Anthroposophical Spiritual Science

AS A SOURCE OF LIVING KNOWLEDGE

Anthroposophical spiritual science is a body of knowledge which encompasses:

♦ the path of cognition which is able to unite the two streams of the reality of the world existence – perceptions and ideas;

♦ the harmonious synthesis of all variations of the materialistic and spiritual worldviews that are valid in their specific domains of existence;

♦ new mystery wisdom suitable to the modern state of human consciousness which leads to true understanding of the world and the human being.

Anthroposophy as a Part of the Reality of the Present Time

Anthroposophical spiritual science (or anthroposophy or spiritual science) [1] is the body of knowledge passed to us by Rudolf Steiner (1861-1925). This knowledge has been attained by him by the means of the study of philosophy, scientific training, genuine artistic approach and capacity for perception of the spiritual world. In other words, he was an accomplished philosopher, scientist, artist and seer. This combination enabled him to obtain direct access to the sources of knowledge which were in the past accessible only to the initiated in the mystery centres and then translate his findings into the modern language adapted to the comprehension of the physical world by the help of intellect.

Today this comprehensive body of knowledge of the world and the human being, which includes explanations of the multi-layered realities of spiritual existence, is available to us via an extensive collection of books. Among them we have to distinguish three kinds of books:

• some 30 books written by Steiner himself;
• books and booklets containing transcripts of his numerous lectures [2];
• and books written by those who have adopted an anthroposophical worldview. This group mainly consists of books which deal with specific topics (education, medicine, farming, etc.) or which offer a general introduction to anthroposophy.

Out of this large body of knowledge there came into existence also practical initiatives: Waldorf schools and kindergartens, biodynamic farms, anthroposophical medical practices, Camphills (curative institutions for people with special needs), new forms of architecture, speech, drama, art of movement (eurythmy), etc.

The fundamental principles of nutrition presented on this website are also the result of the insights attained by serious study of the anthroposophical literature. For that reason we need to provide an introduction for those who are not familiar with the basic properties of anthroposophical spiritual science. We will start with three properties which form the basic orientation for the approach used in the research of the nutritional topics available on this website.

Three Essential Properties of the Living Knowledge

ANTHROPOSOPHICAL SPIRITUAL SCIENCE AS

A PATH OF TRUE COGNITION

ANTHROPOSOPHICAL SPIRITUAL SCIENCE

AS AN ALL-ENCOMPASSING WORLDVIEW

ANTHROPOSOPHICAL SPIRITUAL SCIENCE

AS MODERN MYSTERY WISDOM

   NOTES

1. Any serious reader of Steiner's works can notice that he has used various names for the body of knowledge which he has presented to public. The three most common are: anthroposophy, spiritual science, and anthroposophical spiritual science. This is just another case of his practice of describing things from different perspectives. Although in its essence these terms refer to the same body of knowledge, each of them points to a specific attribute of this knowledge.
2. Steiner has delivered about 6,500 lectures, of which around 4,900 have been recorded. Up to the year 2010 almost 4,000 have been published in the German collected works (containing 354 books); a major part of them have been translated into English. The lectures have been first translated from shorthand reports, mostly (with very few exceptions) unrevised later by Steiner. This means that they might contain faulty passages due to omissions or errors of the stenographers.