Who was Rudolf Steiner?
Rudolf Steiner (1861-1925) was an exceptional spiritual teacher, whose unique genius was to translate into modern consciousness humanity’s most ancient striving to know itself and, in knowing itself, to know nature, the cosmos, and the divine. A philosopher, scientist, and esotericist, Steiner was a dedicated servant of humanity, who gave unstintingly to the world the wisdom he gained through the radical method of meditative, spiritual research that he inaugurated and practiced. The range of his research, far-reaching in its practical implications, included every aspect of human striving, from cosmology, evolution, and history to physics, mathematics, biology, psychology, and astronomy. He was also an artist, a playwright, and an architect. Above all, he was a thinker, a world-transforming, paradigm-creating figure.
The greatest initiate of the 20th Century and one of history’s most original thinkers, Rudolf Steiner’s work is largely unknown in the world today. Below is a list of resources for those wishing to know more about his life and work. Biographies of Rudolf Steiner The most comprehensive biography of Rudolf Steiner to date is the 1025 page 2-volume effort by Christoph Lindenberg, published in 1997. It is available only in German. Numerous other print biographies exist. Online biographies of Rudolf Steiner include: On this Site: Rudolf Steiner by Alfred Heidenreich Owen Barfield introduces Rudolf Steiner Edouard Schuré on The Personality of Rudolf Steiner and his Development On the Internet: Roy Wilkinson Describes Steiner’s Life and Significance Henry Barnes examines Steiner’s significance.
Rudolf (Rudolf Joseph Laurence) Steiner, who was of German-Austrian origin, was born on 25 February, 1861 (usually, biographies give the date of his baptism, two days later, as his birth date). His place of birth was a tiny village, Kraljevec, then within the borders of the Austrian-Hungarian Empire. Today, it is part of Croatia. He spent his childhood and youth in the vicinity of Vienna, in Steiermark, and in Burgenland. From the age of 18, he studied mathematics, physics, chemistry, and natural history at the Technical University in Vienna. At the same time, he attended lectures by the philosophers Robert Zimmermann and Franz Brentano at the University of Vienna. At the suggestion of the (at the time) well-known Germanist Karl Julius Schröer, in 1882, at the age of 21, Steiner was given the task of publishing the natural scientific works of Goethe, the central figure in German culture since the 19th century, in Joseph Kürchner’s compilation National German Literature. At 25, he publi
To attempt an answer to this question is like trying to drink water out of one’s hands—most of it escapes. It is a soul question, not one of biography as we know it. Even an attempt to describe his words (which, as fruit is to tree, is essentially a soul question) meets with familiar fate. In the first paragraph of the preface of his book, The Essential Steiner (1984), Robert A. McDermott said that countless anthologies of Steiner’s works, with the same title, could be written without duplication. The very thought of trying to answer this question calls up the closing thought in John’s gospel. But there are also many other things which Jesus did; were ever one of them to be written, I suppose that the world itself could not contain the books that could be written. What this really says is that there is no earthly possibility of any person or institution, even that which calls itself Christendom, fully capturing such a being. And like the quest for Christ, one seeking to know Steiner de
Many of you would have heard of Rudolf Steiner schools but know little other than that they offer an alternative curriculum to the one followed in most state and traditional church schools. Rudolf Steiner was born in 1861, as a student he took a keen interest in both the arts and sciences and was particularly drawn to the work of the great german scholar Goethe. At the age of 23 he edited an edition of Goethe’s works for publication. Like many of his time he sought to find a way to link the discoveries of science with those of the world of spirit, this led him to an interest in clairvoyance and eventually to a decade long immersion in the study of Theosophy. Eventually he broke with the theosophists but remained convinced that there were paths to higher knowledge and enlightment through a fusion of spiritual and natural knowledge. He founded what became known as Anthroposohpy. His published works continued to reflect this connection books such as ‘Knowledge of the Highter Worlds’ and ‘
