The Rudolf Steiner Archive

How to Apply the Guiding Principles

[ 1 ] The guiding principles issued by the Goetheanum are intended to inspire members who wish to be active to organize the content of anthroposophical work in a uniform manner. If one approaches these sentences each week, one will find that they provide guidance for delving deeper into the existing material of the cycles and presenting it in a certain order at the branch meetings.

[ 2 ] It would certainly be desirable if the lectures given in Dornach could be immediately distributed to all the branches every week. However, one should also consider the complicated technical equipment that would be necessary for this. The Executive Council at the Goetheanum is certainly striving to do everything possible in this direction and will continue to do so. But we have to reckon with the possibilities available. The intentions expressed at the Christmas Conference will be realized. But we need time.

[ 3 ] For the time being, those branches have an advantage which have members who visit the Goetheanum, as they can listen to the lectures and present their content at the branch meetings. And the branches should recognize that sending such members to the Goetheanum is a blessing. But one should not underestimate the work that has already been done in the Anthroposophical Society and that is available in the printed cycles and lectures. Anyone who undertakes these cycles, remembers from the titles what material is contained in this or that one, and then approaches the guiding principles will find that in one cycle they find one thing and in another another, which further elaborates on the guiding principle. By reading together what is written separately in the individual cycles, the points of view can be found from which the guiding principles can be discussed.

[ 4 ] We appear to be quite wasteful in the Anthroposophical Society if we leave the printed cycles completely unused and always want to “receive the latest from the Goetheanum.” It is easy to understand that gradually every opportunity to print the cycles had to cease if they were not used extensively.

[ 5 ] There is another point of view to consider. When disseminating the content of anthroposophy, conscientiousness and a sense of responsibility are of the utmost importance. What is said about the spiritual world must be presented in such a way that the images of spiritual facts and beings that are given are not subject to misunderstanding. Those who hear a lecture at the Goetheanum can gain a direct impression. When they reproduce its content, this impression can linger with them, and they are able to formulate things in such a way that they can be understood correctly. But if a second or third person becomes the mediator, the likelihood of inaccuracies creeping in becomes greater and greater. All these things should be considered.

[ 6 ] And another point of view is probably the most important one. It is not a matter of listening to or reading the anthroposophical content only externally, but of taking it into the living soul. There is something essential in thinking and feeling further on what has been absorbed. But this should be stimulated by the guiding principles in relation to the already existing printed cycles. If this point of view is not taken sufficiently into account, there will be a continuing failure to reveal the essence of anthroposophy through the Anthroposophical Society. People say, with apparent justification: What good is it to me to hear so much about spiritual worlds if I cannot see into such worlds myself? They do not take into account that this insight is promoted when the anthroposophical content is processed in the way suggested here. The lectures at the Goetheanum are given in such a way that their content can continue to live and work freely in the minds of the listeners. And so it is with the content of the cycles. There is no dead material for mere external communication; there is material that, when viewed from different perspectives, stimulates the vision of spiritual worlds. One should not believe: I listen to the content of the lectures; I acquire knowledge of the spiritual world through meditation. This will never lead to true progress. Both must work together in the soul. And thinking and feeling through the anthroposophical content is also a soul exercise. One lives one's way into the spiritual world by looking at it, if one proceeds with this content as described here.

[ 7 ] The Anthroposophical Society pays far too little attention to the fact that anthroposophy should not be a gray theory, but true life. True life is its essence; and if it is turned into a gray theory, then it is often not a better theory than others, but a worse one. But it only becomes theory when one makes it so, when one kills it. It is still far too little recognized that anthroposophy is not just a different worldview from others, but that it must also be received differently. One only recognizes and experiences its essence in this different way of receiving it.

[ 8 ] The Goetheanum should be regarded as the necessary center of anthroposophical work and activity; but one should not lose sight of the fact that the anthroposophical material that has been developed should also be put to good use in the branches. What is accomplished at the Goetheanum can gradually be experienced in its full, living sense by the entire anthroposophical society if as many members as possible approach the Goetheanum itself from the life of the branches and participate in its living work as much as they can. But all this must be shaped with inner life; it will not work by merely “communicating” the content of each week externally. The Executive Council at the Goetheanum will need time and will have to find understanding among the members. Then it will be able to work in the spirit of the Christmas Conference.

Further guiding principles sent out by the Anthroposophical Society from the Goetheanum

[ 9 ] 76. If one wants to evoke a mental image of the first hierarchy (Seraphim, Cherubim, and Thrones), one will have to seek to create images in which the spiritual (only visible supersensibly) reveals itself in the forms that appear in the sensory world. The spiritual in sensory imagery must be the content of thoughts about the first hierarchy.

[ 10 ] 77. If one wants to evoke a mental image of the second hierarchy (Kyriotetes, Dynameis, Exusiai), one must seek to create images in which the spiritual is revealed not in forms perceptible to the senses, but in a purely spiritual way. The content of thoughts about the second hierarchy must be spiritual in non-sensory, but purely spiritual imagery.

[ 11 ] 78. If one wants to evoke a mental image of the third hierarchy (Archai, Archangeloi, Angeloi), one will have to seek to create images in which the spiritual is revealed not in sensory forms, but also not in a purely spiritual way, but rather as thinking, feeling, and willing manifest themselves in the human soul. Spirituality in soulful imagery must be the content of thoughts about the third hierarchy.

(Continued in the next issue.)