Anthroposophy: Movement, Society & People

Glossary Collection · 12 Terms

The anthroposophical movement and its people: Rudolf Steiner, the Goetheanum, the Anthroposophical Society, Ita Wegman and Marie Steiner. Part of Thalira's Anthroposophical Glossary of 515 terms, and companion to the in-depth guide Anthroposophy.

Anthroposophy

Anthroposophy is the spiritual science founded by Rudolf Steiner whose path of knowledge would lead the spiritual in the human being to the spiritual in the universe.

Biographical Work

The anthroposophic practice of reading a human life through seven-year developmental phases and karmic patterns, opening biography as a path of self-knowledge.

Friedrich Rittelmeyer

The Lutheran pastor (1872 to 1938) who co-founded The Christian Community with Rudolf Steiner in 1922 and served as its first Erzoberlenker.

General Anthroposophical Society

The open, public membership body Rudolf Steiner refounded at Christmas 1923, seated at the Goetheanum, carrying the School of Spiritual Science and led by the Vorstand.

Ita Wegman

The Dutch physician (1876-1943) who co-founded anthroposophic medicine with Rudolf Steiner and opened the first anthroposophic clinic at Arlesheim in 1921.

Marie Steiner

Marie Steiner-von Sivers (1867-1948) was Rudolf Steiner's closest collaborator and wife, co-creator of eurythmy as a stage art, and the editor who preserved and published his collected works.

Occult Science (Book)

Rudolf Steiner's 1910 six-chapter cosmology, GA 13, mapping the seven planetary conditions from Old Saturn to Future Vulcan and the path of supersensible knowledge.

Rudolf Steiner

Rudolf Steiner (1861-1925) was the Austrian philosopher and founder of anthroposophy whose Philosophy of Freedom (1894) and later spiritual-scientific research seeded Waldorf, biodynamics, anthroposophic medicine, and the Christian Community.

School of Spiritual Science

Steiner's esoteric school, founded at the Goetheanum in 1923 as the inner research and training core of the Anthroposophical Society, structured in three Classes.

The First Class

The 19 mantric lessons Steiner gave in Dornach in 1924, the only realized section of his planned esoteric School of Spiritual Science.

The Goetheanum

The Goetheanum is the Steiner-designed headquarters of Anthroposophy in Dornach, Switzerland, conceived as living organic architecture and home of the School of Spiritual Science and eurythmy.

Theosophy (Book)

Rudolf Steiner's 1904 foundational text (GA 9), which sets out the fourfold and ninefold human being, reincarnation and karma, and the path to supersensible knowledge.