The Rudolf Steiner Archive

5. Spiritual Forces in the Art of Education and in Public Life

[ 1 ] Yesterday I took the liberty of explaining how three destructive forces are at work in the signs of decline in our time: the global dominance of empty phrases, the global dominance of convention, and the global dominance of routine. And yesterday I already attempted to suggest how empty rhetoric must be replaced by thought-filled speech—thought imbued with spiritual substance that can find expression through language in people’s social lives. And in this context, I attempted to suggest how, precisely through the revival of spiritual life, convention must be replaced by that which can arise solely from the living interaction of mature human beings living together in a democratic sense. And I attempted to suggest how mere routine—spiritless routine—must be replaced by a spiritualized way of life.

[ 2 ] If one initially characterizes all these things solely from the outside, they actually seem to touch only on the superficial aspects of our present-day life. In truth, however, they point directly to that which, on the one hand, is rooted in the very core of human existence and, on the other hand, also manifests itself in the most significant, far-reaching, and life-defining social realities.

[ 3 ] Yesterday I already hinted at how a particular symptom can be traced back to one of the root causes of our present civilization, which is riddled with so many destructive forces. I pointed out that for the past three to four centuries, it has essentially been scientific knowledge that has provided the foundation for our worldview—the worldview that establishes new things

[ 4 ] will. What else exists in our social life are the traditional impulses toward a worldview. What has been bearing new fruit, what has truly moved people for the past three to four centuries, is the question: In what way can a worldview flow from the scientific foundations of human cognition? It is no wonder that, driven by the urge to establish a worldview in this way, precisely those forces of the human soul have developed that are suited to bringing such a worldview into being. A very specific way of thinking and a very specific way of willing have emerged over the last few centuries and have reached a certain peak of activity in our present time. Natural science, after all, emphasizes time and again that for it—and for its conscientious method—it is essential to investigate the world of facts in such a way that nothing from what originates within the human being, from the human personality itself, influences the conclusions drawn about the facts themselves. In vain did minds such as Goethe’s—who recognized the one-sidedness to which mere knowledge of nature, knowledge of nature separated from humanity, must inevitably lead—draw attention to the fact that true knowledge, useful for a comprehensive worldview, must not be separated from humanity, and that even external physical facts must be considered in connection with humanity as it exists in the world. On the other hand, however, one can say that this approach—separated from humanity—has in turn celebrated its great triumphs by bringing the world of technology to what it is today. All of this, however, could only have come about under the influence of a certain kind of thinking—that kind of thinking which devotes itself either to what nature itself presents to observation or to what we can demonstrate through experimentation. To understand the language of the facts themselves—that is the ideal of this kind of thinking.

[ 5 ] Very little of this enters into this line of thought—anyone who has dealt conscientiously and methodically with the natural sciences as well as Spiritual Science knows what human will is, in terms of what impels us as we carry out our tasks in external life, as we come into contact and form relationships with other people, or, in other words, as we place ourselves within the social realm. Indeed, the great triumphs of natural science and technology have only become possible because, in a sense, human beings have learned to think in a way that is influenced as little as possible by their will. One might even say that a certain habit of thinking has emerged under the influence of this fact over the course of the last three to four centuries.

[ 6 ] Now, with such a way of thinking, one can recognize magnificent things in the mineral world and even in the plant world, but to a lesser extent in the animal world, and—as I already indicated yesterday—one cannot recognize anything at all regarding the true nature of the human being. And the fact that, alongside this—I would say—will-deprived way of thinking, no other form of thinking has been developed is, in a certain sense, due to a fear of everything that enters our thinking when a person, of their own accord, through their own will, gives this thinking its structure and organization. Fantasy and arbitrariness can thus enter into thinking through human will. And time and again, attention is drawn to how fanciful the worldviews of certain philosophers appear—philosophers who have, in fact, introduced human will into their thinking—when compared to the reliable findings reached by natural scientists, who allowed only what nature itself or the experiment told them to speak.

[ 7 ] People simply did not know that it is possible to permeate human thought with the will in such a way that, in this well-trained, will-driven thinking, all arbitrariness disappears just as it disappears in thinking that deals only with external facts or experiments. To discover such thinking, which is permeated by the will, requires, however, inner spiritual exercises carried out with energy, care, and patience. This requires that the person who wishes to become a spiritual researcher—who truly wishes to penetrate the spiritual world, from which alone knowledge of the human being can flow—repeatedly and over long periods of time, using inner spiritual methods, hold thoughts in mind from which he develops nothing other than inner will; that he develops in these thoughts a will of the kind that is otherwise developed only in the external world. In the outer world, one loves, one hates; one takes up this or that activity, or rejects this or that activity. In the outer world, one is dealing with something about which one can merely hold opinions. One deals with what contains crises within itself. That which one recognizes in the outer world through one’s will—or by which one is opposed—must be carried into the world of one’s thoughts if one wishes to become a spiritual researcher; and one will gradually notice that these thoughts truly become will-driven forces, imbued with inner lawfulness. You need only accept what I have just said—in what may seem like abstract terms—in such a way that the work it describes—the inner work of the soul—is one that takes a long time and is carried out no less methodically, even if in the spiritual realm, than everything we perform with the most precise instruments for our chemical or physical experiments. Just as the chemist or physicist conducts his experiments with precision, so does the spiritual researcher carry out the process of weighing one thought against another, and examining the effect of one thought upon another. Through this process, the abstract thinking that has developed over the course of the last three to four centuries—precisely under the influence of scientific research—is elevated to an inwardly living form of thinking, a form of thinking that is more a spiritual contemplation of images than ordinary abstract thinking. This is the one aspect that must be developed into true knowledge of humanity, because it is impossible to use that abstract thinking for this knowledge of humanity—which must be a knowledge of the spirit, a spiritual insight—that celebrates its great triumphs in the natural sciences. Yet this very thinking, which is entirely appropriate in the natural sciences, leads—especially in social life in the broadest sense—to certain, I would say, impossible results. The more abstract our thinking becomes, the more dogmatic it becomes in the individual. Certainly, one becomes very critical, conscientious, and methodical when applying the mode of thinking that has been cultivated over the last three to four centuries. But one nevertheless becomes dogmatic with regard to one’s social integration into all of humanity or into a part of humanity. Just take a closer look, and you will see that if you adhere to the way of thinking that has made the natural sciences great: you get used to always being right—and the other person is right, too! And people—this would be the extreme—could, in essence, no longer communicate anything to one another at all.

