The Rudolf Steiner Archive

1. What principles underlie the establishment of the Waldorf School?

[ 1 ] Today I would like to speak to you about the Waldorf School founded by our friend, Mr. Molt. As you are likely aware from the announcements, this school is intended to be a kind of first step on the path toward a free spiritual life. In founding this Waldorf School, Mr. Molt felt a strong impulse to contribute to a free spiritual life—one that, with regard to the social tasks of the present and the future, is to be shaped by the threefold social order. This Waldorf School can, of course, only succeed if it is thoroughly imbued with the spirit from which the threefold social order is sought. It is only too understandable that such a first step cannot be perfect right away, and the realization that such a first step cannot be perfect right away will be part of the understanding that we so dearly hope will be shown—at least by some of the contemporaries of this school’s founding.

[ 2 ] The work has already begun, specifically with those individuals who have decided on their own initiative to participate—or who have been selected by us—currently taking part in a kind of seminar-style course that began recently and is intended to prepare them for their work at the Waldorf School. Only a few individuals have been invited to this course—namely, those who, based on their life experiences to date, appear suited to work in the spirit of the cultural movement that the Waldorf School is intended to serve, and who seem especially called to work in the field of education. But there is, of course, a pressing need for the Waldorf School to be met with understanding, at least initially within a smaller circle. Indeed, the more one becomes immersed in social life, the more one will realize that mutual understanding among people with regard to their achievements is, first and foremost, an integral part of the social life yet to be established. And so it seems to me that, for the time being, those individuals who can express their interest of their own accord are best suited to participate in the discussions that are to be held here today and next Sunday in connection with the aspirations of the Waldorf School.

[ 3 ] However, I would very much like to see something else come about to foster this understanding: Undoubtedly, all parents of children who wish to attend the Waldorf School have a deep interest in what the Waldorf School is intended to achieve. And so it would be particularly important to me if, before the opening of this Waldorf school in the first half of September, a meeting could somehow be convened once again, in which all parents of children who wish to attend this Waldorf school would participate; for only that which is rooted in the understanding of those who are involved in such endeavors with their souls and their whole lives can truly flourish in a socially oriented community life.

[ 4 ] What I would like to discuss with you today is intended to be a discussion of the goals—and, to some extent, also a discussion of the methods of teaching and education—as they are to be approached by the Waldorf School. Indeed, with the Waldorf School, we wish to create what, in our view, should be created out of the particular stage of human development that has been historically reached in the present and for the near future. The founding of the Waldorf School should not be misunderstood to mean that everything in the old school system is bad. Nor should it be assumed that our starting points in establishing the Waldorf School were merely a critique of the old school system. It is, in fact, something entirely different.

[ 5 ] Over the course of the last three to four centuries, a political and legal life, an intellectual and cultural life, and an economic life have emerged in social life; these have taken on a certain configuration and are now—as I have often discussed in recent times—rushing headlong toward a restructuring of our social relations. The school system is particularly integrated into this forward momentum precisely because, over the past three to four centuries, it has become entirely dependent on the state, so that one can say: In a very special way, the school system participates in the state. Now one might say: To a certain extent—though admittedly only to a very limited extent—our school system was appropriate to the institutions into which people had grown through the state configuration of the civilized world. But it is precisely a transformation of this configuration of states that is being sought, and according to the views that will underlie future configurations of states, it will not be possible to leave the school system in the same relationship to the state as it has been until now. Precisely when a social restructuring of the state and economic systems is being pursued, the need to separate the intellectual sphere in general—and the school and educational systems in particular, in terms of their administration—from the realm of state and legal life and from economic life will become all the more urgent. This need has been felt for a very, very long time. But one might say: all pedagogical endeavors in the recent past, and especially in the present, have a certain sense of oppression about them; they have something that seems reluctant to look beyond the broader perspectives of cultural life as a whole. All of this has come about because of the particular way in which public life, in the recent past and especially in the present, has related to endeavors such as those in the field of education.

[ 6 ] Of course, the Waldorf School will have to conform to all current public views and institutions regarding education and instruction; we will not be able to achieve everything we would like to achieve right away—we will, quite naturally, be compelled to generally adhere, step by step, to the curricula that are currently mandated by the public authorities. We will be required to ensure that students graduating from our school have reached the level required for transition to higher schools, particularly universities. We will therefore not be able to structure our curriculum in the way we consider most consistent with the ideal of a truly human education; we will, so to speak, only be able to make use of the gaps that remain in the tightly woven net that extends over the school system, in order to work—in the spirit of a completely free intellectual being—toward the instruction and education of the children entrusted to the Waldorf School. We will carefully exploit these openings in every direction. We will certainly not yet be able to create a model school, but we will be able to demonstrate the degree of inner strengthening and genuine inner education to which a person can be brought when this inner strengthening and education are brought about not by something prescribed from the outside, but purely through the demands of spiritual and cultural life itself.

