Rudolf STEINER

Rudolf STEINER
Display his horoscope with biography and chart

Born:
February 25, 1861, 11:15 PM

in:
Kraljevica (Hongrie)

Sun:
7°21′ Pisces

Moon:
17°35′ Virgo

Ascendant:
11°07′ Scorpio

Midheaven:
22°12′ Léo

Numerology:
Birthpath 7

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Disclaimer: this page is one among hundreds of thousands of pages available online on Astrotheme astrological website. These short excerpts of astrological charts, like the one below, are computer processed in French and in English. They are, by no means, of a personal nature . This principle is valid for the 37,717 famous people currently included in our database. These texts provide the meanings of planets, or combination of planets, in signs and in houses, as well as the interpretations of planetary dominants in line with modern Western astrology rules. When the birth time is unknown, (12:00 PM (unknown)), these portrait excerpts do not take into account the parameters derived from the time, which means, the domification (Ascendant, astrological houses, etc.). Nonetheless, these analyses remain accurate in any case. Therefore, no negative aspect, which may damage the good reputation of a celebrity, is posted, for Astrotheme is not a polemic website.

 

Biography of Rudolf STEINER

Rudolf Steiner (25 February 1861 – 30 March 1925), born in Donji Kraljevec, Croatia, was an Austrian philosopher, literary scholar, educator, artist, playwright, social thinker, and esotericist. He was the founder of Anthroposophy, Waldorf education, biodynamic agriculture, anthroposophical medicine, and the new artistic form of Eurythmy.
He characterized anthropos…

Numerology: Birth Path of Rudolf STEINER

This paragraph begins with a few excerpts of the astrological portrait which analyses several features of the personality of Rudolf STEINER, from a numerological view, dealing only with the life path.

Testimonies to numerology are found in the most ancient civilizations and show that numerology pre-dates astrology. This discipline considers the name, the surname, and the date of birth, and ascribes a meaning to alphabetic letters according to the numbers which symbolise them.

The path of life, based on the date of birth, provides indications on the kind of destiny which one is meant to experience. It is one of the elements that must reckoned with, along with the expression number, the active number, the intimacy number, the achievement number, the hereditary number, the dominant numbers or the lacking numbers, or also the area of expression, etc.

Your Birth Path:

Your Life Path is influenced by the number 7, and indicates that your destiny is marked with spiritual life, research, and introversion. This number prompts you to steer clear from commonly accepted values. You search for wisdom, sometimes at the cost of some degree of solitude. It may translate into curiosity or a keen interest in metaphysics, religion, or spirituality. Or else, the will to follow a personal path off the beaten path and to build a specific destiny for yourself. Your life is an initiation journey, and worldly vagaries are unable to make you turn away from your research. If the quest for a certain form of the absolute proves to be a powerful factor of creativity, your progression tolerates no easy solutions. The danger is that, owing to your need for independence, you may come across as an exceedingly cold and rigid person. It is all the more so because the number 7 marks extraordinary destinies which sometimes demand sacrifices, particularly on the material or interpersonal areas.

Personality of Rudolf STEINER (excerpt)

Introduction

Here are some character traits from Rudolf STEINER’s birth chart. This description is far from being comprehensive but it can shed light on his/her personality, which is still interesting for professional astrologers or astrology lovers.

The dominant planets of Rudolf STEINER

When interpreting a natal chart, the best method is to start gradually from general features to specific ones. Thus, there is usually a plan to be followed, from the overall analysis of the chart and its structure, to the description of its different character traits.

In the first part, an overall analysis of the chart enables us to figure out the personality’s main features and to emphasize several points that are confirmed or not in the detailed analysis: in any case, those general traits are taken into account. Human personality is an infinitely intricate entity and describing it is a complex task. Claiming to rapidly summarize it is illusory, although it does not mean that it is an impossible challenge. It is essential to read a natal chart several times in order to absorb all its different meanings and to grasp all this complexity. But the exercise is worthwhile.

In brief, a natal chart is composed of ten planets: two luminaries, the Sun and the Moon, three fast-moving or individual planets, Mercury, Venus and Mars, two slow-moving planets, Jupiter and Saturn, and three very slow-moving planets, Uranus, Neptune and Pluto. Additional secondary elements are: the Lunar Nodes, the Dark Moon or Lilith, Chiron and other asteroids such as Vesta, Pallas, Ceres or Juno. There are also special features such as the Arabic Parts, the Vertex, the Black Sun, hypothetical planets, etc. They are all posited on the Zodiac wheel consisting of twelve signs, from Aries to Pisces, and divided into twelve astrological houses.

The first step is to evaluate the importance of each planet. This is what we call identifying the dominant planets. This process obeys rules that depend on the astrologer’s sensitivity and experience but it also has precise and steady bases: thus, we can take into account the parameters of a planet’s activity (the number of active aspects a planet forms, the importance of each aspect according to its nature and its exactness), angularity parameters; (proximity to the four angles, Ascendant, Midheaven, Descendant and Imum Coeli or Nadir, all of them being evaluated numerically, according to the kind of angle and the planet-angle distance) and quality parameters (rulership, exaltation, exile and fall). Finally, other criteria such as the rulership of the Ascendant and the Midheaven etc. are important.

These different criteria allow a planet to be highlighted and lead to useful conclusions when interpreting the chart.

The overall chart analysis begins with the observation of three sorts of planetary distributions in the chart: Eastern or Western hemisphere, Northern or Southern hemisphere, and quadrants (North-eastern, North-western, South-eastern and South-western). These three distributions give a general tone in terms of introversion and extraversion, willpower, sociability, and behavioural predispositions.

Then, there are three additional distributions: elements (called triplicity since there are 3 groups of signs for each one) – Fire, Air, Earth and Water – corresponding to a character typology, modality (or quadruplicity with 4 groups of signs for each one) – Cardinal, Fixed and Mutable – and polarity (Yin and Yang).

There are three types of dominants: dominant planets, dominant signs and dominant houses. The novice thinks astrology means only "to be Aries" or sometimes, for example, "to be Aries Ascendant Virgo". It is actually far more complex. Although the Sun and the Ascendant alone may reveal a large part of the character- approximately between 30 and 60% according to the chart, a person is neither "just the Sun" (called the sign) nor just "the first house" (the Ascendant). Thus, a particular planet’s influence may be significantly increased; a particular sign or house may contain a group of planets that will bring nuances and sometimes weaken the role of the Ascendant, of the Sun sign etc.

Lastly, there are two other criteria: accentuations (angular, succedent and cadent) which are a classification of astrological houses and types of decanates that are occupied (each sign is divided into three decanates of 10° each). They provide additional information in this first general part.

These eleven (or six, if the birth time is unknown) general character traits must not be taken literally; they are, somehow, preparing for the chart reading. They allow to understand the second part of the analysis, which is more detailed and precise. It focuses on every area of the personality and provides a synthesis of all the above-mentioned parameters according to sound hierarchical rules.