[ 8 ] Are we not living in the midst of this situation? Doesn’t the person who has gone through a life full of trials and struggled for decades with these problems—and who is compelled, within the framework of today’s education of humanity, to present these problems in the common, accepted forms of concepts from Spiritual Science—find everywhere the youngest people who come and say, with their experience lasting at most a decade and a half: “That is my point of view; that is what I think; that is what I assert in opposition to the rich experiences of life.” And finally, taken abstractly, one cannot even blame these novices in life—who are just as capable of logical thinking as the elderly with their wealth of life experience— one cannot even say they are wrong, for what constitutes the essence of our current scientific understanding is, at its core, not tied to human development; it is something one arrives at, something one finds oneself in, and what one ultimately attains once one has reached a certain degree of maturity. And so one can say: This abstract thinking, this intellectualism, which has today reached a high degree of perfection, gives everyone something they would actually like to communicate to everyone else—but which the other person already knows on their own. One would like to express oneself in social life. One cannot express oneself because the other person is not inclined to receive the message, but at most to counter it with their own point of view.

[ 9 ] What makes the natural sciences great is inapplicable to social life, for through them a person gives—or wishes to give—something that no one else actually wants to receive, because they believe they already have it. Anyone who truly thinks through what constitutes the fundamental orientation of our entire spiritual life today will have to see much of what exists today in our social life as destructive forces—forces that drive people apart instead of bringing them together—as stemming in part from what I have just characterized as a peculiarity and social consequence of abstract thinking, a mode of thought particularly suited to the natural sciences.

[ 10 ] Spiritual Science will lead beyond this way of thinking because it cultivates that which remains unconscious in the thinking commonly used today; because it brings the will—which is precisely what remains unconscious—into this thinking; because it develops volitional thinking. And from this volitional thinking, true knowledge of human nature can arise. But that is only one element.

[ 11 ] The other point is that, precisely under the influence of this way of thinking—as it has emerged in the scientific worldview—human beings have also come to contrast thinking devoid of will with willing devoid of thought. Modern human beings essentially consist of this duality: of that element of the soul that can be described only as thinking devoid of will, and of the other element of the soul that must be described as willing devoid of thought. Spiritual Science insight, just as it seeks to integrate the will into thinking, also seeks to lead the person who wishes to become a spiritual researcher to view their own actions and the results of their own will with the same objectivity with which one otherwise views external facts. When a person embarks on the path of spiritual research, they must become a faithful observer of what they themselves do and what they themselves will. In a sense, they must first detach themselves ideationally and walk alongside themselves as if from a higher perspective. And this higher self beside oneself must observe the person in everything he does in the same way one otherwise observes only external facts of nature or the results of an experiment. For then one learns to develop thoughts about something that, especially in certain radical, extreme circles, has been dominated and driven almost exclusively by the most personal emotions, particularly in the last three to four centuries. One learns to recognize in thought that which one would otherwise not even notice—thoughts that would otherwise remain entirely in the unconscious.

[ 12 ] And because human beings are divided into these two elements, we see even today, torn apart, on the one hand, abstract scientific knowledge that focuses solely on what lies outside the human being, and, on the other hand, social impulses operating merely as personal instincts. We see how the natural sciences have reached certain heights, how, based on the education derived from this scientific way of thinking, people—for example, in the East—are now—and unfortunately, this will not be limited to the East — seek to derive principles from it for human social coexistence; yet it is evident in the East that scientific social policy can do nothing other than organize the most savage human instincts—organize them in such a way that the resulting structure is bound to drive humanity to ruin.

[ 13 ] These things are connected to what has come to prominence in recent centuries, and one must view them in this context. Only when one cultivates the will through thinking, as I have indicated, and then cultivates thinking through the will—you can find the precise description in my books *How to Attain Knowledge of the Higher Worlds?* and in the second part of my *Secret Science*, as well as in similar books—only then, when one establishes such a Spiritual Science in this way, one that can penetrate into the true essence of the human being, will such a science not stand powerless in the face of the entire human personality. Yes, our present-day science stands powerless in the face of the entire human personality, for thinking into which the will does not pulse is merely an activity of the human head; it is intellectualism that has no life-giving power. Spiritual knowledge, as it gradually takes shape into a worldview based on the foundations I have only been able to hint at here—Spiritual Science—is something that encompasses not only human thoughts and the human intellect, but the entire human personality. Because it has emerged from the will—from thinking sustained by the will—it places this human thinking within the social community; and because it carries thought into the realm of the will, it can also inspire thoughts in human beings that give rise to genuine life practice—not merely routine, but life practice that can be based only on ideas, on will sustained by the spirit.

