The Rudolf Steiner Archive

Seventh Lecture

[ 1 ] You can imagine that it is difficult for anyone who does not hold sectarian or fanatical views to put into practice what follows from an understanding of human nature in terms of pedagogy and didactics, as I have hinted at in recent days. For many of you will have said to yourselves: What must be regarded as the right thing here differs very significantly from those things that today, through school regulations, curricula, and whatever else these matters entail, are deemed to be the prevailing norms. One finds oneself in a kind of dilemma. On the one hand, there is this factually and objectively recognized pedagogical and didactic foundation, which—as you will have noticed from what has been presented—prescribes a very specific teaching and educational task for every year of life. One can see from the child’s own life what needs to be done—not only each year, but actually each month, each week, and ultimately, when looking at the individual, each day. And it is certainly a beautiful thing to note that the Waldorf teaching staff has, to a high degree, internalized this objective requirement of true pedagogy and can already see how such a pedagogy is connected to the necessities of human development; how there is nothing arbitrary about it, but rather everything is derived directly from the human being. That is on the one hand. On the other hand—especially for those who are not fanatics, but who must and wish to fully ground themselves in reality even while engaging with ideals, as these things are also called—there are the demands of life.

[ 2 ] We must not, after all, raise children in a fanatical, sectarian way that leaves them unable to fit into life. For life today is not governed by these idealistic demands, but rather by what is still emerging from life itself. And these are the school regulations, the curricula, and the like, as they are formulated based on today’s views. And so one very easily faces the danger of raising a child in a way that, while correct, may—whether one regards this as right or wrong, it is simply a fact—alienate the child from life. One must always bear this in mind: one cannot fanatically charge toward a goal, but must, on the one hand, be aware of what ought to be, and on the other hand, be aware that one must not alienate children from life.

[ 3 ] Precisely what opponents so often attribute to anthroposophy—namely, that fanaticism and sectarianism prevail there—is, as you will find, not the case; the opposite is true. Such traits may manifest in individual anthroposophists, but anthroposophy itself is that which seeks to establish itself everywhere as a living reality. Yet it is precisely through this that one becomes acutely aware, in practical terms, of life’s difficulties. And so, in a certain sense—precisely because fanaticism is not at the root of this, but rather objective practicality prevails everywhere—something—well, how shall I put it?—something “bad” had to be done right from the start: namely, a kind of compromise. A memorandum had to be drawn up right from the start, in which I myself laid down the following: In the first three grades of elementary school, the children are guided from one level to the next, as far as possible, in accordance with the demands inherent in human nature itself. At the same time, however, within these first three years of elementary school, we also adapt to external demands so that the children can transfer to a regular elementary school after the third grade. This must now—and I must use this tautology—be a compromise for the teacher. There is no other way. The practical person must proceed this way, for prudence must prevail everywhere; the fanatic does it differently. Of course, such a path presents various difficulties, and many teachers would find it much easier to head straight for the ideal goal. Many details must be discussed so that one can find the path between the two goals. Then, in accordance with my original memorandum, once the children have completed their 12th year—that is, once they have finished the 6th grade (counting from the bottom up, starting at 1)—they can enter a regular school in the corresponding grade. The reason I chose this particular year is that human beings, as has been described here in recent days, are at a special juncture at that point. Again, the children must be able to transfer in their 14th year to the schools they then wish to attend.

[ 4 ] Well, I would say that things are still going fairly well in the first three grades of elementary school. There, it’s possible to achieve something like that to a certain extent. With a great deal of effort, the same goal can also be pursued for 12-year-olds. The difficulties, however, only begin as the later years of life follow. For you see, even if it arises only from a very dim awareness, something of that ancient, hazy knowledge about human beings has been preserved from times long past. And this has led to the fact that, even today, people still regard the time of tooth replacement—at least roughly—as the age at which children should be enrolled in elementary school. People today no longer realize that one thing is connected to the other; but it is indeed connected to knowledge handed down from ancient times, which is now felt only instinctively. And this, of course, is also part of the reason why people do not know—or did not know—this, and why they therefore wish to push back the age of enrollment in a way that is not entirely in keeping with human nature to the abstractly “completed” age of six, which is actually always a bit too early for sending a child to elementary school. But there’s nothing to be done about it, because if parents today don’t send their children to elementary school by the time they’ve turned six, the police officer or the school marshal—or whatever you call him—comes and simply takes the children to school. There’s not much that can be done to change that. But as I said, it’s relatively easy to strive for this compromise during the first three years. However, once—as always happens—one or another student transfers to another school, the same objection always arises: “Well, these children can’t read and write as well as our students; and we don’t know what to do with what they’ve learned in drawing and eurythmy—they may be far ahead in those areas.”

