Tracing the origin of Rudolf Steiner's pedagogy of imagination.

Nielsen, Thomas ; Smith, Julia

Introduction

Rudolf Steiner believed that imaginative teaching is a way of creating synthesis and wholeness of human experience. (1) Similarly to John Dewey's with his notion of aesthetic experience, (2) Steiner saw the imagination as a point of departure from the observable and objective to the ineffable and subjective, telling us about 'love', 'truth' and that life can be beautiful, a place where the existence of another world can be perceived and where at the same time we are able to make better sense of the material world. Whether or not 'another world' exists is always a matter for individual exploration, which in many ways does not require that education takes a particular stand. Education, however, can encourage non-dogmatic exploration, and the imagination, according to Steiner, is the primary vehicle for such exploration to occur.

To fully understand Steiner's notion of 'imagination' in teaching and learning, however, we would need to place it within the historical context of Steiner's life. The importance Steiner placed on imaginative teaching, and the extent to which this principle permeated his entire pedagogical approach, was intimately connected to an elaborate study of the human being and the universe that he developed in the course, and context, of his own life. The imagination was to Steiner the ultimate means of solving the fundamental problem of tension between ideologies he experienced at first hand. With its potential for allowing synthesis, it was an answer to the polarised debate about spiritualism and materialism that Steiner and many of his European contemporaries engaged in.

How Steiner brought to bear the role of the imagination in reconciling ideological polarities on its function in an educational setting cannot be fully understood without examining the outlook on life from whence it sprang--nor without touching upon historical developments in Western education and the extraordinary life and background of Rudolf Steiner himself. This paper uses historical, biographical and autobiographical commentary to develop an interpretation of the origin of Steiner's notion of imaginative teaching.

Prologue

The 19th century became an age of contrasting ideas, all competing for the allegiances of the Western person. Social, political, economic and educational ideas of the Enlightenment had taken the shape of particular ideologies, such as conservatism, socialism, empiricism, naive realism, logical atomism, analytic philosophy and scepticism. (3) It was also a time for breaking with reason and 18th century rationalism. Romanticism, in particular, was a reaction against the impetus of reason. (4) Moreover, currents of nationalism and individualism took a strong hold around the world at the time. The American Revolution, the French Revolution and the Napoleonic wars all contributed to trenches being dug, not only between ideologies, but between nations and people. (5) The 19th century was a world of conflict and tension.

The disparity found in life in general meant that education was presented with new and different challenges. For a long time, Western thought and culture had been shaped largely by a fundamental belief in the supernatural. (6) The worldview of the Middle Ages rested primarily on a dualistic perception that the natural world was inferior to a supernatural world. (7) In contrast, the Enlightenment era gave birth to a purely material view of the world, a view that had gradually gained momentum over the previous thousand years but which until the 1800s had not become entirely incompatible with a supernatural reality. The Enlightenment theorists believed that the principles of the universe could be accounted for only by way of science and the scientific method. This in turn negated the very impulse to ask the question: what is the meaning of life? This question initiated a futile search, the Enlightenment theorists believed as they sought to find meaning only in things, mechanisms--which could be analysed and subjugated to experiment. (8) Thinkers of earlier times, such as St Augustine, St Thomas Aquinas and Calvin, had emphasised a reverence for the mysteries of life, but the Enlightenment philosophers felt that all questions--if they were valid--could be answered, as long as the right method was applied, that being the scientific method. (9)

Thus, out of the Enlightenment period arose two very different ways of viewing reality and organising education. One was based on the assumption that the most important and powerful ideas reside in the mysteries of life; the other rested on the assumption that there are no real mysteries in life. (10) Whereas one view of education celebrated and exalted mystery, the other tried to demystify life. Romanticism, continuing the school of thought of St Augustine and St Thomas Aquinas, represented the first view; the inheritors of the Enlightenment, such as, for example, Friedrich Nietzsche and Ernest Haeckel, represented the latter. It was into this divided world that Rudolf Steiner was born, and in which he would come to play an important part.

