We, the people of the fifth post-Atlantean period...we have to resolve, to the greatest extent possible and in a way that is filled with the power of life, the problem that one can call the problem of evil. I ask you to think about this in some depth. The fact that evil, which will approach the human being of the fifth post-Atlantean period in every possible form and will do this in such a way that the human being will have to resolve the very nature and being of evil scientifically, will have to come to grips, in all his or her loving and hating, with everything that stems from evil, and battle and wrestle with evil's resistance to impulses of the will; all this belongs to the task of the fifth post-Atlantean period. -- Rudolf Steiner, Goethe's Faust in the Light of Anthroposophy, p. 85)

The two essays published here were written on the basis of lectures given to members of the School for Spiritual Science. Their content therefore deals directly with the path of inner development outlined in the lessons of the First Class of the School.

In the first essay, Selg address the necessary confrontation with the powers of evil as they appear in the Class Lessons and in our time more broadly. Only through confronting and overcoming these powers are we able to find the path to our true humanity.

The second essay deals with the figure of the Guardian of the Threshold as a Michaelic teacher and guide along the soul's path into the spiritual world. This figure, Selg argues, is far too little understood in our time. He is a spiritual being of great significance who offers help to all earnest seekers.

This book represents an ongoing effort on the part of Peter Selg and the leaders of the General Anthroposophical Section at the Goetheanum to deepen and internalize the work with the Class Lessons for all members of the School for Spiritual Science.

This book is comprised of translations of texts originally published in German by Verlag des Ita Wegman Instituts: Die Auseinandersetzung mit dem Bösen: Zur Schulung der Ersten Klasse . Hochschulvorträge Band 1 (2019); Die Sprache des Hüters: Zur Schulung der Ersten Klasse . Hochschulvorträge Band 2 (2020).

During the 2018 Kaspar Hauser Festival in Ansbach, Germany, Peter Selg assumed the task of understanding the individuals in Kaspar Hauser's life and comprehending their significance for his destiny. He begins by unfolding the sociopolitical and philosophical milieu during Hauser's life, starting with Friedrich Hölderlin and other significant luminaries of the time. A fellow student and friend of Hölderlin said of Kaspar Hauser, His fine facial features, his gentle expression, his beautiful bearing, his carefully tended attire, and the unmistakable loftiness expressed in his being have always remained with me, saying further, Whoever saw him loved him, and whoever became acquainted with him remained his friend.

Selg compares the biographies of Kaspar Hauser and Rudolf Steiner, who stated, If Kaspar Hauser had not lived and died as he did, the contact between the earth and the spiritual world would have been completely broken. And Selg points out, Through his path of suffering, Hauser prepared something that would allow new life and a new 'teaching' to enter the earthly realm.

It was not only fame that Kaspar Hauser and Rudolf Steiner shared, but also the common fate of suffering under the methodical campaign of their opponents. From the very beginning, the aim was to divert Hauser from his task--indeed, from his very individuality--through subjecting him to long years of confinement, through the assassination attempt in Nuremberg, and finally the fatal stabbing in the Hofgarten in Ansbach. -- Peter Selg

We are also able witness Kaspar Hauser's confirmation ceremony of May 20, 1833, in the Swan Knight Chapel of the Gumbertus Church in Ansbach. Eckart Böhmer, director of the Kaspar Hauser Festival, wrote, Kaspar Hauser's confirmation, probably in his 21st year, is possibly the brightest event of his short life.

This book is a translation from German of the book Schicksals-Weihe. Die Konfirmation Kaspar Hausers (Verlag des Ita Wegman Instituts, Stuttgart, 2018) and chapters 1 & 2 from Das andere Deutschland. Über Friedrich Hölderlin, Kaspar Hauser und Rudolf Steiner (Verlag des Ita Wegman Instituts, Stuttgart, 2016).

The initial period of childhood is essentially about adapting to and incarnating on Earth and establishing a provisional balance between the spiritual and the physical, between the prenatal cosmic and the earthly factors. During this time, according to Rudolf Steiner, all the forces of a child's organization emanate from the neurosensory system. . . . By bringing respiration into harmony with neurosensory activity, we draw the spirit-soul element into the child's physical life.

Peter Selg investigates how children's early experience of the world begins as an undifferentiated sensory relationship to their phenomenological environment. This aspect of a child's incarnation leads to learning through imitation and to the process of recognizing the Other as a separate entity with which to interact.

In this cogent work, Peter Selg describes the early stages of childhood from the perspectives of conventional scientific and spiritual-scientific-- anthropological and anthroposophic--research with the purpose of encouraging a new educational attitude in working with young children. In his numerous references to early childhood development, this was Rudolf Steiner's most important and urgent purpose.