[ 5 ] It is precisely from such judgments that one can also discern an endorsement of the Waldorf school method. For I would like to point something out to you: You can, in fact, find the wildest spelling mistakes in Goethe’s early handwriting, which dates from a much later period than, say, when he was 7 or 8 years old. And from the way he writes, you can very easily see that today we demand much more—if I may call it “more”—from an eight-year-old child than the seventeen-year-old Goethe naturally fulfilled in certain respects back then. So things are actually a bit different. And Goethe owes many aspects of his character to the fact that he was still making spelling mistakes at age 17, because this kept his inner being flexible enough for certain developments of his soul’s powers, since it had not yet been constrained by fixed rules. Anyone familiar with such connections—albeit through a more subtle psychology than is often found today—will naturally find just as little to object to in such an objection against a natural pedagogy as, for example, in a historical fact, which is, after all, quite interesting.

[ 6 ] You see, in the early 20th century—perhaps even as early as the late 19th century—the view suddenly emerged in the natural sciences that Mendelism was the very best theory for understanding the phenomena of inheritance. This theory is called “Mendelism” because it traces back to a certain Gregor Mendel, who was a botanist in the mid-19th century and who also worked as a high school teacher in Moravia. Gregor Mendel conducted meticulous experiments on heredity in plants. What he wrote on the subject was then ignored for a long time, and so around the turn of the last century and ours, it emerged as the best theory of heredity. Now it is interesting to take a biographical look at the story of Gregor Mendel. He prepared himself—as was generally customary in Austria at the time; Austrian friends will know that monastic clergy prepared for a high school teaching position and then took the exams—he prepared himself and took the teaching certification exam, as it was called back then, and failed spectacularly. He was thus unable to become a high school teacher. Now, there is a rule in Austria that allows one to retake the exam after a certain period of time. Gregor Mendel retook the teaching certification exam and once again failed spectacularly. I don’t think such a person would even be hired as a high school teacher in Austria today. Back then, things were more laid-back; even candidates who had failed the teaching exam were hired because there was a greater need for them. Thus, Gregor Mendel became a high school teacher despite having failed twice. However, he became a high school teacher who had failed twice and was only able to hold the position thanks to the principal’s kindness; he sat among the high school faculty as an inferior figure, where, according to the middle school teacher classification system, not even his title could be listed next to his name: Dr. phil. For those who pass the exam properly, it usually reads, for example: Josef Müller, Dr. phil. There it would say H.G. (Standard German, History), L.G. (Latin, Greek), M.N]. (Mathematics, Natural Science), but in his case there was an additional notation in parentheses: (m) (nl)—precisely this notation appeared next to this “inferior” individual; as a result, he was universally regarded as nothing more than a second-rate high school teacher. Then several decades passed, and after his death, the man was recognized as one of the greatest natural scientists! Things do take a peculiar turn in real life. And even if one cannot organize things directly according to real life—otherwise very strange demands would very soon arise for instruction—but even if one cannot adapt one’s life to what life later brings to fruition, one must still always be clear that one should be psychologically attuned to such things, that one should gain clarity about the things that are happening there. These matters pertain to higher and lower-level instruction, to the higher and lower education of the human being. And so one must say that it is not exactly a terribly serious matter if a third-grade student leaves school and simply does not yet know as much as one might have drilled into other children through a poor teaching method—knowledge that then proves detrimental later in life. In fact, many biographies of this kind could be cited. Sometimes quite strange things come to light in obituaries. Röntgen, for example, was also expelled from high school and was only able to become a teacher at all because of his exceptional kindness. As I said, one cannot base one’s life on this, but these things must certainly be taken into account, and one must seek to understand them through a more nuanced psychology.