Born into two worlds

Rudolf Steiner was born in 1861, in a small village on the border between Central and Eastern Europe. Steiner himself saw his birth to Austrian parents at Kraljevic, in what was then Hungary, and later part of the former Yugoslavia, as symbolic in the sense that the East-West polarity held him in a state of tension, which was to remain with him throughout his life. (11)

In Steiner's childhood, this tension manifested itself first in the contrast he experienced between nature and technology. Early in his life, Steiner gained an appreciation of the beauty and majesty of the natural scenery around him in that part of the world. In contrast to this was the industrialised milieu in which Steiner grew up, largely due to his father's occupation at a railway station, situated close to their house. As a boy, Steiner often saw the trains go by and was fascinated by this technological product of human ingenuity. (12) It was against this background that he became aware of the duality between nature and the city, between inner and outer life. He experienced the healing virtues of nature and felt his introverted self aligned with it. At the same time he felt the attraction of the exterior life of the city and the increasing influence of modern technology and science.

When Steiner was eight, his family moved to Neudorfl, a small Hungarian village. This move brought Steiner one step closer to modern civilisation. However, retaining his love of nature, Steiner sought its blessings in school holidays and whenever circumstances permitted. It was in nature he felt closest to his private self. But at Neudorfl, Steiner discovered how the modern world also offered elements that not only intrigued his curiosity but also gave him an inner satisfaction similar to what he experienced in nature. At the village school he was given a book on geometry, and this was a decisive moment in the young Steiner's life. As he noted: For weeks my mind was full of congruence ... Pythagoras' theorem fascinated me. To be able to grasp something purely in my mind brought me inner happiness. I know that it was in the study of geometry that I first found happiness. (13)

That a boy no more than nine years of age was capable of such experiences seems remarkable, but it is typical of Rudolf Steiner and gives us a sense of the man behind the legacy. In the study of geometry, Steiner first came to fully recognise the existence of the inner world he had only experienced through his feelings. Through studying geometry, he came to understand that the spiritual world was to him as real as the physical world, and that through the powers of his mind he could grasp some of this--at least, to the eyes--hidden world. 'With his geometry book, [the teacher] at Neudorfl gave me the justification I needed at the time for my view of the spiritual world,' Steiner (14) explained.

This explanation can perhaps be understood on a number of levels. First, that the power of the mind can take flight in the abstract nature of geometry and find autonomy. Second, that geometry provides a pattern in which to perceive unity and connection in the world. Third, that it is a human discipline rooted in natural phenomena (thus encompassing the two worlds of Steiner's boyhood). Theorising aside, it seems Steiner might have sought to induce something like the state of mind he achieved on reading the book at Neudorfl in the practice of 'form drawing', whereby primary school children are required to draw prescribed geometrical patterns.

From the age of 11, Steiner attended secondary school in the neighbouring Wiener Neustadt. Since his father wanted him to become an engineer, the school chosen was not a traditional grammar school (Gymnasium) but a modern, technologically geared school (Realschule), which meant that Steiner was not taught in the classical languages. Regarding this as a great deprivation, the young Steiner, now hungry for mental challenges, bought himself textbooks in Greek and Latin and secretly pursued classical studies in addition to his more modern education. (15)

However, it was in the discovery of philosophy that a new dimension was opened to Steiner--a dimension that would instigate his efforts to integrate the dual sides of the world he had come to know. At 15 he acquired Kant's Critique of Pure Reason, 1787. (16) Until then, he had no reason to question religion, but the introduction to the philosophical thought of Kant, which challenged religious dogma, intrigued Steiner. The boy who was trained to think with mathematical clarity, and for whom lucid thoughts were a very part of his existence, found it increasingly important to reconcile philosophy with knowledge of the spiritual. (17)

In order that his son could study at the Vienna Polytechnic, Steiner's father had arranged to be transferred from Neudorfl to Inzersdorf near Vienna. (18) This allowed the young Steiner to continue his studies in biology, chemistry, physics and mathematics and keep alive his father's dream of him becoming an engineer. But the newfound pleasure of reading philosophical literature encouraged Steiner at this new, remote place to sell his school books and purchase works of other great philosophers. (19) From Kant's theory of knowledge, he now turned his attention to Fichte, Hegel and Schelling and also studied Darwin with great interest. (20) New realisations arose from these studies: My preoccupation with the concepts of natural science [versus spiritual idealism] had led me finally to a position in which I saw the position of the human Ego as the only possible point from which to advance towards true knowledge. I put it to myself that when the Ego is in action and contemplates its own activity, then a spiritual entity is directly present in the consciousness. (21)