∞ ∞ ∞

Steiner directed attention to the special character of the senses in childhood, particularly in the first few years of life. Through their senses, children are fully exposed to (and to some extent at the mercy of) objects and people around them.... In many of his lectures, especially those dealing with education and developmental physiology, Rudolf Steiner emphasized that the anthropology of early childhood must not only recognize the child as a 'comprehensive' or 'universal' sense organ, but must also give that recognition top priority in any consideration of what is involved in the child's life and experiences. 'Children are completely like sense organs in how they take in the contents of their surroundings' (from chapter 2).

It is a simple but essential principle: education aims at the future, at a time that we as educators do not yet know and cannot foresee. The challenges that will confront the children in the future are not those of the past--of our past, of our life story and our horizon. Times change, so do the realities of life, and in our times they change quickly and dramatically. Education aims at the future and that puts us as educators in a difficult situation: this future is not--or is only to an extent--identical with our past, with our life experiences. My youth, your youth: they are not identical with the adolescent constitution and life reality toward which we currently have to direct our educational efforts. Yet educate we must, and educating means preparing for a future. -- Peter Selg (from the book)

Schools reflect the state of society. If society is materialistic, competitive, egoistic, technological, and without concern for human values and long-term thinking, our schools will tend to reflect those values. However, what if education were about something else? What if education were about the future? What if education were a about nurturing a new generation of human beings, integrated in body, soul, and spirit and able to think for themselves and have the capacity to love? Perhaps the world would change. The Waldorf school, initiated and guided in 1919 by Rudolf Steiner, was conceived with precisely such an end in view.

In this passionate, inspiring, and moving book, Peter Selg, speaks from a deep knowledge of Anthroposophy and from his extensive experience as a child psychiatrist. He returns to the original impulses behind the first Waldorf school to show their continuing validity and how they still respond to what we need.

From this view, Waldorf education is future-oriented, based on a holistic worldview and cosmology that is humanistic, scientific, and spiritual, and develops through a curriculum and a teacher-student relationship based on love. Its focus is the miracle of the developing human being. Recognizing the equal importance of thinking, feeling, and willing, Waldorf education works through bodily movement and art, as well as through intellect and mind.

Waldorf Education is not a theory but a living reality, and Selg brings this reality to life before us through the biography of the first Waldorf school. Thus, we learn to see it in a new way--in its essence, as a healing model of what education might become if the primary relationship, the inner core of a school, is the free relationship between teacher and student.

As Steiner wrote: It is our task as teachers and educators to stand in awe of the individuality of the student and offer our help so that it can follow the laws of its own development. We are merely called upon to remove any obstacles in body or soul that might hinder the individuality from realizing its potential freely.

A verse given at the dedication of a building at the Waldorf School in Stuttgart expresses the essence of Waldorf Education in poetic form:

May there reign here spirit-strength in love;
May there work here spirit-light in goodness;
Born from certainty of heart,
And from steadfastness of soul,
So that we may bring to young human beings
Bodily strength for work,
inwardness of soul,
and clarity of spirit.

The Essence of Waldorf Education is a translation from German of Der geistige Kern der Waldorfschule (Verlag Ita Wegman Institut, 2009).

Rudolf Steiner's extraordinary ability to perceive the inner nature and development of children provided insights at many levels and areas of the creative learning process. He spoke of this ability as a precondition for all forms of healthy childhood education--including special education--and suggested that teachers should develop such a capacity within themselves.

This process involves the recreation of the child within oneself, based on what we are able to observe in the child's physical appearance, temperament, ways of moving, and environment. In The Therapeutic Eye, Dr. Peter Selg discusses Steiner's views on childhood development, how teachers can look at children, and ways that these approaches can be used to develop lessons and classroom activities to deal with behavioral extremes and learning challenges.

The Therapeutic Eye is a valuable resource for teachers and parents.

The Therapeutic Eye is a translation from German of Der therapeutische Blick: Rudolf Steiner sieht Kinder.

When thousands are in the initial vanguard of a movement, these thousands have a higher, more potentized obligation...they have the obligation to practice, in every detail, greater courage, greater energy, greater patience, greater tolerance, and above all greater truthfulness in all things. -- Rudolf Steiner (Dornach, June 16, 1923)

In light of the centenary of the Christmas Conference 1923/24, Peter Selg has written the four essays published here, which deal, each in its own way, with the past, present, and future of the Anthroposophical Society and its School for Spiritual Science. Selg outlines important historical background to the Christmas Conference, shedding light on the origins of the re-founding of the Society, what necessitated it, and what Rudolf Steiner was hoping to achieve.