Hemispheres and Quadrants for Rudolf STEINER

The axis linking the 1st house’s cuspide (the Ascendant) to the 7th house’s cuspide (the Descendant) divides the zodiac into two bowls, a superior bowl, in the South, and an inferior bowl in the North. Quoting an expression by the famous American astrologer Rudhyar, the Southern part and the Northern part correspond to two functions: "being" and "doing". Other concepts are also associated with this North and South distribution, such as introversion (Northern hemisphere) and extraversion (Southern hemisphere), being or appearances, inner life or external life, reflection or action, dreaming one’s life or living one’s dreams, the abstract or the concrete, backstage or limelight.

This is not about determination but about personal inclination: thus, some people will be thrown into public life despite a prominent Northern hemisphere. If this happens, however, it will not be due to their will, their taste or their deep nature. Conversely, a prominent Southern hemisphere will not bring about a famous destiny to its owner, even if he tends to turn the spotlight on himself, or if he looks for a more active life. It is a matter of deep nature and natural inclination. Of course, none of the typologies is "superior" to another.

In your birth chart, Rudolf STEINER, the ten main planets are distributed as follows:

Rudolf STEINER, the predominance of planets in the Northern hemisphere prompts you to reflect and imagine rather than to exteriorize your actions and to be at the forefront of the stage. So, should you wish to remedy this situation, it is up to you to force your nature to take action in broad daylight, to communicate, and to assert yourself… then, you can move forward in this concrete life and enjoy your newly won situation.

The birth chart is divided into two other parts, Eastern and Western, by the axis linking the Midheaven to the Imum Coeli.

The Eastern part, on the Ascendant side, shows the person’s ego, will, magnetism, and vitality, whereas the Western part, on the Descendant side, symbolizes other people, communication, relationships and their influence, as well as flexibility and adaptability.

The predominance of planets in the Western hemisphere of your chart means that you are quite flexible, capable of empathy, convivial and communicative. An excellent factor for many professional activities or for your social or sentimental life for example.

A definite asset… provided that you are not at the centre of the decisions you must take in your life: you may be tempted to listen to the last person who spoke, and your flexibility won’t always get you out of the tight spot. You are therefore advised to learn to decide alone and to cope with the consequences of your actions with courage and without regrets. This attitude will allow you to combine flexibility and action, adaptability and absence of hesitation.

The Ascendant-Descendant and Midheaven-Imum Coeli axes divide the Zodiac wheel into four quadrants.

Rudolf STEINER, the nocturnal North-western quadrant, consisting of the 4th, 5th and 6th houses, prevails in your chart: this sector favours creativity, conception and some sort of specialization or training, with helpfulness and relations as strong components. You need others’ cooperation in order to work properly, although you are not very expansive: creating, innovating and thinking are what matter most to you because this self-expression enriches you and totally satisfies you.

Elements, Modalities and Polarities for Rudolf STEINER

Rudolf STEINER, here is the graph of your Elements, Modalities and Polarities, House and Decanates’ Accentuations, based on planets’ position and angles in the twelve signs:

Like the majority of Earth signs, Rudolf STEINER, you are efficient, concrete and not too emotional. What matters to you is what you see: you judge the tree by its fruits. Your ideas keep changing, words disappear, but actions and their consequences are visible and remain. Express your sensitivity, even if it means revealing your vulnerability. Emotions, energy and communication must not be neglected; concrete action is meaningless if it is not justified by your heart, your intellect or your enthusiasm.

The predominance of Water signs indicates high sensitivity and elevation through feelings, Rudolf STEINER. Your heart and your emotions are your driving forces, and you can’t do anything on Earth if you don’t feel a strong affective charge (as a matter of fact, the word "feeling" is essential in your psychology). You need to love in order to understand, and to feel in order to take action. Since it may be detrimental to your vulnerability, you should learn to fight against it.

The twelve zodiacal signs are split up into three groups or modes, called quadruplicities, a learned word meaning only that these three groups include four signs. The Cardinal, Fixed and Mutable modes are more or less represented in your natal chart, depending on planets’ positions and importance, and on angles in the twelve signs.

The Fixed mode corresponds to a majority of elements in your chart and represents the desire for security and durability: you are able to concretely appreciate a situation and its stability. You definitely prefer to play the role of a loyal, obstinate and hard-working person, rather than to try new and risky experiences – beware, however, not to confuse obstinacy with intransigence. You structure, cement, and strengthen everything you find on your way: it is your nature, although you are not especially interested in swiftness: slow and steady…

The twelve signs are divided into two polarities, called active or passive, or sometimes masculine and feminine, positive and negative, Yang and Yin. This classification corresponds to two quite distinct tonalities, the first one bringing extraversion, action, self-confidence and dynamism, the second one, introversion, reactivity, reflection and caution. None is superior to the other, each group has its own assets and shortcomings. Odd signs – Aries, Gemini, Leo, Libra, Sagittarius and Aquarius – belong to the first group, whereas even signs – Taurus, Cancer, Virgo, Scorpio, Capricorn and Pisces – belong to the second group.

According to the disposition and qualities of your planets and angles, you are rather influenced by YIN energy, the passive polarity: you are quite introverted, imaginative and sometimes discreet, but you are a deep and wise person who is not content with just noisy and flashy things. At times, you doubt but you think that those who don’t are a bit… thoughtless. Allow yourself to take more laid-back attitudes and put your reserve aside, because good equilibrium is always healthier.

Houses are split up into three groups: angular, succedent and cadent.

The first ones are the most important ones, the most "noticeable" and energetic houses. They are the 1st, 4th, 7th and 10th houses. Their cuspides correspond to four famous angles: Ascendant for the 1st house, Imum Coeli for the 4th house, Descendant, opposite the Ascendant, for the 7th house and Midheaven for the 10th house, opposite the Imum Coeli.

Planets are evaluated according to a whole set of criteria that includes comprehensive Western astrology rules. At their turn, planets emphasize specific types of houses, signs, repartitions etc., as previously explained.

Your angular houses, namely, the 1st, 4th, 7th and 10th houses, are very emphasized in your chart: according to the Tradition, they are the strongest and most dynamic houses. Should the rest of your chart concur, angular houses suggest that you are an enterprising, energetic and assertive man. Indeed, angular houses are said to generate impulsions and to give a powerful and domineering personality.

Unusual fates are often linked to a predominance of angular houses, but this is only a partial indication…

Each sign contains 30 degrees and can be divided into three equal parts: the decanates. The Tradition indicates that specific meanings can be associated to each of the three decanates. Their sphere of activity is usually limited to the Sun sign, however, it is even more interesting to observe the distribution of all the planets in the chart to get an idea of the respective importance of the three decanates, which can complement the description of the personality.

These meanings must be considered with the greatest caution. Indeed, they are minor characteristics that can only underline other outstanding traits of character.

Traditionally, the first decanate highlights the characteristics of the sign where a planet is located. The two other decanates correspond to sub-dominant planets, depending on the nature of each sign. This system leads to a multiplication of meanings and it is impossible to have a clear understanding: here, we prefer to give only the meaning of one decanate in comparison with the other two, within the birth chart as a whole. Again, the greatest caution is needed with regard to this minor indication as it is not always reliable.