In this realisation, Steiner touches upon the cardinal point of not only his own developing spiritual awareness but that of his later, matured notion of a 'spiritual science'. It was the world of senses that to Steiner veiled the true nature of life and 'barred humans from knowing what they really are and how to live in the natural world'. (22)

From early childhood, Steiner had experienced clairvoyance, leaving him with no doubt as to the existence of the spirit world. (23) Once, when eight years of age, he was sitting at the station waiting room at Pottschach, when a woman came to him and said something like: 'Now and always, try and do for me whatever you can.' (24) The figure was not physical and only visible to the young Steiner. Some days later, he learnt that a close relative had taken her life many miles from where Steiner had the experience. (25) There was no doubt in the child's mind that what he had seen was the soul of the departed and that she, in the dire circumstances of her transition, had asked him for help. (26) This experience made a powerful impression on Steiner, but it was only the first among many experiences of his psychic abilities.

From early on, in other words, the problem to Steiner had never been a question of whether a spiritual world exists but rather of what the relationship was between the physical world and the spiritual. And with his emerging kinship with philosophy, Steiner now felt duty bound to reveal the truth, as he saw it, about the world of the spirit through the medium of philosophy. While he celebrated the findings of the mathematical and natural sciences, he felt that they could never stand in proper relationship to the truth if they did not rest upon a secure, philosophical knowledge of the spiritual. Yet many of the practitioners of the natural and mathematical sciences around him at the time did not even accept the possibility of a spiritual reality, let alone how their findings in their field could be intimately connected to a spiritual view. Materialism had brought most world views, even religion, under its sway, and communion with spirit entities was in the eyes of many of his contemporaries a clear sign of insanity--or at best the 'unfortunate result of a hallucinating mind.' (27) Nevertheless, although only a young man, Steiner had entered on his path. It was a path of reconciling the two worlds into which he was born, and which neither the materialist predominance of the time, nor his father's dreams, could discourage him from walking.

A struggle, and a turning point

But how was Steiner to begin this daring task of 'harnessing the dragon of modern science to a knowledge of the spiritual' and above all, to overcome materialism--'the bull of public opinion'? (28) To this question, which would present itself many times throughout his life, he had been given the answer from early on: to overcome one's enemy, one must begin by understanding him or her. (29) This was the realisation that came from his first encounter with philosophy and Kant. He studied theists, atheists and non-theists, but a particular sympathy towards those subscribing to a purely materialist view of the world became a characteristic of Steiner's approach, and a notable feature in our understanding of it. But, although he sought to understand and respect the 'dragon' he was up against, the tolerance was not always mutual. Steiner was to experience the pain of isolation.

Brought to the notice of the management at the Goethe-and-Schiller Archives at Weimar by his admired teacher at Vienna Polytechnic, Karl Julius Schroer, Steiner was invited to edit scientific writings, having received uniquely high praise for his editing of Goethe's scientific works while in Vienna. (30) In Vienna, Steiner had felt at home, feeling a mutual kinship with his fellow Austrians, but in Weimar, Germany, he fully experienced the pedantic philology that was practised in some intellectual circles at the time. (31) Although meeting distinguished thinkers like Treitscheke, Herman Grimm and Ernest Haeckel, Steiner, in his years at Weimar, experienced the vacuum of an intellectualism with no connection to spirit. (32) Furthermore, Steiner was now at an age when normally the mind turns the full weight of its attention to the external world, seeking to forge links with it; but for Steiner, the external world comprised the philosophical ideas that were current--those of Nietzsche and Haeckel, for instance. (33) Steiner realised how much he had lived in his spiritual world and how little he was accustomed to daily life in the physical world. One experience, however, was to mark a turning point in Steiner's struggle and help him again stand firm in his convictions, even against those who tried to ridicule him.

