Rudolf Steiner

Anthroposophy and the Enigmas of the Soul Rudolf Steiner

In this extraordinary lecture, hidden within a cycle on education, Rudolf Steiner describes the existential enigmas of the human soul. As we become more conscious, we begin to feel that our representations of the outer world are insubstantial, and this gives rise to unconscious fear. However, anthroposophy teaches us how to gradually overcome this fear by entering into imaginative representation. We slowly become aware of the sculptural forces of growth and metamorphosis that underlie thinking, and our thinking begins to partake of that substantiality. Our lives of volition and feeling also can be experienced in their real natures, which eventually gives us an intuition of the forces of death, which severs the soul from the body as a "last ripple" of will. A cosmic vista opens up, and our souls are given a "mainstay" just when they start to vacillate.