{"id":72419,"date":"2026-05-13T08:25:00","date_gmt":"2026-05-13T06:25:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/?p=72419"},"modified":"2026-05-13T23:49:22","modified_gmt":"2026-05-13T21:49:22","slug":"thus-far-and-beyond","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/thus-far-and-beyond\/","title":{"rendered":"Thus Far and Beyond"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

At the ceremony marking the completion of the German Gesamtausgabe (GA) [Collected Works (CW)] of Rudolf Steiner, the 453 volumes were laid out on the Goetheanum stage. The speeches and reminiscences expressed deep gratitude and offered a gentle reminder.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Cornelius Bohlen, chairman of the Nachlassverwaltung [Estate Administration], spoke first and named the Gesamtausgabe [Collected Works] as the largest in the world. In the 100 years since Steiner\u2019s death, not a single year has passed without a new publication of his work. Even Goethe\u2019s Weimar Edition (comprised of 143 volumes) and Voltaire\u2019s \u0152uvres compl\u00e8tes (currently 205 volumes) taken together do not yet equal the number of Steiner editions. Bohlen then announced that he would summarize this work in a single sentence (laughter throughout the hall) from a letter by Rudolf Steiner of 1902: \u201cI want to build upon the force that sets students of the spirit on the track of development.\u201d Citing a letter of 1905, he added that Steiner was well aware that the development of spiritual science harbored a danger\u2014for all theosophists and anthroposophists\u2014of seduction into the worst kind of materialism. Spiritual science that is not properly assimilated leads to error and dogmatism. He concluded by saying that the Estate Administration established by Marie Steiner and the Goetheanum, with its Independent School of Spiritual Science, would today collaborate freely and independently. \u201cWhat could be more beautiful?\u201d he asked.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Transcribe, Edit, Digitize!<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Next to speak was Harald Liehr, program director for literature and cultural studies at Schwabe Verlag [publishing house], which also publishes anthroposophical books. Liehr noted that Schwabe Verlag was founded in 1488 and is, today, the world\u2019s oldest publishing house still in operation. As an \u201cexternal sympathizer watching from the sidelines,\u201d he described the Collected Works as a \u201cuniverse of scholarship and philological accuracy that is unparalleled in the global literary community.\u201d \u201cCui bono<\/em>? Who benefits from this?\u201d he asked, answering that the mountain of texts can now be traversed, climbed, and surveyed along surefooted paths. The enthusiasts, the exegetes, the critics, and also the detractors of Steiner must all confront the texts, study them, and, at the very least, take note of them. \u201cIn addition to ensuring the preservation of Rudolf Steiner\u2019s texts, making them available in formats that can be cross-checked and therefore suitable for academic discussion, this edition provides a solid foundation for new forms of engagement with Steiner\u2019s \u0153uvre that have yet to be imagined.\u201d According to Liehr, what has now been accomplished at such a rapid pace is an \u201cimportant intermediate stage\u201d for the work of the Rudolf Steiner Archive (Dornach) and Verlag (Basel) and must continue. He had to disappoint all those hoping that enough had now been done in the way of philological diligence and the clearing of Finnish forests for all the age-resistant paper used in printing. The work does not stop. Transcription, editing, and digitization must and will continue. The point is not to \u201cbury Steiner\u2019s thoughts under even higher mountains of books, but to keep pace with the research and reception needs of current and future generations.\u201d He concluded with the \u201cmotto of all editorial philologists\u201d\u2014\u201cthus far and beyond\u201d\u2014and he thanked the Rudolf Steiner Archive, proclaiming, \u201cMay you remain, may we all remain, devoted to Rudolf Steiner\u2019s books and to all the others as well.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Engage with the Volumes<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Justus Wittich saw it as a stroke of destiny that the dates set independently by the Rudolf Steiner Estate Administration for the completion of the Collected Works and by the Goetheanum for this year\u2019s General Assembly had accidentally coincided. The fact that anthroposophy has been able to unfold transparently in the public sphere is largely due to the ethos of Marie Steiner and the Rudolf Steiner Estate Administration she established, which is dedicated to making every word of Steiner\u2019s openly accessible. Regarding the past conflict between the Estate Administration and the Goetheanum, Wittich said that former leaders of the Anthroposophical Society had adopted a more \u201cesoteric stance that, in fact, did not correspond to the needs of reality.\u201d Then, more succinctly, he said, \u201cWe as the Anthroposophical Society could never have accomplished this [publication] work [alone] because it requires the objectivity of an independent institution, such as the Archive is.