Before we portray this incident, we should note that throughout his childhood and youth Steiner was constrained by the difficulty of not being able to experience the natural world with the same intensity as he did the spiritual. (34) In the physical world he lived in a constant 'cloud' of light, darkness, colours, shapes, and sounds, as if he were in a dream. (35) In his mind the life of the inner dimensions was an open book; it was a state in which he lived in highest alertness. (36) In contrast, he had great difficulty in infusing experiences in the physical world into his senses with sufficient energy. (37)

But towards the end of the Weimar period, all this changed. He suddenly found himself able to observe the objects, beings and processes of the material world with increased focus and exactness. Awakening in Steiner's mind was 'an awareness of sensory objects that had never been there before.' (38) Steiner believed that this turning point--which to him was synonymous with the shift in consciousness from the spirit world before birth into physical incarnation--occurs naturally and gradually in childhood and that what differentiated his life from the norm was the fact that he did not undergo this process until much later in life. (39) But the positive aspect of this late development was exactly that now, in a state of full consciousness, and because the transition was so rapid, he could experience it with all his powers of observation.

It is difficult to imagine what this experience must have been like, but it is important to try. For not only did it have a profound impact on Steiner's self-actualisation in the natural world; it also seems to have provided him with much of the foundation for his reasoning about why humans so often feel no connection to the spiritual world. Steiner believed that the child is incarnated as a spirit into the physical world, gradually descending with his or her consciousness into physical expression: the body. (40) But with the gradual transition from being a 'son of God' to a 'son of man', the awareness of being both often escapes the individual. In contrast, through his sudden and late transition, Steiner seemed to have experienced in full awareness the leap between these two worlds, retaining his apprehension of, and connection to, both.

We would argue that Steiner's idea of teaching and learning on an imaginative plane was to return the child to a 'spirit world' long left behind in order to replay, in vivid 'fast forward', the shift in consciousness to the physical world at an age when the sensibilities drawn from a heightened inner life can most effectively be applied to the external world.

As a result of his own experience, Steiner deduced that true knowledge of life can only be sustained if a comprehension of the polarity between the internal and external world exists, and by holding an equal degree of consciousness of both. He had seen that the physical and spiritual worlds are intimately connected to each other and that they can only be understood through synthesis. Through thinking we approach solutions to problems, Steiner argued. (41) But thinking is not the end; it merely puts the mind on the road to a union with something higher than the mind. Similar to Hegel's dialectical process, Steiner believed that the physical world is the contrast (the antithesis) to the spiritual world (the thesis), and that the human being is the link (the synthesis) between these worlds. To Steiner, the experience at Weimar consolidated his belief that the whole world is an enigma and the human being the solution. (42) The implication for education, Steiner believed, was that children must be given assistance, primarily by way of their imagination, not only to move between two worlds in full awareness but also to aid and maintain an integration of the spirit world and the material world through the various stages of his or her development.

So, although giving the young Steiner initial feelings of loneliness and isolation, the time at Weimar made him stronger in his faith in the spiritual world, as well as in his pursuit of making it known to all. The experience enabled him to rise above the opposition to his spiritual claims--claims which in many ways were merely a continuation of Goethe's work but were now discredited by the dominant materialist view of the time. He not only held his ground more firmly in respect of his own independent ideas from then on; he continued to nurture his wish to absorb ideas that seemed to stand in direct opposition to his own. His interest in his opponents had become justified, as he saw the void and emptiness of a world rid of spirit.

Sympathy for the 'enemy'

Steiner was especially fascinated by the works of Haeckel and Nietzsche, although it was not in his nature to become a follower of either. (43) Nor did he join the opposition to them--an opposition that came almost solely, and with moderate authority, from the Church. (44) Throughout his life, Steiner referred frequently to both Haeckel and Nietzsche, and even wrote books and held lectures dedicated to both. (45)

