What follows was Steiner's conclusion from the first 30 years of his life. These fundamental conceptions developed into The Philosophy of Freedom. The key to Steiner's freedom philosophy is pure thinking (sense free thinking). As this is so critical more work should go into discussing sense free thinking. There is so much work that needs to be done around POF. What is needed is a Philosophy of Freedom Institute or something. Not necessarily scholars but of people who will do archival or introspective work.

The sense of my conception at that time was as follows:

While man is evolving from birth onward he stands consciously facing the world. He attains first to physical perception.

But this is at first an outpost of knowledge. In this perception there is not at once revealed all that is in the world. The world is real, but man does not at first attain to this reality. It remains at first closed to him.

While he has not yet set his own being over against the world, he fashions for himself a world-conception which is void of being.

This conception of the world is really an illusion. In sense-perception man faces a world of illusion.

But when from within man sense-free thought comes forth to meet the sense-perception, then illusion is permeated with reality and ceases to be illusion.

Then the human spirit, living its own life within, meets the spirit of the world which is now no longer concealed from man behind the sense-world, but weaves and breathes within the sense-world.

I now saw that the finding of the spirit within the sense-world is not a question of logical inferences or of projection of sense perception, but something which comes to pass when man continues his evolution from perception to the experience of sense-free thinking.

In a secondary degree I was then concerned to find expression for the idea of freedom.

When man acts upon his instincts, impulses, passions, etc., he is not free. Then impulses of which he becomes conscious as he does of the impressions from the sense-world determine his action.

But his true being is then not acting. He is then acting on a plane where his true being has not yet manifested itself. He then discloses himself as man just as little as the sense-world discloses its being to mere sense-observation.

Now, the sense-world is not really an illusion, but is only made such by man.

But man in his action can permit the sense-like impulses, desires, etc., really to become illusions; then he permits illusions to act upon him; it is not he himself that acts. He permits the unspiritual to act.

His spiritual being acts only when he finds the impulses for action in the moral intuitions of his sense-free thought.

Then he alone acts, nothing else. Then he is a free being acting from within.

I desired to show that whoever rejects sense-free thought as something purely spiritual in man can never grasp the conception of freedom; but that such a conception comes about the moment one understands the reality of sense-free thinking.

The Story Of My Life, Chapter 10, by Rudolf Steiner

I found this school tour material at openwaldorf.com. Is the body of work found in anthroposophy the core of Waldorf education? Is anthroposophy a religion based upon "faith" in anthroposophy? Several Steiner lectures relate to child education. But the core philosophy of Waldorf and all of Steiner's work is The Philosophy of Freedom. Why not make the freedom philosophy the main topic at parents night and school tours? Isn't this the best public introduction? But most Waldorf educators would likely have trouble with this topic as not much support material is available. I would like to assemble some of the core principles of Steiner's philosophy to give Waldorf educators more to work with in talking with the public about the core principles of Waldorf education. Videos could also be produced relating Steiner's freedom philosophy to Waldorf education.

1. What are the core teachings of Anthroposophy?
2. Does this world view have unique implications for educating children? How does Anthoposophy's world view inform Waldorf education? Does the work at this school reflect Rudolf Steiner's world view?
3. Can you assure me that the faculty at the school are committed to applying the core teachings of Steiner's philosophy here at Waldorf?
4. Are reincarnation and karma core teachings of Steiner's Anthroposophy? Where is this discussed in the school literature? What are some other core teachings of Anthroposophy?
5. Are Lucifer and Ahriman core teachings of Anthroposophy? Where is this discussed in the school literature?
6. What is the difference between Anthroposophy and "Spiritual Science"
7. Did Steiner suggest that there are certain ways that children need to be taught in order to be better prepared for reincarnation? Where would an Anthroposophist send their child to school for this preparation?
8. Are there times that you might be concerned about spiritual aspects of my child, but not discuss the complete nature of your concern with me?
9. Is it OK to talk to my child about world religions? Christianity? Judaism? Islam? Buddhism? Is it OK to talk to my child about Anthroposophy?
10. Is it OK to talk to my child about Jesus? Is it OK to talk to my child about George Washington? Is it OK to talk to my child about Rudolf Steiner?
11. Is it OK if our family does not believe in reincarnation and karma?
12. Is it OK if our family does not believe in Lucifer and Ahriman?
13. Is it OK if our family does not believe in anthroposophy?

The Office for Standards in Education, Children's Services and Skills (Ofsted) is the non-ministerial government department of Her Majesty's Chief Inspector of Schools In England. They inspect and regulate to achieve excellence in the care of children and young people, and in education and skills for learners of all ages.

Social learning schools threatened by Ofsted, say critics

Schools offering alternative forms of education are under threat from a one-size-fits-all inspection regime, it was claimed yesterday. Steiner schools which prioritise children's social as well as academic development are falling foul of inspectors who are concerned more with exam results than children's happiness, campaigners say. The allegation, from a leading proponent of Steiner schools, is contained in a book published yesterday by the right-leaning thinktank Civitas. The book argues that cuts to Ofsted's budget and shorter inspections have meant they are increasingly reliant on exam results rather than rigorous inspections in their judgments of schools. Research in the report suggests that Ofsted school ratings can be predicted by their test scores in almost all cases.