Though much good work has been done over the past hundred years, many of the issues that hindered the Society and movement in Steiner's time still persist today. This book is intended as a call to self-knowledge for members of the Anthroposophical Society, a call to actively take up the work of furthering the development of the task-centered worldwide Society that Steiner made so clearly visible in 1923.

Rudolf Steiner's words, spoken one hundred years ago, retain their power and urgency today: Try to grow together with the world! That will be the best, the most significant 'program.' That cannot be put in our statutes--but we should be able to take it as a flame into our hearts.

This book is a translation of Die anthroposophische Weltgesellschaft und ihre Hochschule, originally published in German by Verlag am Goetheanum (Dornach, 2023) in collaboration with the General Anthroposophical Section of the School for Spiritual Science.

This anthroposophical movement is not an act of service to the Earth; this anthroposophical movement in its totality and in all its details is a service to the divine beings, a divine service. -- Rudolf Steiner, 1924

In the twelve months following Sergei O. Prokofieff's death in 2014, Peter Selg gave a series of lectures in various cities on Prokofieff's work, each time focusing on a particular aspect of his writings. This volume (in English for the first time and commemorating the seventh anniversary of Sergei Prokofieff's death) gathers many of Peter Selg's presentations.

Anthroposophy was given to us in order to expand and spiritualize our consciousness, to strengthen our sense of responsibility, and to awaken the will to fulfill our tasks. -- Sergei O. Prokofieff

Every moral deed and every physical action in human life is connected in the human heart. Only when we truly learn to understand the configuration of he human heart will we find the true fusion of these two parallel and independent phenomena: moral events and physical events. --Rudolf Steiner

Today we know very little about the true nature of the human heart. Our knowledge arises only from a materialistic or an emotional standpoint. However, the human heart, as Rudolf Steiner knew and taught, is both spiritual and physical--the place where body and soul come together. It is the place of their unity. We have lost this knowledge, yet it is integral to the Western understanding of what gives humanity its vocation--our spiritual/physical, our earthly/heavenly nature.

In this astonishing and inspiring book, Peter Selg focuses on the evolution of the spiritual understanding of the heart as transmitted through Aristotle, the Gospels, and Hebrew Scriptures to the Middle Ages, when, in the light of the Mystery of Golgotha and its sacramental life, it was synthesized and transformed by Thomas Aquinas, after whom, with the rise of modern science it, was lost until Goethe began a process of recovery and development that led to its complete renewal and transformation in Rudolf Steiner.

The Mystery of the Heart tells this story in three parts. Part one, The Anthropology of the Heart in the Gospels, examines the spiritual anthropology of the heart in the Gospels in the light of Ezekiel's prophetic saying: I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a living heart of flesh.

Part two, De Essentia et Motu Cordis, describes Aristotle's understanding of the heart and its transformation and deepening in Aquinas. Part three, The Heart and the Fate of Humanity, examines the spiritual-scientific view of the heart as developed in Rudolf Steiner's teachings.

Also included is an appendix containing selected meditative verses and therapeutic meditations for the heart.

This volume was originally published in German by Verlag am Goetheanum 2003 as Mysterium cordis: Von der Mysterienstätte des Menschenherzens Studien zur sakramentalen Physiologie des Herzorgans. Aristoteles, Thomas von Aquin, Rudolf Steiner. Second edition in German, Verlag am Goetheanum 2006, Dornach, Switzerland.

In many of his lectures to teachers on education, Rudolf Steiner called attention to a significant but often overlooked change in the way children experience themselves and the world that occurs in the middle of childhood, in the ninth or tenth year.

There comes a time when children show, not in what they say but in their whole behavior, that they are struggling with a question or a number of questions that indicates a crisis in their soul life. It is a very subtle experience for the child that requires an equally subtle response.

In this deep and concise book, Peter Selg illuminates this momentous phenomenon in child development, this dramatic change in the child's consciousness. Though it is hardly noticeable to the observer, Steiner reveals that children during this time in life experience a sudden inner instability, a loss of the foundation they felt had been naturally supporting and carrying them. It is a crisis that pediatric psychologists and psychiatrists know well, as many fears and weaknesses that rise to the surface later, in adolescence, can be traced back to this subtle event.

Parents and educators need to know what to say and how to act, because their response at this time will be crucial for the child's entire life. Through Steiner's profound wisdom of children's inner essence, adults can learn to give them the experience of being carried by a strong and sure relationship:

When children cross the Rubicon between the ninth and tenth year without that feeling, something will be lacking in their later life, and they will have to struggle to attain what they should have received naturally at that moment in childhood.