[ 7 ] We will have to contend with a great deal of resistance, particularly with regard to the understanding that can still be shown toward us today; we will have to contend with this resistance precisely because—as I have often mentioned here—people are essentially talking past one another when it comes to their current understanding. Especially in the field of education and teaching, one can experience time and again that, apparently from the perspectives represented here, people elsewhere are also discussing a transformation of this educational and teaching system. People whose views are deeply rooted in the recent past of current teaching and educational principles listen to you and say: “Yes, that’s quite right; that’s exactly what we’ve wanted for a long time!”—but in reality, of course, they want something entirely different. But today, as we speak our words, we have distanced ourselves so far from the substance of things that we listen to one another and believe we mean the same thing when using the same words—when in fact we mean the exact opposite. So pervasive has become throughout the civilized world what must be described, in the broadest sense, as empty rhetoric! After all, we have indeed experienced the reign of empty rhetoric to the greatest extent over long periods of time within this civilized world of ours, and woven into this reign of empty rhetoric was the most terrible event to have befallen world history: the horrific catastrophe of war in recent years! Just think for a moment about how much empty rhetoric has played a role in everything connected with this catastrophe, and you will arrive at a judgment—one that will truly horrify you from within—regarding the reign of empty rhetoric in our time.

[ 8 ] Thus, even in the field of education today, one can hear from those who truly aspire inwardly to something entirely different from what is meant here that, in education and teaching, it is not the subject matter that matters, but the student. You know, since we must make use of the words in our vocabulary, we will often have to say: it is not the subject matter that matters, but the student, and within our Waldorf school we want to use the subject matter in such a way that, at every level of instruction, it does not serve merely to convey external knowledge, but rather serves to further the student’s human development with regard to the formation of the will, the feelings, and the intellect. Each individual subject should not be an end in itself in terms of its teaching, but rather the teacher should master the art of so that, through its appropriate handling, it affects the student in the way it is intended to affect them during the relevant years of development—in accordance with a truly understood understanding of human development—so that they may become a person who is mature enough for life and who fulfills their place in it. One must be consciously aware that every stage of human life brings forth, from the depths of human nature, the predispositions for certain soul forces. If these predispositions are not developed during the relevant stage of life, they can no longer be truly developed later on: they will then wither away, and the person will be ill-equipped for life in terms of their will, their emotions, and their intellect; they will not properly take their rightful place in life. Precisely between the change of teeth and sexual maturity—a period that coincides with the years of formal schooling—it is of the utmost importance to recognize which spiritual and physical powers are striving to emerge from the individual so that he or she may later fulfill their role in life.

[ 9 ] Everything I have just said might, for example, be heard by someone who has taken the educational ideas of the past decades to heart, and that person would say: “I couldn’t agree more!” But what that person does in an educational context based on this opinion is by no means what is intended here. We often talk past one another these days, and that is why we must try to draw attention, in a somewhat deeper way, to what the Waldorf school actually aims for. Above all, people today are—one might almost say—obsessed with a certain impulse to take everything as absolute. What I mean by this is the following: When people today speak of how a person should be educated in this or that way—let’s just talk about that for now; one could also extend the same considerations in various ways to other areas of life—then one always has in mind that it should be something that applies to human beings in an absolute sense, something that is, so to speak, absolutely right, something that, if only it had been intended to be applied, could have been applied to human beings, for example, in ancient Egypt, in ancient Greece, just as it could still be applied in four thousand years by the people who will be living then, and which can also be applied in China, Japan, etc. This view, by which modern man is downright obsessed—that he can establish something absolutely valid—is the greatest enemy of all reality. Therefore, the crucial point is to recognize that we are not human beings in an absolute sense, but rather human beings of a very specific era; that, in terms of their spiritual and even physical constitution, people in the present age are different from, for example, the Greeks and Romans, and also that they will be different from the people who will live even after a relatively short time—after half a millennium. Therefore, we do not view the task of education in an absolute sense, but rather as arising from the needs of the present and the near future of human culture.

[ 10 ] We ask: What is the nature of civilized humanity today?—and on that basis we form our view of how we must educate and instruct it. We know full well that a Greek or a Roman must have been educated differently, and in five hundred years’ time, humanity will once again have to be educated differently. We want to establish a foundation for education in our present time and the near future. The only way to truly devote oneself to humanity is to become aware of this real condition for human development and not to constantly set one’s sights on nebulous, absolute goals. Therefore, it is necessary to point out what specifically threatens the current system of education and instruction—and what we wish to avert in the present.