[ 7 ] However, it is becoming increasingly difficult to adopt the aforementioned compromise approach in actual teaching and educational practice. It is still possible, at best, if one is able to adapt to the age group up to about 12 years old. But then things begin to get more and more difficult, because from this age onward, the curricula and educational goals no longer have anything to do with what is appropriate for human beings, but stem from pure arbitrariness. What is included in a given year as learning objectives stems precisely from pure arbitrariness, and one can no longer make sense of it if one measures what stems from pure arbitrariness against what follows from human nature. Remember what I said yesterday: that once sexual maturity is reached, the child must have been brought to the point where it can truly enter into the freedom of life and become inwardly strong. For you see, we have the two fundamental virtues: gratitude, the foundation for which must be laid before the change of teeth; and the capacity for love, the foundation for which must be laid between the change of teeth and sexual maturity—we discussed this yesterday; and with regard to ethics, we have seen how the child’s mind and feelings must be filled with sympathy and antipathy, even toward good and evil. If one approaches a child at this age with “You must,” one spoils the child for their future life path. On the other hand, if one does not confront the child with “You must,” but instead serves as a positive authority figure for the child until puberty, one can thereby teach them precisely this: “I take pleasure in what is good; I take no pleasure in what is evil,” then, at the age when sexual maturity gradually emerges, the third fundamental virtue develops from within the human being: this is a sense of duty. There is no true sense of duty that has been drilled into a person. There is only a sense of duty that has arisen of its own accord from natural human development, based on gratitude—as I explained yesterday—and the capacity for love. If these—gratitude and the capacity for love—have been developed in the right way, then a sense of duty emerges with full sexual maturity. And it is a necessary human life experience that this natural emergence of a sense of duty takes place. For the soul-spiritual must develop according to its own laws and conditions, just as the physical does. Just as the arm or the hand must grow from inner forces of growth—and one cannot direct this growth by, for example, strapping the arm into a specific iron brace—just as one should not direct the growth of the feet by strapping them in, even though there is a similar form of restraint—as we apply to the soul, and indeed even to the feet in certain regions of the world— so whatever is to emerge at a certain point in life out of human nature growing in accordance with nature must truly emerge in such a way that the human being has the experience: It comes from within me. Then the human being enters social life with a sense of duty in just the right way. Then, in the noblest sense, he fulfills Goethe’s saying: “Duty—where one loves what one commands of oneself.” - Here, too, you see how love plays a role in everything and how duty must also develop in such a way that one can ultimately love it. Then, as a human being, one takes one’s rightful place in social life. And then, precisely from authority experienced in the right way, emerges that which defines the human being who can stand on one’s own two feet.

[ 8 ] And what then emerges as religiosity—translated into the spiritual realm—is precisely that which, as I have just described to you in considerable detail, develops in the child before the change of teeth as a natural, physical religiosity. These are all things that must be deeply rooted in true pedagogy and didactics.

[ 9 ] But then, simply through an understanding of human nature such as I have described, it becomes clear how necessary it is that instruction and education—beginning at age 12, leading up to sexual maturity, and especially after sexual maturity—shift to a high degree toward the practical. At our Waldorf School, this is handled in such a way that it is prepared in advance. In the Waldorf School, boys and girls sit side by side. And although this gives rise to interesting facts—which I will discuss tomorrow—particularly for psychology, there are extraordinarily interesting facts to be found, as each class has its own unique psychology—one must nevertheless say: Precisely when we naturally allow boys and girls to practice the practical activities of life side by side, this serves as an excellent preparation for life. Isn’t it true that today many men really have no idea what a benefit knitting is for healthy thinking and sound logic? Many men cannot even begin to appreciate what it means for one’s life to be able to knit. Here at the Waldorf School, the boys knit alongside the girls and even darn socks. As a result, when differentiation becomes necessary later on, this differentiation will naturally arise as a matter of course; but it also fosters an education that truly takes into account the life into which a person must step.

[ 10 ] People are always terribly surprised when I make a claim that is not merely a personal conviction but a psychological insight: I simply cannot regard as a good professor someone who cannot, when necessary, mend his own boots. How can one possibly know anything worthwhile about being and becoming if one cannot even mend one’s own boots when necessary! Of course, that is somewhat paradoxical and an extreme way of putting it. But today there are even men who cannot properly sew on a pants button when necessary. Yes, that is a terrible thing! One really cannot know anything worthwhile about philosophy if one does not possess a certain manual dexterity for certain tasks. That is part of life. And one must say: Only the person who, had it been his fate, would also have become a good cobbler can be a good philosopher. Sometimes even cobblers become philosophers, as the history of philosophy shows.