[ 14 ] We need this spiritual Science worldview today above all in the realm of spiritual life that is of the utmost importance to the public; we need it in the realm of the art of education. And it is precisely in the art of education that one can explore the inner truth of what I have just characterized as the principles of Spiritual Science. At the aforementioned “Waldorf School,” which was established in Stuttgart under the auspices of our friend, Mr. Molt, an attempt has been made to ground pedagogy as the art of education on a spiritual-scientific foundation. This Waldorf School does not aim to be an ideological school. Those who claim that it is intended to be a school where anthroposophically oriented Spiritual Science is instilled in children in place of old worldviews are speaking untruths. That is precisely not what this school is about; rather, it is about the fact that what is meant here by “Spiritual Science” can grasp the human will, can permeate human action, and that what in other worldviews remains merely a thought or an idea can be methodically grasped within the anthroposophically oriented spiritual-scientific worldview. Consequently, the focus of the Waldorf School in Stuttgart is not on what content one wishes to impart to the children, but rather on the fact that our Spiritual Science becomes a method within the school—it becomes the foundation for the teacher’s work in teaching, in educating, in acting, and in willing.

[ 15 ] However, this does require that this pedagogy, this art of education, be based on a genuine understanding of human nature. A true understanding of human nature can only be achieved through the methods I have briefly outlined today. Through them, one learns to recognize how, above all, certain stages in the developing human being can be distinguished based on inner soul-spiritual processes. These stages are aspects of the human being that are often superficially overlooked today, even in science, which considers itself to be very precise. One does, of course, observe certain processes in the child when the change of teeth occurs around the age of seven. But those who look more deeply into human nature also see how, during this period of tooth change, a complete metamorphosis of the child’s entire soul life takes place. Whereas in the first period, from birth to the age of seven, everything the child does, everything the child is inclined toward or feels capable of, stems from the principle of imitation—from empathizing with everything the environment does—with the change of teeth around the age of seven, the child enters a phase in which it is, through its inner capacities, inclined toward authority. Just as in the natural, elementary phase of life, up until the age of seven the child will, even in its hand movements and in the development of its speech, do what the adults in its environment do. It will become completely interwoven with what emanates even from the intangible currents of thought and imagination in its environment. From the age of seven onward, the child needs someone in its environment whom it can trust to know, in a certain sense, what is right; it needs authority. No matter how much people may rail against authority today, one should bear in mind that from the age of seven until approximately the age of sexual maturity, authority is something under whose influence a person must stand if they are to develop healthily. For a second phase of human childhood extends from the change of teeth to sexual maturity, up to about the age of fourteen. “About,” I say; this is not a matter of arbitrary numbers, but rather of the significant stages—the transformations in the metamorphoses of life—that are at issue. Around the age of fourteen, a person reaches sexual maturity. At that point, a complete transformation of their soul life takes place; what enables them inwardly to judge independently and to face the world with the judgments that arise within them begins to emerge, whereas from the age of seven to fourteen they thrive when they have beside them the authority to which they look up.

[ 16 ] It is precisely during the years from the change of teeth to sexual maturity that the child must be guided in instruction and upbringing during what is known as elementary school. But even within this period, one can still distinguish certain phases and subphases. The impulse to imitate, which arises from the innermost being of the human being and prevails until the age of seven, continues—albeit in a weakened form, yet still clearly evident—beyond the seventh year and into the ninth year of life. And the person who, through Spiritual Science, acquires a living understanding of how this interplay of the capacity for imitation and the need for authority manifests itself in every single child—in all learning and in relation to all education—will be able to see a unique educational challenge in every child, even when facing the largest class. For such a person, as an educator and teacher, will not be able to submit to any standard pedagogy—not to a pedagogy that, in turn, establishes abstract principles based on intellectualism: “this is how one must educate,” or “that is how one must educate”—no, the one who has become a teacher through Spiritual Science sees in the developing child something that the artist sees in every individual creation: something new, again and again. There are no abstract pedagogical principles here; rather, there is a living process of attuning oneself to the child, of drawing forth from the child itself, of unraveling the mystery of what is hidden within the child—that which, through physicality, seeks to emerge as a spiritual-soul aspect. For this is the distinctive feature of spiritual cognition—which must be applied above all in the art of education—that this spiritual cognition leads the human being back to immediate aliveness. This is not the case with intellectualism or abstract cognition. When I have grasped something abstractly—well, once I have grasped it, I carry it forward into life. At most, I recall what I have already learned. This is not the case with spiritual knowledge. Anyone who has taken even a few steps along the path of spiritual knowledge knows that this knowledge does not provide anything that one can merely recall. Just as spiritual knowledge does not provide anything that one can merely recall, so too what I have eaten and drunk today cannot give me anything that I can merely recall tomorrow or in the days that follow; as a human being, one is not satisfied if one is only supposed to recall what one ate four weeks ago. But as a human being who has absorbed an abstract insight, one is satisfied when one remembers what one learned or acquired four weeks ago. It is not like that with spiritual insight. Spiritual insight interweaves itself with the human being, sinks in, is assimilated, and must be continually revitalized; in this way, it enters into the manifestations of life.