[ 11 ] I have just pointed out how some people already say that it is not the subject matter that matters, but rather the student; that what matters is how the teacher should conduct himself in instructing the student, and how he uses the subject matter for this instruction, for this education. But alongside this, we see a strange alternative approach, particularly among those very people who express such views—an approach that, in a sense, completely paralyzes and renders impossible precisely what they demand more for the student than for the subject matter itself.

[ 12 ] It has been observed that, when speaking in this way, the intellectual life of science has gradually become too much for people to handle due to the specialization of scientific material, and that this material has been presented to students in a certain superficial manner—without regard for the student—purely for the sake of knowledge. So people now say: We must not do that; we must educate the student in a way that is grounded in the very nature of the young human child. But from what, then, do we intend to learn how to treat the student? We seek to learn it from the very science that has developed under the very regime we wish to combat; we wish to understand the nature of the child, yet we strive to investigate it through all manner of experimental psychology using the very methods that science has adopted by confining itself to the very deficiency we seek to remedy. Thus, through experimental psychology at the universities, one seeks to investigate the specific methods that are appropriate for pedagogy. One seeks to introduce experimental pedagogy into university life, to bring into it all the one-sidedness that science has adopted. So one seeks to reform. They want to reform because they have a vague sense of the need for reform, but from the very spirit that brought about the old ways they wish to preserve. They want to establish a science of education, but they want to establish it out of that scientific spirit that arose precisely because people were not properly educated.

[ 13 ] Such powerful forces in our cultural development are not yet apparent. One does not even realize how one becomes entangled in conflicts and contradictions while, on the one hand, having the very best of intentions. Even if one or two people might hold a different view regarding what I am about to say, it can still be said that, in many respects within the field of education, Johann Friedrich Herbart is one of the most significant figures of modern times. Through the educational movement he founded, Herbart actually stands, in a certain sense, alone as an educational writer and practitioner in modern times. His *General Pedagogy* was published in 1806. He then continued his own pedagogical work year after year in such a way that he was always able to learn something new. In 1835, the *Outline* of his pedagogical lectures was published, demonstrating how far he himself had progressed in his understanding of pedagogical problems. It can therefore be said that a significant portion of educational development in the second half of the 19th century stemmed from the impetus provided by Herbart’s pedagogy, since, for example, the entire Austrian school system was inspired by it. And even in Germany today, the spirit of Herbart’s pedagogy continues to live on to a remarkable degree in attitudes toward teaching and education. Therefore, if one wishes to orient oneself today—specifically in the sense of speaking not in absolutist terms but with the awareness that one is situated within a particular cultural epoch—one must already begin to grapple with what constitutes the content of Herbart’s pedagogy and what truly constitutes a pedagogical force, a pedagogical reality.

[ 14 ] If one wishes to understand Herbart correctly, one can say: Herbart, with all his thoughts and ideas, is still fully immersed in that cultural period which, for the true observer of human development, came to a clear conclusion in the mid-15th century. Since the mid-15th century, we have been living in a new epoch for civilized humanity, but we have achieved little in pursuing the impulses that arose in the 15th century; and what was at work before the 15th century continues to shape our lives. In our educational life, it has continued in a spirited and significant way in all that Herbart himself worked on and in what emanated from him. If one were to characterize what actually underlies that long period in human development—which began in the 8th century B.C. and ended in the middle of the 15th century—in terms of human evolution, one must say: within this period, humanity developed in such a way that everything pertaining to the intellect and the emotions was still instinctive. Since that time—since the middle of the 15th century—humanity has been striving toward self-awareness; it has been striving to stand at the pinnacle of its own personality. There is no more significant shift in the historical impulses driving human development—as they pertain to the present and the future—than the transition from the instinctive understanding and instinctive emotional activity of the Greco-Latin era, which gradually came to an end in the 15th century, to the newer era that began in the 15th century! All the detailed explanations proving what I have said can be found in my writings and publications. Here we must simply accept as a fact that, by the middle of the 15th century, something new began for humanity: the striving for conscious personal influence, whereas previously there had been an instinctive understanding and emotional striving. This instinctive understanding and emotional striving had a certain tendency to cultivate intellectual life in a one-sided manner. It might seem strange to say of a time that instinctively oriented the intellect that, at its peak, this era led to a special development—an overdevelopment—of the intellectual and of human intellectuality. But one will no longer be surprised by such an idea when one considers that the intellectual aspect at work in human beings need not always be a conscious, personal one, and that it is precisely through instinct that the intellectual can find its highest expression. One need only recall that humans discovered paper much later than wasps did through their—admittedly—instinctive intellect; for wasp nests consist of paper and are shaped from it in exactly the same way that humans shape paper through their intellect. For intellect need not act solely through human beings; rather, it can also permeate other beings without the personality—which is only to develop in our age—being simultaneously raised to its highest level.

