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FREDERICK BORSCH
Congratulations on the website! I find it all very interesting. While
there are varied ways of attending to and appreciating the messages of the
Bible, the profound understandings and deep insights of Spiritual Science
Bible Studies are well worth any person's study and further learning.
Frederick Borsch
Professor of Anglican Studies at the Lutheran
Theological Seminar at Philadelphia
Episcopal Bishop of Los Angeles (Retired)
ROBERT McDERMOTT
The Christ lived in the Palestine of the first century but was not limited to it. The history of language of that period are helpful
criteria for understanding the meaning of certain statements and
events, but they do not help us to know what to believe about these
statements or events. What was the spiritual reality behind each
statement and image? What was the spiritual world revealing and how
was it both the result of earlier events and intended to make
possible certain future events? This is the kind of knowledge that
is not well studied by social science but was superbly exemplified by
the evangelists and by Rudolf Steiner.
From introduction to According to Luke, 2001, by Rudolf Steiner
LUDWIG BERGER
There was another name besides that of Emil Bock, an all-important
name, the foremost: Rudolf Steiner. His biblical research and
exegesis aroused in me a love that had all but died. It is to him
that I owe it that, since those wartime nights, Nathaniel the
Israelite, Nicodemus, who came by night and Lazarus, whom the Lord
loved, became real to me, and that finally I was able to understand
by the seven daughters of Jethro something that gave the tales of
these encounters a sense that was credible. While the bombs burst
outside, within myself a hymn of reverence arose. In our youth Johann
Sebastian Bach gave us the Gospels, long before we could grasp what
it was that we loved. During those nights, Rudolf Steiner opened the
Bible to me once more.
Christ's deed continues to transform human nature and the cosmos, as
it were turning these inside-out--so that for human beings today the
once-transcendent God is no longer beyond, but within a
non-exteriorized divine-human interaction, more intimate than our
jugular vein. Christ's actual presence--and thereby the presence of
the Mystery of Golgotha--continues to work in Earth, Cosmos, and human nature.
Through the pouring forth of blood and water on the Cross, Christ
became the Spirit of the Earth, the Earth herself Christ's universal
body, the future Sun of the cosmos.
From introduction to The Christian Mystery, 1998, by Rudolf Steiner
A. P. SHEPHERD
The one answer that could resolve the present-day confusion of
humanity would have to be a scientific exposition of the universe and
of man that would do justice to the instinctive trust of man in the
unquestioned value of the individual personality and would see
religion as complementary to this conception, not by denying the
supernatural claims of religion but by giving them their place in the
scientific order of the universe. To most scientists it
seemed impossible that such an answer could be found, and many
religious thinkers considered the attempt presumptuous.
The fact is that such an answer has been provided by a man whose
thinking is to a great extent scientifically grounded, who thought,
spoke, and wrote in all respects as a scientist. This man was Rudolf
Steiner.
A Scientist of the Invisible, 1954
BRUNO WALTER
In old age I have had the good fortune to be initiated into the world
of anthroposophy and during the past few years to make a profound
study of the teachings of Rudolf Steiner. Here we see alive and in
operation that deliverance of which Holderlin speaks; its blessing
has flowed over me, and so this book is the confession of belief in
anthroposophy. There is no part of I my inward life that has not had
new light shed upon it, or been stimulated, by the lofty teachings of
Rudolf Steiner ... I am profoundly grateful for having been so
boundlessly enriched ... It is glorious to become a learner again at
my time of life. I have a sense of the rejuvenation of my whole being
which gives strength and renewal to my musicianship, even to my
music-making.
Of Music and Music Making, 1957
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CHRISTIAN MORGENSTERN
When it falls to the lot of his first biographer to recount the life
of this great man, then, and only then, will the full extent of
Rudolf Steiner's achievements and their, in the highest human sense,
creative nature be revealed. Then men will view with profound
amazement what is happening and what has happened to humanity, and
what irreplaceable strength and support it has received from this
man's mind while this age hurtles onwards into the terrifying
wasteland of materialism.
SELMA LAGERLOF
This man [Rudolf Steiner] is a striking phenomenon, which we should
endeavor to take seriously. He proclaims some doctrines in which I
have long believed; one such doctrine is that it is not for our age
to offer a religion which is full of unsubstantiated miracles: rather
should religion be a science, susceptible of proof; it is no longer a
question of believing, but of knowing. A further doctrine is that it
is possible to attain to knowledge of the spiritual world by firm,
conscious, systematic thought. A man should not sit like a mystic
wrapped in dreams, but should exert his intellectual powers to the
full in the endeavor to see the world that is hidden from us. This is
true and just: and then everything about him carries conviction, and
he is wise, without a hint of the charlatan. In years to come, this
doctrine will be proclaimed from the pulpits.
CHRISTOPHER BAMFORD
Christ's being, person, and sacrificial activity of love--three
descriptions, a single reality--lie at the heart of anthroposophy and
at the center of Rudolf Steiner's life's work.
As for all Christians, the Christ experienced by Rudolf Steiner is
the universal way to unity with the ground of all being, called the
"Father"--a way made possible by the Holy Spirit, the universal
teacher and comforter, who reveals the "open secret" of the
communion of all with all.
For Steiner, however, the incarnation of this Being (His birth,
death, descent into the earth, resurrection, and ascension) is more
than the redemptive turning-point in humanity's relation to God.
Enormous though that is, and hardly to be conceived of, the meaning
of Christ's passage through our human Earth is greater still, and
marks a watershed not just in the life of human beings and the
earth, but also in the life of the gods, and--dare one say it?--even
in the Divine Life itself.
At the same time, the Mystery of Golgotha (as Steiner referred to
it), though certainly historical and singular, is also a continuing
event.
We are of the Same Stuff as Dreams are Made of: Sum of My Life, 1953
RUSSEL W. DAVENPORT
If man's faith could be regenerated, the palpable disintegration of
western civilization could be halted. But this 'if raises some
fundamental questions. The first question is, why men have lost their
faith? And, supposing this question to be answered: how could such a
faith be created?
This second question gives me cause to render thanks to two masters
who so closely
resemble each other in their thinking that they may be considered as
one. The first is
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832) and the second his most
distinguished interpreter, Rudolf Steiner (1861-1925). It may seem a
matter for surprise that in making this acknowledgment of an
exceptional spiritual debt I should link these two names, for Goethe
is renowned above all as a poet and writer, and Steiner is regarded
as a mystic whose work appears to be incomprehensible and quite out
of touch with our age. But anyone who is familiar with the writings
of these two men will understand why we feel ourselves to be
particularly indebted to them.
One of the intellectual curiosities of the 20th century is that the
academic world has seen fit to consider that Steiner's works have no
foundation and are of no significance. But whoever takes it upon
himself to study his voluminous works (at least a hundred
publications) with an open mind will find himself in the presence of
one of the greatest thinkers of all time, whose mastery of modern
sciences is as wonderful as is his knowledge of the sciences of
antiquity. Steiner is no more a mystic than Albert Einstein; he was
first and foremost a scientist, but a scientist who had the daring to
penetrate the mysteries of life.
The linking of Goethe with Steiner brings us back to the question: by
what means can faith be revived in the 20th century? Rudolf Steiner's
answer is: faith can only be brought back into our lives again
through progress in the field of knowledge.
The Dignity of Man, 1955
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