[ 17 ] If anyone were a great scholar of the spirit at the age of forty and did not continually nurture a living engagement with what is to be known, he would starve for spiritual and mental substance just as someone would starve if he stopped eating at the age of forty. Abstract knowledge, such as that which has made the natural sciences great, can be satisfied with phenomena. It is a one-time, closed process. Spiritual knowledge brings people into a living connection with their surroundings; it must be constantly renewed if it is not to wither away; in life, it becomes similar to eating and drinking in a lower realm.

[ 18 ] By voicing such a thing, the world should recognize how radically different this spiritual insight is from the one that is believed today to be the only possible one. But imagine this spiritual insight permeating everything the educator and teacher intends to do—permeating their actions and thoughts as they enter the classroom, just as iron invigorates our blood—imagine a mindset that arises from spiritual insight and knows: you must approach each individual uniquely, you cannot rely on memorization; you must face each child as a new mystery—that alone gives rise to true pedagogy, a pedagogy full of life. People talk a lot about this today: one should educate individuality. All sorts of beautiful abstract principles are also put forward, but nothing will be achieved through them. In these demanding times, we will only achieve something by establishing pedagogy as an art. This pedagogy as an art, which looks anew into the human being at every moment, sets aside the sciences of knowledge, just as the artist casts aside all aesthetics and everything else when he wants to create something positive. What good are all the principles about beauty to us when we want to shape clay! Anyone who knows what artistic creation is will agree with me on this. What good are all the pedagogical rules to us when we are to begin unraveling and developing what is spiritual and soul-related in the child? The point is that we, as educators, must become artists. We can become this when Spiritual Science penetrates our civilization as a living component. Then, however, we will also see how—during the period between the ages of seven and nine, when the sense of imitation and the sense of authority are in balance—we must specifically cultivate the will and avoid placing too much emphasis on the child’s intellect. Above all, we must not present to the child, in an unartistic manner, what has been established by human convention. We must not present to the child as convention anything that speaks merely to the intellect. This includes the shapes of letters, as well as writing and reading. All of this, as we have it today—since we are no longer in the era of ancient pictographic writing—is based on human convention. We must move away from this. That is why Waldorf schools strive to develop reading and writing—writing first and foremost—out of the artistic. The aim is first to draw—and even paint—forms from which the letter forms can then be developed; that is, first the artistic, and from that, the intellectual. But in order for what the child’s nature actually craves in this age to blossom in the right way, everything must be geared toward this artistic instruction. And now, having taught at the Waldorf School for only a few months, we see how it is truly possible to work from the artistic—how it is possible, above all in music, in singing, in eurythmy, and in inspired music — for the child, this is still eurythmy — how it is possible, in all of this, to give the child something that its nature demands, that its nature desires, but which at the same time makes the artistic sense flexible, inclines the artistic sense to perceive the whole world in an artistic way. Then, as the ninth year approaches—when the human being can establish a relationship between the “I” and the external world—one can experimentally move toward what is known as the description of nature; then one can evoke science from the artistic.

[ 19 ] However, we must always bear in mind—as strange and trivial as it may sound, it must be said—that a human being is a human being. The so-called “timetable,” as we often see it today, takes no account of the fact that a human being is a human being. There is nothing less pedagogical than teaching a child one subject for three-quarters of an hour, followed immediately by three-quarters of an hour of something completely opposite: three-quarters of an hour of religion, three-quarters of an hour of arithmetic, three-quarters of an hour of writing, and so on. At the Waldorf School, we seek to draw out everything from the laws that express themselves within the child’s soul and spirit. This does, however, require that one focus solely on a single subject—for example, arithmetic—for three, four, five, or even six weeks, without a timetable, and only when a certain amount of material has been covered does one move on to something else. This fosters concentration in the classroom. At the end of the school year, everything relevant can then be summarized through review. But the timetable—that is actually the enemy of any true art of education.

[ 20 ] And in this way, one not only achieves something with regard to the educational and instructional guidance of the child, but one also comes to discern the necessities of the curriculum from the child’s own development. When I conducted the pedagogical course for the teachers at the Waldorf School to prepare them for their task, my primary concern was to develop a curriculum that is, in fact, simply the result of what the child requires—from the sixth and seventh through the eighth and ninth years, from the ninth through the twelfth year, and from the twelfth year until puberty. By discerning from the fundamental development of human nature what needs to be done—and this is possible if one has an understanding of the human being through Spiritual Science—one can, year by year, and upon entering the classroom, discern with deep pedagogical insight what the faces of the children sitting before one are telling us. In this way—I can only sketch this out for you; I cannot, of course, describe these things in every detail—an attempt is made, through Spiritual Science, to bring immediate life into one of the most important social spheres: the art of education. |

[ 21 ] All abstractions, everything that makes technology great—these are not fruitful when it comes to bringing people together. True art of education will have to seek its sources in Spiritual Science. It will only be able to do so if, in the spirit of the threefold social order, spiritual life is liberated from the state and from economic life. In fact, it was only because the Württemberg School Law still had a loophole that it was possible to establish the Waldorf School within that loophole as a free school where one can truly operate according to pedagogical and artistic principles. To embrace Spiritual Science, one does not need to become a spiritual scientist. Just as one can accept modern astronomy or modern chemistry without needing to become an astronomer or a chemist—just as one needs only common sense—so, too, one needs only common sense, provided one does not allow oneself to be influenced by prejudices, in order to take in what the researcher of the Spiritual Science brings to the surface from the depths of the soul. But when one immerses oneself in what is recognized through will-driven thought and thought-driven will, one also gains the necessary zest for life that is lacking in today’s slumbering humanity—and which must come if things are to improve.