I Am Different from You is a vital book for all parents and teachers to read--well before the crisis in the middle of childhood--to recognize what is necessary to support children during this decisive event in the right way.

I have never in my life pursued personal ambitions, nor will I in future. -- Rudolf Steiner

To acknowledge and understand Rudolf Steiner's unique achievement and life's work, one must be able to accept that the founder and spiritual researcher of Anthroposophy was a citizen of two worlds--both the spiritual and the physical. Anthroposophy teaches that this duality, rather than being a quality reserved for special individualities, is inherent to human nature. According to Rudolf Steiner, it is a central aspect of being human, even in times when the suprasensory aspect of humanity is eclipsed (for ordinary day consciousness) and almost eliminated by certain civilizations.

The interest in Rudolf Steiner's person and essence, in his attitude toward life and work, will continue to grow in the decades and centuries that lie ahead, both within and outside the anthroposophical movement. It will take hold of entirely different groups of people, including those who come with spiritual questions or discover them in times of need. Rudolf Steiner's work grew to be one unique effort of bringing courage to human beings (Michael Bauer).

This is the first of seven comprehensive volumes on Rudolf Steiner's being, intentions, and journey. It presents Rudolf Steiner from childhood and youth through his doctorate degree and up to the time of his work for the Goethe Archives as editor of Goethe's scientific writings. By considering his formative years in depth, we come to understand better the roots and development of Rudolf Steiner's later spiritual research and teachings.

In the night of January 10 [1880], I did not sleep a wink. I studied certain philosophical problems until half past twelve, when I finally lay down. In the year before I had tried to find out whether Schelling was right in saying, 'We all have a secret and wondrous capacity of withdrawing from temporal change into our innermost self, which we divest of everything external. And there, in the form of immutability, we behold the eternal.' I believe that I have found this innermost capacity within me. I have had an intuition for some time. I now see the whole idealistic philosophy in a new way. What is a sleepless night compared to such a discovery! -- Rudolf Steiner (letter to a friend, Jan. 1881)

Rudolf Steiner, Life and Work, Seven Volumes

Vol. 1. (1861-1890): Childhood, Youth, and Study Years
(ISBN: 9781621480822 Pbk - ISBN: 9781621480839 Hbk)

Vol. 2. (1890-1900): Weimar and Berlin
(ISBN: 9781621480853 Pbk - ISBN: 9781621480860 Hbk)

Vol. 3. (1900-1914): Spiritual Science and Spiritual Community
(ISBN: 9781621480884 Pbk - ISBN: 9781621480891 Hbk)

Vol. 4. (1914-1918): The Years of World War I
(ISBN: 9781621481577 Pbk - ISBN: 9781621481584 Hbk)

Vol. 5. (1919-1922): Social Threefolding and the Waldorf School
(ISBN: 9781621481935 Pbk - ISBN: 9781621481942 Hbk)

Vol. 6. (1923): The Burning of the Goetheanum
(ISBN: 9781621482192 Pbk - ISBN: 9781621482208 Hbk)

Vol. 7. (1924-1925): The Anthroposophical Society and the School for Spiritual Science
(ISBN: 9781621482321 Pbk - ISBN: 9781621482338 Hbk)

All we can do is try to gain a clear picture of the situation and really live with that knowledge. We must remember that thoughts are actual, dynamic forces. All we can do now is think matters through clearly. Living with these true thoughts for just two days before being drawn in again by the black magic of journalism will make a difference. And the time might come when we can use this to bring something about or get someone else to do something. --Rudolf Steiner, Jan. 13, 1917

In volume 4, Peter Selg's exploration into Rudolf Steiner's life and work focuses on the period of World War I. Steiner saw that dark time as largely the result of mounting economic tensions between England and Germany, marked by unsustainable materialistic and nationalistic thinking. In his view, the prevalent social concepts resisted evolution toward a form of society that would enable a long-term future peace; he would soon propose his alternative in the form of the threefold nature of the social organism to maintain societal health, sovereign and mutually interdependent relations among the three principal domains of social life: the political, economic, and cultural-spiritual realms.

This volume describes a dramatic period during which Rudolf Steiner showed competence and devotion in his attempts to communicate and implement a long-term path to peaceful relations in Europe. His lectures during this time focused heavily on themes of inwardly accompanying those who have died; caring for the wounded; the importance of selflessly experiencing the full tragic reality of world events; and the vital importance of truthfulness in journalism. He regarded the deficiency of truthful reporting to be so dire that he considered founding a news organization in Switzerland.