[ 15 ] Naturally, in an era such as this—in which intellectualism strove to develop to its highest peak—there was also a desire to infuse the educational system and everything that intellectually permeates it with intellectualism. Anyone who examines Herbart’s pedagogy will indeed find within it a strong emphasis on the need to educate the will and the mind. But if one were not to stop at mere statements, but were to move on to reality, one would notice the following. One would notice that the training in self-discipline and order, as it manifests in Herbart’s pedagogy, somewhat rigidly insists: the will must be trained; the mind must be trained. Yet what Herbart offers in terms of content is actually only suitable for developing intellectuality. And because it is instinctively felt—most of all by Herbart himself—that what he offers in terms of pedagogical principles is not sufficient to comprehend the whole person, but only the person as intellectual being, he demands, out of a sound instinct, again and again: there must also be the formation of the mind and the will.

[ 16 ] The only question is: Is it really possible, based on these principles, to educate and instruct the mind and will in an appropriate manner—in a way that is grounded in the nature of the human being? I would like to draw your attention to the fact that Herbart assumes that all pedagogy must be grounded in psychology and philosophy—that is, in a general worldview and in an understanding of the life of the human soul. Now, Herbart’s thinking is thoroughly abstract in orientation, and he has, in fact, carried this abstract orientation specifically into his psychology. I would like to explain this to you in layman’s terms using an example from Herbart’s psychology.

[ 17 ] We know that three fundamental forces are at work in the human being: thinking, feeling, and willing. We know that the health of the human soul depends on these three fundamental forces—thinking, feeling, and willing—developing in an appropriate manner, so that each of these fundamental forces is given its due. What does Herbart’s philosophy offer regarding the cultivation of these fundamental forces?

[ 18 ] Herbart believes that the entire life of the soul is initially subsumed in the life of the imagination; he regards feeling as nothing more than figments of the imagination. And for Herbart, volition, striving, and desire are also figments of the imagination. Thus, you may hear the following from Herbartians: When we strive to drink water because we are thirsty, we are not actually striving for the substance of the water at all, but rather we are striving to rid ourselves of the mental image that thirst triggers within us and to replace it in our soul with the mental image of quenched thirst. We therefore do not desire the water at all, but rather we desire that the mental image of thirst cease and be replaced by the mental image of quenched thirst. When we seek a lively conversation, we do not seek the content of that lively conversation; rather, we long for a change in the mental images currently within us and are actually striving for what will emerge within us as a mental image through the lively conversation. When we experience pleasure, we do not experience it as the effect of some elemental force of our soul; rather, we experience it because certain mental images that are pleasant to us easily rise into our consciousness, easily overcoming the opposing inhibitions—and this experience—that a mental image easily penetrates into our consciousness in the face of the inhibitions that resist it—is what constitutes pleasure. Everything is driven by the life of the imagination; everything else is, in fact, merely what is meant to be revealed through that active life of the imagination. One might say: Herbart’s entire way of thinking and everything that has been built upon it to this day—and more than one might think has been built upon Herbart’s way of thinking—is permeated by a belief, albeit not a conscious but an unconscious one, that true inner life consists in the interplay of mutual inhibition and support among mental images, and that what manifests as feeling and will consists precisely only in the movements of the life of the imagination. One must not be misled by the fact that, although many people with a pedagogical orientation today claim to oppose teaching and educating in a way that directs one’s efforts solely toward the life of the imagination, they say this but do not act accordingly; everything they do is based on the underlying mental image: it all comes down to the mental image! And the strangest thing one can experience today is precisely this way of life people lead, full of such contradictions. How much is preached and declaimed today about the need to consider the whole person, to ensure that the life of the soul—that is, the life of feeling and will—is not neglected. Yes, but when it comes down to practice, it is precisely those who speak so grandly about the development of the life of feeling and will who are most likely to intellectualize in their teaching and education. People simply do not understand themselves because the word has strayed so far from the thing itself and has become a mere phrase.

[ 19 ] These are the issues that must be examined with the utmost care today if we are to strive, particularly in the field of education and teaching, toward standards that are appropriate to our current cultural era.

[ 20 ] This brings me to a key point: It is often said that what matters is not the subject matter but the student; however, as I have already mentioned, the methods of one-sided science seek to study the student through educational science. But one cannot come close to the human being through the outwardly focused science of the past few centuries. A completely different orientation is needed to come close to the human being. And this orientation is what our anthroposophically oriented Spiritual Science strives for. We want to replace anthropology—which has become external—and the external understanding of the human being with another approach that truly addresses the whole human being: their physical, soul, and spiritual nature. Certainly, people today emphasize—even in their words—the spiritual and the soul, but they do not truly understand them.

