalitarian claim." Steiner refers to his experience as a "Soul's Probation" which he had to undergo. (He later chose The Soul's Probation as the title of one of his Mystery Dramas.) He speaks of the "tempests" which during those years in Berlin raged in his soul, a rare expression in the otherwise very even and dispassionate style of his autobiography. At the end of those "forty days in the wilderness" — which were in fact four years — the thunderclouds lifted, the mist cleared, and he stood, to use his own phrase. "in solemn festival of knowledge before the Mystery of Golgotha." He had come to a first-hand experience of Christ and His active presence in the evolution of the world.

We have now reached the point where we must venture into the great unknown: Steiner the seer, the Initiate.

It is a plain fact that in some form or other spiritual knowledge has existed throughout the ages. Secret wisdom has never been absent from human history. But in Steiner it assumed a totally new form. In order to appreciate this revolutionary novelty, we must first have a picture of the old form.

The faculty of spiritual perception and secret wisdom is obtained through certain organs in the "subtle body" of man, to borrow a convenient term from Eastern Indian medicine. In Sanscrit these organs are called "chakrams," generally translated into English as "lotus flowers." They fulfill a function in the "subtle body" similar to our senses in the physical body. They are usually dormant today, but can be awakened. We can disregard for the moment the rites of Initiation which were employed in the Mystery Temples of the ancient world, and confine ourselves to the survival of more general methods which today are still practiced in many parts of the world. They all have one thing in common: they operate through the vegetative system in man, through bodily posture, through the control of breathing, through physical or mental exercises which work upon the solar plexus and the sympathetic nervous system. I realize that I am presenting a somewhat crude simplification. But nevertheless I am giving the essentials.

Steiner broke with all this. He began to operate from the opposite pole of the human organism, from pure thought. Thought, ordinary human thought, even if it is brilliant and positive, is at first something very weak. It does not possess the life, say, of our breathing, let alone the powerful life of our pulsating blood. It is, shall we say, flat, without substance; it is really lifeless. It is "pale thought," as Shakespeare called it.

This relative lifelessness of our thoughts is providential, however. If the living thoughts filling the Universe were to enter our consciousness just as they are, we would faint. If the living idea in every created thing simply jumped into our consciousness with all its native force, it would blot us out. Fortunately, our cerebro-spinal system exerts a kind of resistance in the process; it functions like a resistor in an electric circuit; it is a sort of transformer, reducing the violence of reality to such a degree that our mind can tolerate it and register it. However, as a result, we see only the shadows of reality on the back wall of our Platonic cave, not reality itself.

Now one of the magic words in Steiner's philosophy with which he attempts to break this spell, is "Erkraftung des Denkens." It means putting force, life into thinking, through thinking, within thinking. All his basic philosophic works, notably the Philosophy of Spiritual Activity, and many of his exercises, are directed to this purpose. If they are followed, sooner or later the moment arrives when thinking becomes leibfrei, i.e. independent of the bodily instrument, when it works itself free from the cerebrospinal system.

This is at first a most disturbing experience. One feels like a man who has pushed off from the shore and who must now strive with might and main to maintain himself in the raging sea. The sheer power of cosmic thought is such that at first one loses one's identity. And perhaps one would lose it for good, if it were not for a fact which now emerges from the hidden mysteries of Christianity. One does not finally lose one's identity because He Himself has walked the waves and extended a helping hand to Peter who ventured out prematurely. Gradually the waves seem to calm down, and a condition ensues which Steiner expresses in a wonderful phrase: "Thinking itself becomes a body which draws into itself as its soul the Spirit of the Universe."

This is a stage which, broadly speaking, Steiner had attained at the point of his biography which we have reached. Now he made a discovery which was not known to him before. He discovered that this "living thinking" could awaken the chakrams from "above," just as in the old way they could be stimulated from "below." Thought which at first in the normal and natural psychosomatic process "died" on the place of the skull, but which through systematic exercises had risen again to the level of cosmic reality, could now impart life to the dormant organs of spiritual perception which have been implanted into man by Him who created him in His image. From about the turn of the century Steiner began to pursue this path with ever greater determination, and gradually developed the three forms of Higher Knowledge which he called Imagination: a higher seeing of the spiritual world in revealing images; Inspiration: a higher hearing of the spiritual world, through which it reveals its creative forces and its creative order; Intuition: the stage at which an intuitive penetration into the sphere of Spiritual Beings becomes possible.

With these unfolding powers Steiner now developed up to his death in 1925, in twenty-five momentous years, that truly vast and awe-inspiring body of spiritual and practical knowledge to which he gave the name "Anthroposophy." (Incidentally, this word was first coined by Thomas Vaughan, a brother of the English mystical poet, Henry Vaughan, in the 17th century.) Anthroposophy literally means wisdom of man or the wisdom concerning man, but in his later years Steiner himself interpreted it on occasion as "an adequate consciousness of being human." In this interpretation the moral achievement of Steiner's work, his mission, his message to a bewildered humanity which has lost "an adequate consciousness of being human," to which Man has become "the Unknown," is summed up. This monumental work lies before us today and is waiting to be fully discovered by our Age — in some 170 books and in the published transcripts of nearly 6,000 lectures.

Three characteristic stages can be observed in Steiner's anthroposophical period. In a lecture given at the headquarters of the German Anthroposophical Society at Stuttgart (on February 6, 1923) he himself described these stages. Stage one (approximately 1901-1909): to lay the foundation for a Science of the Spirit within Western Civilization, with its center in the Mystery of Golgotha, as opposed to the purely traditional handing down of ancient oriental wisdom which is common to other organizations such as the Theosophical Society. Stage two (approximately 1910-1917): the application of the anthroposophical Science of the Spirit to various branches of Science, Art and practical life. As one of the milestones for the beginning of this second stage Steiner mentions the building of the Goetheanum, that architectural wonder (since destroyed by fire) in which his work as an artist had found its culmination. Stage three (approximately 1917-1925): first-hand descriptions of the spiritual world. During these twenty-five years of anthroposophical activity, Steiner's biography is identical with the history of the Anthroposophical Movement. His personal life is entirely dedicated to and absorbed in the life of his work.

It was during the last of the three phases that Steiner's prodigious achievements in so many fields of life began to inspire a number of his students and followers to practical foundations. Best known today are perhaps the Rudolf Steiner Schools for boys and girls, which have been founded in many countries and in which his concept of the true human being is the well-spring of all educational methods and activities. There are some seventy Steiner schools in existence with well over 30,000 pupils. A separate branch are the Institutes for Curative Education which have sprung up both in Europe and Overseas, and whose activities have been immensely beneficial to the ever increasing number of physically and mentally handicapped children and adults. Steiner's contributions to medical research and to medicine in general are used by a steadily growing number of doctors all over the world, and his indications are tested and followed up in a number of research centers and clinics. Another blessing for humanity flowed from his method of Biodynamic Agriculture, by which he was able to add to the basic principles of organic husbandry just those extras which, if rightly used, can greatly increase both fertility and quality without those chemical stimulants which in the long run poison both the soil and its products.

In the field of Art there is hardly an area he did not touch with the magic wand of creative originality. The second Goetheanum which replaced the first one destroyed by fire shows the massive use of reinforced concrete as a plastic material for architecture a generation before this use was attempted by others. Steiner's direct and indirect influence on modern painting with the symphonic use of color, on sculpture, on glass-engraving, on metal work and other visual arts is too far-reaching for anyone even to attempt to describe in condensed form. Students and graduates of the Steiner schools for Eurythmy and for Dramatic Art have performed before enthusiastic audiences in the cultural centers of the world, ably directed by Marie Steiner, his wife.

To those who have been attracted to this present publication by its title and its reference to Christianity, it will be of particular interest to hear that among those foundations which came into being during the last phase of Steiner's anthroposophical work was a Movement for Religious Renewal, formed by a body of Christian ministers, students and other young pioneers who had found in Rudolf Steiner "a man sent from God," able to show the way to a true reconciliation of faith and knowledge, of religion and science. This Movement is known today as "The Christian Community" and has centers in many cities in the Old and New World. Apart from the inestimable help this Movement received from him in theological and pastoral matters, Rudolf Steiner was instrumental in mediating for this Movement a complete spiritual rebirth of the Christian Sacraments for the modern age and a renewal of the Christian priestly office.

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Christianity as Mystical Fact and the Mysteries of Antiquity holds a special place in the story of his remarkable and dedicated life. The book contains the substance of a series of lectures Rudolf Steiner gave in the winter of 1901–1902 in the "Theosophical Library" of Berlin at the invitation of the President, Count Brockdorff. This series had been preceded by another on the German mystics from Master Eckhardt to Jacob Boehme (published in the Centennial Edition of the Written Works of Rudolf Steiner under the title Mysticism at the Dawn of the Modern Age) in which Steiner had ventured for the first time to present publicly some measure of his spiritual knowledge.

After these lectures on the mystics which was something of a prelude, Christianity as Mystical Fact now ushered in a new period in the understanding of the basic facts of Christianity as well as in Steiner's own life.

