Northernrefugee39, you write:
"Would you like to give a quick resume of anthroposophy, which is the central core of all Steiner education, to the newcomers on this thread?"
No small request! it took me ten years to begin to feel that I started to understand what anthroposophy is. During the ten years, I felt like touching a large elephant in the dark without knowing what it was and be able to identify it.
Then some 28 years ago, I suddenly felt that I got a glimpse of the core of it. I've put a description of this here.
There are many possible perspectives. In my very personal view, I think describing it from (the) four aspects or levels (descibed at the page) approaches a good summary, that many people who in some sense consider themselves to be "anthroposophists" would not disagree with.
What is anthroposophy, a I see it?
- Anthroposophy is a spiritual philosophy, mainly developed by Rudolf Steiner (1861-1925) at the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century. It is born out of a philosophy of freedom, living at the core of anthroposophy.
- It is a path of knowledge or spiritual research, developed on the basis of European idealistic philosophy, rooted in the philosophies of Aristotle, Plato, and Thomas Aquinas. It is primarily defined by its method of research, and secondly by the possible knowledge or experiences this leads to.
From this perspective, anthroposophy can also be called spiritual science. As such, it is an effort to develop not only natural scientific, but also a spiritual scientific research on the basis of the idealistic tradition, in the spirit of the historical strivings, that have led to the development of modern science.
On this basis, anthroposophy strives to bridge the clefts that have developed since the Middle Ages between the sciences, the arts and the religious strivings of man as the three main areas of human culture, and build the foundation for a synthesis of them for the future.
- Anthroposophy also is an impulse to nurture the life of the soul in the individual and in human society, meaning among other things to nurture the respect for and interest in other people on a purely human basis independently of their origin and views.
- It also has possible practical implications and as such lives as applied or practical anthroposophy in various "daughter movements" of anthroposophy.
The most developed of these daughter movements of anthroposophy are biodynamic farming, Waldorf schools anthroposophical curative education and anthroposophical medicine.
When anthroposophy is cultivated on all the four levels it becomes something very living and inspiring beyond what you would expect. When it is cultivated in a more limited sense, which mostly is the case, you only get a glipse of what anthroposophy is at its core.
This is quite short and abstract, but at least an effort to cover all of the basic aspects of anthroposophy - as I understand it - in a way that gives a faint but balanced picture of it, that can then be deepened and developed much further on all four points, with regard to what they actually mean and their sources through human history.