The first decanate, which means the part between 0° and 10° of any zodiacal sign, prevails in your natal chart: this decanate is traditionally linked to vitality and physical constitution, and may indicate that you efficiently express your concrete energy on the material and sensual planes.

Dominants: Planets, Signs and Houses for Rudolf STEINER

The issue of dominant planets has existed since the mists of time in astrology: how nice it would be if a person could be described with a few words and one or several planets that would represent their character, without having to analyse such elements as rulerships, angularities, houses, etc!

The ten planets – the Sun throughout Pluto – are a bit like ten characters in a role-play, each one has its own personality, its own way of acting, its own strengths and weaknesses. They actually represent a classification into ten distinct personalities, and astrologers have always tried to associate one or several dominant planets to a natal chart as well as dominant signs and houses.

Indeed, it is quite the same situation with signs and houses. If planets symbolize characters, signs represent hues – the mental, emotional and physical structures of an individual. The sign in which a planet is posited is like a character whose features are modified according to the place where he lives. In a chart, there are usually one, two or three highlighted signs that allow to rapidly describe its owner.

Regarding astrological houses, the principle is even simpler: the twelve houses correspond to twelve fields of life, and planets tenanting any given house increase that house’s importance and highlight all relevant life departments: it may be marriage, work, friendship etc.

In your natal chart, Rudolf STEINER, the ten main planets are distributed as follows:

The three most important planets in your chart are Jupiter, Pluto and Sun.

Jupiter, the planet of expansion, organization, power and benevolence, is quite emphasized in your chart. Like any Jupiterian, you are warm, open, sociable, consensual, active and optimistic. You can use your self-confidence to erase differences of opinion, and you leave the task of analyzing and perfecting things to specialists. Your role, and you know it since you were young, is to gather, to demonstrate your synthesizing and conciliatory mind, and to naturally reap its fruits – power.

You appreciate legality, social order but also order in general. With you as a leader, every plan or human entity can be organized and structured. You excel at supervising. The Jupiterian type is indeed the politician par excellence, and a positive Jupiter in your chart is synonymous with good integration into society, whatever the chosen path.

Is this idyllic picture really perfect? Certainly not: each planet’s typology has its own weaknesses. One of yours is pride, like the Solarian, but your will of expansion at all costs may generate a form of exaggeration in everything, endless pleasure, inappropriate self-confidence that could lead you to rough materialism and the thirst for absurd material comfort – in the worst cases, of course.

With Pluto as a dominant planet in your chart, you are a magnetic and mighty predator, like the Scorpio sign ruled by this planet, who needs to exert pressure on others in order to "test" them. You are always ready to evolve, to risk destruction for reconstruction – including your own – to live more intensely whilst imposing your secret authority on things and on people you encounter.

You may come across as wicked, cruel or too authoritarian, but actually you only follow your instinct, you sound people out, and you like to exert your domination simply because your vital energy is too powerful to remain inside. You are inclined to be passionate, with hidden motivations. You are sometimes misunderstood but one of your great Plutonian assets is to go successfully through each life ordeal with ever growing strength.

One of the dominant planets in your natal chart is the Sun. He symbolizes will, magnetism, sense of honour and dignity. You are a Solar being, and you often display charismatic and leadership qualities. Your warmth and your persuasive power lead you far away from pettiness. You enjoy thinking big and, consequently, you move forward according to what you decide.

Your Solarian weakness may be related to the sin of pride or to excessive authority. The frontier between pride and vanity is tenuous: be careful not to overstep it and to keep the nobleness of heart that is part of your charm.

In your natal chart, the three most important signs – according to criteria mentioned above – are in decreasing order of strength Pisces, Taurus and Virgo. In general, these signs are important because your Ascendant or your Sun is located there. But this is not always the case: there may be a cluster of planets, or a planet may be near an angle other than the Midheaven or Ascendant. It may also be because two or three planets are considered to be very active because they form numerous aspects from these signs.

Thus, you display some of the three signs’ characteristics, a bit like a superposition of features on the rest of your chart, and it is all the more so if the sign is emphasized.

Pisces is among your dominant signs and endows your personality with unlimited sources of emotions, dreams, imagination, and sensitivity, to the extent that you literally swim in a cloudy ocean of delightful impressions. These impressions are so intense and overwhelming that you don’t really need to take action concretely, to show your dynamism or your willpower, since you already live so intensely with your feelings – you are as keen as a radar, always on the alert! That is why some people may not like your carelessness, and the lack of clarity in your opinions or actions; however they quickly notice your artistic talents, your poetic or artistic side, and your total lack of wickedness. Besides, you feel compassion for people in pain – empathy is one of your great qualities. Thanks to your flexibility, your intuition, and your generosity, you may spend an important part of your life helping others. And if you are creative or if you have well-known artistic talents, everybody will forgive your little flaws: absent-mindedness, lack of energy or of will, too dreamy temperament…

With the Taurus sign so important in your chart, you are constructive, stable, and sensual. Good taste, sense of beauty, manners, and unfailing good sense – all these qualities contribute to your charm and seductive power. Furthermore, if some people criticize your slow pace and your stubbornness, you rightly reply that this is the price for your security, and that you like the way it is – slow and steady….

Virgo, associated with perfectionism, numbers and reason, is among your dominant signs: you inherit its sense of responsibility and tidiness, a clear mind, an unfailing logic, as well as a need to be useful and to fulfil your task to the best of your abilities. Obviously, people may think that you are too modest or reserved, suspicious or pessimistic because of your exceedingly critical mind, but aren’t logic and wisdom great qualities? Of course, they are. Moreover, you keep your feet on the ground, you never behave irrationally and you are helpful and hardworking – what more can you ask for?!

The 10th, 6th and 4th houses are the most prominent ones in your birth chart. From the analysis of the most tenanted houses, the astrologer identifies your most significant fields or spheres of activity. They deal with what you are experiencing – or what you will be brought to experience one day – or they deal with your inner motivations.

With a prominent 10th house, your destiny’s achievement may be very notable: the 10th house represents your career, your public life, and your ambitions. A good deal of your energy may thus be used to successfully implement what you have in mind. Instinctively, you are very keen to make your dreams come true. Sooner or later, you will deal with the public, and your personal achievement will go through trials and ordeals: other people and visible actions.

Your 6th house is quite emphasized and indicates interest in work and daily occupations that take up a lot of your time: in analogy with Virgo, this house inclines towards perfectionism and training; somehow, you may be fulfilled through the process of being useful and investing your energy in your work. An environment appealing to you may be involved – your colleagues, for example – or a passion for one of these daily occupations. Medical positions or pets may play a role in your life; or ancillary love affairs too… These are a few possibilities indicated by an important 6th house.