[ 11 ] Well, an understanding of human nature demands that the entire course of education be guided by proper preparation for practical life. And so it simply follows from an understanding of human nature that, for example, in a particular school class, the children—no, the young gentlemen and young ladies—are introduced to weaving, so that they learn to master the loom; that they are introduced to spinning; that they also learn to grasp, for example, how paper is made; that they learn to understand at least the simple processes of mechanical-chemical—not merely mechanics and chemistry—but mechanical-chemical technology, and to apply them on a small scale, so that they know how things happen in life. This transition to a truly practical approach to teaching and education must be achieved. And this is precisely what must be strived for if one wishes, in earnest and with honesty, to build a pedagogy and didactics—particularly for the higher grades—based on a genuine understanding of human nature.

[ 12 ] Yes, that’s when you run into terrible difficulties. You can more or less prepare a nine-year-old child—beyond what you reasonably have to do—so that he or she can advance to the 4th grade of elementary school; it’s still manageable even for a twelve-year-old who is supposed to advance to the 7th grade of elementary school. It becomes terribly difficult, however, to ensure that children can advance to the Gymnasium and the Realschule after completing elementary school; but the matter becomes particularly difficult as they move up into the higher grades. For there, an understanding of human nature demands that we return a little to the ideal of the Greeks. A wise Greek did, in fact, have to hear from an Egyptian: “You Greeks are all like children; you know nothing of all the transformations that have taken place on Earth.” - A wise Greek had to hear this from a wise Egyptian; yet the Greeks had not become so childish as to demand that a young person, if he were to become truly educated in a particular field, learn the Egyptian language. They were content with the Greek language. We do not imitate what the Greeks did; we learn Greek. Now, I have nothing against that; learning Greek is a fine thing—but it simply does not follow from human nature at a certain age that one should set aside a certain number of hours for Greek, and that learning Greek should fall during the time when one should actually be engaged in weaving, spinning, and the craft of papermaking. Yes, now the curriculum must be established. But we must also ensure that the students—since we will certainly not be granted a university education anywhere—can advance to universities, technical colleges, and the like, or, in other words, that they pass the high school graduation exam. That is when the terrible difficulties—the almost insurmountable difficulties—arise. You find that, on the one hand, you are trying to cultivate practical activities based on a genuine understanding of human nature—and then the Greek teacher comes along and says: “I don’t have enough class hours; I can’t prepare the students for the high school graduation exam; I don’t have enough class hours—it’s impossible!” —So that, based on this entirely objective consideration, you can see what difficulties still stand in the way of this endeavor today and how any fanatical insistence on an ideal cannot take hold. What needs to happen does not depend solely today on, say, a teaching staff realizing: “this is so good, this is so right”—but much broader spheres of life must recognize the ideals of an education that is truly in keeping with human nature, of teaching that is in keeping with human nature, so that life itself becomes such that we do not alienate young people from life when we educate them in accordance with their nature. For, of course, today a person is made alienated from life if they complete their high school or secondary school education at a certain institution and then fail the high school graduation exam, which they must take elsewhere. As for failing—well, I’m speaking to experts here—the fact is that I could, if I set my mind to it, cause a full professor of botany—even one who is a true expert in the field—to fail an exam in his own subject at a university. I do believe that this would certainly be possible! After all, you can of course always fail an exam. Even there, the strangest things in life come to light. You see, there’s an Austrian-German poet, Robert Hamerling. He had pretty much the best German style one could acquire in Austria, later as a poet. It’s interesting to look through Hamerling’s high school teaching certification. Greek: excellent. Latin: excellent. German language and German composition: barely capable of teaching in the lower grades of middle school. That’s what it says in Hamerling’s teaching certification! So, isn’t it true that failing and passing exams is a bit of a mixed bag?