Compared with the free flow of spiritual teaching on Christianity offered by Steiner in his later works, the book may appear somewhat tentative and even reticent in its style. But it contains as in a nutshell all the essential new elements he was able to develop and unfold so masterfully in his later years.

Steiner considered the phrase "Mystical Fact" in the title to be very important. "I did not intend simply to describe the mystical content of Christianity," he says in his autobiography. "I attempted to show that in the ancient Mysteries cult-images were given of cosmic events, which occurred later on the field of actual history in the Mystery of Golgotha as a Fact transplanted from the cosmos into the earth."

* * *

It will not be out of place to round off this biographical sketch with a few personal reminiscences of the last four years of his life when I met Steiner as man and Initiate among his friends and students, and saw quite a good deal of him.

What was Rudolf Steiner like? — In the first place there was nothing in the least pompous about him. He never made one feel that he was in any sense extraordinary. There was an astonishing matter-of-factness about him, whether he spoke at a business meeting of the Anthroposophical Society, presided over faculty meetings of the Waldorf School (See footnote), lectured on his ever increasing discoveries in the spiritual field, or spoke in public discussions on controversial subjects of the day.

I attended small lecture courses of less than fifty people, heard him lecture in the large hall of the first Goetheanum, was present at large public meetings when he expounded his "Threefold Commonwealth" ideas in the electric atmosphere of the Germany of 1923, during the occupation of the Ruhr and the total collapse of the German Mark. He was always the same: clear, considerate, helpful, unruffled. In those days he could fill the largest halls in Germany, and his quiet voice was strong enough to be heard without artificial amplification in the last rows of the gallery.

His hair remained jet black to the end; I cannot remember a strand of grey in it. His brown eyes, they sometimes had a shimmer of gold in them, looked with sympathy upon everything. And he possessed a wonderful buoyancy of carriage.

From 1913 Steiner lived permanently at Dornach, near Basel, Switzerland, in a house known locally as "Villa Hansi." However, he spent most of his time in his studio, which was really nothing but a simple wooden building adjoining the large carpentry-shop where much of the woodwork of the first Goetheanum was prefabricated. In this studio he received an unending stream of callers. One would, perhaps, be shown into the room by a helping friend, but at the end he would always conduct one to the door himself. He put one at ease with such courtesy that one was in danger of forgetting who he was. And he gave the impression that he had no other care nor interest in the world than to listen to one's immature questions.

He would sit on a simple wicker chair, his legs crossed, perhaps occasionally moving one foot up and down. On the lapel of his black coat one might see a slight trace of snuff, because he indulged in the Old-World pleasure of taking snuff, but he neither drank nor smoked. I have never met anyone, and I am sure I shall never meet anyone who seemed so constantly at rest and in action simultaneously, all the time perfectly relaxed and absolutely alert.

The last summer of his life, in 1924, was the most prolific of all. He gave specialized courses on agriculture, on curative education, on Eurythmy. Then followed a summer school in August at Torquay in England; and when he returned to Dornach in early September, he increased his activities still further and gave as many as five, sometimes six different lectures each day. There was a daily course on the New Testament Book of Revelation for the priests of the Christian Community, another on pastoral medicine for priests and doctors combined, another on dramatic art, where I remember him one morning acting singlehanded the whole of Dantons Tod, a drama of the French Revolution by the German writer, Buchner. On another morning he acted the Faust fragment by Lessing. And in addition to all this, he also held lectures for the workmen of the Goetheanum.

Besides these specialized courses, the general lectures and other central activities of the Goetheanum School for the Science of the Spirit continued without interruption.

But the inevitable moment approached when even his resilient body showed the strain of his immense work. Sometimes for the period of a whole week he would hardly sleep more than two hours each night. I believe that he knew what he was doing. He well knew why he burned the candle not only at both ends but also in the middle.

My last memory of him is of the night when I was privileged, together with another friend, to keep vigil at the foot of his bed on which his body was laid out. It was the night before his funeral. The bed stood in his simple studio where he had been confined during the last six months of his life. Looking down on him was the great wooden statue of Christ which he had carved and nearly finished. Even in the literal sense of the word he had laid down his life at the feet of Christ.

The dignity of his features was enhanced by the marble whiteness of death. In the stillness of the night, with only a few candles burning, it was as if ages of human history converged to do homage. With a deep sense of reverence I wondered who he was. I am wondering still.

Alfred Heidenreich
London, England
August 1961

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Andrei Bely wrote about the misunderstood ideas of Rudolf Steiner "who understood Paul's fiery spirit (Apostle Paul), [as] he also understood Steiner: he understood his problem—the problem of the seeds of future unexperienced flowers. He was completely sealed with the seal of fire and a real understanding of the now incomprehensible and modern problem: "thinker", "scientist ", "teacher", "yogi", "magician", "occultist", "anarchist", "crusher of the basics", "chancellor of the order", "gnostic", "cultivator"; and he did not fit into the framework of this literature! Paul was a fidget: and so was Steiner. Thundered that one; and this one rattled. When I read Paul's cry that he was everything for everyone to wake some up, I say to myself: "Oh, I understand; I saw Steiner!"". Even during his life, Steiner felt the enmity of theologians, Catholics, Protestants, occultists, Marxists, nationalists, and Nazis. There were two attempts on his life and the arson of his greatest creation, the Goetheanum.

Source: MDPI

"Anthroposophy is a path of knowledge cognition^*, to guide the spiritual in the human being to the spiritual in the universe. It arises in people as a need of the heart and feeling life. Anthroposophy can be justified only to the degree that it satisfies this inner need. It may be acknowledged only by those who find within it what they themselves feel the need to seek. Therefore, Anthroposophists are those who experience, as an essential need of life, certain questions on the nature of the human being and the universe, just as one experiences hunger and thirst."

Rudolf Steiner, Anthroposophical Leading Thoughts, 1924

^* The German term used has been mistranslated as "knowledge." 'Erkenntnis' is more accurately translated as 'cognition'. A Theory of Knowledge Implicit in Goethe's World Conception and The Philosophy of Freedom teaches this new cognition, part of humanity's evolution in our time.

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Earliest Recorded Autobiography of Rudolf Steiner

Anthroposophy / Spiritual Science

Spiritual knowledge and freedom

Anthroposophical proponents aim to extend the clarity of the scientific method to phenomena of human soul-life and to spiritual experiences. This requires developing new faculties of objective spiritual perception, which Steiner maintained was possible for humanity today. The steps of this process of inner development he identified as consciously achieved imagination, inspiration and intuition. Steiner believed results of this form of spiritual research should be expressed in a way that can be understood and evaluated on the same basis as the results of natural science: "The anthroposophical schooling of thinking leads to the development of a non-sensory, or so-called supersensory consciousness, whereby the spiritual researcher brings the experiences of this realm into ideas, concepts, and expressive language in a form which people can understand who do not yet have the capacity to achieve the supersensory experiences necessary for individual research."

Steiner hoped to form a spiritual movement that would free the individual from any external authority: "The most important problem of all human thinking is this: to comprehend the human being as a personality grounded in him or herself." For Steiner, the human capacity for rational thought would allow individuals to comprehend spiritual research on their own and bypass the danger of dependency on an authority.

Steiner contrasted the anthroposophical approach with both conventional mysticism, which he considered lacking the clarity necessary for exact knowledge, and natural science, which he considered arbitrarily limited to investigating the outer world.

Nature of the Human Being

In Anthroposophy, Steiner suggested that human beings unite a physical body of substances gathered from (and that ultimately return to) the inorganic world; a life body (also called the etheric body), in common with all living creatures (including plants); a bearer of sentience or consciousness (also called the astral body), in common with all animals; and the ego, which anchors the faculty of self-awareness unique to human beings.

Anthroposophy describes a broad evolution of human consciousness. Early stages of human evolution possess an intuitive perception of reality, including a clairvoyant perception of spiritual realities. Humanity has progressively evolved an increasing reliance on intellectual faculties and a corresponding loss of intuitive or clairvoyant experiences, which have become atavistic. The increasing intellectualization of consciousness, initially a progressive direction of evolution, has led to an excessive reliance on abstraction and a loss of contact with both natural and spiritual realities. However, to go further requires new capacities that combine the clarity of intellectual thought with the imagination, and beyond this with consciously achieved inspiration and intuitive insights.

Anthroposophy speaks of the reincarnation of the human spirit: that the human being passes between stages of existence, incarnating into an earthly body, living on earth, leaving the body behind and entering into the spiritual worlds before returning to be born again into a new life on earth. After the death of the physical body, the human spirit recapitulates the past life, perceiving its events as they were experienced by the objects of its actions. A complex transformation takes place between the review of the past life and the preparation for the next life. The individual's karmic condition eventually leads to a choice of parents, physical body, disposition, and capacities that provide the challenges and opportunities that further development requires, which includes karmically chosen tasks for the future life.

Steiner described some conditions that determine the interdependence of a person's lives, or karma.