That Steiner could enter so profoundly and sympathetically into the minds of these thinkers--who held radically different views to his own--was something that his contemporaries found 'almost impossible to comprehend.' (46) But what few people seemed to understand was that it was in the very opposition to Steiner's own beliefs that Haeckel and Nietzsche's work served Steiner's growing inclination and ability to explain the material world in relation to the spiritual. It appeared to Steiner that what these thinkers had to say was of greater momentum than 'what many of the Christian theologians could advance against them and in their own defence.' (47) Steiner saw the theory of evolution, for instance, of which Darwin and Haeckel were the pioneers, as far more significant than the theologians' helpless attempts to explain our origin, so often in direct opposition to the findings of the natural sciences. (48) However, Steiner believed that the theory of evolution as a notion eventually had to be absorbed into a spiritual consciousness in order to fully be understood. Steiner wrote: Haeckel's thinking on [the history of evolution] is the most significant fact of German intellectual life in the second half of the nineteenth century. And there is no better foundation for [a spiritual science] than Haeckel's theory. Haeckel's theory is great, and Haeckel the poorest commentator on it. We do the best service to culture, not by exhibiting Haeckel's shortcomings to our contemporaries, but by demonstrating to them the greatness of his phylogenetic [theory]. (49)

It is said that the main reason that Dostoevsky was such a persuasive conversationalist was the fact that he often argued the opponents' argument better that they themselves did, and always at great length, before he introduced his own position. (50) Similarly, by studying Haeckel's views, Steiner seemed to have found a gateway through which his beginning notion of a spiritual science could be accentuated and defined.

Likewise with Nietzsche, it seemed that the ferocious denial of a spiritual world so characteristic of his work only highlighted to Steiner its reality. Meeting Nietzsche on his sickbed, Steiner commented: It was clear to me that in certain of Nietzsche's thoughts, which strove to reach the realm of spirit, he was a prisoner of his own view of nature ... this was how he had to suffer the consequences of the age in which he lived. (51)

Nietzsche's explosive but imbalanced attacks on any foundations of objectivity exacerbated Steiner's feeling that the human psyche is in need of a spiritual science, bridging a spiritual and material conceptualisation of the world.

The urgency for a spiritual science to inform philosophy and the natural sciences was also particularly evident in how the materialists had lost the spirit in 'the word', Steiner argued. (52) It used to be that spirit was within in the word but, as intellectualism gained idol status in the later period of the Middle Ages, the word in itself became admired over the substance it represented. Humans turned away from their inner selves and became lost in the world of senses. Not surprisingly, then, Steiner believed that it was through philosophy that the restoration of human relations would begin, for it was especially in language that he witnessed the emptiness of a life denied of spirit.

This is also why Goethe assumed such a large role in Steiner's life. Goethe was the fighter for the word of spirit, a 'Michael slaying the dragon of the non-word'. (53) The notable difference between Goethe and his contemporaries, Steiner felt, was not so much in their thinking as in the power of their words. The materialists had lost power in their words, which were becoming increasingly colourless and used merely to pass on their thoughts, experiments and results. In their hands, language was just a vehicle for information. In contrast, Goethe was to Steiner the Sun who, together with the lesser suns of German idealism such as Schelling, Fichte, and Hegel, was making heard the ancient sound of spirit, nourishing the soul of those who listen. (54) It was not that Steiner thought all materialists succumbed to the dry language, for instance, of Darwin. (55) Steiner described how the language of Nietzsche's last works, so explosive and provocative, so poetic at times, was written no longer by himself but by the power of darkness working through him. It was a language of pessimism and of contempt towards any spiritual view. To Steiner, the point was this: people's use of the word is analogous to their closeness and their relationship to the spirit world; the word is next to spirit, for 'in the beginning was the Word, and the Word became flesh'. (56) A spiritual science therefore had to begin with a rediscovery of the spirit in the word.

We would then also discover, Steiner believed, that what humans can become in their wholeness they could never achieve in their divided selves. (57) In medieval times, for instance, when the human being was susceptible primarily to the realm of feeling, and the rational mind was less developed, a somewhat 'spiritual' perception of the world prevailed. Yet the ability to reason had not developed sufficiently to discern the spiritual from the superstitious. (58) Through the era of intellectualism, Steiner argued, humans developed thinking to near perfection but, in their focus on the mental faculty, diminished their connection to their bodies and feelings and the power of intuition, thus causing a new imbalance. To Steiner, the expansion of the scientific mind in the modern era was no doubt valuable to, and even governed by, that of spirit, furthering the evolution of humankind. But the impending task for the modern Western person, as he saw it, is to balance the newfound mental abilities with those of the ancient.