[ 22 ] Unless a sufficiently large number of people vigorously demand what is necessary for a new beginning, it will not come about on its own from any quarter. The current state of human development is such that it requires us to demand the great goals of life out of our own will—out of our conscious will. We have pursued that kind of politics long enough—the kind that always takes a diplomatic view of what is happening there [gap] and says, “It will work itself out.” Today, people see how things are getting worse every day; each day anew, they believe that the situation will remain as it is now. They have not the slightest sense that the power of renewal must be recognized within decline. And so, just as in the art of education, we must also seek out in the life of the people those very forces that can lead to a new beginning. There, too, these can only be the forces that arise from the spirit, from the knowledge of the spirit, from the contemplation of the spirit. How starkly do those two elements of the soul—to which I have alluded—stand in contrast to one another in our social life, in our national life today! Abstract thinking, which every human being actually possesses—it really makes no difference whether one has grown up in a cobbler’s workshop, is the son of a cobbler, or [gap]—if one has reached a certain level of thought. This kind of thinking is independent of the personal; it is from this thinking that one derives one’s point of view. But these points of view are actually all unnecessary, for every person actually has the right to their own point of view, and they could actually go through the world as a solitary individual with this point of view. There is no need to live together at all if everyone has “their own point of view,” if no one has anything to say to the other.

[ 23 ] But this is what is unique about spiritual knowledge: that it breaks completely free from these “standpoints,” from this fixation on standpoints; that it actually becomes something that makes people receptive to life, to a true school. For anyone who familiarizes themselves with Spiritual Science—in the sense intended here as anthroposophically oriented, as represented by the Dornach Building—every single person they encounter in life becomes an interesting problem. The child itself—which is, after all, particularly important for the art of education—becomes an interesting problem. And just as in physical life one feels a hunger for the external natural world—just as one must connect with the external natural world—so, as a student of Spiritual Science, one feels the need to engage again and again with what other people mean, what they think, feel, and want. Spiritual Science brings us together with people to the greatest possible extent.

[ 24 ] Today, the Spiritual Science scholar can say, above all else: when he reads about other worldviews, oh, he lets them affect him differently than other people do. He is less concerned with what is error or truth, for that is usually determined only by one’s own point of view—and I have just spoken about this very point of view. But no matter how great the supposed error may be—whether produced by this or that person through thought or action—what a person presents to us serves as a complement to our own being when we allow ourselves to be permeated by Spiritual Science. Just as the natural scientist feels the need to engage with experimentation, so does the spiritual scientist feel the need to engage with all that is human. When he establishes a worldview, it becomes a social impulse, because it does not drive people apart, but brings them together; because it, in turn, infuses individual life into what is otherwise merely an abstract standpoint that anyone might hold toward anyone else. The spiritual scientist stands before the small child, who may be able to do nothing more than babble—or perhaps not even that—yet who, through elementary glances, can reveal mysteries to him through eyes that are still entirely childlike. He receives revelations of all that is human. Thus, what Spiritual Science has to say—if only it were to be incorporated into human life—becomes an impulse for social togetherness among people. Just as scientific knowledge has extracted the content of thought from human language—just as it has created the phrase—so Spiritual Science becomes a living spiritual substance woven into the mysteries of our language; and because Spiritual Science leads human beings to their true humanity, our language will thereby become the most important means of social betterment for the time to come.

[ 25 ] And precisely because knowledge has become so abstract on the one hand, the will has become dependent on mere emotions, on mere personal instincts, as I have also explained today. Because Spiritual Science derives its content from the will carried by thought, what it can give to human beings is the foundation for interests that go further than what mere personal feeling—mere personal egoism—can provide. What, then, has ultimately become the decisive factor in social life over the last three to four centuries? Egoism has become the decisive factor. If we cannot rise through the recognition of [gap] to what is human, if what is human cannot permeate us, then we can only assert egoism in social life. But the moment we have spiritual life in its independence, and can thereby establish that independence in the art of education that I have outlined today, and at the moment when we allow our will to be permeated by ideas, we can find the path from person to person in our economic life; we can form associations out of the various professions, out of the coming together of consumers and producers; we can create an economic structure within the social organism that is built precisely upon what one person can learn from another, what one person can experience from another. In this way, the routine of life will be transformed into the practice of life. The more deeply one contemplates human life, the more one looks at human life itself, the more the necessity of the threefold structure of the social organism emerges from every corner. And just as, on the one hand, economic life is enriched by a will imbued with ideas, and, on the other hand, spiritual life [gap], so too does that which takes place between human beings—in our time, it actually takes place only as convention, and to such an extent that one even seeks convention in the form of the League of Nations among nations—becomes a living element in the legal life of the state, which, as an independent member of the threefold social organism, is to stand opposite the other independent members: the independent spiritual life and the independent economic life. But at the same time, you can see precisely from the example of the art of education how Spiritual Science intervenes in the life of the people, in social life, and what Spiritual Science must be like—for it is upon its foundations that the structure of the threefold social organism must be built. Oh, what a state of affairs has arisen in recent times under the influence of the two soul elements described! On the one hand, we have—I would say—abstract thinking that transcends all human individuality, which is the same in all people who have attained the capacity for this logical, abstract, intellectualistic thinking. Because this is the same for everyone, it is therefore necessary that what a human being—as an abstract human being—cannot attain on their own, what they seek to acquire within the social community, must be built upon what is subhuman, upon mere instincts, upon egoistic instincts. And so we see how, in the era of Darwinism—when people observed the struggle for existence in the animal kingdom (though it applies there only to a limited extent as well)—it came to be that naturalists wanted to become social politicians and social scientists, and now also wanted to establish the struggle for existence in human life as a matter of course. Yes, it is even true that the struggle for existence would rage in human life if only the instincts of selfishness were allowed to operate in social life. And Lenin and Trotsky, too, [want to] establish this struggle for existence; they will merely organize selfishness. Anyone who can see through human life today knows this. Everything else will be a mask. We can already see today the inherent falsehood of Leninism, which promises people mountains of gold and short working hours, yet has already reached the point of establishing a twelve-hour workday because this turns out to be a necessity within the mechanism they intend to introduce.