Evolution

The anthroposophical view of evolution considers all animals to have evolved from an early, unspecialized form. As the least specialized animal, human beings have maintained the closest connection to the archetypal form; contrary to the Darwinian conception of human evolution, all other animals devolve from this archetype. The spiritual archetype originally created by spiritual beings was devoid of physical substance; only later did this descend into material existence on Earth. In this view, human evolution has accompanied the Earth's evolution throughout the existence of the Earth.

The evolution of man, Steiner said, has consisted in the gradual incarnation of a spiritual being into a material body. It has been a true "descent" of man from a spiritual world into a world of matter. The evolution of the animal kingdom did not precede, but rather accompanied the process of human incarnation. Man is thus not the end result of the evolution of the animals, but is rather in a certain sense their cause. In the succession of types which appears in the fossil record-the fishes, reptiles, mammals, and finally fossil remains of man himself — the stages of this process of incarnation are reflected.

Ethics

The anthroposophical view is that good is found in the balance between two polar influences on world and human evolution. These are often described through their mythological embodiments as spiritual adversaries which endeavour to tempt and corrupt humanity, Lucifer and his counterpart Ahriman. These have both positive and negative aspects. Lucifer is the light spirit, which "plays on human pride and offers the delusion of divinity", but also motivates creativity and spirituality; Ahriman is the dark spirit that tempts human beings to "...deny [their] link with divinity and to live entirely on the material plane", but that also stimulates intellectuality and technology. Both figures exert a negative effect on humanity when their influence becomes misplaced or one-sided, yet their influences are necessary for human freedom to unfold.

Each human being has the task to find a balance between these opposing influences, and each is helped in this task by the mediation of the Representative of Humanity, also known as the Christ being, a spiritual entity who stands between and harmonizes the two extremes.

Paths of Spiritual Development

According to Steiner, a real spiritual world exists, evolving along with the material one. Steiner held that the spiritual world can be researched in the right circumstances through direct experience, by persons practicing rigorous forms of ethical and cognitive self-discipline. Steiner described many exercises he said were suited to strengthening such self-discipline; the most complete exposition of these is found in his book How To Know Higher Worlds. The aim of these exercises is to develop higher levels of consciousness through meditation and observation. Details about the spiritual world, Steiner suggested, could on such a basis be discovered and reported, though no more infallibly than the results of natural science.

Anthroposophy is a path of knowledge cognition, to guide the spiritual in the human being to the spiritual in the universe…. Anthroposophists are those who experience, as an essential need of life, certain questions on the nature of the human being and the universe, just as one experiences hunger and thirst.

Steiner regarded his research reports as being important aids to others seeking to enter into spiritual experience. He suggested that a combination of spiritual exercises (for example, concentrating on an object such as a seed), moral development (control of thought, feelings and will combined with openness, tolerance and flexibility) and familiarity with other spiritual researchers' results would best further an individual's spiritual development. He consistently emphasised that any inner, spiritual practice should be undertaken in such a way as not to interfere with one's responsibilities in outer life. Steiner distinguished between what he considered were true and false paths of spiritual investigation.

In anthroposophy, artistic expression is also treated as a potentially valuable bridge between spiritual and material reality.

Prerequisites to and Stages of Inner Development

A person seeking inner development must first of all make the attempt to give up certain formerly held inclinations. Then, new inclinations must be acquired by constantly holding the thought of such inclinations, virtues or characteristics in one's mind. They must be so incorporated into one's being that a person becomes enabled to alter his soul by his own will-power. This must be tried as objectively as a chemical might be tested in an experiment. A person who has never endeavored to change his soul, who has never made the initial decision to develop the qualities of endurance, steadfastness and calm logical thinking, or a person who has such decisions but has given up because he did not succeed in a week, a month, a year or a decade, will never conclude anything inwardly about these truths. — Rudolf Steiner, "On the Inner Life"

Steiner's stated prerequisites to beginning on a spiritual path include a willingness to take up serious cognitive studies, a respect for factual evidence, and a responsible attitude. Central to progress on the path itself is a harmonious cultivation of the following qualities:

• Control over one's own thinking
• Control over one's will
• Composure
• Positivity
• Impartiality

Steiner sees meditation as a concentration and enhancement of the power of thought. By focusing consciously on an idea, feeling or intention the meditant seeks to arrive at pure thinking, a state exemplified by but not confined to pure mathematics. In Steiner's view, conventional sensory-material knowledge is achieved through relating perception and concepts. The anthroposophic path of esoteric training articulates three further stages of supersensory knowledge, which do not necessarily follow strictly sequentially in any single individual's spiritual progress.

• By focusing on symbolic patterns, images, and poetic mantras, the meditant can achieve consciously directed Imaginations that allow sensory phenomena to appear as the expression of underlying beings of a soul-spiritual nature.
• By transcending such imaginative pictures, the meditant can become conscious of the meditative activity itself, which leads to experiences of expressions of soul-spiritual beings unmediated by sensory phenomena or qualities. Steiner calls this stage Inspiration.
• By intensifying the will-forces through exercises such as a chronologically reversed review of the day's events, the meditant can achieve a further stage of inner independence from sensory experience, leading to direct contact, and even union, with spiritual beings ("Intuition") without loss of individual awareness.

Christ as the Center of Earthly Evolution

Steiner's writing, though appreciative of all religions and cultural developments, emphasizes Western tradition as having evolved to meet contemporary needs. He describes Christ and his mission on earth of bringing individuated consciousness as having a particularly important place in human evolution, whereby:

• Christianity has evolved out of previous religions;
• The being which manifests in Christianity also manifests in all faiths and religions, and each religion is valid and true for the time and cultural context in which it was born;
• All historical forms of Christianity need to be transformed considerably to meet the continuing evolution of humanity.

Spiritual science does not want to usurp the place of Christianity; on the contrary it would like to be instrumental in making Christianity understood. Thus it becomes clear to us through spiritual science that the being whom we call Christ is to be recognized as the center of life on earth, that the Christian religion is the ultimate religion for the earth's whole future. Spiritual science shows us particularly that the pre-Christian religions outgrow their one-sidedness and come together in the Christian faith. It is not the desire of spiritual science to set something else in the place of Christianity; rather it wants to contribute to a deeper, more heartfelt understanding of Christianity.

Thus, anthroposophy considers there to be a being who unifies all religions, and who is not represented by any particular religious faith. This being is, according to Steiner, not only the Redeemer of the Fall from Paradise, but also the unique pivot and meaning of earth's evolutionary processes and of human history. To describe this being, Steiner periodically used terms such as the "Representative of Humanity" or the "good spirit" rather than any denominational term.

Divergence from Conventional Christian Thought

Steiner's views of Christianity diverge from conventional Christian thought in key places, and include gnostic elements:

• One central point of divergence is Steiner's views on reincarnation and karma.
• Steiner differentiated three contemporary paths by which he believed it possible to arrive at Christ:
  • Through heart-filled experiences of the Gospels; Steiner described this as the historically dominant path, but becoming less important in the future.
  • Through inner experiences of a spiritual reality; this Steiner regarded as increasingly the path of spiritual or religious seekers today.
  • Through initiatory experiences whereby the reality of Christ's death and resurrection are experienced; Steiner believed this is the path people will increasingly take.
• Steiner also believed that there were two different Jesus children involved in the Incarnation of the Christ: one child descended from Solomon, as described in the Gospel of Matthew, the other child from Nathan, as described in the Gospel of Luke. (The genealogies given in the two gospels diverge some thirty generations before Jesus' birth, and 'Jesus' was a common name in biblical times.)
• His view of the second coming of Christ is also unusual; he suggested that this would not be a physical reappearance, but that the Christ being would become manifest in non-physical form, visible to spiritual vision and apparent in community life for increasing numbers of people beginning around the year 1933.
• He emphasized his belief that in the future humanity would need to be able to recognize the Spirit of Love in all its genuine forms, regardless of what name would be used to describe this being. He also warned that the traditional name of the Christ might be misused, and the true essence of this being of love ignored.

Anthroposophy and life practice

Anthroposophical spiritual science was not conceived by Rudolf Steiner as a theoretical doctrinal structure, but aims to become fruitful in the immediate practice of life. Steiner formulated the following motto for this purpose:

A motto must take hold of people out of a spiritual-scientific attitude, otherwise no progress will be possible in our hopeless times. And this motto must be:

Seek the really practical material life,
But seek it in such a way that it does not stupefy you
   about the spirit that is active in it.
Seek the spirit,
but do not seek it in super-sensible lust,
   out of supersensible egoism,
but seek it,
Because you want to apply it selflessly in practical life,
   in the material world.

Apply the old principle:
"Spirit is never without matter, matter is never without
   without spirit" in such a way that you say:
We want to do everything material in the light of the spirit,
And we want to seek the light of the spirit in this way,
so that it will give us warmth for our practical actions.

The spirit that is led by us into matter,
Matter, which is worked by us to its revelation,
By which it expels the spirit from itself;
Matter, which receives from us the revelation of the spirit,
The spirit which is driven by us to matter,
These form that living being
which can bring humanity to real progress,
That progress which the best of the best...
   in the deepest recesses of the
   present souls can only long for.