Steiner's deep concern for the tragedy that had befallen Europe, for the many lives violently cut short, and for the political exploitation attempted in the aftermath of the war led him to imbue his anthroposophic activity with a fundamentally new gesture, focusing on practical contributions to society in a way never before attempted in the anthroposophical movement.

The soul passes through the nations: when we look at the higher self the concept of nationality becomes meaningless. Because everything that is an expression of our nationality we will leave behind when we cross the threshold of death. We must therefore be aware as seriously striving human beings that--in our consecutive incarnations--we do not belong to one nationality but to various nationalities and that all that connects us with each of these nationalities is left behind in the moment of death. -- Rudolf Steiner (Oct. 31, 1914)

Rudolf Steiner, Life and Work, Seven Volumes

Vol. 1. (1861-1890): Childhood, Youth, and Study Years
(ISBN: 9781621480822 Pbk - ISBN: 9781621480839 Hbk)

Vol. 2. (1890-1900): Weimar and Berlin
(ISBN: 9781621480853 Pbk - ISBN: 9781621480860 Hbk)

Vol. 3. (1900-1914): Spiritual Science and Spiritual Community
(ISBN: 9781621480884 Pbk - ISBN: 9781621480891 Hbk)

Vol. 4. (1914-1918): The Years of World War I
(ISBN: 9781621481577 Pbk - ISBN: 9781621481584 Hbk)

Vol. 5. (1919-1922): Social Threefolding and the Waldorf School
(ISBN: 9781621481935 Pbk - ISBN: 9781621481942 Hbk)

Vol. 6. (1923): The Burning of the Goetheanum
(ISBN: 9781621482192 Pbk - ISBN: 9781621482208 Hbk)

Vol. 7. (1924-1925): The Anthroposophical Society and the School for Spiritual Science
(ISBN: 9781621482321 Pbk - ISBN: 9781621482338 Hbk)

This third volume of Peter Selg's comprehensive presentation of Rudolf Steiner's life and work begins with Steiner's invitation to lecture in the Theosophical Society during the summer of 1900. From the outset of his theosophical involvement, Steiner was resolved to serve and develop the Western path to the spirit, traversed in full, conscious clarity of thought. He was therefore critical of the tendency to avoid the modern standards of a sound knowledge process in matters of spirituality and esotericism, and instead emphasized the importance of idealist philosophy as groundwork for understanding spiritual cognition. (Whoever speaks of the coldness of the world of ideas can only think ideas, not experience them. Those who live the true life in the world of ideas feel in themselves the being of the world working in warmth that cannot be compared to anything else. -Rudolf Steiner, Goethe's World View) Although his approach did not always harmonize with theosophical pursuits, Rudolf Steiner recognized the sincere striving at the basis of this movement and agreed to take on increasingly greater responsibility for the German Section. Marie von Sivers, who would later become his wife, was his most supportive colleague during this time. At a decisive juncture, Steiner broke from the Theosophical Society to found the Anthroposophical Society, through which he would continue the development of modern spiritual science more freely in accord with his original intentions. This volume covers the period during which Steiner wrote some of his foundational works: Christianity as Mystical Fact, Theosophy, Knowledge of the Higher Worlds, and An Outline of Esoteric Science. Peter Selg also describes the building of the first Goetheanum in Dornach as an artistic embodiment of esoteric wisdom, giving rise to an international working community, as well as the performance of the mystery dramas and Rudolf Steiner's profound Christological lectures known as the Fifth Gospel.

Not only do we pass through the gate of death as immortal beings, we also enter through the gate of birth as unborn beings. We need the term unbornness, as well as the term immortality, to encompass the whole human being (Rudolf Steiner).

As anyone who has had a child knows, newborns enter the earthly world as beings different from their parents. They arrive with their own individuality, being, and history. From the beginning, they manifest an essential dignity and a unique I, which they clearly brought with them from the spiritual world.

This unborn life of a person's higher individuality guides the whole process of incarnation. It frames our lives, but we fail to recognize this because of a single-minded focus on immortality, or life-after-death, which makes us forget the reality of our unbornness. This unbornness extends not only from conception to birth, but also includes the whole existence and history of one's I in its long journey from the spiritual world to Earth. Unbornness--the other side of eternity--allows us to experience the fact that birth is just as great a mystery as is death. In a new and striking way, unbornness poses the mystery of our human task on Earth.