Hence, through observing his opponents' life and work and the times he lived in, Steiner understood the ramifications of a world without spirit. Without spirit in our lives, Steiner felt, we are as a ship without a crew, tossed to and fro in aimless obedience to the wind, with no permanent values and thus no direction. The direction had to be rediscovered, Steiner believed. It would be a synthesis of past and present merits, connecting feeling and thinking, heart and mind. This idea of building a bridge between modern science and the ancient spiritual sciences was new to many from both the materialist and idealist camps that existed at the time. Yet, as Steiner was to discover, he was not entirely alone on his quest.

Allies on the path

Steiner's wish to found a spiritual science led him into affiliation with the Theosophical Society, which at the time was the main avenue (outside established churches) for seekers of spirituality in the West. (59) Founded in 1875, this organisation was led by such prominent contemporaries as H.P. Blavatsky, Henry S. Olcott, C.W. Leadbeater and Annie Besant. The objectives of the Theosophical Society were to further the spiritual evolution of humanity through spiritual teachings. In theosophy, meaning 'divine wisdom', Steiner found detailed occult descriptions of the human condition.

Steiner already knew that his aim was not to present to the world 'new' information as such. He acknowledged that he belonged to a minority, but legitimate, tradition of holistic thinkers, and that ancient spiritual sciences had been taught and practised for aeons in secluded monasteries and secret brotherhoods. He believed that this knowledge had only been kept hidden from the public domain because humanity, in general, was not ready for it. (60) But to Steiner this was no longer the case. To him, the dominance of materialism and the highly developed intellectualism of the age indicated a readiness for spiritual truths to find their place within the natural sciences, and thus the average consciousness of humanity. Steiner sensed a bond with members of the Theosophical Society, who were also trying to make a 'secret' doctrine of the spiritual available to the majority. Understanding Steiner's relationship with the Theosophical Society (which he served as General Secretary of the German branch from 1902 to 1912) is helpful in knowing the specific brand of spiritual science that Steiner would later advocate. For although Steiner was to break with the Theosophical Society, his science of 'anthroposophy' which he developed later, directly out of, and continued to resonate deeply with, theosophy.

Steiner did not stay in the Theosophical Society, primarily because he felt that the theosophical line of thinking was more suited to people in the East than in the West. (61) Steiner saw the philosophies of East and West as complementary. He did, however, believe that each philosophy had a specific role to play in its own geographical and historical context. The modern, scientific inclination of the West is still refining, Steiner argued, whereas the ancient traditions of the East belong to an epoch that had reached its climax, and is dying out in proportion to humanity's ability to adapt to new influences. For this reason Steiner believed that Westerners should be wary of adopting Eastern customs and should follow their own path of scientific and practical living, suited to the Western world. (62) Moreover, to leave the outer world to look inwards, an achievement the Eastern person has perfected, would for the person in the West be not only impractical but, indeed, selfish. For in modern times, Steiner argued in similar fashion to Kraft, it is in the world that a person can be of use, not on a far, removed mountaintop preoccupied with him or herself at the expense of the world's need. (63)

Another reason for the break from the Theosophical Society was that Steiner preferred to retain a core of esoteric Christianity. While distancing himself from much of the Christian dogma throughout his life, Steiner saw in the life of Jesus Christ and the 'Golgotha event' a central representation of the history and path of humanity. (64) But to hold a Christian line of thought as central to a knowledge of life was foreign to the theosophists; they envisaged an encompassing synthesis in all religions, a core of truth which they hoped humanity would 'eventually come to recognise through mutual tolerance'. (65) Neither did they agree with Steiner's belief that God's son in the person of Jesus of Nazareth could only appear once. Instead, Annie Besant claimed the boy Krishnamurti as being the reincarnation of Christ, which Steiner found ludicrous. In any case, while sharing many of the fundamental concepts, and holding the work of the founder, H.P. Blatavsky, in especially high regard, Steiner eventually found it necessary to break with the theosophists.

