For some, wanting to follow up on the idea that I could raise money for the Society, consider:  A few decades ago, a CEO of General Motors said: "the business of America is business".  This is an apt intution of that aspect of the American Soul that is innovative and entrepreneurial.  Americans make things ... new things, - never thought of before things.  We invented the movie industry and the television industry and the personal home computer industry.  The transistor too.  A long list.

Americans are also natural anthroposophists, for details read: Transcendentalism Comes of Age.

Businesses spend a lot of money bringing in speakers for inspiration, and as well hiring various kinds of experts to help their workers and executives develop new and necessary skills.  Its a business, and competitive as well.  From a certain point of view many involved in Anthroposophy already think of what we do as a product - see the work of Robert Sardello, and  his business: the School of Spiritual Psychology.

In order to develop my idea of a business, that can both serve human beings and provide money for the future development of anthroposophical works, such as Waldorf Schools, the Society itself, and Biodynamic Farms, we would start by capitalizing a small working group which would take the idea below and evolve it into a business organization that would offer itself as competitive within that field of inspiration and self-development that already exists.  Such an effort either works or it does not.  This can only be established by taking the related risks.

the pharaoh foundation

       

Statement of Purpose

The purpose of the pharaoh foundation is to create unusual educational opportunities for adults, so as to prepare them to participate in the advancement of human civilization through means an ordinary university education does not provide.

The pharaoh foundation adopts as its model the ideal of the Old Kingdom of Ancient Egypt, in that the "leader" of society was both a "king" and a "priest". This idea is also repeated in the Platonic ideal of the "philosopher king".

By this ideal, we do not mean to suggest that modern democratic political leaders, as well as business and military leaders, should be both imperial and religious, but rather that individuals seeking to accept responsibility for the advancement of human civilization need to recognize that to truly contribute to such a goal requires the cultivation of unusual qualities. No one is any longer born into such a life path. And to aspire to this, and succeed, demands an extraordinary effort.

It is the desire then, of the pharaoh foundation, to aid individuals who want to achieve something in the realm of social evolution. Such individuals should not feel it is necessary to aspire to office, but rather only to want to prepare to play a leading role in one or more of the realms of ordinary human endeavor. However, for such aspirations to succeed, there must be a source leaders turn to, outside themselves, which helps inspire them to face the difficult and often personal questions, whose answers mean the difference between success and failure. To turn to such a source does not mean to sacrifice personal freedom, but rather to understand that there are teachers who are willing to serve the ambitions of those who find it necessary to lead.

The above is the purpose of the pharaoh foundation. The means to achieve this purpose can be stated quite simply, in what follows.

One must become a generalist. One may start out a specialist, and may even continue to grow in a particular chosen field. Yet the knowledge of a specialist carries a great danger - the necessity for a narrowness of vision. Concentrated knowledge builds walls; and leaders, in any field, need to see around corners and over walls. They need to see through the conceptual confines that specialization creates. But, most especially, they need to see through the biases of those who they would advise and serve.

For each individual the process of becoming a generalist is different. Basically, what is required is the balanced cultivation of the ability to know the truth, to create beauty, and to do the good. Inwardly, in the life of soul and spirit - as that appears in human thinking, every individual is gifted with the possibility of striving toward such experience, because every individual is given the possibility of a balanced unfolding of three universally human qualities: reason, imagination, and devotion. It is through reason that we come to know truth; it is through imagination that we come to create beauty; and it is through devotion that we learn to do the good.

This process is not a course of study, although study may be a part of it. The ordinary university, in providing its most general or liberal education, strives to teach what is called "the cannon" of Western Civilization: the works of the great thinkers and artists who have preceded us. At the pharaoh foundation the task is to discover in one's self those passionate impulses of the spirit which first drove those who created our current civilization. It is not knowledge which is sought after, but that skill in the life of the soul which is only won through the experience of the individual struggle with the fundamental riddles of human existence. Through this process we teach not what, but how.

As a consequence, the student/graduate becomes the most effective and essential social architect for the renewal and regeneration of our civilization, because he/she acquires the capacity to see through the limitations of the hidden assumptions of the time and of the culture, an insight which is the fundamental key to all progress and growth for any human community.

In addition, to what is essentially an educational mission, we do offer consulting services on a similar fee basis. Where an individual or an institution desires the considerations of an experienced generalist, this service can be provided, by either resident faculty, or graduates, in accord with the needs of the requesting party.

In a like manner the pharaoh foundation, through its faculty and graduates, is available to give lectures, or to facilitate gatherings for whatever institution may desire this or similar services.