[ 13 ] Well, this is where the difficulties arise that make one realize that the broadest circles must first shape life itself in such a way that it becomes possible to achieve more than what can be achieved through the compromise I have described. So if I were to ask you, purely in the abstract: “Can the Waldorf school be introduced everywhere?”—then, of course, I could answer, again in the abstract: “Yes, everywhere it is allowed in.” But on the other hand, even this abstract “being allowed in” is not yet the decisive factor. For, as I said, these are really just two ways of expressing one and the same thing for many people. Some people, don’t you think, manage to make it and become famous poets, even with a poor grade in the language of instruction. But not everyone makes it. For many, failing the high school graduation exam means being cast out of life! And so one must say: The higher the grade levels one reaches, the more it becomes apparent that the instruction one must provide there does not fully correspond to the ideal. That, in particular, is something we must not lose sight of. And that is precisely what shows just how much one must reckon with these things in life.

[ 14 ] For education and teaching that are in harmony with nature, the only question can, of course, be: Does a person achieve the level of social integration in life that human nature itself demands? - After all, it is ultimately people who demand the high school graduation exam, even if demanding it in the manner it occurs today is, in fact, a mistake. But one is then compelled to fall short of the ideal if one seeks to introduce Waldorf pedagogy precisely in accordance with these contemporary social demands. Therefore, anyone inspecting the upper grades will naturally have to admit: “Yes, not everything here is as required by the ideal Waldorf pedagogy!” But I can guarantee you this: If what is currently interpreted as human nature—namely, when it comes to making the transition to the practical aspects of life—were to be implemented, then everyone would fail today’s high school graduation exams. That is how starkly opposed these things are today! This must certainly be taken into account. Of course, such matters can be taken into account in a wide variety of ways, but on the other hand, this must give rise to an awareness of just how much work needs to be done—not only in the realm of school but also in the broader sphere of life—if we are to bring about what constitutes a truly human form of instruction and education, particularly in social terms. Nevertheless, to a certain extent, practical activities of the kind described are taken into account in our educational system. Of course, hours for practical work are always lost because the Greek and Latin teachers claim those hours. But for now, there’s simply no other way.

[ 15 ] From what I have just said, however, you can see that precisely at the time in human life when sexual maturity approaches, the transition into external, real life must also take place; that what makes a person—in body, soul, and spirit—a fully functioning human being in a higher sense must increasingly come into play in school. In this regard, we certainly do not have sufficient psychological insight. For the finer spiritual connections in human life—spiritual, soul, and physical—are often not even suspected. Today, only those who make it their very mission to understand the life of the soul are still aware of them. And I can certainly tell you, in all modesty and based on a certain degree of self-knowledge, that I would not be able to present certain things—which today may, indeed certainly do, seem useless to some—in the field of Spiritual Science in the way that I do, if, for example, I had not, at a certain age—not through Waldorf school pedagogy, but through fate —learned the craft of bookbinding. The unique human activity involved in bookbinding yields something quite special even for the most intimate aspects of the spiritual and soul life, especially when it occurs at the right age. And this is particularly true of practical activities. And I would consider it a sin against human nature if, here at the Waldorf School, handicraft instruction—including bookbinding, box-making, and cardboard work—were not incorporated at a specific point in time that is determined precisely by human nature. These things are essential if one is to become a whole human being. What matters is not that one has made this or that box or bound this or that book, but that one has performed the tasks involved, that one has gone through these specific feelings and thought processes.

[ 16 ] The differentiation between boys and girls then occurs naturally. To recognize this, one must have a certain kind of insight—namely, an insight of the soul. For example, something occurs whose psychology—since I cannot spend enough time at the Waldorf school myself—has not yet been researched, but will be researched in the future. What is peculiar is that when it comes to spinning, it turns out that the girls really enjoy spinning; the boys also quite like to be involved, but they only want to fetch things for the girls—they want to perform chivalrous services. They gladly bring everything that the girls then spin into yarn; they prefer to do the preparatory work. This has become apparent, and it must now be investigated psychologically to understand why things differentiate in this way. But also from this—if I may put it this way—particular direction of handicraft instruction, which is held in very high regard in our Waldorf school pedagogy, from this direction of handicraft instruction toward bookbinding and cardboard crafts, it becomes clear, just as everywhere else, especially when one aims at the spirit, taking the practical aspects of life into account emerges as a matter of course. After all, it was terribly impractical people who devised the methods—people who actually believe they’ve mastered the practicalities of life. The least practical experience of life results when one starts from pedagogical theories. They yield nothing at all; in fact, they produce nothing but prejudices. In contrast, true pedagogy is an understanding of human nature. And it is indeed a true understanding of human nature when it is developed in this particular direction, as I have indicated. It is already pedagogy, and it becomes didactics in the living practice of teaching and education; it becomes, in fact, a pedagogical-didactic mindset, and that is what matters. And, of course, the entire nature of the school must be adapted to this.

