The Rudolf Steiner Archive

48. The Path Through Turmoil of the Present

[ 1 ] The number of people who admit that a recovery of state and economic conditions can only come about through stimuli from the spiritual life is currently growing. It is also obvious enough how little "statesmanlike" thinking, which continues along the old lines, is up to the tasks arising from the turmoil of recent years. We have experienced Versailles, Spa, St. Germain and so on. The "League of Nations" haunts many minds like an idea of salvation. None of this has given the peoples of the civilized world any promising idea of what they should do in their own territories or how they can relate to each other. In Eastern Europe, the superstition that an empire can be built on the basis of one-sided economic organization is working its evil. The statesmanlike impotence of the West, the destructive superstition of the East, which leads to economic militarism: They probably contribute their fair share to the fact that many a personality concerned about the future of mankind looks to the spiritual life for help.

[ 2 ] The nurturers of American worldviews are raising their voices. These voices can already be heard in neutral countries. Why shouldn't they soon reach the center of Europe? The meaning that can be heard from these voices is something like this: the "League of Nations" must come. Because it will be a blessing. But what comes out of the brains of the "statesmen" will not be able to give it a promising shape. It must have its roots in the hearts of men, not merely in external institutions. It can only become so if the moral and spiritual feelings of the people lead to an understanding of the civilized world. Therefore, the paralyzed religious feelings, the spiritual powers that have become lax, should be encouraged to a new life. - It cannot be denied that many a fine word is spoken and many a well-intentioned speech made today out of such sentiments. But anyone who can observe impartially must see that access to the hearts of men is closed to such words today. They do not have the power to arouse in the minds of men that which should come to the idea of the League of Nations in order to give it life, the power to exist. And if we want to recognize the reason why they do not have this power, we must consider how dependent questions of worldview have become in modern times on the state and the economy. By completely occupying the teaching and educational system, the states have adapted the spiritual life to their own organization in such a way that it is drawn into all their crises. Where should there be an intellectual life that serves a renewal of the state's essence, since the states have only allowed that which was appropriate to their now questioned form to flourish?

[ 3 ] In Central Europe, out of need and misery, people are calling for a gathering of confessions, for a revival and understanding in religious life. All this is well-intentioned. But here, too, there is no strength in words and speeches. The state forms want to be renewed; and what one wants to collect, what one wants to revive, was so connected with the essence of the old that it is drawn into its decline.

[ 4 ] Not a renewal of state and economic life by the old spiritual powers can be a promising goal, but only the renewal of spiritual life itself. We will have to summon up the courage to admit that new sources of spiritual life must be opened up.

[ 5 ] The view of the threefold structure of the social organism implies this courage. It would like to awaken an unbiased judgment that the prevailing intellectual scientific spirit of the present is a consequence of the nationalization of teaching and education and thus of the predominant part of public intellectual life. But it is this scientific spirit alone in which mankind of the present day believes so strongly that it ascribes to it a validity in the affairs of public life. Apart from this scientific spirit, the old views of life have no power for this life. Only people who are alien to life can delude themselves about it. Only they can believe that they can draw from old creeds speeches of power which have a determining influence on the state or the economy. Through such speeches a certain part of people's souls can be put in the right mood. But with the profit that these people gain from such influences, they will not have any effect in public life.

[ 6 ] Those who do not wish to indulge in illusions must not close their minds to the realization that modern mankind needs a view of life which does not preserve old creeds alongside the newer scientific spirit, but which grows out of this spirit itself. It is the endeavor of anthroposophically oriented spiritual science to form such a view of life. Modern science only cultivates an intellectual understanding of natural phenomena. This has no power to affect the human mind and will. It is therefore unsuitable for the social shaping of life. Anthroposophical spiritual science draws not only on the intellect, but on all the powers of the human soul. It therefore also works back on all these soul forces. It can give stimulating ideas to state and economic life.

[ 7 ] Today's states still have what they can give to their own and economic life from the old creeds and world views. It is just so watered down that it is no longer recognized as a legacy of the old. That is why this fact is not acknowledged. The newer, purely intellectualistic science can achieve great things in the knowledge of nature; in the social sphere it can only produce socialist theories that are alien to life or life-destroying social experiments. It is, however, capable of being developed into a spiritual view. If it is, then it can also generate ideas for viable social structures.

[ 8 ] The mere demand for intellectual stimulation for public life is not enough today. What is needed is the courage for a spiritual rebirth. The present lives in crises of states and economic life. They cannot be solved by the forces of the old spiritual life. They will only be solved if the crisis of spiritual life itself is seen through and a solution is sought in its own field of spirit.