GA297

The Purpose of this Site

This site brings together a subset of the books and lectures of Rudolf Steiner and a collection of articles written on specific topics of Spiritual Science / Anthroposophy. Its intended purpose is to present this knowledge in a readable and organized manner. Every book, lecture, article, etc. is downloadable in PDF format. It is highly recommended that, if possible, the chosen material be downloaded (PDF) and read "offline" and, more desireable, would be in printed format.

Most, if not all, of Steiner's lectures and books that have been translated into English can be purchased online through the Dr. Rudolf Steiner Bookstore.

How should one approach Spiritual Science, or, the science of the spirit?

To be sure, this material presents a drastic "new view" of life and the world around us. One for whom this material (information / knowledge) is entirely new, the initial tendency is often to recoil from such teachings. This is "normal". However, there is one prerequisite for approaching this material in order to (begin to) understand what it teaches. That prerequisite is desire, a thirst that becomes, over time, unquenchable. It becomes unquenchable because this journey is life-long, even many-lives-long. Studying what is here follows the maxim, 'the more I learn, the less I know'. This is because there is so much to learn. This knowledge does not fit in a box that can be carried around. One should not expect simple answers to questions regarding the secrets of either the macrocosm (the universe) or the microcosm (human beings).

To paraphrase Richard Smoley in his introduction to the book containing Rudolf Steiner's cycle of lectures (given in 1910) The Gospel of Matthew [SteinerBooks; Revised edition (February 1, 2002)]:

How, in the end, are we to deal with Steiner's vision? Are we to accept it on blind faith, repudiate it because the "experts" disagree, or launch our own independent spiritual-scientific investigations (via personal clairvoyance)? However, all three approaches are beset with problems adn challenges. But there is another way of looking at Steiner's teachings that offer an alternative.

The conventional mind is trapped in dualities. Everything must be yes/no, good/bad, either/or. Although this form of intellect can accomplish a great deal, it is not particularly high or sophisticated: a computer, which operates entirely with dualistic sequences of zeros and ones, "thinks" in much the same way. Esoteric texts like Steiner's call for another approach. It is quite simply this: to read his ideas, not as so many theories and opinions to be agreed with or rejected, but as possibilites to be contemplated and meditated upon. If we are able to step back from the critical, evaluative mind — which serves us so well in some respects while causing us such misery in others — we may find we are able to enjoy and appreciate what Steiner has brought to our time in a new and beneficial way. Liberated from the necessity to take all of Steiner's words at face value (a perspective Steiner himself warned against), we become more able to see the truth in what he is trying to convey to today's humanity.

In an exercise in one of his most important books, How to Know Higher Worlds, Steiner suggests contemplating a seed and cultivating a vivid awareness of its different life stages, so that one eventually senses, "Within the seed already lies concealed what — as the force of the whole plant — later grows out of it." The cultivation of the vision of spiritual science is to see clearly and distinctly not only what is to come, but what already lies in an object as its past and its origin. It is this vision Rudolf Steiner sought to share. He did so with utter humility and a desire for mankind to [finally] "know thyself."

It is through spiritual science that human knowledge becomes serious, and people shy away from it. They also want spiritual science only as something that ripples on the surface of existence. That it goes to the core and essence of the human being, that is what people fear. That is why they do not want to accept spiritual science. If they were to accept spiritual science, then many things in social life, in historical life, would have to change in the very near future, then people would have to think differently in their most everyday life. And that is what matters.

That is why it is possible to take up other sciences, but one remains the same throughout life, one only becomes richer in knowledge. Spiritual science should not be absorbed without transforming you, and it cannot be absorbed without transforming you. It slowly and gradually makes you a different person. You have to be patient, but it makes you a different person, because it appeals to quite different human tasks, and it appeals to quite different things in human nature.

Source (German): Rudolf Steiner – GA 182 – Der Tod als Lebenswandlung – Heidenheim, 29 April 1918 (page 58)

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Within the din of life, one must strive to develop spiritual ears to hear those in the higher realms who reach down to us and desire nothing more than to help humanity reach the heights intended for it by God.

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Gallery

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External Resources

Rudolf Steiner Archive

The Steiner Online Library (SOL) is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization established to increase public awareness of Anthroposophy, a philosophy created by the 20th century polymath Rudolf Steiner.

Free Man Creator

This is an English wiki-based reference site with advanced materials for the earnest student of spiritual science and anthroposophy.

Dr. Rudolf Steiner Center, Croatia (Dr. Steiner's birthplace)

The Dr Rudolf Steiner Centre is a multidisciplinary institution that integrates science, art and tourism on the basis of the teachings of Dr Rudolf Steiner. The Centre also manages the birthplace of Dr Rudolf Steiner, which has been a meeting place of numerous visitors from all around the world for many years now.

Meditations on the Tarot (Blog)

Plunging in the currents of the Hermetic Tradition

Hermetic World Library

This library offers an extensive collection of books written throughout history and makes a wide spectrum of texts available online.

Bible Gateway

Bible Gateway is a searchable online Bible tool hosting more than 200 versions of the Bible in over 70 languages that you can freely read, research, and reference anywhere.

Rudolf Steiner Web

The purpose of this site is to highlight the multi-faceted genius of Rudolf Steiner.

Steiner Online Library

As we add new content here, you will find the largest online collection of the digital works of Dr. Rudolf Steiner in English in the world.

Dr. Rudolf Steiner Bookstore

At its founding in 1976, the Dr. Rudolf Steiner Books (Bookstore) was the first of its kind in the Seattle area and in the Northwest.

Two Approaches to Anthroposophy [Spiritual Science]

The first of these, which is perhaps the easiest for most people who feel drawn to this kind of material, is Theosophy – An Introduction to the Supersensible Knowledge of the World and the Destination of Man.

The second approach is for the hard-nosed philosophical and scientific thinker, the critical, analytical mind, namely The Philosophy of Freedom (initially translated as Philosophy of Spiritual Activity as recommended by the author).

This book has absolutely no supernatural content whatsoever; it provides the philosophical and epistemological foundation for everything Steiner gave out through his lectures later: Humanism, empiricism, and monism, with Charles Darwin's natural science as point of departure. This is the most important of all Steiner's works. 30 years later, when asked which of his works would be best remembered by posterity, Rudolf Steiner answered without a moment's hesitation: "The Philosophy of Freedom will survive all my other works."

The Philosophy of Freedom, often referred to as the PoF for brevity, is quite a heavy digest, however, and may need several re-reads, at least some of the chapters. For this approach, I would recommend first reading Truth and Knowledge. This is Rudolf Steiner's doctoral thesis, published in 1892 as an introduction to The Philosophy of Freedom. It's a nice introduction to the science of epistemology that also makes it clear why Steiner disagreed with Kant, who was, and still is, the most influential of epistemological philosophers.

The first approach, though, through the book Theosophy, is a much shorter and easier way to grasp the cosmological and evolutionary background that many of the lectures are based upon. This enormous body of lectures covers an incredibly diverse range of topics. They may be extremely challenging to follow without the foreknowledge outlined in the basic books. A very useful follow-up to Theosophy would be Occult Science — An Outline. This book is a sequel to Theosophy and deals with the evolution of Man and the Earth.

—Tarjei Straume

Theosophy then Occult Science — An Outline.

OR

Truth and Knowledge then The Philosophy of Freedom.

Library

☆ Personal Study Curriculum

Reading List

Read First: ☐ Esoteric School, then #1 under Basics.

I. Basics

1. ❌ (1923) The Invisible Man Within Us [GA 221]
2. Adriana Koulias: The Seven Cultural Epochs
3. (1894/1918) The Philosophy of Freedom [GA 4]
4. (1916) The Riddle of Humanity [GA 170]
5. * Urs Schwanderner: Fundamentals of Spiritual Science
6. * Urs Schwanderner: The Supersensible World
7. (1904) Theosophy – {Body, Soul, Spirit} [GA 9]
8. (1917/1970) * The Case for Anthroposophy (Riddles of the Soul) [GA 21]
9. ☐ (1910) * Christianity as Mystical Fact [GA 8] This book is a first step on the way to a truly modern comprehension of the Mystery of Golgotha — of the events leading up to it, and of the consequences of it in the early years of our era.
10. (1914) * Anthroposophy and Christianity [GA 155]
11. (1915) The Great Virtues [GA 159]
12. (1923) * A collection of six lectures [GA 220]
13. (1905) The Foundations of Esotericism [GA 93a] (31 lectures)

II. Self Development

1. (1921) Evil and the Power of Thought [GA 207]
2. (1921) The Seeds of Future Worlds [GA 207] (There is also a Deep Dive article with this same title)
3. (1908) * What is Self Knowledge? [GA 108]
4. * Logismoi or Assaultive Thoughts
5. * The Fall and Redemption Original Sin and Grace
6. (1920) Man: Hieroglyph of the Universe [GA 201]
7. (1921) * Therapeutic Insights: Earthly and Cosmic Laws [GA 205]
8. (Sept. 1924) Lectures to Priests The Apocalypse [GA 346] (Lecture 15 in particular for this study curriculum)