[ 17 ] Thus, it is precisely the teaching system—the educational system—practiced in the Waldorf school the focus lies on the teaching staff and their consultations, because the entire school is meant to be a living, spiritually animated organism, and because the first-grade teacher, with genuine inner involvement, should follow not only what the twelfth-grade physics teacher does in his or her class, but also what he or she experiences and observes in the students. All of this converges in the teachers’ conference. But all the advice arising from the overall conduct of instruction also flows together there in a jumble. A genuine effort is made to have something in the teachers’ conference that serves as the soul of the entire school organism. There, the first-grade teacher knows that the sixth-grade teacher has a child who, in one way or another, is developmentally delayed or is proving to be specifically gifted in one way or another. And these things that the individual knows bear fruit in a completely different sphere among the others. I would say that because the teaching staff is a unified whole, it also perceives the entire school as a unified whole. Then a shared enthusiasm—but also shared concerns—permeates the entire school. Then all the teachers together bear the burden of what must be upheld for the entire school, particularly in a moral and religious sense, but also in terms of knowledge.

[ 18 ] There, one also learns how the lessons taught by one teacher specifically influence the lessons taught by another teacher. Just as it is by no means irrelevant in the human organism whether the stomach is properly attuned to the head or not, so too is it by no means irrelevant in a school whether the lesson from 9 to 10 a.m. in the 3rd grade is properly attuned to the lesson from 11 a.m. to 12 p.m. in the 8th grade. Of course, these are all things that are stated in extreme and radical terms—terms that are not, of course, fulfilled in this extreme and radical sense—but they are stated this way because they correspond to reality. For it is precisely when one thinks in accordance with reality that one arrives at entirely different assessments of natural, sensory reality than one does through abstract doctrine. One often sees that laypeople, where permitted, treat patients in the field of medicine. These laypeople have then acquired a certain degree of—well—lay knowledge. Now, such a layperson might say of a patient: “Yes, that person’s heart isn’t normal.” - That may even be correct, but it does not follow that one should make this heart “normal.” For the person who has this heart may have built his entire organism precisely around this heart, which somewhat contradicts an abstract notion of normality. If one then attempts to make his heart “normal,” this heart will no longer fit the organism. One must leave it as it is, and when symptoms of illness arise, despite the heart’s necessary abnormality, one must simply adjust the entire course of therapy rather than abstractly targeting the heart with medications.

[ 19 ] I said yesterday: Education is similar to healing. And that is why it is true that, for a genuine pedagogy, one must have a similar mental image and perception—one that, so to speak, encompasses reality broadly—just as one must ultimately have in other fields of knowledge about reality.

[ 20 ] If one takes what emerges from today’s anatomy and physiology—not to mention psychology, since that is, after all, merely a hodgepodge of abstractions—and uses it to construct an understanding of humanity—an understanding of humanity is, to a certain degree, self-understanding; I do not mean the self-knowledge that broods inwardly, but rather the self-knowledge of the human being through humanity—that is, general knowledge of humanity as self-knowledge—well, if one were to use what we have today to arrive at such a knowledge of human existence, it would be as if, through self-reflection, one were to form a mental image of oneself as a skeleton. If, when looking within oneself, one had to disregard everything surrounding the skeleton, one would feel like a skeleton. This is how one feels regarding the totality of the human being—body, soul, and spirit—when one applies to this understanding of humanity only what modern anatomy and physiology provide. Psychology must, in fact, achieve a genuine interpenetration of the soul with the spirit. And once one has grasped the spiritual, one can trace it even into physical reality. For the spirit is at work in everything physical.

