Abstract:
In this article, I attempt to interpret the concept of illnesses outlined in the 12th lecture of the Course on Education for Special Needs and the associated tendencies toward the animal realm from a pedagogical perspective and to examine their applicability to working with students who require assistance, in particular students who show a strong identification with specific animals.
The ‹map of illnesses› and its associated concept of illness
Before Rudolf Steiner addressed the notion of illness in the 12th lecture, he suggested that a kind of map of human illnesses could be created – on one side, those illnesses that are «related» to each other, and on the other, those that are fatal (Steiner, GA 317. 2024, p. 201). This suggestion is linked to a spiritual understanding of illness that forms one of the foundations of the Course on Education for Special Needs.(1) This concept describes how, during the incarnation process before conception and birth, the soul-spiritual aspect of the human being strives toward the earth through the sphere of the fixed stars and planets, absorbing from the cosmos those impulses that will later bring about the bodily constitution. This process is expressed on the etheric level through physiological processes in the human body (Steiner GA 204, 1989, pp. 66-69 and 78f.). The discussion of the sisters Martha and Elisabeth in the 10th and 11th lectures of the Course on Education for Special Needs goes beyond this astrosophical aspect by adding a consideration of the etheric geography of the place of conception and birth as well as hereditary factors (cf. GA 317, p. 188 and Thewless, 2024, pp. 343-52). This appears to imply that these aspects yield criteria that could support the creation of a ‹map of illnesses›. However, it is not possible to further develop such a map in this article. Instead, I will concentrate on the pedagogical aspects of the tendencies toward the animal world that are associated with this concept of illness.
Relationships between humans and animals
In connection with his remarks in the 12th lecture, Rudolf Steiner pointed out that each individual illness could be connected to a specific animal species. In doing so, he referred to the philosopher Hegel (1770-1831). Hegel postulated that illnesses occur when individual organs or organ systems become disconnected from the integrated overall organization of the body due to a disharmonious interaction of physiological processes. In the process, the dysfunctional system within the organism becomes ‹alien› to the being of the person affected. Hegel described such alienated organic processes as a slipping into functional states that are related to aspects of animal-like processes (Hegel 1986, p. 520f. and 534).
An indication of how the relationship between illnesses and animal species can be understood can be found in Foundations of Human Experience. In the fourth lecture, Rudolf Steiner referred to the lowest level of volition – the instincts. These are anchored in the physical body and live both in our reflexes, which are either innate or acquired, and in the bodily functions that we only consciously perceive when they occur irregularly. The relationship to the animal world arises from the following:
«If we were to consider and record the main forms of individual animals, we would be able to draw the different areas of instinct. What instinct is as a form of will, appears as an image in the form of the physical bodies of the various animals. (…) We survey the forms of the physical animal bodies and see in them a drawing which nature itself creates, of the instincts through which it wants to realize what lives in existence.» (Steiner 2010, GA 293, p. 58f.).
If humans are able to control their instincts, both at the level of conscious awareness and subconsciously, e.g., by controlling their bodily functions through the higher members of their being, then they act within their own sphere of being. Humans become ill when they lose this control and a process falls into the instinctive realm represented by an animal species. The instinctive nature of an animal is not determined by its individuality, but is related to its the nature of its species on the one hand and to its environment on the other (Steiner GA 312, 1999, p. 329ff.).
In the following, I would like to refer to observations in connection with two students who showed a strong fascination for certain animals – to such an extent that they identified with them not only in their imagination, but also in the form of their movements, and were also highly restricted by this fixation. In the experience of these children, a kind of existential depth of their connection with the animal imaginations they named and ‹embodied› could be felt.
Identification with animal qualities
Many children identify with an animal species in their imagination. For example, they want to be as strong as a lion or as powerful as an elephant. They slip into the role of these animals and enjoy making an impression on those around them. This identification and transformation is reflected in the fairy tales and fables that are taught in the first two grades at Waldorf schools. They focus on the role of animals as siblings of humans, but also as carriers of characteristics that need to be overcome and transformed. In animal and human studies (fourth grade), this impulse is taken up again as a diversified threefold structure visible in the animal kingdom which is integrated in human beings. This theme is pursued further in a variety of ways in the following grades.
However, grasping these impulses requires an imagination appropriate to the age of the child. The following two reports show that these prerequisites first had to be created in the two students discussed in order to dissolve identification with an animal species or genus demonstrated by them.