[ 21 ] And so it happens that no one has really noticed that something like Herbart’s worldview is, particularly with regard to the soul, entirely intellectualistic, and that it therefore cannot find its way into our cultural era. On the other hand, Herbart seeks to build upon philosophy. But the philosophy on which he builds also came to an end with the conclusion of that historical period that drew to a close in the middle of the 15th century. In our own era, a worldview that truly addresses the spiritual must find its place. And it is only from this worldview that the soul-spiritual aspect of the human being can truly be strengthened to the point where it can be connected with what we find, from a purely anthropological perspective, in relation to the physical-bodily realm. For our age is truly great, even in its infantile understanding of the physical-bodily realm, even if it often merely touches upon the soul. But pick up a contemporary psychology book—and do so as people with a healthy sensibility—and ask yourselves what you can actually gain from it. There you will find discussions about the world of imagination, the world of feeling, and the world of the will. But what you find associated with these terms—mental image, feeling, and will—is, at its core, merely a play on words. You will not gain any deeper understanding of the nature of mental image, feeling, and will by studying modern psychology. Therefore, one cannot build true pedagogy on the foundation of modern psychology. We must first be able to return to the factual, to the true nature of mental images, feeling, and will. This does not require that overripe, scholastic spirit that prevails in psychology today; rather, it requires a genuine gift for observing human life. What is supposed to be observed today in psychological and educational laboratories seems like something that, in its endeavors, is inspired by the best of intentions, but which has taken the direction it has precisely because, fundamentally, the ability to engage in genuine observation of human beings is simply not there.

[ 22 ] Today, we would most like to subject the developing human being to psychological experimentation and gain an external understanding of how he develops internally, because we have lost the living relationship between one person and another. Such observation is necessary for life, and it has been lost to a great extent. Today we speak of the spiritual and soul aspects in the same way that we speak of the external aspects of a human being. When we encounter a child, a 35-year-old, or an elderly person—we say: this is a human being, this is a human being, this is a human being. But true observation distinguishes in such a way that the abstract concept of “human being” has its place, yet ultimately a reality underlies it: that the child becomes a 35-year-old, and that a 35-year-old becomes an elderly person. To a true observer, the difference in this process of becoming must be very clear. Now, it is relatively easy to distinguish a child from a 35-year-old and from an elderly person. But it is somewhat more difficult to make genuine observations regarding such differences when it comes to the inner life of the human being. That is why, in our time, people constantly confuse unity with diversity—the unity of the soul’s life with the diversity brought about, for example, by the three aspects of the soul’s life: thinking, feeling, and willing. Are thinking, feeling, and willing entirely distinct from one another? If they were, then our soul life would be absolutely divided into three members; there would be no transition between willing, feeling, and thinking—and thus between these and the intellectual aspect of the human being—if these were three members of human soul life that could simply be placed side by side for classification, as people today find convenient. Precisely because this is not possible, Herbart attempts to view thinking, feeling, and willing as a unified whole. But he has shifted the entire concept toward the realm of imagination, and his entire psychology has, in essence, become intellectualistic. One must develop an understanding that allows one, on the one hand, to see the unity of thinking, feeling, and willing, and, on the other hand, to recognize the differences between thinking, feeling, and willing.

[ 23 ] If, after having sufficiently prepared oneself, one now considers human volition—everything connected with desire and volition—one can compare this volition to something that stands further apart from it in the life of the soul, namely the intellectual, and one may ask: How does the life of the will, the life of desire, relate to the intellectual life of mental images? And one gradually comes to realize that there is a developmental difference between willing, desiring, and imagining—a difference in development similar to that between a child and an elderly person, for example. A child develops into an elderly person; willing develops into imagining. The two are not so different from one another that one can set them side by side and say, “This is one thing, that is another”—rather, they are as different from one another as stages of development are different. One will only be able to truly understand the unity of human soul life when one realizes: When a seemingly pure desire arises in the human soul—a pure volition—this is a youthful expression of soul life; the soul is living in its youthful state. When intellectual life arises, when the life of imagination arises, the soul lives in a state that already presupposes the unfolding of the will—a state that has emerged from the unfolding of the will—and the life of mood and feeling stands right in the middle of it, just as a thirty-five-year-old person stands between the child and the elderly person. Through the element of mood, the will develops into intellectual life. Only by not conceiving of willing, feeling, and thinking as three separate faculties of the soul—as Herbart opposed but failed to correct properly—but rather by understanding these three faculties in their vitality and in the way they emerge from one another, can one arrive at a true understanding of human soul life.