With an important 4th house in your chart, your private life, your intimacy, as well as your family and home, play a fundamental role. Your security and your family unit, the one you come from, but also the one you set up when you get married and start a family – or even as a bachelor living alone in your sweet home – are necessary for you to blossom. According to the Tradition, your father may play an important role in your life.

After this paragraph about dominant planets, of Rudolf STEINER, here are the character traits that you must read more carefully than the previous texts since they are very specific: the texts about dominant planets only give background information about the personality and remain quite general: they emphasize or, on the contrary, mitigate different particularities or facets of a personality. A human being is a complex whole and only bodies of texts can attempt to successfully figure out all the finer points.

Your sensitivity

Your sensitivity is dominated by your reason, Rudolf STEINER, and you tend to analyze your emotional reactions in the slightest details, as if you wanted you hold them at bay so that they cannot overwhelm you or weaken you. Your nature is anxious, shy, you do not like to be in the forefront and you lack self-confidence. You are extremely perfectionist, you need to examine, to organize and to plan everything according to your logic. You like to help and to feel that you are useful, in your own work or through your wise and clever advice. You may also be very demanding and critical, even unbearable, because you are insistent and you find fault in everything. Learn to gain some self-confidence and do not constantly be ready to criticize…

Your career or professional achievements, Rudolf STEINER, are fields where your emotions will be more easily channelled. You are often popular, especially with women, and you instinctively have the desire to please audiences or crowds. Your fame is often due to your changeable side, light-hearted, emotional and moody sometimes. It also means that it is very likely that you experience professional changes several times during your life. Each time, you will contrive to be the star, in your way…

Your intellect and your social life

Your thinking process works on a rather instinctive and intuitive mode, Rudolf STEINER. You “feel” more than you understand, as if your reasoning were not active. Your strong receptivity and your natural empathy make you an understanding, pleasant, warm and benevolent person although you may be neglectful, even heedless. You are shy and anxious and you prefer to withdraw and to isolate yourself in a quiet place in order to give free rein to your inspiration, rather than to assert yourself. Despite your lively imagination, it may be hard for you to get out of the flow of your mystical and irrational thoughts, with the result that you become even more worried and impressionable. You must develop your logic, rational mind and your willpower, so as to gain self-confidence and creativity. Try and see…

Your thoughts, Rudolf STEINER, are irresistibly attracted to hobbies and entertainments, or you may be particularly oriented towards creation if you are dealing with something amusing. Your way of communicating is often pleasant, charming, you are the type who blends humour and charm in your speeches and who can spend many hours telling about your hobbies and detailing them with fire. This state of mind is favourable for love affairs or children’s education. Your playful spirit often amazes children.

Your affectivity and your seductiveness

In your chart, the Sun is in Pisces and Venus, in Aquarius. Between the subtle detachment of the Sun in Pisces and the excitement of Venus in Aquarius, the contrast is striking: more than anyone, you are aware that one shifts quickly from fascination to disenchantment or from indifference to amazement. These two consecutive signs react in an antinomical way: while Venus in Aquarius readily gives free rein to her heart or her senses’ impulses, the Sun in Pisces does not follow these fleeting stimulations and remains impervious, unyielding and selective. Aquarius is optimistic because the relationship is constantly evolving (tomorrow is another day…). Pisces knows or feels the limits of the relationship (the end is for tomorrow…). You may be criticized for these inconsistencies: I love you madly today and not any more tomorrow. I don’t love you but when you leave me, I am hurting! Your affectivity lives on all these paradoxes. More than others, you need to be amazed and to be seduced… Indifference occurs so rapidly! You give a lot to those who deserve your esteem because of their qualities or their shortcomings. Indeed, you may find certain flaws quite seductive because they extol your compassion and your taste for strangeness at the same time.

In love, you are more cerebral and friendly than really passionate, Rudolf STEINER. You are made for amorous friendships, for refined and light feelings where each partner retains one’s freedom, and almost detachment, without getting really committed. Sometimes, you may be distant from, and indifferent to, love matters for a while, because you can be completely engrossed in original intellectual pursuits and the collective atmosphere which you are so fond of. You substitute a great number of friendly and light contacts to amorous relationships and it is fair to say that they satisfy you. To fall in love, you need spice and a partner who is original, who amazes you and whom you admire; under such conditions, you can freely express your feelings in an ambiance devoid of constraint, where freedom is perfectly respected and shared within the couple.

With such a configuration, Rudolf STEINER, you are inclined to scattering regarding the expression of your feelings which can easily get carried away in your multiple relationships or within your surroundings. The medium to express your feelings often consists in shared interests for cultural, journalistic or scientific knowledge and frequent short trips. In a way, they lead you to open up more easily, may be because you want to ensure that you don’t commit yourself more seriously than you really wish to. Correspondences are high on your agenda, ranging from exchanging letters, via the Internet – oh virtuality…! – to telephone talks. Indeed, you tremendously enjoy communicating in this superficial and a bit distant fashion where you know best how to open up and blend love and friendship without asking yourself too many questions. You are sometimes a SMS champion, always happy with changes and thoughtlessness. For you, undertaking a sole commitment is near to impossible.…

Your behaviour

Psychologically speaking, your nature is bilious, with aggressive impulses that lead you towards the transformation of your entire being and, continuously, of the situation surrounding you. You seem to be constantly struggling for your self-assertion. You cannot refrain from testing others with cutting remarks, not because you want to hurt them, but because you want to know them better through their reaction; for you, life and the feeling of aliveness are experienced through rebellion and tension. You may be manipulative and your aggressive attitude may equate with sly inquisition. You often remain silent, introverted and secretive, mulling over turbulent thoughts in the depths of your mind, leaving others puzzled by your somewhat peculiar behaviour.

As you are born under this sign, you are secretive, powerful, domineering, enduring, intuitive, assertive, charismatic, magnetic, wilful, daring, clear-sighted, passionate, creative, independent, vigorous, generous, loyal, hard-working, persevering, indomitable, possessive, shrewd, stubborn, ambitious, instinctive, tenacious, sexual, sexy, proud, intense and competitive. But you may also be aggressive, destructive, stubborn, anxious, tyrannical, perverse, sadistic, violent, self-centered, complex, critical, cruel, nasty, jealous, calculating, vulnerable and dissembling.

In love, Sir, you are very magnetic, with a discreet and indefinable charm that inevitably attracts the persons you set your heart on. You detect their weaknesses so well that you can, at will, exert your powers and your manipulation tendencies over them. There are no negative consequences, as long as things go well, because you are very sensual, charming, possessive and swaggering and you make happy all the people who look for this domineering aspect in their partner. However, when things start to deteriorate, your almost pathological jealousy and your capacity to harm when you feel threatened are the causes of your partners’ tears.

For you, passion means tension and tragedy. It is the price to be paid for sharing your sexuality loaded with unlimited fantasies, male ardour, loyalty and generosity. You are excessive, but very endearing, and your partner finds it very hard to leave you. It is preferable when things are fine between you.

