Wednesday, November 10, 2010

The Kingdom, the Power, and the Glory



"I must think especially of a visit to my class by Rudolf Steiner; it is written deeply in my heart. It was an English class, and I had--as I then later always repeated--taken the children through the Lord's Prayer and had begun to have them learn it. Dr. Steiner entered just as we had spoken the closing words, 'For thine is the kingdom, the power, and the glory, forever.' As we finished Dr. Steiner stood up, went to the blackboard, picked up the chalk, and said to the children: 'You have just spoken the beautiful closing words of the Lord's Prayer in English, and you, of course, also know it in German. Now, every royal kingdom encompasses a certain area, has a certain size.' Along with these words, he drew a circle on the board. 'And where is the power of this kingdom?' The children answered that it is in the middle. 'Yes, it is in the middle of the circle; and the glory, the radiance, which rays out from this kingdom, shines outward far and wide!' Thereby he drew something like rays of radiance and light all around the circle. And then he continued: 'Yes, now what does this all look like?' After a brief hesitation the children called out: 'Like the Sun!' Rudolf Steiner, visibly pleased, said, 'Yes, it is the Sun.' He then left. We kept his drawing on the blackboard for a long time as a kind of living greeting from him to the class."







Source: Rudolf Treichler, Wege und Umwege zu Rudolf Steiner [Paths and Roundabout Ways to Rudolf Steiner], cited on p. 240 of First Steps in Christian Religious Renewal

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