III. Deeper Esotericism

1. (1921) Materialism and the Task of Anthroposophy [GA 204] (One of his most important lecture cycles)
2. (1920) The Bridge between Cosmic Spirituality and the Physical Constitution of Humans [GA 202]
3. (1921) Human Freedom and its Connection with the Mystery of Golgotha [GA 207]
4. (1915) * The Mystery of Death [GA 159]
5. (1924) * The Evolution of the Earth and Man and the Influence of the Stars [GA 354] (chapters are independent lectures)
6. (1909) * The Deed of Christ and the Opposing Spiritual Powers [GA 107]
7. (1916) The Moment of Death and Beyond [GA 168]
8. (1917) * The Elemental Spirits of Birth and Death [GA 177]
9. * Cultural Ages Overview — Excerpts that provide a birdseye view of the Cultural Ages
10. * Demonic Possession
11. (1923) The Four Seasons and the Archangels [GA229]

IV. Grail Studies

1. (1913–14) * Christ and the Spiritual World: The Search for the Holy Grail [GA 149]
2. ** The Grail Triptych by Douglas Gabriel
3. Adriana Koulias: The Book of Revelations, The Holy Grail - An exploration of Karma, Soul Transformation and Modern Initiation
4. The Arthur Stream
5. (1924) * Karmic Relationships Volume VIII [GA 240] (This cycle of lectures is also called Cosmic Christianity and the Impulse of Michael) (Includes 2 lectures on the Arthur Stream)

V. History & Society

1. ** History (Read First)
2. (1923) * World History and the Mysteries [GA 233]
3. (1918) * A Sound Outlook for To-day and a Genuine Hope for the Future [GA 181]
4. (1914/1915) The Destinies of Individuals and Nations [GA 157]

VI. The Coming Future

1. (1921) The Responsibility of Man for World Evolution [GA 203]
2. * The Sixth Epoch: Preparing for the future
3. (1915) Preparing for the Sixth Epoch [GA 159]
4. (1918) * Evil and the Future of Man [GA 185]
5. (1919) * Elemental Beings and Human Destinies [GA 194]
6. (1908–09) The Being of Man and His Future Evolution [GA 107] (chapter IX)
7. The Meaning of the Present Time
8. The Emergence of the Eighth Sphere

VII. Misc. Subjects

1. (1897) * Goethe's Conception of the World [GA 6]
2. (1904) * Goethe's Fairy Tale – The Green Snake and the Beautiful Lily [GA 68c]
3. (1920) * Roman Catholicism [GA 198]
4. (1908) * The Ten Commandments [GA 108]
5. CHRISTMAS:
   (1913) * Newborn Might and Strength Everlasting, A Christmas Lecture [GA 150] (Includes a sample of Dr. Steiner's handwriting)
6. * The Personality of Rudolf Steiner and His Development
7. ** The Grail Triptych by Douglas Gabriel
8. * Chakra Development Through the Writings of Rudolf Steiner
9. (1921) The Remedy for Our Diseased Civilisation [GA 206]

1. ---

   Anthony's Notes & Excerpts
2. Anthony's Dream 3 December 2023

☆ Books by Rudolf Steiner

The Five Basic Books

Rudolf Steiner intended these carefully written volumes to serve as a foundation to all of the later, more advanced anthroposophical writings and lecture courses. You can read about them here, then buy the books to read and study at home.

Theosophy

The book begins with a beautiful description of the primordial trichotomy; body, soul, and spirit. A discussion of reincarnation and karma follows. The third and longest chapter of the work (74 pages) presents. In a vast panorama, the seven regions of the soul world, the seven regions of the land of spirits, and the soul's journey after death through these worlds. A brief discussion of the path to higher knowledge is found in the fifth chapter.

The Philosophy of Freedom

Steiner's most Important philosophical work deals both with epistemology, the study of how man knows himself and the world, and with the issue of human freedom. In the first half of the book Steiner focuses on the activity of thinking in order to demonstrate the true nature of knowledge. There he shows the fallacy of the contemporary idea of thinking, pointing out that the prevailing belief in the limits to knowledge is a self-imposed limit that contradicts its own claim to truth. The possibility for freedom is taken up in the second half of the book. The Issue is not political freedom, but something more subtle; freedom of the will. There are those who maintain that man's thoughts and actions are Just as determined as a chemical reaction or a honey bee's behavior. Steiner points again to the activity of thinking, from which arises the possibility of free human action.

Knowledge of the Higher Worlds

Rudolf Steiner's fundamental work on the path to higher knowledge explains in detail the exercises and disciplines a student must pursue in order to attain a wakeful experience of supersensible realities. The path described here is a safe one which will not interfere with the student's ability to lead a normal outer life.

Christianity as Mystical Fact

An Introduction to esoteric Christianity which explores the ancient mythological wisdom of Egypt and Greece. The work shows how this wisdom underwent a tremendous transformation into a historical event in the Mystery of Golgotha. This book is a first step on the way to a truly modern comprehension of the Mystery of Golgotha — of the events leading up to it, and of the consequences of it in the early years of our era.

Occult Science

This work of nearly 400 pages begins with a thorough discussion and definition of the term “occult” science. A description of the supersensible nature of man follows, along with a discussion of dreams, sleep, death, life between death and rebirth, and reincarnation. In the fourth chapter evolution is described from the perspective of initiation science. The fifth chapter characterizes the training a student must undertake to become an initiate. The sixth and seventh chapters consider the future evolution of the world and more detailed observations regarding supersensible realities.

---

These books were written by Rudolf Steiner for publication. Full list of his published works can be found on the RSArchive.

1. (1886) The Science of Knowing [GA 2]
2. (1891) Truth and Knowledge: Introduction to the Philosophy of Freedom [GA 3]
3. (1894/1918) The Philosophy of Freedom [GA 4]
4. (1897) * Goethe's Conception of the World [GA 6]
5. (1901/23) Mysticism at the Dawn of the Modern Age [GA 7]
6. (1903) Reincarnation and Karma: From the Point of View of Modern Scientific Thought [GA 34]
7. (1904) Theosophy – An Introduction to the Supersensible Knowledge of the World and the Destination of Man [GA 9]
8. (1904) * Cosmic Memory [GA 11]
9. (1905) The Stages of Higher Knowledge [GA 12]
10. (1909) Occult Science — An Outline [GA 13]
11. (1910) * Christianity as Mystical Fact [GA 8] This book is a first step on the way to a truly modern comprehension of the Mystery of Golgotha — of the events leading up to it, and of the consequences of it in the early years of our era.
12. (1911) * Spiritual Guidance of Mankind [GA 15]
13. (1914/23) The Riddles of Philosophy [GA 18]
14. (1916) * The Mission of Spiritual Science and of its Building at Dornach [GA 35]
15. (1917/1970) * The Case for Anthroposophy (Riddles of the Soul) [GA 21]
16. (1918) Knowledge of the Higher Worlds [GA 10]
17. (1919) * The Threefold Social Order [GS 23]
18. (1920) * Renewal of the Social Organism [GA 24]
19. (1925) Goethe's Standard of the Soul [GA 22]
20. (1925) Fundamentals of Therapy: An Extension of the Art of Healing Through Spiritual Knowledge [GA 27]
21. (1904–1923) The Festivals and Their Meaning: Christmas [Various GA]
22. (1925) The Story of My Life [GA 28]

☆ Books Composed of Rudolf Steiner's Lectures

The books listed below are collections of Steiner's lecture cycles later compiled into books after his death. Dr. Steiner was very adament on the difference between the spoken word and the written word. For some of his specific thoughts on the subject, please read About the Transcripts of Lectures.