Your will and your inner motivations

Psychologically speaking, your nature is adaptable and receptive, exactly the opposite of the sign of Virgo whose very essence is to analyze every detail, thus creating a definite duality between the self and the outside world: conversely, Pisces absorbs and erases all forms of differentiation they face. With Pisces, there is no opposition, no conflict and no individual reaction. There is only fusion, non-separation, a perpetual and mobile spreading of the self over some blurred and huge sensation of sympathy with the environment. It is the absolute reign of feelings and emotions over the intellect and its separative logics.

As you are born under this sign, you are emotional, sensitive, dedicated, adaptable, nice, wild, compassionate, romantic, imaginative, flexible, opportunist, intuitive, impossible to categorized, irrational, seductive, placid, secretive, introverted, pleasant, artistic, and charming. But you may also be indecisive, moody, passive, confused, wavering, lazy, scatterbrained, vulnerable, unpredictable and gullible.

In love, Sir, you are the very type of the sentimental romantic in the highest meaning of the term. You live your love affairs in your mind. You upkeep the weft of your endless daydreamings just to exacerbate your emotions and your feelings, over and over again.

You fall in love frequently and according to how your encounters develop. You adjust to the person you set your heart on and you may harbour illusions because your imagination and your capacity to intensely live a virtual life are very strong. You are utopian and you are so gentle that you usually achieve your aims in spite of your boundless passivity: you seldom take the first step, except when you are thrown a line, which is as big as a tree trunk…

You live for love and through love. Your only weakness may be your lack of determination at the early stage of a relationship. However, once you get started, if there is any compatibility, you trap your prey with your overflowing affectivity and your unlimited sensuality.

Pisces’ waters are shifting and changeable. When other opportunities appeal to you, you are able to handle two relationships simultaneously. You achieve an alternate osmosis with your partners and you see no harm in doing so, because you live the instant with plasticity and in communion.

You loathe solitude and you prefer to be caught in the nets of a woman even though she does not match your personality. If, by lack of chance, your partner belongs to the domineering and unscrupulous type, you may be trapped and wake up bitter and disappointed that you extended for too long the illusion of a marvellous story.

Once you find your soul mate, your home is usually harmonious. In your couple, love is immense, even mystical. Like a wave, it bathes the shores of your emotions, which range from the noblest feelings to the wildest physical passions. Since you merely live in concrete life, it is necessary that your partner be well grounded, so that your home is well up kept and your children are properly reared!

Unless salient factors indicate otherwise, Rudolf STEINER, your nature is not very extroverted and your tendency is to keep to yourself emotions that may run very deep. Your will prompts you to create some sort of security, or cocoon, around you.

You are deeply attached to your family and to your initial home. You need this cosy and warm atmosphere, your parents’ love and your family security, and later you reproduce them in your adult’s home. Such strong bonds with your family and your home benefit your self-assertion as they combine professional efforts with presence at home. Working at home is particularly suitable, as are, indirectly, professions related to genealogy or even more, to real estate, because you are comfortable with the security aspects of the places you visit. Your father often plays a major role, possibly an excessive one, with the danger that he may smother your desire for freedom and autonomy and contribute to aggravate your already strong natural introversion. You are what is called belated and it is mainly during the second part of your life that you can concretely and efficiently exercise your will. Your assets lie in your determination to build a stable and comfortable home. However, family conflicts may exist and you may quarrel with your father over authority matters or over your projects; later, you may even undergo this sort of troubles in your own home if you are not flexible enough.

Your ability to take action

Rudolf STEINER, the way you take action gains in power and in precision what it loses in rapidity and spontaneity. You are “slow”, certainly. But when you get started, you put all your ingenuity and your persistence into it and you love to see a job well done. At the end of the day, owing to your ways, you are the winner. In your sex life, similarly, you are generous and instinctive and your slowness is not an obstacle. It may even bring fulfilment to you, but above all, to your partner! In love, as well as in your exchanges in general, you tend to keep your worries to yourself because you are extremely patient; you don’t say anything, you stand all the hits and one day, you explode into outbursts of anger that are as violent as they are rare, thanks God.

It is in the area of your work environment that you are most active and pugnacious, Rudolf STEINER. Or in your daily life, if you do not work. You are a hard-worker, completely dedicated to the service of others: being helpful and efficient is your battle horse. Indeed, it is so obvious! Ask the opinion of your colleagues or your entourage… Your efficiency is not to be proved. You get things moving, you progress, you are very keen to improve yourself, and your boss can only rejoice that his staff contributes so actively. The areas of health and pets are traditionally favoured by this planetary configuration. However, do check your Mars’ aspects if you intend to be a tamer! In any case, the daily work sphere is the area where you can deliver to the best of your abilities, in terms of action. The only reservation may be not to overdo.

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A   S K E T C H   O F   H I S   L I F E   A N D   W O R K

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sketch of Rudolf Steiner
All over the world there are now to be found activities — schools, communities for the handicapped, farms, hospitals and medical practices, artists and architects, banks and businesses — whose work acknowledges a special debt to Rudolf Steiner.

His life spanned the last part of the nineteenth century and the first part of the twentieth. But his inspiration is proving capable of reaching into our time with enhanced rather than diminished vigor. There remain very few people who know him personally. Some have left written recollections, [See, for example, A Man Before Others, Rudolf Steiner Press, 1993.] but the thread of living memory is now being woven into the fabric of history. Who was Rudolf Steiner? And what is the meaning of his life and work for our time?

R

UDOLF STEINER was born in Kraljevic (then in Austria, now in Croatia) in 1861, and died in Dornach, Switzerland, in 1925. He thus saw the end of an old era and the birth pangs of a new one. His life echoes the transition intimately. The outer surface of the late nineteenth century gave little hint of the extraordinary events the twentieth century would bring. And a superficial biography of the first part of Steiner’s life might not easily foresee the extraordinary activities of his later years. Yet the seeds of the later are to be found in the earlier times.

Outwardly, we see the gifted son of a minor railway official growing up in the small peasant villages of Lower Austria. He attends the village schools, and then the modern school in Wiener Neustadt. His father is a freethinker and sees his son as a railway engineer rather than as a priest (the more usual destination for bright boys from the villages). Steiner takes a degree in mathematics, physics, and chemistry, and later writes a philosophical thesis for a doctorate. He supports himself through university and afterwards by tutoring. He is drawn into literary and scholarly work. The famous Goethe scholar, Professor Karl Julius Schroer, who has befriended the young man, arranges for him to edit the scientific works of Goethe for a new complete edition. He participates actively in the rich cultural life of Vienna. Then he is invited to Weimar, to the famous Goethe archive, where he remains for seven years, working further on the scientific writings, as well as collaborating in a complete edition of Schopenhauer. The place is a famous center, visited by the leading lights of Central European culture, and Steiner knows many of the major figures of the artistic and cultural life of his time.