It was one of Rudolf Steiner's great gifts that he returned the concept of unbornness to human consciousness and language. In this brief, stunning, and moving, almost poetic work, Peter Selg gathers the key elements and images needed to begin an understanding of--and wonder at--the vast scope of our unbornness. Drawing on and expanding on Steiner's work, as well as Raphael's Sistine Madonna and the poems of Nelly Sachs and Rainer Maria Rilke, Selg unveils this deepest mystery of human existence. After reading it, one will never look at a child or another human being in the same way again.

Life after death
life before birth;
only by knowing both
do we know eternity.
(Rudolf Steiner)

Unbornness is a translation of Ungeborenheit: Die Präexistenz des Menschen und der Weg zur Geburt (Verlag Ita Wegman Institut, 2009).

Rudolf Steiner received The Fifth Gospel--unrecorded events from the so-called lost years of the life of Jesus, obtained by grace and by spiritual research into the akashic record--as a sacred obligation to which he experienced a deep sense of responsibility. However, he never finished the project of unveiling it. Had he done so, not only Anthroposophy but also Christianity would have received an enormous spiritual gift: a concrete, soul-filled description of the Mystery of Golgotha. His deeply moving and often startling lectures in 1913 are thus fragmentary, giving the near-tragic impression that, because those who heard or read them did not take them up with sufficient seriousness and inner dedication, humanity has suffered an inestimable loss.

Steiner traveled through various German cities to give personal summaries of the Fifth Gospel. But in each center, he encountered the same sleepiness. The thorns were already starting to prick; he seemed to begin hiding the content rather than disclosing it. He was forced to see in all clarity that the Fifth Gospel was not being appropriately received (Andrei Bely).

In this dramatic book, Selg tells the story of those lectures. He recounts their background and many of the most important episodes. He illumines and gives context to the excerpts with a profound yet accessible commentary. Most important, he offers insights into their importance to both Steiner and the hearts of those who heard and understood--even those who felt inadequate to the task.

Those who has read Steiner's lectures on the Fifth Gospel and wondered about their significance will find here an inspiring guide to further meditation, while those who have not yet read them will find many reasons for doing so and discover a new way of understanding Steiner and his mission. Those unfamiliar with Steiner but wish to fine a meaningful, heartfelt way to Jesus Christ and the Christian mystery will discover a new way of understanding a new path to Christ.

When Rudolf Steiner embarked on the esoteric lessons of the First Class in the newly founded Esoteric School at the Goetheanum, he suggested that the School for Spiritual Science as an esoteric institution had, in the years preceding the Christmas Foundation Meeting of 1923, become estranged from its intrinsic task.

This volume closely investigates those matters--to which Steiner referred only briefly--tracing the development of Rudolf Steiner's idea of the School in relation to the Michael community, which he first discussed at length in his lectures on karma, given in parallel to the First Class lessons.

This book also describes Ita Wegman's path and her mission in connection with these undertakings.

All this must be accepted as destiny [karma]. It would be sentimental to enlarge on how much it pains me to be separated physically from the Goetheanum and its activities. I hope only that all this will not inhibit but temper and enhance our dear friends' forces.
--Rudolf Steiner, Dec. 24, 1924

In the final volume of his comprehensive biography of Rudolf Steiner, Peter Selg describes Steiner's last months on Earth. Although his health was beginning to decline, 1924 might have been his most productive and fruitful year. It saw a new beginning for the Anthroposophical Society and the beginning of the Esoteric School and the School for Spiritual Science.

The year began with the Christmas Conference, during which the Anthroposophical Society was reborn). That year also witnessed Rudolf Steiner's Karmic Relationships lectures, as well as the serialized Leading Thoughts, summarizing Anthroposophy in a series of aphoristic guidelines for meditation, supplemented by essays on the Michaelic nature of Anthroposophy. Also serialized in the Goetheanum newsletter were autobiographical chapters in Rudolf Steiner's life up to 1907. He also defined his important spiritual relationships with Ita Wegman, Marie Steiner, and Lili Kolisko, as well as their significant connection to the Society and his spiritual legacy.

New initiatives were also planted in the world during that time, including anthroposophically extended medicine and biodynamic agriculture. From his sickbed in the Goetheanum carpentry shop, Steiner also formed plans and a model for the new Goetheanum in Dornach, Switzerland.

Also included in this volume is a lecture by Rudolf Steiner on June 4, 1924, The Festival of Pentecost.