1. (1904) * Goethe's Fairy Tale – The Green Snake and the Beautiful Lily [GA 68c]
2. (1904) Greek and Germanic Mythology in the Light of Esotericism [GA 92]
3. (1904–1921) Esoteric Christmas
4. (1905) The Foundations of Esotericism [GA 93a]
5. (1906) An Esoteric Cosmology [GA94]
6. (1906) At the Gates of Spiritual Science [GA 95]
7. (1907/09) Reading the Pictures of the Apocalypse [GA 104a]
8. (1908/09) Goethe's Secret Revelation [GA 57]
9. (1904–14) Esoteric Lessons: The School of Spiritual Science [GA270] (Not meant for general publication)
10. (1904–14) Guidance in Esoteric Training [GA245] (Condensed from "Esoteric Lessons")
11. (1905/07) Wagner – In the Light of Anthroposophy [GA 92]
12. (1906) The Origin of Suffering, The Origin of Evil, Illness and Death [GA 55]
13. (1906) The Temple Legend: Freemasonry and Related Occult Movements [GA 93]
14. (1907) * Supersensible Knowledge [GA 55]
15. (1907) Occult Signs and Symbols [GA 101]
16. (1907) Theosophy of the Rosicrucian [GA 99]
17. (1907) Theosophy and Rosicrucianism [GA 100]
18. (1908) The Influence of Spiritual Beings on Man [GA 102]
19. (1908) The Gospel of St. John [GA 103]
20. (1908) The Apocalypse of St. John [GA 104] (see 1924 lectures on the Apocalypse, GA 346)
21. (1908–09) The Being of Man and His Future Evolution [GA 107]
22. (1909) The Spiritual Hierarchies and Their Reflection in the Physical World [GA 110]
23. (1909) The Gospel of St. John In Relation to the Other Three Gospels [GA 112]
24. (1909) Deeper Secrets of Human History in the Light of the Gospel of St. Matthew [GA 117]
25. (1909) The Gospel of St. Luke [GA 114]
26. (1909–10) Metamorphoses of the Soul and Paths of Experience [GA 58 & 59]
27. (1910) Manifestations of Karma [GA 120]
28. (1910) Genesis [GA 122]
29. (1910) The Gospel of Matthew [GA 123]
30. (1910) The Mission of Individual Folk-Souls [GA 121]
31. (1911) Atlantis and Lemuria [GA 11]
32. (1911) Faith, Love, and Hope [GA130]
33. (1911/2) The Mission of Christian Rosenkreutz [GA130]
34. (1911) From Jesus to Christ [GA 131]
35. (1911/12) Turning Points in Spiritual History [GA 60]
36. (1911/12) Human History in the Light of Spiritual Investigation [GA 21]
37. (1912) Reincarnation and Karma – Their Significance in Modern Culture [GA 135]
38. (1912) The Gospel of Mark [GA 139]
39. (1913) The Effect of Occult Development Upon the Self and the Sheaths [GA 145]
40. (1913) Secrets of the Threshold [GA 147]
41. (1913) The Occult Significance of the Bhagavad Gita [GA 146] (Ending statement about separation from the Theosophical Society)
42. (1913–14) * Christ and the Spiritual World: The Search for the Holy Grail [GA 149]
43. (1913/14) The Fifth Gospel [GA 148]
44. (1914) The Building in Dornach (The First Goetheanum) [GA 287]
45. (1914) Ways to a New Style in Architecture [GA 286]
46. (1914) Christ and the Human Soul [GA 155]
47. (1914/1915) The Destinies of Individuals and Nations [GA 157]
48. (1915) * The Mystery of Death [GA 159]
49. (1915) The Tree of Life and the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil [GA 162]
50. (1916) * Toward Imagination [GA 169]
51. (1916) Memory and Habit [GA 170]
52. (1916) Necessity and Freedom [GA 166]
53. (1916) The Riddle of Humanity [GA 170]
54. (1917) Fall of the Spirits of Darkness [GA 177]
55. (1916/17) The Karma of Untruthfulness [GA 173 & 174]
56. (1917) * Cosmic and Human Metamorphoses [GA 175] Companion Lecture cycle to Building Stones for an Understanding of the Mystery of Golgotha
57. (1917) * Building Stones for an Understanding of the Mystery of Golgotha [GA 175] Companion Lecture cycle to Cosmic and Human Metamorphoses
58. (1917) Aspects of Human Evolution [GA 176]
59. (1917) The Karma of Materialism [GA 176]
60. (1917) The Secret Brotherhoods and the Mystery of the Human Double [GA 178]
61. (1917) * Mysteries of Ancient and Modern Times [GA 180]
62. (1918) Ancient Myths – Their Meaning and Connection with Evolution [GA 180]
63. (1918) * A Sound Outlook for To-day and a Genuine Hope for the Future [GA 181]
64. (1918) Three Streams in the Evolution of Mankind [GA 184]
65. (1918) The Challenge of the Times [GA186]
66. (1919) Lucifer and Ahriman [GA 191/93]
67. (1919) Mysteries of Light, of Space and of the Earth [GA 194]
68. (1919) Basic Issues of the Social Question [GA 23]
69. (1920) * Roman Catholicism [GA 198]
70. (1920) Man: Hieroglyph of the Universe [GA 201]
71. (1920) The Bridge between Cosmic Spirituality and the Physical Constitution of Humans [GA 202]
72. (1921) The Responsibility of Man for World Evolution [GA 203]
73. (1921) Materialism and the Task of Anthroposophy [GA 204] (One of his most important lecture cycles)
74. (1921) * Therapeutic Insights: Earthly and Cosmic Laws [GA 205]
75. (1922) The Tension Between East and West [GA 83]
76. (1922) * Philosophy, Cosmology and Religion [GA 215]
77. (1922) * Man and the World of Stars & The Spiritual Communion of Mankind [GA 219] (last lecture before the First Goetheanum burned down)
78. (1922) * Man's Life on Earth and in the Spiritual World [GA 211/214/218]
79. (1922/23) The Origins of Natural Science [GA 326]
80. (1923) *** On the Life of the Soul [GA 36]
81. (1923) * A collection of six lectures [GA 220]
82. (1923) * The Driving Force of Spiritual Powers in World History [GA 222]
83. (1923) Evolution of Consciousness [GA227 ]
84. (1923) The Four Seasons and the Archangels [GA229]
85. (1923) * Man as Symphony of the Creative Word [GA 230]
86. (1923) * World History and the Mysteries [GA 233]
87. (1924) * Anthroposophy, An Introduction [GA 234]
88. (1924) * Karma Studies [GA 235]
89. (1924) * The Evolution of the Earth and Man and the Influence of the Stars [GA 354] (chapters are independent lectures)
90. (1924) Karmic Relationships Volume I [GA 235]
91. (1924) Karmic Relationships Volume II [GA 236]
92. (1924) Karmic Relationships Volume III [GA 237]
93. (1924) * Karmic Relationships Volume IV [GA 238] (Includes Rudolf Steiner's Last Address on September 28)
94. (1924) Karmic Relationships Volume V [GA 239]
95. (1924) Karmic Relationships Volume VI [GA 240]
96. (1924) Karmic Relationships Volume VII [GA 239]
97. (1924) * Karmic Relationships Volume VIII [GA 240] (This cycle of lectures is also called Cosmic Christianity and the Impulse of Michael) (Includes 2 lectures on the Arthur Stream)
98. (Sept. 1924) Lectures to Priests The Apocalypse [GA 346]
99. (1923/1924) ** Christmas Conference 1923/1924 [GA 260] (My edited edition)

☆ Lectures of Rudolf Steiner

1. (1904) The Inner Development of Man [GA 53]
2. (1904–09) Esoteric Lessons I [GA 266]
3. (1906) Blood is a Very Special Fluid [GA 55]
4. (1906) Esoteric Christianity – The Gospel of St. John and Ancient Mysteries [GA 68a]
5. (1907) The Education of Children [GA 34]
6. (1907) Who are the Rosicrucians? [GA 55]
7. (1907) The Bible and Wisdom [GA 55]
8. (1907) Illusory Illness and The Feverish Pursuit of Health [GA 56]
9. (1907) The Lord's Prayer [GA 96]
10. (1907) The Animal Soul [GA 97]
11. (1907) The Mysteries – A Christmas and Easter Poem by Goethe [GA 98]
12. (1908) Philosophy & Anthroposophy [GA 35]
13. (1908) Man's Mission on Earth [GA 102]
14. (1908) * The Ten Commandments [GA 108]
15. (1908) * What is Self Knowledge? [GA 108]
16. (1909) The Practical Development of Thinking [GA 57]
17. (1909) The Children of Lucifer and the Brothers of Christ [GA 97]
18. (1909) * The Deed of Christ and the Opposing Spiritual Powers [GA 107]
19. (1909) Practical Training in Thought [GA 108]
20. (1909) Questions of the Law of Karma [GA 108]
21. (1909) Four Noble Truths – Excerpts from The Gospel of Luke, lectures 2 & 3 [GA 114]
22. (1910) The Nature of Prayer [GA 59]
23. (1910) The New Spiritual Age and the Return of Christ (Sermon on the Mount) [GA 118]
24. (1910–12) Esoteric Lessions II [GA 266]
25. (1911) Buddha and Christ: The Sphere of the Bodhisattvas [GA 130]
26. (1912) Christ and the 20th Century [GA 60–61]
27. (1912) The Three Paths of the Soul to Christ [GA 143]
28. (1912) Love and Its Meaning in the World [GA 143]
29. (1912) Conscience and Astonishment As Indications of Spiritual Vision in Past and Future [GA 143]
30. (1912) Calendar of the Soul [GA 143]
31. (1912) Birth of the Light – Thoughts on Christmas Eve [GA 143]
32. (1912) On the Meaning of Life [GA 155]
33. (1913) The Fifth Gospel Vol. 2 [GA 148]
34. (1913) * Newborn Might and Strength Everlasting, A Christmas Lecture [GA 150] (Includes a sample of Dr. Steiner's handwriting)
35. (1914) Evil in the Light of Spiritual Knowledge [GA 63]
36. (1914) * Anthroposophy and Christianity [GA 155]
37. (1915) The Great Virtues [GA 159]
38. (1915) Preparing for the Sixth Epoch [GA 159]
39. (1915) Future Jupiter and its Beings [GA 275]
40. (1916) The Unification of Humanity through the Christ Impulse [GA 165]
41. (1916) How Can the Destitution of Soul in Modern Times be Overcome? [GA 168]
42. (1916) The Moment of Death and Beyond [GA 168]
43. (1916) Architectural Forms Considered as the Thoughts of Culture and World-Perception [GA 288]
44. (1917) Dr. Steiner's Struggles with Slander and Backlash Against His Work [GA 174b]
45. (1917) * The Elemental Spirits of Birth and Death [GA 177]
46. (1917) Behind the Scenes of External Happenings [GA 178] (Same cycle of lectures as The Wrong and Right Use of Esoteric Knowledge)
47. (1917) The Wrong and Right Use of Esoteric Knowledge [GA 178] (Same cycle of lectures as Behind the Scenes of External Happenings)
48. (1918) The Nature of the Thinking Soul and of Meditation [GA 17]
49. (1918) Michael's Battle and Its Reflection On Earth [GA 174a]
50. (1918) The Work of the Angels in Man's Astral Body [GA 182]
51. (1918) * Evil and the Future of Man [GA 185]
52. (1919) Fundamentals of the Science of Initiation [GA 191]
53. (1919) * Elemental Beings and Human Destinies [GA 194]
54. (1919) Concerning the Publication of a Pamphlet by an Evangelical Theologian [GA 255b]
55. (1921) The Remedy for Our Diseased Civilisation [GA 206]
56. (1921) Human Freedom and its Connection with the Mystery of Golgotha [GA 207]
57. (1921) Evil and the Power of Thought [GA 207]
58. (1921) The Seeds of Future Worlds [GA 207]
59. (1922) Spiritual Wisdom in the Early Christian Centuries [GA 213]
60. (1923) Knowledge Pervaded with the Experience of Love [GA 221]
61. (1923) The Invisible Man Within Us [GA 221]
62. (1923) The Need for Understanding The Christ [GA 224]
63. (1923) Our Experiences at Night, Life after Death [GA 226]
64. (1923) Man as a Picture of the Living Spirit [GA 228]
65. (1923) The Spiritual Individualities of our Planetary System's Destiny-Determining and Human-Inwardly-Freeing Planets [GA 228]
66. (1923) The Plant World and the Elemental Spirits [GA 230]
67. (1923) Spiritual Knowledge: A Way of Life [GA 231]
68. (1923) Man and Earth in North and South [GA 351] (How are snowflakes formed?)
69. (1924) Karmic Connections in Relation to the Physical [GA 236]
70. (1925) About the Transcripts of Lectures [GA 28]