A Youthful Steiner

In 1894 he publishes Intuitive Thinking as a Spiritual Path: A Philosophy of Freedom (also known as The Philosophy of Spiritual Activity) but is disappointed by its reception (we shall return to the significance of this work). [Intuitive Thinking as a Spiritual Path, Rudolf Steiner, Anthroposophic Press, 1995.] Then, as the end of the century approaches, he leaves the settled world of Weimar to edit an avant-garde literary magazine in Berlin. Here he meets playwrights and poets who are seeking, often desperately, for alternatives of various kinds. The city is a focus for many radical groups and movements. Steiner is invited to lecture at the Berlin Workers’ Training School, sponsored by the trade unions and social democrats. Most of the teaching is Marxist, but he insists on a free hand. He gives courses on history and natural science, and practical exercises in public speaking. His appeal is such that he is invited to give a festival address to 7,000 printers at the Berlin circus stadium on the occasion of the Gutenberg jubilee. But his refusal to toe any party line does not endear him to the political activists, and soon after the turn of the century, he is forced to drop this work.

In 1899, Steiner’s life begins to change quite rapidly. Only later does he give a more personal glimpse of his inner struggles, which matured into a far-reaching decision during the 1890s. [Autobiography: Chapter in the Course of My Life 1861–1907, Anthroposophic Press, 1999.] On August 28, 1899 he publishes in his magazine a surprising article about Goethe’s mysterious “fairy tale” The Green Snake and the Beautiful Lily. The essay is entitled “Goethe’s Secret Revelation,” and points definitely, if discreetly, to the “occult” significance of this story. The article attracts the attention of a Count and Countess Brockdorff, who invite Steiner to speak to one of their weekly gatherings. The Brockdorffs are Theosophists. They give Steiner the first opportunity to realize the decision he has come to during the last years of the century, namely to speak openly and directly out of the inner faculties of spiritual perception he has known since childhood and has been quietly developing and disciplining ever since.

Quite soon, Steiner is speaking regularly to groups of Theosophists, which upsets and bewilders many of his former friends. There is uproar at a lecture on the medieval scholastics which he delivers to the Giordano Bruno Society. The respectable if often radical scholar, historian, scientist, writer, and philosopher is emerging as an “occultist.” It is truly shocking to many of those around him. Steiner knows he is running risks of isolation. Yet he sees around him a culture in decay, and profound crises to come. Much later, he writes: “From the spiritual world, a new light was ready to break into human evolution through the intellectual accomplishments of the final third of the nineteenth century. But materialistic explanations of those achievements had caused a spiritual sleep in humankind that prevented any inkling, let alone a conscious awareness, of this. This is how an era arrived that, through its very existence, should have developed toward spirit; but it denied its own essential nature. That time began to make the impossibility of life a reality.” [Ibid. p. 248.]

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Steiner and Sculpture

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Steiner with Model of the Goetheanum

Steiner’s decision to speak directly of his own spiritual research was not prompted by a desire to set up as a spiritual teacher, to feed curiosity or to revive some form of “ancient wisdom.” It was born out of a perception of the needs of the time. Today it is perhaps easier to appreciate what Steiner meant by times that “begin to bring about the impossibility of life.” This lay behind what he described as most important to him “to introduce impulses into life from the spirit world,” but for this “there was no understanding.” [Ibid. p. 258.]

It took him nearly two decades to create a basis for the renewing impulses in daily life that he sought to initiate. At first he worked mainly through lectures to Theosophists and others, and through articles and books. These works remain an extraordinarily rich resource which is still far too little known in the English-speaking world. Within quite a short period of years, Steiner surveyed with clarity and intimacy the spiritual realities at work in the kingdoms of nature and in the cosmos, the inner nature of the human soul and spirit and their potential for further development, the nature and practice of meditation, the experiences of the soul before birth and after death, the spiritual history and evolution of humanity and the earth, and detailed studies of the workings of reincarnation and karma. The style is sober and direct throughout, and it often calls for an effort to realize the quite remarkable nature of these communications. For they are not derived from earlier sources, nor was Steiner acting as a spokesman for a spiritual guide. They are fruits of careful spiritual observation and perception — or, as Steiner preferred to call it, “spiritual research” — undertaken in freedom by an individual thoroughly conversant with, and deeply serious about, the integrity of thought and apprehension striven for in natural science. After seven or eight years, Steiner began to add to his work in “spiritual science” a growing activity in the arts. It is significant and characteristic that he should see the arts as a crucial bridge for translating spiritual science into social and cultural innovation. (We are now vividly aware of what happens when natural science bypasses the human heart and is translated into technology without grace, beauty, or compassion.) Between 1910 and 1913 he wrote four Mystery Plays, which follow the lives of a group of people through successive incarnations, and include scenes in the soul and spiritual worlds as well as on earth. With his wife, Marie von Sivers, an actress, new approaches to speech and drama were initiated. In this period, too, lie the beginnings of eurythmy, an art of movement that makes visible the inner forms and gestures of language and music. In 1913 the foundation stone was laid for the first Goetheanum at Dornach in Switzerland. This extraordinary building in wood, with its vast interlocking cupolas, gradually took shape during the years of the First World War, when an international group of volunteers collaborated with local builders and craftsmen to shape the unique carved forms and structures Steiner designed. The building stimulated much innovation in the use of form and color and is now increasingly recognized as a landmark in twentieth century architecture. Yet Steiner was not concerned to build an impressive monument. He regarded architecture as the servant of human life, and designed the Goetheanum to support the developing work of anthroposophy, [“Anthroposophy,” Rudolf Steiner’s preferred term, which he once said should be understood to mean, quite simply, “awareness of one’s humanity.”] and particularly the work in drama and eurythmy.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Second Goetheanum

An arsonist caused this building to burn to the ground during the night of December 31, 1922. There survived only the great sculpture of “The Representative of Humanity” on which Steiner had been working in a neighborhood workshop with the English sculptress Edith Maryon. Steiner soon designed another building that was completed after his death and now serves as a center for the world-wide Anthroposophical Society and its School of Spiritual Science [photo above]. There is a magnificent stage and auditorium, where the Mystery Plays are given regularly as well as Goethe’s Faust in full, other plays and concerts, and frequent performances of eurythmy.

As the First World War neared its end, Steiner began to find ways to work more widely and deeply for a renewal of life and culture in many spheres. Europe was in ruins and could have been ready for quite new impulses. Attempts to realize a “threefold social order” as a political and social alternative at that time did not succeed, but the conceptual basis Steiner developed exists as a seed that is even more relevant for today.

Steiner’s social thinking can be adequately grasped only in the context of his view of history, which he saw, in direct contrast to Marx, as shaped fundamentally by inner changes in human consciousness in which higher spiritual beings are actively participating. Just in this century, quite new experiences are awakening in the human soul. (Since Steiner’s time this is a good deal more apparent than it was then.) But we cannot expect to build a healthy social order except on the basis of a true and deep insight not only into the material but also into the soul and spiritual nature and needs of human beings as they are today.

These needs are characterized by a powerful tension between the search for community and the experience of individuality. Community, in the sense of material interdependence, is the basic fact of economic life and of the world economy in which it is embedded today. Yet individuality, in the sense of independence of mind and freedom of speech, is essential to every creative endeavor, to all innovation, and to the realization of the human spirit in the arts and sciences. Without spiritual freedom, our culture will wither and die.