[ 21 ] I have already pointed out that the tragedy of materialism lies in the fact that it understands nothing about matter. It is precisely spiritual knowledge that leads to a true understanding of the material world. Materialism may speak of matter, but it does not penetrate the inner structures of force within matter. Nor does a pedagogy that focuses solely on the external penetrate into what follows from the human being for practical life. And so something arises that is, of course, natural to the spiritual researcher, but which for many people today is not natural at all—rather, it is something paradoxical. Consequently, you will find yourselves saying: Yes, it is remarkable that this pedagogy derived from anthroposophy specifically addresses the need to guide children at a certain age toward very specific practical activities—to guide them in performing material tasks in the proper way. What is pursued through a pedagogy and didactics based on anthroposophical research is not an alienation from life or a leading of children into mystical mists, but rather an imbuing of the body with spirit and soul, so that this body is fit for earthly life, as long as they are in it, and can in turn draw inner security from that competence. That is why, with every new school year that we add to the previous ones—we began with an eight-grade elementary school, then added the 9th, 10th, and 11th grades, and will now add the 12th grade as well—that is why the need to broaden our focus toward the practical will arise, and the difficulties will indeed grow with each passing year.

[ 22 ] This led to a situation recently, when other difficulties facing the anthroposophical cause were to be discussed, in which a memorandum was also submitted by our students in what is currently the graduating class of the Waldorf School. Those who are soon to take their high school graduation exams have drafted a very remarkable memorandum, which will only be fully understood once the entire matter has been properly considered. They had, in fact, submitted the following memorandum to the Anthroposophical Society: Since we are, after all, being educated and taught in accordance with the nature of the human being—something they have already sensed in some way—and since, even though we are taught in this way, we cannot enter the ordinary universities —I do not wish to say what judgment these young men and women have passed on the universities, but it does not differ greatly from many judgments one encounters elsewhere today—we would therefore like, if we cannot attend such universities, to propose to the Anthroposophical Society that it establish its own university, to which we can then transfer.

[ 23 ] Yes, that is, of course, where the greatest difficulties arise today. But this must also be mentioned because—now that you have realized your intention, which is so satisfying for us, to come here to see what Waldorf education is really all about—because you need to develop a sense and an understanding of what is actually intended, you must be made aware of the difficulties that arise.

[ 24 ] Namely, Waldorf education is actually practiced today only by Waldorf school teachers. Of course, the difficulties become greater and greater the higher up you go. At a university, they would likely be even greater. But since this is still a very abstract ideal, I can only speak in terms of assumptions, because I always focus solely on what life demands. So I can only speak now up to the 12th grade, because that is right at our doorstep. What is to be conceived of in the abstract must not occupy the practical person too much, otherwise he will be distracted from his tasks. But one can certainly say: the difficulties would increase significantly. There would be two kinds of difficulties here, which would be immediately apparent: First, if we were to establish a university today, our university exams would have no effect whatsoever. The people who passed these exams would not be able to find their place in life at all; they would not be able to become doctors or lawyers—which, even today, one is still expected to become in the customary manner. So, on the one hand, it would not work. But on the other hand, one might feel anxious and fearful if a certain reality did not, in turn, alleviate that anxiety just a little. Indeed, having seen what a commendable aspiration exists among the youngest generation, an association has been formed to establish such a university, which is to be founded in the spirit of Waldorf education. There is no need to feel anxious, however, because the fund raised by such an association will certainly not grow large enough in the near future to even consider establishing such a college. So a laudable aspiration exists, but for the time being it remains highly impractical. Fear and anxiety would only set in if, for example, a wealthy American were to come along and make available all the millions that would be necessary today to establish a fully-fledged college. Yes, the most one could do would be to promote all Waldorf school teachers to a college—but then we would no longer have a Waldorf school. —I say all this because I believe that facts matter far more than all sorts of abstract debates. It really does come down to learning to feel—on the one hand, perhaps, that there is indeed a comprehensive ideal here, based on the idea of grounding pedagogy and didactics in a genuine understanding of human nature; on the other hand, however, the circle of those who are truly and actively immersed in this ideal today is exceedingly small. That is why we are so delighted by every step toward expansion that may emerge from this course as a result of such a gratifying turnout. On the other hand, it is necessary to recognize, based on the nature of the matter itself, everything that must happen to place the Waldorf school ideal on a truly broad foundation. This must also be stated within the broader context, for it follows directly from the very constitution of the Waldorf school itself.

[ 25 ] Tomorrow, in a concluding lecture, I will take the liberty of speaking about the constitution of the Waldorf School, about the overall administration of the Waldorf School, about the relationships that should prevail between teachers and students, among students themselves, and among teachers themselves, and about the entire approach to examinations and report cards based on an understanding of human nature.