☆ The Rudolf Steiner Letters

1. Albert Schweitzer's Friendship with Rudolf Steiner
2. Farmer Zeltner
3. Last Months of Steiner's Life
4. Letter from Steiner to His Sister and Brother
5. How Steiner missed the train at Oldenzaal
6. Letter About Steiner's Sister Five Days Before His Death
7. The Story of My Life, A Letter
8. The Story of My Life, Conclusion by Marie Steiner
9. Introduction to Turning Points in Spiritual History GA 60
10. Rudolf Steiner's Lectures at Oxford, August 1922
11. Herbert Hahn – Rudolf Steiner, as I Knew Him
12. Concerning Lecture Transcripts
13. Steiner's Thoughts on 'Happiness'
14. Rudolf Steiner and the Theosophical Society – A Foreword by Marie Steiner
15. Remembrances of Rudolf Steiner
16. Reminiscences of Rudolf Steiner; a Book Review
17. Rudolf Steiner: Recollections by Some of His Students (The Golden Blade, 1958)

☆ Articles on Spiritual Science

Sixty One years of articles published in the Annual Magazine The Golden Blade

1. ** The Response of Christ Jesus to Being Tormented and Crucified
2. * Urs Schwanderner: Fundamentals of Spiritual Science
3. * Urs Schwanderner: The Supersensible World
4. Nuclear Attacks on the Etheric structure of Humanity
5. Etheric Christ Glimpses
6. Pineal Neuropsychology and The Christ Event
7. The Emergence of the Eighth Sphere
8. The Black Magic of Consumerism
9. The Possible Division of Mankind Through Digital Immortality
10. 'Race' in Light of Spiritual Science
11. Rudolf Steiner Speaks to the Covid Plannedemic
12. The Threefold Social Organism: An Introduction
13. The Eighth Sphere
14. From Gondhishapur to Silicon Valley: A Review by Joel A. Wendt
15. The Michaelmas Festival
16. An article on the 100^th anniversary of the First Goetheanum
17. An article on the Second Goetheanum
18. An article about Rudolf Steiner's studio in the Schreinerei complex
19. Rudolf Steiner by the Newspaper Alchemist
20. On the death of Rudolf Steiner
21. Illusion of Coexistence: The Waldorf Schools in the Third Reich, 1933–1941 (Doctoral Dissertation)
22. Rudolf Steiner at Haus Hansi
23. Good And Evil In Faust
24. I Believe: The young Steiner's worldview
25. Joachim of Fiore
26. Spirituality: Rudolf Steiner's discovery of spiritual wisdom in Goethe's poem, 'Elegy'
27. The Youth of Sais
28. Understanding the Dreamtime: Spiritual Features of Nature-spirituality in the 'Dreaming' of indigenous peoples, and in the faery-lore of old Europe
29. Wagners Ring of the Nibelungen: The Tragic Crisis for Wotan
30. Soul Forces: Thinking, Feeling, and Willing in Relation to the Soul, Spirit, and I
31. The Evolution of Healing (Earth's Evolution)
32. Scientific-Spiritual Aspects of the Coronavirus
33. Reflections on Judith von Halle
34. The Nature of Sorat the Sun Demon
35. The Greatest Spiritual Event of Our Time: Awaken in the Dream
36. Current Fifth Cultural Age
37. Future Oriphiel Age
38. Spiritual Minority in a Materialistic World
39. Eastertide
40. COVID Vaccines: Consequences For The Soul, Spirit, And Life After Death
41. Covid Inoculation Also Attacks the Spirit: Testimony of a Priest Monk (What is to Come for Those Who are Inoculated)
42. Sexual Vampirism – Sex and Entity Attachments
43. Rudolf Steiner and Sri Aurobindo: An Introductory Comparison
44. Protection Against Our Adversaries
45. Owen Barfield: The Light of the World
46. Timeline of Rudolf Steiner's Life
47. New Year's Eve
48. * Jack the Giant-Killer and Ourselves
49. The Grand Illusion
50. * Earliest Recorded Autobiography of Rudolf Steiner
51. * The Search for Felix the Herb-Gatherer
52. Anthroposophy and Religion
53. * The Personality of Rudolf Steiner and His Development
54. ** The Grail Triptych by Douglas Gabriel
55. * Logismoi or Assaultive Thoughts
56. Tintagel: In the Footsteps of Rudolf Steiner
57. Adriana Koulias: The Seven Cultural Epochs
58. Adriana Koulias: A Time of Decision
59. Adriana Koulias: The Book of Revelations, The Holy Grail - An exploration of Karma, Soul Transformation and Modern Initiation
60. Adriana Koulias: Faith Love and Hope as a Counterforce to Evil & The Task of Anthroposophy In the 5th Post Atlantean Epoch
61. Adriana Koulias: The Mystery of Sorath
62. Adriana Koulias: Cosmic Sophia, and Human Anthroposophia: Their Connection to Humanity
63. Adriana Koulias: Meeting The Two Guardians, The Lesser and the Greater At the Mysterious Threshold of the Spiritual World
64. Adriana Koulias: The Trinity of Nathan Soul, Vidar, and Michael In the Past, Present and Future Sacrifices of Christ
65. Bondarev: Consciousness and Civilization
66. Jennifer M. Gidley, PhD: Rudolf Steiner
67. The Meaning of the Present Time
68. * Chakra Development Through the Writings of Rudolf Steiner
69. * Demonic Possession
70. 100 Years after The Christmas Foundation Meeting
71. Christmas: The Birth of the Light for the Redemption of Humanity
72. Bradford Riley: Features of our Sub-surface Shadows

☆ 'Deep Dive' Articles

Most of this material is extracted from the FreeManCreator website.