Individuality and community, Steiner urged, can be lifted out of conflict only if they are recognized not as contradictions but as a creative polarity rooted in the essential nature of human beings. Each pole can bear fruit only if it has its appropriate social forms. We need forms that ensure freedom for all expressions of spiritual life, and forms that promote brotherhood in economic life. But the health of this polarity depends on a full recognition of a third human need and function, the social relationships between people which concern our feeling for human rights. Here again, Steiner emphasized that we need to develop a distinct realm of social organization to support this sphere, inspired by a concern for equality — not equality of spiritual capacity or material circumstance, but that sense of equality that awakens through recognition of the essential spiritual nature of every human being. In this lies the meaning and source of every person’s right also to freedom of spirit and to material sustenance. These insights were the basis from which Steiner then began to respond to a great variety of requests for new beginnings and practical help in many fields. He was approached by doctors, therapists, farmers, businessmen, academics and scientists, theologians and pastors, and by teachers. From these beginnings have grown the many activities which have survived all the tensions and upheavals of this century, and which continue to spread round the world.

Portrait of Rudolf Steiner

Best known is the work in education and curative education. The former originated in a request from Emil Molt, director of the Waldorf-Astoria cigarette factory, for a school to which his employees could send their children. There are now Waldorf Schools throughout the world (127 in North America). The homes, schools, and village communities for handicapped children and adults are also flourishing. Biodynamic agriculture originated in a course of lectures at Koberwitz in 1924, held at the request of a group of farmers concerned about the destructive trend of “scientific” farming. From Steiner’s work with doctors, a medical movement has developed that includes clinics and hospitals and a variety of therapeutic work. From a request by a group of German pastors there developed the Christian Community, a movement for religious renewal. The art of eurythmy, which also serves the educational and therapeutic work, has developed strongly, and there are now a number of eurythmy schools where a full four-year training is given. Other training centers — for teacher training, agriculture, the arts, social work, and general orientation in anthroposophy — have grown up in recent years. [For a current list of activities and study groups contact the Anthroposophical Society in America (address at end of article).]

Rudolf Steiner died on March 30, 1925, surrounded by new beginnings. The versatility and creativity he revealed in his later years are phenomenal by any standards. How did he achieve all this?

The last part of the twentieth century is bringing a growing recognition that we live within a deeper reality we can call spiritual, to which at present we have direct access only through altered conditions of consciousness. We are also learning to see that these realities were known in the past, described in other images and languages, and were the source of all great religions and spiritual teachings. They have been obscured and forgotten for a while as our scientific culture devoted itself to the material world revealed by the senses.

Many individuals have glimpses during their lives of spiritual realities. Some recollect a more consistent experience in childhood. A few achieve some form of enduring insight as adults. Rudolf Steiner spoke little of his spiritual life in personal terms. But in his autobiography he indicates that from childhood he was fully conscious of a world of invisible reality within the world of everyday. His inner struggle for the first forty years of his life was not to achieve spiritual experience, but to unite this fully with the forms of knowledge and insight of our time, and in particular with the language and discipline of natural science. Historically, this can be seen as the special challenge and contribution of Steiner’s life and work. He himself saw the scientific age, even in its most materialistic aspects, as an essential phase in the spiritual education of humankind. Only by forgetting the spiritual world for a time and attending to the material world, he said, could there be kindled new and essential faculties, notably an experience of true individual inner freedom. Steiner indicated that his own capacities to meet, in the most practical way, the life questions and working needs of people from so many walks of life had their origins in the struggles of his earlier years, when he kept almost complete silence concerning his inner experiences, and gradually learned to grasp and articulate their relationship to the mode of consciousness from which science arises. His book Intuitive Thinking as a Spiritual Path: A Philosophy of Freedom embodies a first fruit of these struggles — he himself described it as “a biographical account of how one human soul made the difficult ascent to freedom.” Studied more intimately, this book contains the basis for a path of knowledge that can lead the soul to discover spiritual experience and reality right into the world of ordinary thought and experience. Along this path, Steiner sought to develop a spiritual science that is a further development of the true spirit of natural science.

This path led him in his thirties to awaken to an inner recognition of the “turning point of time” in human spiritual history, brought about by the incarnation of the Being we know as the Christ. He saw that the meaning of this event transcends all differentiations of religion, race, or nation, and has consequences for all humanity; we are as yet aware only of the beginnings of these. This also led him to know the new presence and working of the Christ, which has begun just in this century, not in the physical world but in the sphere of invisible life forces of the earth and mankind.

Steiner was therefore not concerned to bring old teachings in new forms, nor to promulgate doctrines of any kind, but to nurture a path of knowledge in freedom, and of love in action, that can meet the deep and pressing needs of our times. These are the ideals, however imperfectly realized, by which those who find in anthroposophy a continuing inspiration for their lives and work seek to be guided.

— John Davy

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Summary of Rudolf Steiner’s
Principles of Education

Review of Lecture V in Rudolf Steiner’s The Roots of Education, Five Lectures Given in 1924. London: Rudolf Steiner Press, 1968. (Translated by Helen Fox)

by Leon James
and Diane Nahl
University of Hawaii
1979

Rudolf Steiner was a radical thinker. His conception of man is a wholistic one, connecting him with the cosmos and the elements of nature. This connection he defined as "spiritual." He insisted that scientific modernism is sinking into an excessive materialistic view of man which saps his strength and must be rectified.

We’ve extracted 42 "Principles of Education" from Lecture V. These are our views and interpretations. The titles we’ve made up indicate what pedagogic relevance we see in the statements we’ve quoted or paraphrased.

The Pragmatic Principle

Education builds the social person, i.e. national and universal citizenship.

The Wholistic Principle

Relevance in education is achieved when the whole of the teaching is integrated.

The Developmental Principle

A valid education recognizes and works with the person’s natural phases of development.

Developmental phases are "states of perceiving" in particular ways, e.g.

The Perceptual Principle

The person’s experiences result from a particular way of perceiving; hence, each developmental phase yields a different variety of experiences.

The Methods Principle

The teacher must know explicitly and work with the varieties of experiences as they are related to the universal phases of development of the social person.

The Correspondence Principle

The individual person recapitulates the seasons.

The Principle of Dependence.

At some state of learning, students must rightly accept from the teacher what they cannot yet intellectually understand.

The Principle of Scholarship

At first, the students imitate the teacher and accept knowledge by authority; later, they seek in the world the source of the teacher’s knowledge.

The Order Principle

During the initial phase, learners naturally grasp with their imagination, and this, with concrete pictures; later, they can add more abstract forms of intellectual causality.

 

The Principle of the Two Cultures

Natural learning capacities today are of two kinds: (I) direct and instinctive apperception of what is to be learned; and, (II), sequencing of reasoning steps through conscious thinking.