Rudolf Steiner, Life and Work, Seven Volumes

Vol. 1. (1861-1890): Childhood, Youth, and Study Years
(ISBN: 9781621480822 Pbk - ISBN: 9781621480839 Hbk)

Vol. 2. (1890-1900): Weimar and Berlin
(ISBN: 9781621480853 Pbk - ISBN: 9781621480860 Hbk)

Vol. 3. (1900-1914): Spiritual Science and Spiritual Community
(ISBN: 9781621480884 Pbk - ISBN: 9781621480891 Hbk)

Vol. 4. (1914-1918): The Years of World War I
(ISBN: 9781621481577 Pbk - ISBN: 9781621481584 Hbk)

Vol. 5. (1919-1922): Social Threefolding and the Waldorf School
(ISBN: 9781621481935 Pbk - ISBN: 9781621481942 Hbk)

Vol. 6. (1923): The Burning of the Goetheanum
(ISBN: 9781621482192 Pbk - ISBN: 9781621482208 Hbk)

Vol. 7. (1924-1925): The Anthroposophical Society and the School for Spiritual Science
(ISBN: 9781621482321 Pbk - ISBN: 9781621482338 Hbk)

Then he gave her the Warmth Meditation and said that she was allowed to give it to all future participants. He wanted to give it to Dr. Wegman himself. It is a chain-meditation, not a circle-meditation. Then he described it as the way for medical practitioners to behold the etheric Christ. --Madeleine van Deventer

Rudolf Steiner wrote the text of the Warmth Meditation on two sheets of A4 paper in neat handwriting and without revisions or corrections, complete with two small, sketch-like drawings. He gave the meditation to the medical student Helene von Grunelius in early 1923 and described it as the way for medical practitioners to behold the etheric Christ. It was intended for use by her and her circle of friends in their medical studies. The warmth meditation became their central esoteric medical meditation and has been maintained and practiced by countless individuals during the past eight decades, becoming for many the existential core of their therapeutic practice and perspective.

Peter Selg's insightful book describes the historical context of meditation and some of its spiritual implications. Included are reproductions of the original meditation as written down by Rudolf Steiner and Ita Wegman.

You detect at this point what life, which has poured into the world, actually is. Where can the source of this life be found? It can be found in what stirs the moral ideals and prompts us to say that if we allow ourselves to be filled by the light of moral ideals today, they will bear life, matter, and light and create worlds. We carry that world-creating element, and the moral ideal is the source of all that creates worlds.--Rudolf Steiner

Try to become one with the world--that will be the best and most important 'program.' It is something that cannot be contained in statutes but needs to burn in our hearts as a flame. -- Rudolf Steiner

The third volume of Peter Selg's comprehensive presentation of Rudolf Steiner's life and work begins with Steiner's invitation to lecture in the Theosophical Society during the summer of 1900. From the outset of his theosophical involvement, Steiner was resolved to serve and develop the Western path to the spirit, traversed in full, conscious clarity of thought. He was therefore critical of the tendency to avoid the modern standards of a sound knowledge process in matters of spirituality and esotericism, and instead emphasized the importance of idealist philosophy as groundwork for understanding spiritual cognition.

Although his approach did not always harmonize with theosophical pursuits, Rudolf Steiner recognized the sincere striving at the basis of this movement and agreed to take on increasingly greater responsibility for the German Section. Marie von Sivers, who would later become his wife, was his most supportive colleague during this time. At a decisive juncture, Steiner broke from the Theosophical Society to found the Anthroposophical Society, through which he would continue the development of modern spiritual science more freely in accord with his original intentions.

This volume covers the period during which Steiner wrote some of his foundational works: Christianity as Mystical Fact (1902); Theosophy (1904); How to Know Higher Worlds (1904); and An Outline of Esoteric Science (1909). Peter Selg also describes the building of the first Goetheanum in Dornach as an artistic embodiment of esoteric wisdom, giving rise to an international working community, as well as the performance of the mystery dramas and Rudolf Steiner's profound Christological lectures known as the Fifth Gospel.

One of the most essential conditions of a book that has grown out of spiritual science is that one assimilates more than its content--that is the very least of it. In addition, in assimilating the book, one in a certain way alters how one thinks and feels and senses things; one progresses in relation to the standards and criteria otherwise used in the ordinary world. The difficulty confronting the understanding of spiritual-scientific works even today is that people read them like other writings and believe they can absorb the content in the same way as in other writings; whereas in fact something in themselves must be transformed if they have understood a true esoteric book really thoroughly. Hence it is understandable that most people in our time reject real esoteric books. -- Rudolf Steiner (Oct. 3, 1914)

Rudolf Steiner, Life and Work, Seven Volumes

Vol. 1. (1861-1890): Childhood, Youth, and Study Years
(ISBN: 9781621480822 Pbk - ISBN: 9781621480839 Hbk)