[ 26 ] But never in human life will that which exists within a person as abstract thought—which is the same in all people—be able to say “yes” to this struggle for existence; it will always be dissatisfied with this struggle for existence; it will always strive for harmony and for the overcoming of the struggle for existence. But if we do not succeed in infusing true spirituality into abstract intellectualism, the world of abstraction will be too weak to eliminate egoism from social life. And on the other hand, egoism will remain brutal unless it is infused with that which only spiritual knowledge and spiritual insight can bring to humanity. That which appears dualistically in human beings today—on the one hand, abstract intellectualism; on the other, the mere reign of instincts—can find its balance only when both are permeated by the Spirit. When thoughts are spiritualized, they are brought to the individual human being and transform that individual into someone who does not merely seek to be right, who does not merely offer what others do not want, but who must continually engage with other people, continually converse with them—so to speak—in the language of thought rather than in empty phrases. But this can only be achieved through a spiritual life that is not merely based on memory, but—like hunger and thirst—on the daily renewal, on the metamorphosis of life, which must constantly renew itself, even if it has already flourished to the highest degree. This can only happen when the instincts are permeated by those thoughts that arise in the manner I have described today. Then, within their economic associations, people will be able to will what transcends the individual. Then economic life will be able to be spiritualized. It is indeed the case that wherever one looks at the world today, wherever one looks into life as it really is, the necessity arises for what can be called the threefold social order. This is not a utopia. Only those people who lack a sense of reality—who are themselves utopians—describe the threefold social order as a utopia, and who therefore declare everything that does not fit into their utopias to be a utopia.

[ 27 ] What is presented to the world as the impetus for the threefold structure of the social organism is drawn from life in its fullness. But it also shows that this fullness of life today demands an interpenetration with that which can be grasped vividly through spiritual insight. This spiritual insight is necessary for human beings. And until it is recognized that human beings are not merely natural beings, it will not be possible to find a solution to the social problems that are so pressing today. Years ago, when theoretical materialism was at its height, those who could already see through it—that this theoretical materialism must also lead to practical materialism—raised a clamor against this materialism. But one cannot help but say that, after all, the people who became theoretical materialists—such as Haeckel and others like him—were also intelligent individuals. We are faced with the peculiar phenomenon that truly brilliant minds have become materialists. Why? They became materialists because the kind of thinking that has developed over the course of the last three to four centuries as abstract thinking—and this becomes clear especially to the researcher of the spirit—must be explained in materialistic terms. The very thinking that makes the natural sciences great is bound to the instrument of the brain, to the instrument of the human body. Thinking ceases with death. But when we infuse our thought processes with the will, when we do not allow ourselves to be guided solely by observation of nature and experimentation, when we permeate our thinking with that which arises from the will, then something emerges that can become free of the body—something that is truly soul-spiritual. Materialism was right regarding the kind of thinking that has grown so much in the last three to four centuries and has reached its peak in the present day. This must be explained materialistically. That is why the most intelligent people in the second half of the 19th century became materialists, because ultimately they were faced with only one great mystery: What is the nature of ordinary thinking, which has reached such heights, particularly in the natural sciences? This must be explained materialistically. Materialism, in its own way, is entirely justified, and no one can be a spiritualist in the sense of anthroposophically oriented Spiritual Science who does not recognize that materialism has its place within its limited sphere. Anyone who now asks the question: “Either materialism or spiritualism?”—is on the wrong track. For materialism has its own domain, and one must be clear that if human beings wish to preserve the soul-spiritual realm, they must also transcend the kind of thinking of which they are so proud today. Likewise, a truly desirable social order will never be able to emerge if human beings seek to establish such social orders solely on the basis of ordinary, egoistic emotions, for these can only give rise to the struggle for existence, not to a Leninist social utopia. Humanity can establish a true social order only if it infuses social life with the spiritual and soul aspects—as described today and as they are awakened within us by that worldview that arises from spiritual insight. Then human beings will recognize—and be able to verify through life—what Goethe had in mind when he turned his gaze to the essence of the human being and asked himself: What is the human being’s relationship to nature, after all? — Goethe said to himself: When we survey all of this—from the wondrous stars above to everything that presents itself as nature around us in the various kingdoms— we must look at the human being, standing opposite this nature, to see how he takes this nature into himself, how he transforms it, how he brings it forth within himself as something new—creating a higher nature through the human being within the human being, a higher nature that is spiritual-psychic and psychic-spiritual. Goethe expresses this so beautifully when he says:

