Dementia

Dementia: Anthroposophical Perspectives

Dementia, a broad category of brain diseases including Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s, affects millions of people worldwide. Although its impact is primarily focused on populations of Western countries, orthodox medicine has not been able to discover the causes of dementia, let alone develop successful treatments or a cure. Given this situation, there are good reasons to investigate the psychospiritual factors connected to the outbreak of the illness. As the author states in her preface:

“The conception of man that is given priority today by the scientific world hardly takes into account that in addition to the physical–material component, for which certain degenerative or pathological processes can be determined with the help of technical apparatus, there are other components of his being to be taken into account which cannot be investigated in that way. So long as the cause of an illness is not sought in connection with those spiritual components of the human being, a successful treatment of the patient cannot be assured.”

Developing successful methods of treatment requires a full understanding of the human being. This cannot be achieved through observation with the outer senses only, but increasingly calls for spiritual–scientific perception. Through this method, as founded by Rudolf Steiner, great service can be rendered to humanity, including precise research into the causes of ill health. The factors involved in the eruption of modern afflictions, such as dementia, can be determined by careful consideration of humanity’s—as well as the individual’s—destiny.

In this succinct but rich study, Judith von Halle describes her investigations into the phenomenon of dementia, beginning with a general outline of the anthroposophic view of the human being and society, and applying that knowledge to what today is increasingly referred to as an epidemic. This book does not require medical expertise, but rather an effort to engage with the psychospiritual conditions of those suffering dementia. It provides a wealth of insights and guidance to approaching one of the greatest challenges of our time.

C O N T E N T S:

Foreword by Michaela Glöckler

1. What Is the Human Being?
2. The Origin of Remembrances and Their Recording in Memory
3. The Difference between “Normal” Forgetfulness in Old Age and Dementia
4. The Trinitarian Impulse of Spiritual Forces in Human Beings and in the World
5. The Spiritual Causes of Individual and General Human Illnesses
6. The Transformation of the “Invisible” and the “Visible” Person with Dementia
7. “Dead” and “Living” Remembering
8. Where Does the Spirit of the Person with Dementia Go and How Can They be Helped?

About the Author

Judith von Halle was born in Berlin in 1972. She attended school in Germany and the U.S. and studied architecture, graduating in 1998. She encountered Anthroposophy in 1997 and began working as a staff member at Rudolf Steiner House in Berlin, where she also lectured from 2001, while maintaining an architectural practice. In 2004, her life was transformed when she received the stigmata. Her first book was published in German in 2005, and she now works principally as a lecturer and author. She lives with her husband in Berlin.

Dr. Michaela Glöckler has been Leader of the Medical Section at the Goetheanum, the School of Spiritual Science in Dornach, Switzerland since 1988. She attended the Waldorf School in Stuttgart, then studied German language, literature, and history in Freiburg and Heidelberg. She studied medicine in Tübingen and Marburg and trained as a pediatrician at the community hospital in Herdecke and at the Bochum University Pediatric Clinic. Until 1988 she was a colleague in the children’s outpatient clinic at the Community Hospital in Herdecke and served as school doctor for the Rudolf Steiner School in Witten, Germany. Michaela has many publications in German, many of which have been published in English.