Reading Steiner's autobiography, (66) one suspects that reasons of a more personal nature also contributed to his departure from the Theosophical Society. There may have been a personality clash between Steiner and one or more of the society's leaders. Whatever the reasons for Steiner's dissatisfaction, his relationship with the Theosophical Society was certainly instrumental in him becoming a public figure. This is evident in Steiner's own words: Working within the existing branches of the Theosophical Society, which was necessary as a starting point, comprised only a part of [my] activity. The biggest task was arranging public lectures in which I spoke to audiences not connected with the Theosophical Society at all and who came to my lectures only because of the subject matter. What ... arose within the framework of the Theosophical Society ... later became the Anthroposophical Society. (67)

Steiner's affiliation with the Theosophical Society, therefore, was useful in providing him with an audience--and even much of the content of his thesis. Having a strong sense of the importance of merging a spiritual science with the modern scientific inclination of the West, however, Steiner abandoned the partnership to form his own branch of theosophy: anthroposophy.

Conclusion

The dual nature of the world into which Rudolf Steiner was born proved an important factor in the development of his philosophy. The disparity he experienced between nature and technology in his childhood, between materialism and idealism in his adolescence, and between Christianity and Eastern philosophy as a young man, were all important influences. It was against this backdrop that his ideas took form. It was not only that his efforts to merge a spiritual science with that of modern science arose out of the disparities of his own life; his experiences in, and unique awareness of, both the spiritual and the physical world seemed to equip him with an ability to view the connectedness of life. It was this ability that also made him view his adversaries in an unusual light: not as opponents, but rather as a 'sounding board' against which his own philosophy could develop. Friend and foe, spirit and matter, the 'inner' and the 'outer' world, were to Steiner the ends of the continuum that constitutes life. Correspondingly, he believed that an integration of these continuum ends was essential for the human being to become a self-actualised whole. And it was this intent of bringing wholeness and synthesis to Western life that formed the basis for his notion of anthroposophy, and later, his philosophy of an imaginative education. Imaginative teaching and learning were to Steiner an answer to the problem of dualities he had experienced in the course and context of his life. (68)

(1) R. Steiner, A Modern Art of Education, London, Rudolf Steiner Press, 1928; Spiritual Grounds of Education, London, Anthroposophical Publishing Company, 1947; The Kingdom of Childhood, London, Rudolf Steiner Press, 1974; Rudolf Steiner: an autobiography, Blauvelt, Rudolf Steiner Publications, 1977; The Roots of Education, Hudson, Anthroposophic Press, 1997;

(2) J. Dewey, 'Art as Experience', John Dewey, Volume 10:1934, The Later Works, 1925-1953, (ed.) A. Boydston, Carbondale, Southern Illinois Press, 1934.

(3) G. L. Gutek, Cultural Foundations of Education, New York, Macmillan, 1991.

(4) R. Miller, What are Schools for? Brandon, Holistic Education Press, 1997.

(5) Gutek, Cultural Foundations of Education.

(6) K. Grue-Soerensen, Opdragelsens Historie (A history of child-rearing). Copenhagen, Gyldendal, 1956.

(7) Gutek, Cultural Foundations of Education.

(8) Gutek, Cultural Foundations of Education.

(9) Gutek, Cultural Foundations of Education.

(10) Gutek, Cultural Foundations of Education.

(11) J. Hemleben, Rudolf Steiner, Sussex, Henry Goulden, 1975, pp. 5-12.

(12) Hemleben, Rudolf Steiner.

(13) Steiner, cited in Hemleben, Rudolf Steiner, p. 5.

(14) Steiner, cited in Hemleben, Rudolf Steiner, p. 16.

(15) Hemleben, Rudolf Steiner, pp. 17-19.

(16) H. Barnes, A life for the Spirit: Rudolf Steiner in the crosscurrents of our time, Hudson, Anthroposophic Press, 1997, p. 27.

(17) Steiner, Rudolf Steiner: an autobiography.

(18) Hemleben, Rudolf Steiner, pp. 20-22.

(19) Hemleben, Rudolf Steiner.

(20) Barnes, A Life for the Spirit, pp. 77-78.

(21) Hemleben, Rudolf Steiner, p. 22.