[ 28 ] “Since man is placed at the pinnacle of nature, he sees himself once again as nature in its entirety, which must in turn produce another pinnacle within itself. To this end, he elevates himself by imbuing himself with all perfections and virtues, invoking choice, order, harmony, and meaning, and finally rising to the creation of a work of art that occupies a prominent place alongside his other deeds and works.” And as a complement to this thought is the other one found in the book on Winckelmann—in which the one just mentioned is also to be found—when Goethe says: “When the healthy nature of man functions as a whole, when he feels himself in the world as part of a great, beautiful, dignified, and valuable whole, when harmonious contentment grants him pure, free delight; then the universe, if it could perceive itself, would exult as having reached its goal and admire the pinnacle of its own becoming and being. For what is the purpose of all the effort of suns and planets and moons, of stars and the Milky Way, of comets and nebulae, of worlds that have come into being and those yet to come, if not ultimately for a happy human being to rejoice, unaware of his own existence?”

[ 29 ] It is out of such a mindset—one that leads human beings through nature, beyond nature, and toward their own inner being, toward the soul and spirit—that the very foundation of our social life can arise. But it will arise only if human beings, through their own will, direct their gaze toward what the exploration of spiritual life itself can offer them.

[ 30 ] Therefore, it must be said: We should not look to external institutions and their restructuring to find what can lead us forward. No matter how we might restructure external institutions, it will not lead to a new beginning. A true renewal can only come about when human beings seek within themselves that which currently tends toward destruction. For everything external that arises in human life is created by human beings themselves, by their innermost being. Only through re-learning, only through a change in thinking, can we move forward. Therefore, things cannot get better until a sufficiently large number of people muster the courage to rethink and relearn. And ultimately, that which may one day once again come upon humanity as constructive forces must emerge from the courage to rise to the true spirit, so that this spirit, as I said at the end yesterday, may gradually but effectively eliminate the unspirit.

[ 31 ] [A discussion follows.]

[ 32 ] Concluding Remarks

[ 33 ] Ladies and gentlemen! I actually have no specific basis in Mr. B.’s remarks to say anything of substance in this closing statement, for he has provided an example of how one judges, from the abstract thinking of the present, that which one would like to express through spiritually inspired thinking. And so, for those in the distinguished audience who may have misunderstood—perhaps justifiably—what I said about the curriculum, I would like to add a few words here.

[ 34 ] What I said about the curriculum is that it should be designed to foster concentration. I didn’t say there shouldn’t be any variety. Aside from the fact that one could argue whether this variety should be introduced after three to five weeks for arithmetic, or whether one approach is better than the other—that is a purely didactic question that cannot be addressed in a polemical manner, but only objectively. But setting that aside: one must work toward concentration in class, meaning that a certain amount of material must be covered in such a way that the schedule does not hinder this process, so that one can truly work through a unit for three to six weeks—as long as necessary—without being interrupted by anything else. Of course, the child’s individual nature is fully taken into account in this process. Lest you misunderstand me, I would like to explain how things work, for example, in a typical class at a Waldorf school. Let’s take the fifth grade of elementary school. I could just as easily mention the first grade. Classes begin a few minutes after eight in the morning. During the first two periods, the focus is precisely on fostering this concentration—something that, in ordinary school subjects, is otherwise dispersed by the schedule, with all concentration spread out over a short period of time. Thus, during these first two hours—until about a few minutes past ten—the focus is concentrated on what is otherwise regarded as the content of the school subjects. So during this time—let’s say over a sufficiently long number of weeks—arithmetic is taught, followed by language instruction for a number of weeks, and so on. Then comes what makes concentration possible precisely because it is taught in a certain way; even with the youngest children, we offer foreign language instruction—French and English—so that even the first-grade classes receive foreign language instruction. And it makes a great impression when you see the little ones coming to their classes and see how, with great joy, they have already made progress in foreign language instruction in just a few weeks. The work with them is actually geared toward using the language. So this is already the case for the first grade for five to six weeks; French is taught until 11:00 a.m., and English until 12:00 p.m. Then the children go home. And on some afternoons—the children have enough free time; this is also part of the variety, so that they can get out again—on some afternoons, when they come back, they have singing, music, and eurythmy: animated gymnastics, animated movement art. In this animated movement art, the children do not merely engage in physiological gymnastics, which is also practiced, but in movement imbued with spirit. They are, as it were, given a silent language through eurythmy. The children take to this exceptionally well. And on those days—which happen quite often—when the children are gathered for special celebrations and there are eurythmy performances, the children flock to them, and you can see how alive it all is. So there can be no question of there being a lack of variety or of failing to take into account what corresponds to the nature of the child. But when it is said: “If the children get too bored, something else must be introduced”—well, my dear friends, that is precisely the task: to ensure that the children never get too bored! At most, the children might misbehave once in a while because something irritates them, but out of boredom—and this is what must be ensured—they never want the lesson to end in any way. And even in this short time—since I have attended the school twice for extended periods and am essentially always in charge of the lessons—I have been able to see for myself how this approach truly breathes life into the entire lesson.

