Rudolf Steiner (1861–1925) is the philosopher and spiritual teacher behind such practical activities as Steiner Schools, biodynamic agriculture (as in television's Chateau Monty), and Weleda medicines.
Steiner's work is a body of spiritual knowledge, obtained by his own "spiritual perception" and elaborated as a "spiritual science", based on his own philosophical foundation. He discusses whether a "spiritual science" is possible, and outlines how to develop "spiritual perception". This knowledge and its validity are based on a theory of knowledge and on the development of ordinary thinking into an activity that perceives reality.
Steiner strikes me as rooted in the nineteenth century, in the three areas of philosophy, natural science, and theosophy. Kant (d. 1804) had determined limits to man's faculty of knowledge. Steiner's own theory of knowledge had to take account of Kantianism in order for spiritual knowledge to be valid. Natural science was held by serious people to be the one means of sure knowledge, and a "spiritual science" had to engage with that view.
On the other hand, spiritualism developed in the 1840s, and Helena Blavatsky founded the Theosophical Society in 1875 to investigate spiritual phenomena. Meanwhile, in England, the ritual-based Order of the Golden Dawn attracted well known artists and wealthy people. Around the turn of the century, Steiner began presenting spiritual teachings, and he became the head of the German section of the Theosophical Society. But there was a conflict between the Society's emphasis on non-Christian Indian/Tibetan knowledge, and Steiner's Western approach and emphasis on Christ.
"Anthroposophy" is the name of Steiner's spiritual science. The Anthroposophical Society was formed when Steiner was expelled from the Theosophical Society. Its headquarters in Britain today is Rudolf Steiner House in London.
Our physical senses perceive only physical things. Everything alive has not only a physical body but a "life body" within and behind that physical body, hidden from the physical senses. This "body of formative forces" maintains the life activities of nutrition, growth, reproduction in the physical body. For historical reasons it is known as the "etheric body". It is of course not a second body walking around with us, but a body of forces within our being.
For Steiner, the etheric body is not an item of speculation, but something that can be perceived and studied just as a physical phenomenon can—when the required non-physical "senses" have been developed.
Everything sentient, every being that senses and feels, has also a "sentient body", historically called the "astral body". A human has still more members of his/her being—different levels of "soul" and "spirit". In particular, a human being has self-consciousness, an "ego" or "I". When I say "I", I am referring only to myself. I cannot refer to anyone else as "I", and nobody else can refer to me as "I". A human being has a kind of inner life which is experienced as an independence from everything outside—an inner life he/she would not have merely by sensing and feeling.
When a human being dies, the body of formative forces departs the physical, and the physical body disintegrates. The life-body similarly dissolves into its environment, and the soul and spirit dwell in a spiritual world. In this world, the results of the person's life take effect, eventually leading the individual to another life on Earth in which the results of the previous life are incorporated. This is a teaching of reincarnation and karma.
Just as the physical body has evolved over time, so have the non-physical members of the human being. Steiner adds to natural science's physical evolution the evolution of consciousness. He describes various "cultural epochs" in which consciousness was different. For example, there was an "Indian epoch" in which the physical world was perceived as "maya", illusion. Our own epoch is characterised by independent self-consciousness and seeing the material world as the only reality. These are necessary for us to develop free will, to make our own choices based on our own perceptions, instead of being just an extension of the gods.
In the "Graeco-Latin" cultural epoch, the Christ, a spiritual being, incarnated in the man Jesus and bore the sufferings and much negative karma of humanity. After the Crucifixion, He brought light to the spiritual world in which human beings dwell after death, and is now united with the Earth and its future evolution.
Steiner claims to have experienced a spiritual world from childhood. When he studied Kant's theory of knowledge, which determined limits to human knowledge from the nature of cognition, Steiner knew that these limits were not binding. When he studied natural science, and its thoughts which are abstractions and theories of the physical world, he knew that was not the only kind of thinking. But he wanted to reconcile these things with his experience, in clear thinking, not to retreat from them into vagueness or faith.
Steiner says that he first knew happiness when studying a book of geometry. A geometrical form in the mind is fully clear and knowable, and yet exists only in the mind, not to the physical senses. This was the model for his "spiritual knowledge".
Steiner developed the necessary account of knowledge while working on the scientific writings of the poet Goethe. A Theory of Knowledge Implicit in Goethe's World-Conception is his first book, published when he was 25. The mature presentation is The Philosophy of Freedom (1894). These books examine human thinking and cognition. They are accounts from first principles, intended to rely on nothing outside themselves, in a similar way to Descartes' Meditations. The finding is that thought is not merely an abstraction or copy of perceived objects which are already complete in themselves, but that thinking brings part of the world to manifestation that would otherwise be unmanifest.
Steiner gives the example of a stone thrown through the air. We find that the path taken by the stone is a parabola. A parabola is a mathematical form, purely an idea. We do not receive the idea of a parabola when we watch the stone moving. It is obtained by thinking. And yet it belongs to the phenomenon just as much as any aspect perceived through the senses.
In The Philosophy of Freedom, Steiner discusses alternative views of perception and knowledge, including Berkeley's view that matter does not exist, only perceptions, and the Kantian views that external reality does exist but is unknowable. I think that Steiner's criticism of these views deserves attention, even if his own views cannot be accepted.
Thus thinking is an activity which works in a "world of thought", not empty abstractions but real content of its own. We are not aware of this because usually our thinking is directed outward at objects, not inward at itself. Thinking about thinking is the basis of Steiner's philosophical work.
Another potential activity of thinking is meditation on a deliberately chosen symbolic mental content. According to Steiner, this strengthens the mind and awakens a region of the mind previously empty. With these awakened faculties, founded on clear thinking, not on vague mysticism, not only the world of thoughts but a world of spiritual beings becomes accessible.
What is worth noting about Rudolf Steiner is the combination of a philosophical theory of knowledge, a comprehensive spiritual world view, and the many practical activities he inspired. To find out more, I recommend Steiner's Philosophy of Freedom for some philosophical mental gymnastics, and Johannes Hemleben's Rudolf Steiner: An Illustrated Biography for his life and work.
Copyright © 2009 Nigel Perks