(22) Hemleben, Rudolf Steiner, p. 22.

(23) Barnes, A Life for the Spirit.

(24) Steiner, cited in Hemleben, Rudolf Steiner, p. 23.

(25) Hemleben, Rudolf Steiner.

(26) Hemleben, Rudolf Steiner.

(27) Hemleben, Rudolf Steiner, p. 23.

(28) Hemleben, Rudolf Steiner, p. 24.

(29) Hemleben, Rudolf Steiner.

(30) Barnes, A Life for the Spirit, pp. 47-51.

(31) Barnes, A Life for the Spirit.

(32) Barnes, A Life for the Spirit, pp. 47-51.

(33) Steiner, Rudolf Steiner: an autobiography.

(34) Steiner, Rudolf Steiner: an autobiography.

(35) Hemleben, Rudolf Steiner, p. 65.

(36) Hemleben, Rudolf Steiner.

(37) Barnes, A Life for the Spirit, p. 56.

(38) Steiner, in Hemleben, Rudolf Steiner, p. 65.

(39) Steiner, Rudolf Steiner: an autobiography.

(40) Steiner, A Modern Art of Education.

(41) Steiner, Spiritual Ground of Education.

(42) Steiner, A Modern Art of Education.

(43) Steiner, Rudolf Steiner: an autobiography.

(44) Hemleben, Rudolf Steiner, pp. 55-57.

(45) Hemleben, Rudolf Steiner.

(46) Barnes, A life for the Spirit, p. 52.

(47) Hemleben, Rudolf Steiner, p. 56.

(48) Hemleben, Rudolf Steiner, p. 56.

(49) Steiner, in Hemleben, Rudolf Steiner, p. 52.

(50) M. Muggeridge, Dostoevsky, 1821-81 [video documentary], Bendigo, VIC: La Trobe University, 1998.

(51) Barnes, A Life for the Spirit, p. 52.

(52) Steiner, A Modern Art of Education.

(53) Roth, in Steiner, Rudolf Steiner: an autobiography, p. 409.

(54) Roth, in Steiner, Rudolf Steiner: an autobiography.

(55) Steiner, Rudolf Steiner: an autobiography.

(56) Steiner, Rudolf Steiner: an autobiography, p. 409.

(57) Steiner, A Modern Art of Education.

(58) S. Warneke, 'Medieval World' lecture series notes, La Trobe University, Bendigo, 1998.

(59) Miller, What are Schools for?

(60) Steiner, Spiritual Ground of Education, p. 8.

(61) A. B. Mazzone, Waldorf Education in Theory and Practice. Interviews, Adelaide, 25-28 April 2000.

(62) A. B. Mazzone, Waldorf Education in Theory and Practice. Interviews, Adelaide, 25-28 April 2000.

(63) R. J. Kraft, Guest Editorial: 'A call to action and reflection', The Journal of Experiential Education, vol. 4, no. 1, 1981, pp. 5-7.

(64) Hemleben, Rudolf Steiner, pp. 65-67.

(65) Hemleben, Rudolf Steiner, p. 66.

(66) Steiner, Rudolf Steiner: an Autobiography, p. 409.

(67) Steiner, in Barnes, A Life for the Spirit, p. 82.

(68) To learn more about Steiner's notion of imaginative teaching itself, see e.g., Steiner, A Modern Art of Education; Spiritual Ground of Education; The Kingdom of Childhood; and Steiner, An Autobiography,--Or, Nielsen: Rudolf Steiner's pedagogy of imagination; and A concrete approach to imaginative education--and a non-concrete benefit.

Dr. Thomas William Nielsen is a Lecturer in Education at the University of Canberra, Australia, where he teaches behaviour management and educational theory. Thomas has studied spiritual traditions (anthroposophy and theosophy) for many years and is very interested in education systems that cater for the whole person--body, mind and heart. His current research projects involve values education with the Curriculum Corporation and imaginative education with the Imagination and Education Research Group (IERG), based at Simon Fraser University in Vancouver, Canada. Email: thomas.nielsen@canberra.edu.au

Julia Smith is an editor and former education student at the University of Canberra who has an interest in educational theory.