Vol. 2. (1890-1900): Weimar and Berlin
(ISBN: 9781621480853 Pbk - ISBN: 9781621480860 Hbk)

Vol. 3. (1900-1914): Spiritual Science and Spiritual Community
(ISBN: 9781621480884 Pbk - ISBN: 9781621480891 Hbk)

Vol. 4. (1914-1918): The Years of World War I
(ISBN: 9781621481577 Pbk - ISBN: 9781621481584 Hbk)

Vol. 5. (1919-1922): Social Threefolding and the Waldorf School
(ISBN: 9781621481935 Pbk - ISBN: 9781621481942 Hbk)

Vol. 6. (1923): The Burning of the Goetheanum
(ISBN: 9781621482192 Pbk - ISBN: 9781621482208 Hbk)

Vol. 7. (1924-1925): The Anthroposophical Society and the School for Spiritual Science
(ISBN: 9781621482321 Pbk - ISBN: 9781621482338 Hbk)

From 1933 to 1935, Ita Wegman was confronted by both Nazi fascism and internal crises in the General Anthroposophical Society. During those years, she traveled to Palestine in the fall of 1934 following a grave illness that nearly ended with her death. Her correspondence during this period, as well as her notes on the trip, reveal the great biographical importance to her of these travels and indeed the whole scope of her spiritual experiences in 1934.

Ita Wegman had unambiguous perspectives and a uniquely clear view of both the political threat and her social-spiritual task during this period. There was, however, a radical change in her inner stance toward the opposition, aggression, and defamation she encountered within anthroposophic contexts in reaction to her intense, purely motivated efforts. She tried to live and work in true accord with her inner impulses and, ultimately, with Rudolf Steiner's legacy, especially within the anthroposophic movement. Doing so, she increasingly found her way to her own distinctive and uncompromising path.

The author reveals the general nature of those three years--a period whose distinctive spiritual and Christological task and dramatic dangers Rudolf Steiner had foreseen in 1923: If these men [the Nazis] gain government power, I will no longer be able to set foot on German soil. Ita Wegman's efforts in 1933 to confront the dark powers of National Socialism and the convulsions in Dornach, which she experienced firsthand, as well as her subsequent illness and the clarity of her Christological conversion in 1934 to '35, reveal a very specific, intrinsically comprehensible and forward-looking quality whose spiritual signature is clearly prefigured in Rudolf Steiner's spiritual-scientific predictions.

In this book, Peter Selg focuses exclusively on Ita Wegman, her development, and her words, simply presenting the processes she went through and, implicitly, their extraordinary spiritual nature, without any attempt at interpretation. This focus arises from the governing premise that the mysteries of a great life such as that of Ita Wegman reveal themselves in the details. Tracing the subtle steps in her life allow us deeper insight into Ita Wegman's being. She herself wrote, In general meetings or gatherings, people always understood me poorly because I lacked a smooth way of expressing myself. But people of goodwill always understood what I meant.

This book was originally published in German as Geistiger Widerstand und Überwindung. Ita Wegman 1933-1935 by Verlag am Goetheanum, Dornach, Switzerland, 2005.

As for me, I will claim for myself the freedom always to be in the place that I feel I need to be in my inmost feelings (Ita Wegman, Aug. 26, 1940). Ita Wegman spent the last three years of her life in Tessin, in the Casa Andrea Cristoforo. In this secluded province, largely protected from the destructive events of those years and imbued with certain forces, she developed a great work for the future, gathering, leading, and nurturing people both therapeutically and spiritually, preparing for the war's end with the full intensity of her being.

Her last three years were a period of devotion to Rudolf Steiner and his work, as well as to esoteric Christianity--to the forces of the Archangel Michael and to Christ for the present and future. She continued to take a great interest in the difficulties of her time and never ceased to participate in events--taking in refugee children and the homeless, keeping up extensive correspondences with others, struggling with aid organizations and various agencies, caring daily for the afflicted and for patients and colleagues. On March 4, 1943, Ita Wegman passed into the spiritual worlds, well prepared and with all of the spiritual intentions of a Christian initiate.

This book contributes to documenting the final phase of Ita Wegman's life, focusing on the forces of the future that emerged in her. It draws on her notebooks from her time in Ascona, as well as from her extensive correspondence and memories of those who lived and worked at Casa Andrea Cristoforo. She remained upstanding, free, and positive with an esoteric Christian orientation and felt that she was obligated only to her conscience and to the spiritual world for which Rudolf Steiner stood and that she served.

This book was originally published in German as Die letzten drei Jahre. Ita Wegman in Ascona 1940-1943 (Verlag am Goetheanum, Dornach, Switzerland, 2004).