Everyone needs shoes, but not everyone needs to be a shoemaker

It is paramount for present day humanity to receive a strong dose of esotericism. Plagues, epidemics, and terrible wars would rage among men, under prevailing materialism, if mankind does not receive a deepening in the spiritual realm. However great is the need for spreading spiritual life, and despite the necessity to have more esotericists today, it would be totally wrong to work at propagating spiritual science.

We must have esoterics, but not everyone needs to be one. A very simple example can help us understand: It is a fact that everyone needs shoes. Shoemakers are therefore a necessity. It would however be quite wrong to draw the conclusion that everyone needs to be a shoemaker. Likewise, people need not all to become esotericist, but those who want to do so, will, during their present or future incarnations, have the task of spreading spiritual knowledge, and promoting it in the lives of others.

Source (German): Rudolf Steiner – GA 266a – Aus den Inhalten der esoterischen Stunden – Stuttgart, September 15, 1907 (page 243)

Anonymous translator

Previously posted on July 29,  2016

Advertisement

Waldorf Schools: Not a worldview but an educational system and teaching technique

We should in the strictest sense retain the attitude that the Waldorf School is not a school where a specific view of the world is to be taught. What we have gained from our worldview, which we have been presenting during the past decades, should never be brought as dogma. It should only be used – because it can be used – to improve and reform the didactic methodology, the pedagogical technique.  

Our times require it of us to completely relinquish the idea of handing on the content of our worldview to the children. The Catholic Child should have a Catholic religion teacher and be taught the Catholic doctrine; his religious exercises should be led by the Catholic religion teacher. The same holds good for the Protestant child. What must be brought about through the Waldorf schools we want to establish, is not to be found in the dissemination of a view of the world, but we want a new educational method, a new approach to teaching, a new didactic system sprouting from what we are able to bring.

Source (German): Rudolf Steiner – GA 297 – Idee und Praxis der Waldorfschule – Stuttgart, August 31, 1919 (page 86-87)

Translated by Nesta Carsten-Krüger

Previously posted on August 25, 2016

The length of time between incarnations

It should be clear that a certain amount of time needs to elapse before the human being comes back to earth again after death. You might ask, ‘ Yes, when does one come back? ‘ –  if one really considers this matter well, the following conclusion arises: the one who has occupied him or herself much with the spiritual world grows into the spirit world easier after death. He or she then has a relatively, because of having been occupied with the spiritual world during the time on earth, longer time between death and a new birth. You may be surprised, that I say: longer. Such a person may stay there for a longer time because he has already learned a lot about the spiritual world. People who engaged themselves with spiritual matters on earth can develop better there, stay longer and come back later. By contrast, those who are only occupied with the material world, come back relatively earlier again.

Source (German): Rudolf Steiner – GA 350 – Rhythmen im Kosmos und im Menschenwesen – Dornach, May 30, 1923 (page 21)

Translated by Nesta Carsten-Krüger

Previously posted on August 13, 2016

Crap Science

If your urine is dark, then it’s likely you have an inflammation somewhere in the body. Clear urine makes you subject to tumour formations. […] An accurate examination of urine, is therefore a way to evaluate a number of diseases. (page 174)

Of course, this must not come out, as it would cause our enemies to repeat, once more, that Spiritual Science is basically crap science, since it concerns itself with sweat, urine, and so on. They would like nothing more! (page 173)

Source (German): Rudolf Steiner – GA 352 – Natur und Mensch in geisteswissen- schaftlicher Betrachtung – Dornach, February 23, 1924 (page 173-174)

Anonymous translator

Previously posted on July 26, 2016

Politics: Russian and American

The Russian becomes ill or actually suffers a death if he desires to be political. This may seem strange, yet a Russian person has a constitution which creates a disposition towards disease, towards death, with intensive political involvement. The Russian Folk Soul has absolutely no affinity with that quality in the English and American Folk Soul which creates a political capacity.

Source: Rudolf Steiner – GA 186 – Social and Anti-Social Forces in the Human Being – Bern, 12th December 1918

Previously posted on August 10, 2014