research & reviews he glosses Steiner’s detailed typology of motives and driving forces in two and a half pages. His summaries (in five more short chapters) of Steiner on sense perception, the objective reality of concepts, and their role in thinking are likewise succinct. Thomas provides an excellent discussion of “qualia,” the secondary qualities inhering in sense perception, and finishes with a discussion of what actually is meant by “spiritual activity.” The brevity of Thomas’s book may raise eyebrows among readers who have diligently studied the Philosophy, with its lengthy build-up toward the fundamental insight that thinking itself is a secure, reliable starting point for knowing and Steiner’s point-by-point challenge to Kantian dualism, critical idealism, and other isms in order to demonstrate their epistemological unreliability. Thomas is far less concerned with quashing the opposition. He does briefly respond to objections to human freedom that have been raised by positivists, skeptics, and scientific materialists (who say that feelings are “merely chemical processes in the body”). But more often, his approach is to appeal to common sense and ordinary human experience. Common sense justifies our dismissing science for failing to “embrace inwardness in human experience” and dismissing also any mainstream philosophy that fails the test of relevance to our daily lives: “Surely the richness and problems of our relationships with other people are the most pressing and ‘real’ aspects of our life! No philosophical denial of their reality can remove them; for example, to point out that we do not know what reality is or that all our supposed knowledge is illusion does nothing to alleviate the problems we have to contend with every day.” Thomas is an electrical engineer and former General Secretary of the Anthroposophical Society in Great Britain. He has aimed in his writings and lectures to bridge the gap between conventional and spiritual science (according to the author blurb). Given its title and publisher, this book is not likely to attract mainstream scientists and philosophers. Nor, given its conversational style, will it pass scholarly muster. 50 •
being human
Nevertheless, to open minds, Thomas’s presentation of the case for human freedom is cogent, convincing, and inspiring. It would be wonderful if the book reached an audience of non-anthroposophical general readers. It would be accessible and excellent reading for teenagers. Best of all, for anthroposophists it suggests an effective way of speaking (to non-anthroposophists or even to each other) about the relevance for our troubled times of Steiner’s views on of love, freedom, and the meaning of life.
Anthroposophy in the Light of Goethe’s Faust By Rudolf Steiner, Collected Works volume 272; SteinerBooks 2014, 444 pages
Review by Herbert O. Hagens This long-awaited publication in English of Rudolf Steiner’s lectures on Goethe’s Faust (CW 272) is most welcome. We are deeply grateful to Burley Channer for his highly readable translation from the German and to Frederick Amrine for his scholarly introduction, commentary, and extensive footnotes. The colorful front cover displays a detail from the ceiling painting of the First Goetheanum, depicting Faust contemplating the letters ICH (German for “I”, “ego”). Actually we may well consider this volume to be an “upgrade” of the German edition: English readers are treated to an additional ten short essays and three lectures that are not contained in GA 272. A chronology of all the texts (ranging in date from 1880 to 1916) provides a much needed and very useful orientation. Most of the lectures took place in Dornach in 1915 and 1916. The talks were held in the carpentry workshop (Schreinerei) in conjunction with performances of select scenes from both Faust I and Faust II. The audience consisted of many people from various countries who were actively engaged in the construction of the First Goetheanum. During all this time the battles of World War I were raging just to the north of the Swiss border. Let us take a look at a passage from the lecture given on September 9, 1916, entitled “Goethe’s Insights into the