1. * The Human Bodily Organization
2. The Arthur Stream
3. The Contemporary Worldview War
4. The Counterforces: Lucifer, Ahriman and Sorat
5. The Fourfold Human Being: A Deep-Dive Look at the Human Being
6. Gender and Sexuality
7. The Meaning of Life
8. Moral Ideals
9. Epochs and Ages
10. Mystery of the Blood
11. Seeds for Future Worlds
12. The Threefold Human Being
13. Spiritual Minority in a Materialistic World
14. * Kamaloka
15. * On Karma
16. The Twelve Holy Nights & Epiphany
17. On the Edge of the Abyss
18. Interpreting the Bible
19. Reincarnation in the Bible
20. Rakshasas, Asuras and the Eighth Sphere
21. Overview of the Adversarial Influences
22. * The Elementary Kingdoms
23. * Pentecost
24. Developing Imaginations and the Imaginative Process
25. Group Souls
26. * The Fall and Redemption Original Sin and Grace
27. * Cultural Ages Overview — Excerpts that provide a birdseye view of the Cultural Ages
28. * Esoteric School
29. * The Sixth Epoch: Preparing for the future
30. (1923) The Invisible Man Within Us [GA 221]
31. History
32. Gospel of John as an Initiation Document
33. The Holy Grail
34. From the Nativity to Epiphany
35. The Golden Legend

☆ Other Subjects & Material written by others

1. Perennial Philosophy (Anthony)
2. Light on the Path & The Gates of Gold
3. The Apocryphon of John | The Secret Book of John
4. Light on the Path (My edition)
5. The Dolorous Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ (Emmerich)
6. The Life of the Blessed Virgin Mary (Emmerich)
7. Karl Von Eckartshausen: Cloud Upon the Sanctuary
8. Major Arcana of the Tarot
9. An Esoteric Reading of Biblical Symbolism
10. Gospel of Nicodemus
11. The Book of Enoch
12. The Gospel of Thomas
13. The Geneva Bible 1560
14. Isis Mary Sophia: Her Mission and Ours
15. Pistis Sophia 1896
16. Pistis Sophia – 2007 Edition of the 1896 Translation
17. * Twelve Keys of Basil Valentine
18. The Kybalion
19. The Seven Hermetic Principles
20. * The Battle for the Soul, Bernard Lievegoed
21. * The Eye of the Needle, Bernard Lievegoed
22. * Intuitive Meetings Within Anthroposophy, Martha Keltz
23. * The Fountain of Christ, Martha Keltz
24. Irina Gordienko's on Sergei O. Prokofieff
25. Interview with Judith von Halle
26. Aristotle: Categories
27. Goethe's Faust (illustrated)
28. Synopsis of Wagner's Parsifal
29. Twelve Holy Nights (Anthony)

☆ Spiritual Science by Topic

☉ World War I

1. (1915) Thoughts During the Time of War [GA 24]
2. (1916/17) The Karma of Untruthfulness [GA 173 & 174]
3. (1917) The Karma of Materialism [GA 176]
4. (1918) The Challenge of the Times [GA186]
5. (1922) The Tension Between East and West [GA 83]
6. (1917) The Secret Brotherhoods and the Mystery of the Human Double [GA 178]
7. (1917) Fall of the Spirits of Darkness [GA 177]

☉ Karma

1. (1903) Reincarnation and Karma: From the Point of View of Modern Scientific Thought [GA 34]
2. (1909) Questions of the Law of Karma [GA 108]
3. (1910) Manifestations of Karma [GA 120]
4. (1912) Reincarnation and Karma – Their Significance in Modern Culture [GA 135]
5. (1916/17) The Karma of Untruthfulness [GA 173 & 174]
6. (1917) The Karma of Materialism [GA 176]
7. (1924) Karma Studies [GA 235]
8. (1924) Karmic Relationships Volume I [GA 235]
9. (1924) Karmic Relationships Volume II [GA 236]
10. (1924) Karmic Relationships Volume III [GA 237]
11. (1924) Karmic Relationships Volume IV (Includes Rudolf Steiner's Last Address) [GA 238]

☉ Festivals

1. From the Nativity to Epiphany: A Sketch of the Two Jesus Children and Jesus of Nazareth
2. (1904–1921) Esoteric Christmas
3. (1912) Birth of the Light – Thoughts on Christmas Eve [GA 143]
4. (1913) * Newborn Might and Strength Everlasting, A Christmas Lecture [GA 150] (Includes a sample of Dr. Steiner's handwriting)
5. (1923) The Four Seasons and the Archangels [GA229]
6. (1907) The Mysteries – A Christmas and Easter Poem by Goethe [GA 98]
7. The Michaelmas Festival
8. Eastertide
9. New Year's Eve

☉ Controversial Topics

1. 'Race' in Light of Spiritual Science
2. (1908–09) The Being of Man and His Future Evolution [GA 107] (Original Sin, Races of Men)
3. (1913/14) The Fifth Gospel [GA 148] (Two Jesus Children)

☉ Cosmology

1. (1906) An Esoteric Cosmology [GA94]
2. (1923) The Four Seasons and the Archangels [GA229]
3. (1909) The Spiritual Hierarchies and Their Reflection in the Physical World [GA 110]
4. (1911) Atlantis and Lemuria [GA 11]
5. (1922) Man and the World of Stars & The Spiritual Communion of Mankind [GA 219] (last lecture before the First Goetheanum burned down)
6. (1907) Occult Signs and Symbols [GA 101]
7. (1909) The Spiritual Hierarchies and the Physical World [GA 110]

☉ Illness

1. (1906) The Origin of Suffering, The Origin of Evil, Illness and Death [GA 55]
2. (1907) Illusory Illness and The Feverish Pursuit of Health [GA 56]
3. (1908–09) The Being of Man and His Future Evolution [GA 107]

☉ Related the Bible

The Bible is but a seed that, when planted in the [good] soil of the heart and is thereafter cultivated with love and yearning, blossoms Truth that is hidden within. To quote Steiner, "Within the seed already lies concealed what — as the force of the whole plant — later grows out of it." (Knowledge of Higher Worlds)

1. Interpreting the Bible
2. (1906) Esoteric Christianity – The Gospel of St. John and Ancient Mysteries [GA 68a]
3. (1907) The Lord's Prayer [GA 96]
4. (1907/09) Reading the Pictures of the Apocalypse [GA 104a]
5. (1908) * The Gospel of St. John [GA 103]
6. (1908) * The Ten Commandments [GA 108]
7. (1908) * The Apocalypse of St. John [GA 104] (see 1924 lectures on the Apocalypse, GA 346)
8. (1909) * The Gospel of St. Luke [GA 114]
9. (1909) * Deeper Secrets of Human History in the Light of the Gospel of St. Matthew [GA 117]
10. (1910) Genesis [GA 122]
11. (1910) * The Gospel of Matthew [GA 123]
12. (1912) * The Gospel of Mark [GA 139]
13. (1910) * The New Spiritual Age and the Return of Christ (Sermon on the Mount) [GA 118]
14. (1914) Christ and the Human Soul [GA 155]
15. Reincarnation in the Bible
16. An Esoteric Reading of Biblical Symbolism
17. Gospel of Nicodemus
18. The Book of Enoch
19. The Gospel of Thomas (Older than the writings of the Four Evangelists)
20. The Geneva Bible 1560
21. (1907) The Bible and Wisdom [GA 55]

☉ Lucifer & Ahriman

1. (1919) Lucifer and Ahriman [GA 191/93]
2. The Nature of Sorat the Sun Demon

☉ Society

1. (1919) The Threefold Social Order [GS 23]
2. (1920) Renewal of the Social Organism [GA 24]

☉ The Christ

1. (1916) The Unification of Humanity through the Christ Impulse [GA 165]
2. (1911) Buddha and Christ: The Sphere of the Bodhisattvas [GA 130]
3. (1912) Christ and the 20th Century [GA 60–61]
4. (1912) The Three Paths of the Soul to Christ [GA 143]
5. (1911) From Jesus to Christ [GA 131]

☉ Mystery of Golgotha

1. (1910) Christianity as Mystical Fact [GA 8]
2. (1917) Cosmic and Human Metamorphoses [GA 175] (MoG, chapter 4)

☉ Thinking

1. (1909) The Practical Development of Thinking [GA 57]
2. (1918) The Nature of the Thinking Soul and of Meditation [GA 17]
3. Soul Forces: Thinking, Feeling, and Willing in Relation to the Soul, Spirit, and I

☉ Rosicrucian

1. (1907) Who are the Rosicrucians? [GA 55]
2. (1907) Theosophy of the Rosicrucian [GA 99]
3. (1907) Theosophy and Rosicrucianism [GA 100]

☉ Covid

1. COVID Vaccines: Consequences For The Soul, Spirit, And Life After Death
2. Rudolf Steiner Speaks to the Covid Plannedemic
3. Covid Inoculation Also Attacks the Spirit: Testimony of a Priest Monk (What is to Come for Those Who are Inoculated)
4. Sexual Vampirism – Sex and Entity Attachments
5. The Metaphysical Consequences of the COVID Jab In Light of the Occult Matrix and The Way Out
6. The Long Range Matrix Agenda and What We Can Do About It
7. Corona Vaccines from the Spiritual Perspective

☉ The First Goetheanum

1. (1914) The Building in Dornach (The First Goetheanum) [GA 287]
2. (1914) Ways to a New Style in Architecture [GA 286]

☉ The Cinema

1. (1917) Cosmic and Human Metamorphoses [GA 175] (End of chapter 4)

☆ Infographics & Study Grids

1. Earth Incarnations
2. Anthony's Infographics
3. The Mystery of Jesus
4. The Forty Days of Jesus in the Desert
5. The Grail Triptych

☆ Image Galleries

1. Artwork of the First Goetheanum
2. Goetheanum Site in Dornach Switzerland
3. Rudolf Steiner's Blackboard Drawings
4. Representative of Humanity Sculpture
5. Rudolf Steiner
6. Artists
7. Prominent Women
8. Arlid Rosenkranz: The Seven Apocalyptic Seals