[ 35 ] Ladies and gentlemen, if one wishes to establish the principle of equal rights for all not through idle talk but through action, then one really need not get worked up in a chatty sort of way about the difference between entrepreneurs and workers, which, despite all the talk, still exists today; it simply exists as a fact, and when we speak today, we truly cannot, for the time being, wipe this difference away. The point of the Waldorf School is that, in fact, the child of a working-class family sits next to the child of an entrepreneur. The children are educated in complete unity, and through this very act, equal rights for all are established! Whereas with all the idle talk and all the agitational rhetoric—that there must not be “entrepreneurs” and “workers,” but rather that they must have equal rights—nothing will be achieved. In short, the issue cannot be resolved with idle chatter; it can be resolved solely by setting goals and, above all, by aiming for a real solution to the social question. By constantly interjecting with agitational phrases whenever action is required—that way, not a single step toward improvement can ever be taken! That is what matters today: distinguishing between action and empty talk. If we fail to make this distinction between the talkers and those who want to take action, we will get nowhere; instead, the talkers will talk the entire social order to death. In this day and age, nothing can be achieved with fine-sounding rhetoric, no matter how much that rhetoric is based on equality. Equality must be substantiated; merely talking about equality accomplishes absolutely nothing.

[ 36 ] Another question, ladies and gentlemen: Shouldn’t the material conditions be created today for those who are economically disadvantaged, so that they may be given the opportunity to absorb spiritual knowledge? I recently wrote an article titled “Ideas and Bread” in the latest or second-to-last issue of the journal *Dreigliederung des sozialen Organismus* (Threefold Social Order), published in Stuttgart—to counter the common prejudice that, as those who are well-fed and those who can still afford to feed themselves today repeatedly point out: “All that needs to be done to solve the social question is for people to work.” That’s easy to say! The point is that people must see a goal, a meaning in their work! But on the other hand, it accomplishes nothing when the other side keeps saying: “First, bread must be provided for the people; then they will rise spiritually, or then we can ensure that they rise spiritually.” It is, after all, intellectual work that leads to the production of bread. One must organize; one must, in a certain way, bring what is produced into some kind of structure—a social one—otherwise bread cannot be produced. If a terrible wave of famine is now spreading across Central Europe, then this wave of famine —even though things were certainly not good before, a point we won’t dwell on now—did not arise because bread suddenly withdrew from people, but because people were thrust into a social order by the catastrophe of war, within which no bread is earned, within which no ideas are at work that enable bread to be earned. The ideas that were revered by the people—and by the leaders—until 1914 have been reduced to absurdity over the last five to six years; they have been discarded. We need new ideas! And if we do not resolve to say to ourselves: “We need new ideas”—for it is through these new ideas that the social order will be organized, and through them that the necessary bread will be produced—if we do not resolve to do this, then we will not move forward into the future in a healthy way. It is very strange how, I would say, individual cases reveal that people do not want to admit to themselves how the truth actually lies and unfolds. One of the most radical figures up until 1914 was certainly Prince Krapotkin. When he had returned to Russia, one soon heard afterward: “Yes, if only we could get bread from the West, then things will surely get better!” — And at the same time, one heard that he was writing an “ethics.” You see, that is precisely what has ruined us: that people have, on the one hand, material life, and on the other, an abstract spiritual life—and that nothing from this abstract spiritual life finds its way into actual material life. The spirit does not reveal itself through worship; the spirit reveals itself by becoming capable of mastering and organizing matter as well. That is precisely the problem: our creeds have come to the point of merely wanting to provide people with a beautiful message once they have stopped working—or, at most, a directive on the first blank page of the ledger, where it says, “With God”—even though what is recorded there in debits and credits by no means always justifies the inscription, “With God”! But this reveals the signs of decline in our time: that we have lost the power to find a bridge between what we profess spiritually and material life; that the very attitude is becoming dominant which says: “Oh, no, don’t link material life with the spirit! The spirit is something utterly sublime; one must keep it free from material life!” — No, that is not what the spirit is for—to keep it separate from material life, so that when one leaves the factory, one can only experience it as a Sunday-afternoon sensation, however noble it may be. Rather, the spirit is there to be carried through the factory gates, so that the machines operate according to the spirit, and the workers are organized according to the spirit. That is what the spirit is for—to permeate material life! And that is what has ruined us: that this is not the case, that we have an abstract spiritual life alongside a spiritless material life dominated by mere routine workers. Things will not get better until the spirit becomes so powerful that it can master matter. It is not the spirit—alien to matter and to the world—that Spiritual Science seeks to lead us to, but rather the spirit that can master human beings—a spirit that one does not merely find when one is glad to leave the factory, but one that one carries joyfully and gladly into the factory, so that every single action may take place in the light of this spiritual life.

[ 37 ] Those who desire the spirit in the sense intended here do not, in truth, want an impractical spirit; they want a spirit that in the world truly has more to offer than mere idle chatter, more than just words that can bring joy in one’s spare time—but rather a spirit that, by mastering matter, organizes life thoroughly and can become intimately connected with life itself. It will depend on this spirit—or rather, on our acceptance of it—whether we, if we deny it, will sail deeper and deeper into misfortune or not. Today, we must decide between these two alternatives. The more people who decide to rise to the challenge of this active spirit, the better it will be for the future of humanity.

[ 38 ] That is what I wanted to add to what I said today.