[ 24 ] However, our observation is easily misled when we view the life of the soul from this perspective. Our observation is easily misled because we can never remain within the span of human life between birth and death if we take these perspectives as our basis. Anyone who were to believe that life between birth and death proceeds in such a way that intelligence simply develops out of the will would be standing on false ground. We see how intelligence gradually reveals itself from the depths of the human being in the developing child. We can draw out that aspect of intelligence—which can also be cultivated through education—only if we are aware that the mental image of what the child experiences after birth is the result of what it experienced before birth, or rather, in its prenatal existence, before conception. And we can understand what develops as will in the life between birth and death only if we take into account that the human being passes through the gate of death, enters a spiritual life, and continues to develop their volitional element there. We cannot truly educate a human being without taking into account the entirety of their life. If we merely say to ourselves: we want to nurture what is to be present in the future—then we fail to take into account that the human being is such that every child, in a mysterious way, day by day, week by week, year by year, reveals through the fabric of the body what has developed in the prenatal life, or rather, in the life prior to conception. And with regard to the will, we will never gain a correct understanding unless we become aware that what asserts itself as will is merely a seed that only comes to full bloom once the outer body—in which it develops as if in soil—has been shed. Certainly, we must develop moral ideas within a human being, but we must be clear that these moral ideas, embedded as they are in the will, do not yet signify everything between birth and death that they appear to express; rather, their full life only emerges once this body has been left behind. This still shocks people today when, for a complete understanding of the human being, one calls for an integration of the human being into the entire world—including the temporal world—and when one adds to what lives within the human being that which the person experienced before birth and will experience after death. But if one does not include this—if one views the human being as contemporary anthropology does, solely in terms of their manifestations between birth and death—then one is not dealing with the complete human being, but only with a fragment of the human being; and this fragment of the human being cannot be educated for the simple reason that one stands before the unborn child and seeks to educate something about which one knows nothing. The qualities that seek to develop according to what is prenatal want to emerge; but we take no account of this. One does not solve the mystery of the child because one has no idea what lies within the child from life before birth, nor does one solve the mystery of the child from the other side, because one does not know what the principle of becoming is—that which only develops once it has passed through death.

[ 25 ] This must become a central tenet of education today—based on a science that takes the whole human being into account; not on a science that claims to focus on the student rather than the curriculum; not on a science that does not take the human being into account, but rather an insubstantial abstraction of the human being. It is truly not a one-sided mysticism that is to underlie the educational system when we speak in this way, but rather a comprehensive observation of the whole human being. It is the will to truly grasp the whole person in education. If one strives one-sidedly, as Herbart did, for the development of intellectuality, then the formation of the will and the emotions must remain uneducated and undeveloped, for one will then believe that by imparting certain mental images, by formulating and presenting certain mental images, one can evoke that movement, that restraint, and that self-support of the mental image—which is precisely what one refers to when speaking of feeling and will. This is not possible; one can only develop the will that has become entrenched—that is, intellectuality—through an intellectual education. One can develop the mind only through that relationship that forms between teacher and pupil in a natural, heartfelt way; and one can never develop the will in any other way than by becoming aware of the mysterious threads that exist subconsciously between pupil and educator. Any abstract formulation of educational principles for the development of the soul and the will cannot bear fruit unless consideration is given to the educator and instructor themselves being imbued with such qualities of soul and will that can have a spiritual—rather than a physical, through admonition—effect on the student. Thus, the educational and instructional relationship must not be based solely on intellectuality, but must be grounded entirely in the relationship between one human being and another. You can see from this that it is necessary to broaden everything related to education—that is, to ensure that an intimate relationship can indeed be established between the educator, the teacher, and the student, thereby elevating the statement “one should not merely impart subject matter, but should educate the student” beyond mere rhetoric. However, this will only be possible if we realize that, if such a goal is to be pursued, the entire life of the teacher and educator cannot be dependent on anything else—such as state or economic life—but that the educational and instructional system must be entirely self-reliant so that it can operate based on its own impulses and its own conditions.

[ 26 ] What is asserted both in the field of anthroposophy and in the field of the threefold social order is, in fact, already vaguely sensed by the better personalities of present-day humanity. But since even these more enlightened individuals of present-day humanity shy away, discouraged, from truly engaging in a spiritual understanding of life—as sought by an anthroposophically oriented Spiritual Science—these individuals, even with the best of intentions, cannot recognize the full nature of the human being, which might lead them to say: It is precisely the system of teaching and education that must be based on the true grasp and the true experience of the spiritual impulse itself. It is interesting to see how—I would say, feebly—the feelings of some of the better personalities, yearning for a liberation of the system of teaching and education, struggle to make their way through contemporary culture, and how they cannot break through because they do not really know what to do, since they live in a state of contradiction, seeking to reform with a science that has grown entirely out of the old.

[ 27 ] I have before me a book on “Developmental Psychology and Educational Science” by Dr. Johannes Kretzschmar, who genuinely wants to bring something new to teaching and who senses that the educational system is not properly attuned to the social conditions of the present. Let’s take a look at something characteristic of this man in particular. On page 210 of his book, he says:

[ 28 ] “If we now proceed in this manner from the standpoint of an independent, research-oriented educational science”—and by this he means an educational science that is firmly grounded in traditional scholarship—“this will influence not only teacher training and school operations, but also the status of the teacher, the educator, within the state and in school administration. First of all, it goes without saying in principle that the teacher, much like the doctor, must hold a position of trust vis-à-vis the state and the community. They must acknowledge that education—like health care—is a matter in which the expert opinion of a scientifically trained specialist must be the primary determining factor, not the wishes and demands of political and religious parties; and that, furthermore, the leadership of a school is less an administrative task than a scientific function.”