Sandroe’s self-perception as a lion
In the sixth and seventh lectures of the Course on Education for Special Needs, the then nine-year-old Sandroe was introduced (Steiner GA 317, 2024, pp. 103 and 106). At that time, it was noted that the boy’s physical body was too hardened to allow the astral body and the ego organization to pass through it in a regular manner. This resulted in both health and cognitive impairments. Due to the limited resonance between his head pole and his metabolic limb pole, Sandroe was unable to process external sensory impressions into memories, among other things. As a result, he lacked the basic foundations for communicating with his social environment. For example, when Rudolf Steiner asked him why he would not close his mouth, Sandroe replied that his mouth was a device for catching flies. On the one hand, this was a clever response, but on the other hand, it was not fully anchored in his own bodily reality. In addition, Sandroe had a constitution described as «iron-rich.» This was characterized by a tendency toward stereotypical behavior. Sandroe was unable to control his fine motor skills according to his own intentions because he fixated on isolated impressions and was unable to grasp a sequence of actions (Grimm 2018, pp. 6-17).
Due to the impenetrability of his physical body, then, Sandroe’s astral body deviated beyond the boundaries of his body and became perceptible to the boy in the gestalt of a lion. This perception so completely took over the boy’s imagination and will that he stereotypically asserted that he was a lion and behaved accordingly. For example, he crawled on all fours across the floor and roared like a lion (Uhlenhoff 2007, pp. 107-115).
The pedagogical concept
If it had been merely a stereotype in the boy’s imagination, it would have been possible to talk him out of his fixation. However, since it was an identification at the levels of imagination, will, and feeling, Rudolf Steiner recommended an action-based pedagogical approach:
Sandroe was taught to knit. This taught him to control his own movements according to his intentions and, at least for the duration of the process, to break away from his stereotype. This activity also enabled him to experience his own self-efficacy. Sandroe’s teacher, Gerda Langen, likely used rhyming verses to support his attention, which accompanied the individual movements and at the same time linked them together. Sandro’s sensory and imaginative life was thus directed toward his own body and no longer toward its periphery. Over the following years, Gerda Langen introduced him to an imaginative activity that processed sensory impressions into memories and ultimately into concepts.
In doing so, she incorporated Sandroe’s identification with a lion into the images to which she directed his attention. For example, when drawing shapes, she imagined the ‹crooked› line as a jet of water quenching a lion’s thirst. This removed the lion-like quality from Sandroe’s periphery and transformed it into an object of his reflective perception and imagination.
Memories, such as the content of the narrative part, were recreated through role-playing. This enabled Sandroe to identify with the respective character he was embodying and broke his fixation on the lion identity. Through roleplaying, Sandroe was also able to remember the conveyed impulses of will, feelings, and ideas as vivid images and identify with them. Based on this, Gerda Langen transformed these memories into riddles. This motivated Sandroe to transfer his ideas into a different context and form them into richer concepts (Hallen 2018, pp. 18-33).
These impulses led, on the one hand, to perceptions of his own astral body in the gestalt of a lion. On the other hand, Sandroe was able to develop a self-directed life of imagination, feeling, and will.
Bruno’s self-perception as a reptile
Bruno attended a Waldorf school for children with intellectual disabilities. He showed physical and cognitive developmental delays. After starting school, he was diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder.
Bruno perceived himself as a reptile, mainly a dinosaur. Although he was already able to move skillfully and climb trees in his parents’ garden in his first year of school, he preferred to crawl on all fours. His movements were angular and lizard-like. Whoever spoke to him, it did not affect him. Communication was limited to one-word sentences with which Bruno expressed his needs. If asked, for example, who he was, he replied ‹Dino.› At home, he had a considerable collection of plastic dinosaurs that completely captured his imagination.
Bruno’s teachers came to the conclusion that even dinosaurs could learn to knit. Bruno agreed to give it a try for their sake. However, he continued to think of his hands as lizard front paws. He found it both surprising and gratifying that they could produce something so impressive, especially since Bruno’s parents were delighted with his creations.
Bruno also encountered the other children in his class like a lizard – observing them from a distance in a frozen stance and then fleeing when someone wanted to play with him, for example. So the teachers told stories in which lizards played with each other. Bruno transferred these stories to his social behavior. He accepted his teachers’ suggestions to play with other children and, after six months, took the initiative himself to make social contacts. The resulting play activities naturally focused on lizards and dinosaurs. Nevertheless, Bruno was delighted when, towards the end of his first school year, he managed to successfully copy the beautiful board inscriptions into his main lesson book. He had been told that he was in a school where even dinosaurs could learn cultural skills.
