Not abstractions, but concrete facts

You must keep in mind that Anthroposophy does more than look at the physical world and say: It is based on something spiritual. This would be much too easy. By such a way of thinking, we could acquire no real conception of the spiritual world. Someone who is determined to repeat in philosophic terms that the physical world rests on a spiritual foundation, would be like a man who when walking across a meadow is told by his companion: Look, this flower is a dandelion, these are daisies, and so forth. The first man, however, might reply: Indeed, I am not interested in these names. Here I see flowers, just flowers in the abstract. Such a person would be like a philosopher who recognizes only the pantheistic-spiritual element, but refuses to discuss the concrete facts, the particular formations of the spiritual.

Source: Rudolf Steiner – GA 226 – Man’s Being, His Destiny and World-Evolution: Lecture III – Oslo, 18th May 1923

https://rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA226/English/AP1966/19230518v01.html

Translated by Erna McArthur

Art of Arild Rosenkrantz

Previously posted on 17 August 2019