The Anthroposophical Society is the organisational body of Anthroposophy, the spiritual philosophy developed by Rudolf Steiner, and it is distinctive for how much of its influence has been indirect and practical rather than doctrinal.
A path of knowledge
Steiner defined Anthroposophy as a path of knowledge leading the spiritual in the human being to the spiritual in the universe, and taught that a supersensible world can be investigated with a discipline as exact as that of natural science, through the methodical cultivation of higher organs of perception. He led the German Section of the Theosophical Society from 1902 but broke with it, above all over the proclamation of Krishnamurti as the coming world-teacher, and founded the independent society in 1912 to 1913, more Western and Christian in orientation. Its centre is the Goetheanum at Dornach in Switzerland, the first of which, a great wooden building, burned at the turn of 1922 to 1923 and was rebuilt in concrete.
The outgrowths
What has spread most widely is not the doctrine but its applications: Waldorf education, biodynamic agriculture, anthroposophical medicine, and the arts of eurythmy. These reach far beyond the membership of the society, and many who encounter them do not know their source, which makes Anthroposophy one of the most quietly influential of modern esoteric movements. Steiner refounded the society in 1923 to 1924, shortly before his death in 1925.