[ 29 ] So what does the man feel? He feels that administrative activity—which is a function of the state—cannot be fully extended to teaching and education, and that the impulses of the teacher and educator contain too little of what can be known about the nature of the human being. He would like to see administrative control replaced by a system of teaching and education based on what can be scientifically understood about human nature. That is why, out of a vague sense of conviction, he says: “Furthermore, the management of the school is less an administrative activity than a scientific function; consequently, it cannot be prescribed down to every detail through official regulations.” The municipality and the state must have full confidence in the teaching staff, that they are up to the task, that they are fully aware of their duties, and are therefore independent of external influences. This trust will be expressed in the fact that—as far as the internal affairs of school operations are concerned—the teaching staff, alongside the principals, will also have a say, so that the teacher is not viewed merely as a subordinate or a civil servant. Proper recognition of the pedagogical profession must then be reflected in the regulation of school supervision. Neither the clergyman nor the philologist can be regarded as the appropriate person for school administration and supervision.”

[ 30 ] One can’t help but wonder: Why can’t this man bring himself to realize that even the school superintendent cannot be appointed by the state, but must come from within the school system itself?

[ 31 ] “Both must definitely be placed in the hands of experts, of educators”: Yes, so why shouldn’t it be directed from the field of education right from the start? Why take the detour of involving something that, strictly speaking, has no business having a say in the matter!

[ 32 ] “It surely requires no detailed proof that welfare institutions, schools for the mentally disabled, etc., should be run neither by pastors nor by doctors. — Above all, however, the influence of the teaching profession on school legislation is of the utmost importance.”

[ 33 ] This influence of the teaching profession on school legislation will certainly be greatest when teachers themselves draft these school laws within a self-governing spiritual life in the spirit of the threefold social organism.

[ 34 ] They see in all of this a sluggish drift toward that which only the impulse of the threefold social organism has the courage to truly seek to implant in the outer world. What the impulse of the threefold social organism seeks is already present as a need among the best people of our time. Yet these best people of our time are so constricted in their spiritual breathing by the stifling atmosphere of today’s public life—by the prejudices that weld everything together into the unitary state—that they are unable to truly bring their thoughts to completion. And so one can read that legislation “will have to work toward ensuring that the state supports and strengthens the school’s influence on the family home, and that, under certain circumstances, parents who are hostile to school or uncooperative must be compelled to provide their children with a proper education. The School Synod would thus seek to persuade the state not only to exercise its supervisory authority over the school system, but also to value and support teachers in their work.”

[ 35 ] One wonders: Yes, why shouldn’t the teacher be able to do all of this himself? — Because people who think along these lines, as I said, simply do not feel the freedom that a free spiritual life affords. They have been led, by the atrophy of thought in the spirit of the old unitary state, to the point where they do not even consider what an absurdity it is that what—as they themselves demand—is to be administered by the spiritual member of the social organism does not first need to be commanded by the legal member, nor first protected and supported by the legal member. Are not the words that the teacher “should be protected and supported” by the state quite characteristic? It is as if someone were to say: We do not dare to bring about this desirable state of affairs ourselves; we want to be driven to do so. But this impetus does not come. For on the side from which it is expected, there is simply—and, of course, quite justifiably—no understanding of what is actually supposed to happen.

[ 36 ] “This greater influence of the state on education”—that is, he even wants the state to have an even greater influence on what teachers and educators should do—“is, after all, quite logical in the context of historical development.” Yes, it does indeed lie in the direction of historical development, but for its own sake, historical development must take a different course than the one it has been heading toward so far. Just imagine if a plant, in the spirit of Goethe’s metamorphosis, were to produce only green leaves and refuse to transition from green foliage to colorful petals; it would then fail to reach the goal of its development. In a similar vein, one must recognize that historical development cannot always proceed in the same manner; rather, one epoch must give way to another.

[ 37 ] “There was a time when the state had no direct interest in the education system, and then came the time when it expressed this interest through compulsory schooling and formal instruction. The modern state, as a constitutional state in which the people participate directly in the legislative process, must place particular emphasis not only on the political education but also on the general education of its citizens. However, since the educational opportunities provided by schools are limited, the state must extend its influence to all areas of education—including the family and the child’s environment.” — Now the state is to be called upon to act as a co-educator alongside what intellectual life can produce on its own. You can see from this that there is a vague sense of what is right, and from this perspective one arrives at a contrast with what should be strived for today based on a sound worldview: “The area of educational science that holds the greatest value for him is, naturally, educational sociology.”