At the age of nine, Bruno began to take an interest in books – but only those featuring lizards and dinosaurs. By studying these books, Bruno eliminated the lizard identity from his self-perception within a few weeks. He stopped moving around on all fours. He also stopped referring to himself as a lizard or dinosaur. The only remnant of his ‹lizardhood› to this day is the habit of curling his right hand slightly and hissing like a lizard whenever he greets someone.
After Bruno had transformed his lizard identity into a keen interest in reptiles, he broadened his horizons to include the world of insects. Numerous little plays, which were designed to be part of the cultural techniques and narrative material of the main lessons, helped Bruno to integrate into the class community as a fellow student. From eighth grade onwards, he was friends with a girl in his class for several years.
Today, Bruno works in a workshop for people with support needs. He continues to be interested in lizards and dinosaurs, as well as insects and reptiles of all kinds. In his free time, he likes to sit on the side of the road and watch everything that crawls and flies.
Conclusion
In both Sandroe’s and Bruno’s cases, the educational work aimed to redirect their identification with the respective animal species or genus into a regulated activity of perception – by promoting self-awareness, among other things with the help of manual and artistic activities. In this respect, experiencing the activity of one’s own limbs was of central pedagogical importance. The path to self-awareness as a human being naturally ran through an emotional connection to the educators. In this context, parables and allegories, as well as their theatrical representation, served as a means of helping the child to detach themselves from their strong attachment to ideas.
Meditationrecommendations
In contrast to the images and ideas that come from the children themselves, it is not uncommon to observe a tendency in the environment to make attributions that arise involuntarily and draw parallels or similarities to animal behavior. In this context, and also in general when dealing with unconscious tendencies in imagination and action on the part of educators, Rudolf Steiner pointed to the importance of meditation in general and to specific meditations. In his lectures on Foundations of Human Experience, he pointed to the attitude of seeing pupils (also) as a reflection of the entire cosmos (Steiner GA 293, 2010, p. 156).
In the Course on Education for Special Needs, particular reference is made in this context to the effort to connect with a child’s ‹direction of striving.› In abstract terms, this meditation consist in creating an image of how a child might develop as an adult (Steiner GA 317, 2024, p. 135).
In the context of our ideas bound to the senses, thought and image meditations do not arise by themselves, as they are greatly influenced by our egoistic tendencies. To overcome these tendencies, the image of the scarab was given as a meditation in the 12th lecture of the Course on Education for Special Needs. According to Rudolf Steiner, in ancient Egyptian culture this was an imagination of the human head as the bearer of the ego and the overcomer of the egoistic life of imagination, which is bound to the soul gestures of antipathy and sympathy (ibid., p. 203f.).
With the help of these ‹propaedeutic meditations›, we can approach the point-circle meditation presented in the 10th lecture of the Course on Education for Special Needs. This meditation serves to immerse ourselves in the night side of our consciousness in the evening, before falling asleep. We carry our questions into this meditation with the mantra «God is in me.» When we return to the day side in the morning with the mantra «I am in God,» we can listen within ourselves to experience, at times, an inner certainty that contains an answer to our questions. Experiencing a resonance is not automatic, but always a blessing that may be granted to us (on polarity: Pepper, 2024, pp. 388-408, on inner effort: Pichler, 2024, pp. 411-419).
The point-circle meditation is therefore not the subject of a theoretical study of the spiritual world, as it was understood at the time by some anthroposophists in their examination of the book How to Know Higher Worlds, but rather the basis for a real encounter with spiritual beings (Steiner, GA 10, 1982, pp. 28-41). Rudolf Steiner commented on the sphere into which we enter on the night side as follows: «(…) You will see the fruitfulness of what you practice with a certain orientation within yourself as meditation in that you are carried along as if (…) in your feelings, in the absence of the body, as in an astral wave bath, driven into a world that stands before you in quiet waves and gives you the opportunity to see things around you that then answer your questions.» (Steiner GA 317, 2024, p. 181)Experiencing this ‹astral wave bath› with increasing awareness is a matter of spiritual schooling.
Evaluation
When implementing the meditation recommendations given in the Course on Education for Special Needs, I noticed in my work as a special education teacher that my initially pathologizing view of students was transformed into a keen interest in their individual constitution. As a result, with the help of meditative deepening, ideas and impulses for action flowed to me that broadened my perspective on how to cope with the students’ need for assistance and, and also on the resources that they brought with them. My imagination was also stimulated to an extent that repeatedly amazed me.
(1) Editor’s note: At the time of Steiner’s course (GA 317), the concepts of ‹illness› and ‹disability› had not yet been established as distinct. The reflections in this essay should not be taken to imply that disabilies, in the contemporary sense, should be understood as illnesses.
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