\u201d That being said, Wittich noted, the Goetheanum does share the responsibility for the Archive\u2019s future, and it is up to each individual to personally engage with the volumes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the Heart, Instead of on 100,000 Pages<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Three generations of directors of the Archive took the floor with Stefan Hasler as moderator. Angelika Schmitt outlined one of their ongoing projects: \u201cIn addition to the 100,000 pages of the Collected Works, there are 84,000 pages of notebooks in digital form.\u201d Philip Kovce emphasized that each of these 100,000 pages is linked to archival materials buried away in the recesses of the archive: \u201cFree access to the Collected Works includes their whole backstory.\u201d Access to this archival material entails the prospect of broadening the focus of the Collected Works, presenting and communicating Steiner\u2019s non-textual legacy. The predecessor to the two current co-directors of the archive was David Marc Hoffmann. \u201cOur task as an archive,\u201d as he put it, \u201cis a historical-philological one, not an anthroposophical one.\u201d Then he pointed to the problem of anthroposophical books. Steiner\u2019s books can be \u201cfatally misread\u201d by assuming that anthroposophy is found inside the books. \u201cAccording to my reading, anthroposophy is not found in the volumes of the Collected Works, but\u201d\u2014now quoting from Steiner\u2019s first leading thought\u2014\u201c\u2018it is a path of knowledge that wants to lead the spiritual in the human being to the spiritual in the universe. It takes place within the human being as a need of the heart and feelings,\u2019 and not on the 100,000 printed pages. There is an immense temptation with these editions because we think they contain the ultimate wisdom. But this should actually take place within me, as a need of the heart and life of feelings.\u201d David Hoffmann didn\u2019t shy away from sharing what makes archival work difficult: the \u201chardliners,\u201d or those who are suspicious of the work done by the archive. On the other side, though, was the wide circle of goodwill that had brought him inwardly to his knees. He named the biggest donor institutions over the years: the Humanus-Stiftung in Basel, the Software AG Foundation (SAGST), the Damus-Donata Foundation, and the Union of Waldorf Schools in Germany [Bund der Freien Waldorfschulen]. The latter had transferred one euro per student annually for years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Everything That\u2019s Important to Us!<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Prior to 2011, Walter Kugler headed the Archive. He shared how he discovered Steiner\u2019s chalkboard drawings one day. He was working on the publication of the \u201cButterfly Cycle\u201d (CW 230) and didn\u2019t understand the dotted line drawings in the book. Then he stumbled across the chalkboard drawings hidden in tubes in a small basement room. A short time later, he showed them to two artists. Both exclaimed, \u201cEverything that\u2019s important to us and where we want to go is right there. These must be exhibited!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As a coda to this GA symphony, Peter Selg painted a portrait of Helene Finckh, the GA\u2019s main stenographer. The place where she worked for many years, a wooden hut behind the Goetheanum, is now a museum.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

Translation <\/strong>Joshua Kelberman
Image\u00a0<\/strong>Ceremony marking the completion of the Rudolf Steiner Gesamtausgabe [Collected Works] during the 2026 General Assembly. From left: Stefan Hasler, David Marc Hoffmann, Philip Kovce, and Angelika Schmitt. Photo: Xue Li.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

At the ceremony marking the completion of the German Gesamtausgabe (GA) [Collected Works (CW)] of Rudolf Steiner, the 453 volumes were laid out on the Goetheanum stage. The speeches and reminiscences expressed deep gratitude and offered a gentle reminder. Cornelius Bohlen, chairman of the Nachlassverwaltung [Estate Administration], spoke first and named the Gesamtausgabe [Collected Works] as the largest in the world. In the 100 years since Steiner\u2019s death, not a single year has passed without a new publication of his […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9159,"featured_media":72089,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8762,8848,8837],"tags":[11794,11795,8824],"class_list":["post-72419","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-goetheanum","category-literature","category-restrospective","tag-ausgabe-18-2026-en","tag-english-issue-20-2026","tag-spotlights"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72419","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9159"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=72419"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72419\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":72441,"href":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72419\/revisions\/72441"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/72089"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=72419"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=72419"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=72419"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}