[ 38 ] So he wants to make social life the guiding principle of education, whereas it is precisely the social instincts in human beings that must be awakened through proper education so that they can contribute to the restoration of social life.

[ 39 ] “On the one hand, it shows him the influence of education on public welfare, and on the other hand, it explains to him the extent to which a student’s development depends not only on systematic education but also on those who help shape his character. The School Synod must also repeatedly emphasize the importance of this pedagogical sociology, whose counsel becomes all the more indispensable to the state as its influence on education grows.”

[ 40 ] So Kretzschmar acknowledges: The state will increasingly need to listen to the education system. Nevertheless, it should not be carried out directly by an institution that can be created by the educational system itself; rather, the state should be the one to carry it out first; only then is it pointed out that the state can also “dictate.” Thus, this is meant to support what must actually be demanded in our time: the freedom to develop independently.

[ 41 ] There is something particularly interesting about this book. Naturally, a man as well-meaning as Kretzschmar also realizes that teacher training needs to change. He finds that not everything in teacher-training institutions is the way he would like it to be. He notices this and tells himself: Many things need to change here. He observes that pedagogy is treated as a minor subject at universities, but in his view it encompasses so much that it should not be treated as a minor; rather, it should be integrated into universities as an independent academic discipline. Now he reflects: the so-called four faculties have already been expanded; the natural sciences have already been added to the philosophy faculty, and political science to the law faculty. He now wonders whether pedagogy might perhaps be integrated into one of these faculties by expanding them. Thus, there are universities today that, in addition to the well-known four faculties—namely, theology, philosophy, medicine, and law—also have faculties of political science and natural sciences. Now he believes that establishing a separate faculty of education could lead to all sorts of problems. But to which faculty else should pedagogy be linked? And it is very telling that he ultimately concludes that he would like to assign pedagogy to political science and establish a faculty of political science and pedagogy.

[ 42 ] You see, the pressure is so strong—the pressure that everything that affects human beings must emanate from the state—that even such an enlightened gentleman finds it most appropriate to make pedagogy the sister discipline of constitutional law. As I have already said here: people always strive not to be regarded as what they are by their very nature, but as what they can be through the state’s stamp of approval. They are not even meant to be free citizens, but rather people who are somehow registered with the state through their civil rights. People strive to become members of the state order. This gives rise to the idea: Therefore, people must be educated and instructed in such a way that they become proper members of the state. Where, then, could pedagogy be better placed than within constitutional law? It is interesting that a man who has entirely correct intuitions about what ought to happen draws conclusions from his premises that are the opposite of what one might expect.

[ 43 ] You see, what I have done today, above all else, is to describe the resistance one will face when attempting to establish a school such as the Waldorf School is intended to be. It runs counter to people’s ideas—even the ideas of the best among them. It must go against the grain; for if it did not, it would not be working in the direction of future development. But it is precisely in this direction—in the spiritual, educational, and instructional realms—that work will have to be done. We will certainly not establish a school based on a one-sided worldview. Anyone who believes that we want to found an “anthroposophical school,” or who spreads such a claim, is either believing or spreading a slander. We have absolutely no desire to do so, and we will demonstrate that we do not want to. For if others meet us halfway—just as we meet them halfway—then in the Waldorf School, religious instruction for Protestant children will be provided by the local Protestant pastor or vicar, Catholic instruction by the Catholic priest, and Jewish instruction by the rabbi. This means we will not engage in founding any kind of ideological school; we do not want to introduce the content of anthroposophy into our school—we want something else. Anthroposophy is life; it is not merely a theory. And anthroposophy can translate into creative ability and into the practice of teaching—insofar as anthroposophy can become pedagogical, insofar as through anthroposophy one can acquire the skill, for example, to teach arithmetic better than it has been taught so far, to teach writing, languages, and geography better than they have been taught up to now. So to the extent that a method for this school is to be created through anthroposophy, to that extent we strive. We strive for methodology, for teaching practice. That is what we wish to channel into what will truly follow from a genuine understanding of the spiritual. We will teach reading, we will teach writing, and so on, in a way that is appropriate to the nature of the human being. In doing so, we will initially refrain entirely from what people will likely accuse us of: that we want to use a school to spread propaganda for anthroposophy among children. We will not do that. For we know full well that the resistance we already have to overcome will rise to immeasurable heights. We will strive only to teach to the extent that, through living in harmony with anthroposophical impulses, children can be well taught and educated. Therefore, it will not bother us if certain requirements—coming from here or there—are met; for example, that religious instruction in the individual denominations is provided by the administrators who belong to those denominations.

[ 44 ] With that, I have said a few introductory words about what the Waldorf School aims to be. I will continue these reflections next Sunday at the same time.