The Principle of "Ethical Physiology"

Man is born ("the Fall of Man") into a "sub-human" state — as are animals; the function of education is to fully humanize the sub-human child.

The Principle of Collectivity

Defective education fails "to heal the fall of man", i.e. fails to fully humanize the individual; this is a collective tragedy.

The Principle of the Fall of Man

To fully humanize the individual, education must implant "a full humanity" in the learner.

The Principle of "Ethical Physiology"

"It must come about as a demand of cultural life that `cultural medicine’ and `cultural pedagogy’ are really brought nearer to one another so that they may be mutually productive."

(Rudolf Steiner, Roots of Education, 84).

The Principle of Sequencing

First one learns concrete pictoral fragments; then, causality of sequence in a comprehensive survey.

The Principle of Communication

Unless students feel and evince "inward joy and eager participation," they are not listening, and they’re not listening because the teacher talks above their heads.

The Principle of Freedom

Intellect can be awakened only through the willing and eager "co-operation" of the learner.

The Principle of Totality

Without global coordination across the age — years as individuals go through the school levels, education cannot prepare the whole of social man.

The Principle of Self-Reliance

The global aim of education is, first, to build a base for independent thinking; second, to allow this independent thinking to be discovered by the learners on their own.

The Principle of the Emerging Intellects

Through imitation and imagery, the learners build a base out of which independent intellectual activity emerges, becomes conscious, and serves as the base for security.

The Principle of Soul Life

When a right education is given to social beings, the inner experience of pure thinking or intellect calls forth the idea and experience of freedom, morality, and the "eternal" in the individual.

The Principle of Spirituality

"…as the art of education has fallen into the clutches of materialistic thinking, the children are unable to have…the experience of time passing over into eternity. Thereby they lose connection with the eternal part of their own being." (R. Steiner, p. 86)

The Principle of Anti-Materialism

"…the wrongness of materialism in education is shown in life when a human being has no feeling or inner experience of his own eternal nature." (Rudolf Steiner, p. 88)

The Principle of "Ethical Physiology" or "Medical Pedagogy"

The "Anthroposophical Principles" in education, called "ethical physiology" and "medical pedagogy" by Rudolf Steiner, state that wrong (materialistic) education practices cause specific illnesses in the adult’s life.

The Principle of "Reading the Pupil"

The relation between teacher and pupil is like that between reader and book.

Teacher
Reader

——
=
——

Pupil
Book

The Principle of Dual Citizenship

A "right education" must prepare the person

(I) "to take his place socially in the outside world";

(II) "after death (to) be able to live his way rightly into the spiritual world."

(Rudolf Steiner, p. 90-91)

The Principle of Babel

"Men have lost the possibility of meeting each other in a human way, and this is another dark side to the picture of our present age." (Rudolf Steiner, 1924, p. 91)

The Principle of Collectivity

"The obvious basis of social life, the power really to feel and experience with the other person, has been sadly lost." (Rudolf Steiner, 1924, p. 91)

The Principle of Estrangement

"The fact that there is so much talk about social demands nowadays" (is attributable to the fact that) "nowhere do we find this loving feelings of one’s way into the other human being."

The Principle of Insufficiency

That "social life is lacking" is one everyone’s mind; but "education for social life" is not given the highest prominence. "It has retreated into the background." (p. 91)

The Principle of Excessive Modernism

"Education for social life…has retreated more and more into the background, and in many respects human beings meet and pass each other without any understanding one for the other." (Rudolf Steiner, 1924, p. 91)

The Principle of Separativeness

"It is indeed a grievous feature of present-day life that when man meets man there is no understanding between them." (Rudolf Steiner, 1924, p. 91)

The Principle of Avoidance of Relationship

"Men know nothing of the inner life of the people they are working with, because they lack a living interest, a living devotion, a living sympathy, with the other man." (Rudolf Steiner, 1924, p. 91)

The Principle of "Education for Social Life"

"Education for social life" develops in the person a "social feeling"; this is an "understanding for the other man", a "living interest, devotion and sympathy with the other man." (p.91)

The Principles of Imitation and Authority

"Education for social life" will be achieved "if at the right age we permeate all branches of our teaching and education with the principle of imitation and in its right place the principle of authority also." (p. 91)

The Positive Bias Principle

"Man uses complicated tools, …but what is lacking today is the power to enter into the spirit of nature, the spirit of the cosmos, into the universe as a mighty whole. This power much be regained." (Rudolf Steiner, P. 92)

The Principle of Anti-Materialism

"The human being is not only a citizen of the earth but of the cosmos also." But while he knows his connection to food, "he has no knowledge of how he is connected with the starry worlds in his soul and spirit." (p. 93)

The Principle of Humanity

Without adequate spiritual development man cannot be with understanding, cannot be true to himself, cannot be true to others, cannot be whole, and cannot be completely human.

The Astrodynamic Principle

Spiritual education is one that "seeks and finds the spirit in man": this is the knowledge that "he receives his spiritual nourishment from what streams forth from the whole galaxy of the stars." (p. 93)

The Principle of Higher Connections

Spiritual education recognizes that the stars, planets, and elements of nature all "work in man": what’s `out there’ affects what’s `inside’ in his soul and body in a direct way. To know this restores his understanding.

The Principle of Concrete Reality

To teach in a right way, the teacher much evolve "a conception of the world which is permeated with spirit"; then will he "save the methods and practice of his teaching work…from becoming abstract principles." (p. 94)

The "Education for Life" Principle

"To bind the self to matter means to annihilate souls. To find the self in spirit means to unite mankind. To behold the self in man means to build worlds." (A Meditative Poem for Teachers by Rudolf Steiner, 1924, p. 94.)

ADDENDUM

DIRECTIONALITY IN PSYCHO-SPIRITUAL FORCES OF COLLECTIVE EVOLUTION

IN and UP = Mass Media Drama & Entertainment Ideals & Fantasies generate Luciferic Forces (Blood, Universalizatlon)

IN and DOWN/OUT and UP = a Christ and Michael Forces (From Steiner’s Occult Science an Outline)

OUT and DOWN = Materialistic Values of Bourgeoisie Establishment generate Arimanic Forces (Power, Bones, Ossification)

We just read Steiner’s lectures on Michael and the above 18 our summary. Is it recognizable? This diagram summarizes the activities and exercises we wish to emphasize during your week visit. This takes the form of keeping track of one’s daily round circumstances and identifying their source by relating them to one of the four directions specified by the diagram. For example, the excitement experienced in and around discotheque activities are identified as Lucifer I.e.) IN and UP, since they are "inspirational" and a "dead end"; whereas anxiety related to one’s grade point average Is an OUT and DOWN force, i.e., Arimanic since it is a dead end as well as "fixative"; on the other hand, Christ Michael Forces are Involved (IN and DOWN (Christ)/OUT and UP (Michael)) when the students observe "the spiritualization of matter" (the cross) through the realization that "man does not live by bread alone", and when the students observe "the congregation of selves"(the consciousness of spirit) through perception of the "upside down tree of life"(Michael) .