Walter Stein

Walter Johannes Stein (6 February 1891, in Vienna – 7 July 1957, in London) was an Austrian philosopher, Waldorf school teacher, Grail researcher, and one of the pioneers of anthroposophy.

Stein studied mathematics, physics, and philosophy at Vienna University, before completing a doctorate in philosophy at the end of the First World War, having continued work on it throughout his service in an artillery unit in the war. He became a personal student of Rudolf Steiner from about the age of 21, and enjoyed the unofficial supervision of Steiner while writing his dissertation. Broadly speaking, the dissertation was an attempt to write a theory of cognition for spiritual knowledge.

After the First World War, Stein assisted Steiner in promoting Social Threefolding. When it became apparent in 1919 that these efforts were not going to succeed, Steiner asked Stein to teach history and German literature at the first Waldorf School in Stuttgart. It was as part of this work that Stein began his research on the Grail, which culminated in 1928 with his book The Ninth Century and the Holy Grail. In this work, he attempted to identify historical people and events represented in the Grail epic and to interpret Parzival as an esoteric document representing the human path of inner development. Stein also wrote various articles on these themes.

Stein lectured extensively on anthroposophy and related themes from the early 1920s onward, giving up to 300 lectures a year. He also contributed many articles to The Present Age and similar periodicals, and wrote a number of short books including The Principle of Reincarnation, Gold: in History and in Modern Times, West-East: A Study in National Relationships, Labour: in History and in Modern Times, and The British: Their Psychology and Destiny. Stein claimed to have had a spiritual breakthrough in 1924 using the meditative methods of Steiner and to have attained some insight into his own karmic background.

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