In one chapter of the book, Kevin Avison of the Waldorf Steiner Schools Fellowship, writes: "Our distinctive approach poses problems for an inspectorate directed by public policy towards 'rigorous' standardisation and blandishments of fickle fashions and assumed 'best practice'. "The education of children will not be better served by stony-faced expediency or by politically correct schools. Ofsted needs greater independence and inspectors need to become bold enough to state what they find on every level of experience, because growing and learning is not limited to tick-boxes."

He says Steiner schools are only independent because they can't work on a wide basis within the state national curriculum, adding: "The piling up of government initiative upon initiative and continual tampering with the inspection system is an ever-present threat to the distinctiveness of all independent schools."
By Polly Curtis, guardian.co.uk © Guardian News and Media Limited 2008, Nov. 17, 2008

The matters discussed by anthroposophical spiritual science are not drawn out of some blue haze of mysticism, rather the way to reach this particular knowledge can be indicated step by step. It is in no sense an outer way. It is inward in its entire journey, but it is such that it leads to the perception of a truly objective yet supersensible reality. And in that we raise ourselves in this way to real intuitive knowledge, we first obtain a true insight into what is in fact our own thinking, our ideation, that we employ in ordinary life, with which we mix our sense-perceptions. One reaches to full, complete reality when to a certain extent one can create an idea for oneself, an empirical idea, in the way I have attempted to describe in my book The Philosophy of Freedom. There I have tried to make known that pure thinking, that very thinking that can live in us before we have fully united the thinking with some outer perception. I have shown that this pure thinking itself can be perceived as an inner soul content.

For this spiritual science works through the will, so that it can reach up to what I have described in my Philosophy of Freedom as moral intuition. And its power streams into human life as the moral ideal. The moral intuitions are gradually permeated with what indeed is love, so that we can become men who act freely out of love springing from our individuality. more...

For more on why the archive was temporarily off line read Breaking: Serious Damage To Rudolf Steiner Archive Server

I came across this blog post by an anthroposophy skeptic tonight: --I may take a thousand looks, it is still just the same old bs fed by anthroposophists and other pseudo-scientists. There is no scientific verification. That’s it.-- Well, I don't think "That's it".

I have been pondering about how to do some sort of verification project for POF. On the title page of The Philosophy of Freedom it reads: Some results of introspective observation following the methods of Natural Science or as Rita Stebbing puts it; The result of observing the human soul as natural science observes nature. From my own experience I know many people can verify much of the book if the described inner observations are clear and looked for. As part of the POF study course I could list the basic observations in each chapter and then collect data for the number of readers who say they can verify specific observations from the list. This research certainly wouldn't pass the rigors of science but it could be a helpful study project and would count for verification at some level.

Concerning Anthroposophical Research: An edited Interview With Dr. Michaela Glöckler (from Die DREI, Stuttgart, July/ August, 1998, page 116)

Where do you see the unsolved problems in anthroposophical research, and how about the verification of the research results?
I see unsolved problems in anthroposophical research in all fields. We have to create the social conditions for the above, which means to awaken and stimulate the insight, that such is necessary. A next step could be to create a global network for funding of research, so that the specific people who are doing the practical work and know the questions, arising from real life, through their own experience, are enable to do research on these. There are several ways in which the verifiability of these research results will be achieved: Either through developed evaluation methods, through observation of their consistency and fruitfulness in life; or, when it comes to pure spiritual science, it can happen through a conversation with others, who started from completely different points and have come to the same results.

Are you able to name three central present day problems, where anthroposophists should and could contribute more essentially to the solution than they presently do?
A top priority for me seems to be inner training and the question of self-development. I regret that we aren’t able enough yet to present the anthroposophical inner training more visibly in its fruitfulness and, in the social field, live it as an example. Here I see the biggest task for us all.

Steiner in his wisdom, wrote many books and articles, he gave many lectures covering a huge array of diverse content in many different contexts. This legacy or more accurately, this work is in actuality a tremendous multifaceted map. But it is not the territory. The Philosophy of Freedom, while a fundamental part of that map, is still only one part or facet. The practice of spiritual science/anthroposophy is the constructing of the bridge to the territory.

To reframe spiritual science/anthroposophy into a philosophy or map would be a regressive move, as the corporate/scientific alliance are now in the process of finalizing their colonization of popular culture and most of so called high culture (which has already occurred in the universities). Spiritual science/anthroposophy will be/is eaten alive in this environment. All they will leave intact is a corrupted map, without the possibility to create the bridge the map should signify.

I understand that the progressive frame for spiritual science/anthroposophy would be/is living art. Art is the creative bridge from map to territory. Art is the spear and the Goethean phenomenological methodology is at the tip of this spear. This spear is still taking shape at the periphery and will land in the centre in the future.

At this time, not every Tom, Dick or Ozodi will meet kindly with spiritual science/anthroposophy. This is symptomatic of the current social/political or unreasonable environment and cannot be helped as many individuals are descending with/bringing down the culture around them.

How to cultivate/create maps as seeds that grow to be possible bridges to freedom is the fundamental question?
This is the essence of Steiner's work. If you cannot recognize this when you encounter anthroposophy in practice then you will be disappointed by your own unfree expectations. Being open minded and curious/interested is the key.

Finding freedom in the act of being free, is where it's at.
In other words have courage! Have hope! Have Faith! In your own future!

What could be more reasonable?

Svetlana