The results of my anthroposophical work are, first, the books available
to the general public; secondly, a great number of lecture-courses,
originally regarded as private publications and sold only to the members
of the Anthroposophical Society. The courses consist of more-or-less
accurate notes taken at my lectures, which for lack of time I have not
been able to correct. I would have preferred the spoken word to remain
the spoken word, but the members wished to have the courses printed for
private circulation. Thus they came into existence. Had I been able to
correct them, the restriction for members only would have
been unnecessary from the beginning. As it is, the restriction was dropped
more than a year ago.
In my autobiography it is especially necessary to say a word about how
my books for the general public on the one hand and the privately printed
courses on the other belong within what I have elaborated as
anthroposophy.
Someone who wishes to trace my inner struggle and effort to present
anthroposophy in a way that is suitable for present-day consciousness
must do so through the writings published for general distribution. In
these I define my position in relation to the philosophical striving of the
present. They contain what to my spiritual sight became ever more
clearly defined, the edifice of anthroposophy certainly incomplete in
many ways.
Another requirement arose, however, different from that of elaborating
anthroposophy and devoting myself solely to problems connected with
imparting facts directly from the spiritual world to the general cultural
life of today: the requirement of meeting fully the inner need and the
spiritual longing of the members.
Especially strong were the requests to have light thrown by
anthroposophy upon the Gospels and the Bible in general. The members
wished to have courses of lectures on these revelations bestowed upon
humanity.
In meeting this need through private lecture courses, another factor
arose: at these lectures only members were present. They were familiar
with the basic content of anthroposophy. I could address them as people
advanced in anthroposophical knowledge. The approach I adopted in
these lectures was not at all suitable for the written works intended
primarily for the general public.
In these private circles I could formulate what I had to say in a way I
should have been obliged to modify had it been planned initially for the
general public.
Thus the public and the private publications are in fact two quite
different things, built upon different foundations. The public writings are
the direct result of my inner struggles and labors, whereas the privately
printed material includes the inner struggle and labor of the members. I
listened to the inner needs of the members, and my living experience of
this determined the form of the lectures.
However, nothing was ever said that was not solely the result of my
direct experience of the growing content of anthroposophy. There was
never any question of concessions to the prejudices or the preferences of
the members. Whoever reads these privately printed lectures can take
them to represent anthroposophy in the fullest sense. Thus it was possible
without hesitation when the complaints in this direction became too
persistent to depart from the custom of circulating this material only
among members. It must be borne in mind, however, that faulty passages
occur in these lecture-reports not revised by me.
The right to judge such private material can, of course, be conceded
only to someone who has the prerequisite basis for such judgment, and
regarding most of this material this would mean at least knowledge of
the human being and of the cosmos in so far as these have been presented in
the light of anthroposophy, and also knowledge of what exists as
anthroposophical history in what has been imparted from the spiritual
world.
Extract from
Rudolf Steiner, An Autobiography,
Chapter 35,
pp. 386-388, Second Edition, 1980, Steinerbooks, New York.