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Community Life, Inner Development, Sexuality and the Spiritual Teacher
GA 253

13 September 1915, Dornach

IV. Methods and Rational of Freudian Psychoanalysis

Considering the kind of deliberations you are engaged in at the moment, my friends, I must assume that your minds would be less than ready to take in a continuation of yesterday's lecture. For those of you who want to hear it, that lecture will be given tomorrow, but today I would like to speak about something that will relate in some way to things you all must necessarily have in mind at the moment.

First of all, and from a very specific point of view, I would like to address the question of what is really confronting us in the Goesch-Sprengel case. In recent lectures I have often said that it is important to arrive at the appropriate perspective from which to try to resolve any given issue. How, then, can we arrive at the right perspective on this particular matter through objective study of the case?

In order to deal with a case like this objectively, we must first of all remove it from its personal context and insert it into a larger one. If, as I believe, this larger context turns out to be what is most important for our anthroposophical movement, we will find ourselves obliged to study this case for our own edification and for the sake of spiritual science itself. And in fact there is a larger context to the case, as will become apparent if we look at Mr. Goesch's letter of August 19 with an eye for his main motives and arguments.

Since you have important deliberations ahead of you, I will not detain you too long, but will only select a few essential points for your consideration. The first is Goesch's claim that promises have not been kept. If you listened to the letter carefully, you will have noticed that the emphasis in his reproach is not on the alleged making and not keeping of promises. His primary accusation is that I looked for and systematically applied a means of making promises to members and not keeping them, and that once the members noticed that these promises were not being kept, they were put into a state of mind that forced them into a particular relationship to the one who had made and not kept the promises. As a result, forces accumulated in their souls that eventually made them lose their sound judgment.

So the first hypothesis Goesch presents is that systematic attempts were made to stifle the members' good sense, that deliberately making and breaking promises was a means of dulling their normal state of consciousness, resulting in a kind of stupefaction that turned them into zombies. That is the first point his letter addresses.

His second point has to do with one of the means of carrying this out. To put it briefly, through handshakes and friendly conversations and the like, I am supposed to have initiated a kind of contact with members that was suited, because of its very nature and the influence it allowed me to exert, to bringing about the above-mentioned effect on their souls.

A third thing we must keep in mind as a red thread running through Goesch's whole letter is the nature of his relationship to Miss Sprengel. We could add to these three points, but let us deal with them first.

To begin with, how does Goesch manage to construct such a systematic theory, based on his first two points, about how steps were taken to undermine the members' state of consciousness? We need to go into this thoroughly and try to find out where it comes from. In Goesch's case, we are led to his long involvement with Dr. Freud's so-called theory of psychoanalysis.1Sigmund Freud, 1856–1939. Psychiatrist, founder of psychoanalysis. If you study this theory, you will begin to see that it is intimately related to how the pathological picture presented in the letter develops. Certain connections can be drawn between this pathological picture, as it relates to Goesch's first two points, and his involvement with the Freudian psychoanalytic point of view.

Of course, I am not in a position to give you a comprehensive picture of Freudian psychoanalytic theory in brief—my intent is only to present a few points that will help clarify the Goesch-Sprengel case. However, in a certain sense I do feel qualified to talk about psychoanalysis, because in my earlier years I was friends with one of the medical experts involved in its very beginnings.2Joseph Breuer, 1842–1925. Rudolf Steiner met Breuer in the home of the Specht family, where Steiner was a tutor from 1884–1890. See Steiner's The Course of My Life, GA 28, Chapter XIII, (Hudson, NY: Anthroposophic Press, 1986). See also Karl Konig, “Die Schicksale Sigmund Freuds and Joseph Breuers” (“The Destiny of Sigmund Freud and Joseph Breuer”), Stuttgart 1962. This person eventually abandoned the theory of psychoanalysis after it degenerated later on in Freud's life. In any case, please do not take what I am going to say now as a comprehensive characterization of Freudian theory; I only want to highlight a few points.

Freudian psychoanalysts start from the assumption that an unconscious inner life exists alongside our conscious soul-activity—that is, in addition to the soul-activity we are conscious of, there is also an unconscious inner life we are usually not aware of. An important component of psychoanalysis is the doctrine that certain experiences people have in the course of their life can make impressions on them, but these impressions disappear from their conscious awareness and work on in their subconscious. According to the psychoanalysts, we do not necessarily become fully conscious of these experiences before they sink down into the unconscious—for example, something can make an impression on a person during childhood without ever coming to full consciousness, and still have such an effect on that person's psyche that it sinks down into the unconscious and goes on working there. Its effects are lasting, and in some cases lead to psychological disturbances later on. I am skipping a lot of links in the chain of reasoning and jumping right to the outcome of the whole process. In other words, we are to imagine in the soul's subconscious depths a kind of island of childhood and youthful experiences gone rampant. Through questioning during psychoanalysis, these subconscious proliferating islands in the soul can be lifted up into consciousness and incorporated into the structure of conscious awareness. In the process, the person in question can be cured of psychological defects in that particular area.

During the early years of the psychoanalytic movement, it was the practice of Dr. Breuer in particular to carry out this questioning with the patient under hypnosis.3In Joseph Breuer's therapy, hysteric patients were put under hypnosis and their symptoms traced back to the point when they first appeared; as a rule, on recreating this condition, the symptoms intensified, but usually disappeared afterward. In their Studies on Hysteria, (Leipzig and Vienna, 1895) Breuer and Freud described this form of therapy on the basis of five individual cases. Later on, this practice was discontinued, and now the Freudian school conducts this analysis with the patient in a normal waking state of consciousness. In any case, the underlying assumption is that there are unhealthy, proliferating islands present in the psyche below the level of consciousness.

This psychoanalytic outlook has gradually spread to incorporate and try to explain all kinds of phenomena of ordinary life, particularly with regard to how they appear in people's dreams. As I already explained once in a lecture to our friends in another city, it is at this point that the Freudian school really goes out on a limb in saying that unfulfilled desires play a primary role in dreams.4Berlin, November 4, 1910, included in Wisdom of Man, of the Soul, and of the Spirit, GA 115, (New York: Anthroposophic Press, 1971). Also Munich, November 18, 1911, in Esoteric Christianity and the Mission of Christian Rosenkreutz, GA 130, 2nd ed., rev., (London: Rudolf Steiner Press, 1984). Freudians say that it is typical for people to experience unfulfilled desires in their dreams, desires that cannot be satisfied in real life. It can sometimes happen—and from the point of view of psychoanalytic theorists, it is significant when it does—that one of these desires present on an unconscious island in the psyche is lifted up in a dream and reveals in disguised form an impulse that had an effect on the person in question during his or her childhood.

Please note the peculiarity of this train of thought. It is assumed that as young boys or girls, people have experiences that sink down into subconsciousness and work on as fantasy experiences, clouding their consciousness. The pattern, then, is this: experiences of waking life are repressed and continue to work on the subconscious, leading to a weakened state of consciousness. This is exactly the same pattern Goesch constructs with regard to promises being given and broken and working on in the subconscious—all with the intention to create the same effect in the subconscious as the “islands” in Freudian psychoanalytic theory. According to Goesch, this was done cunningly and deliberately and resulted in a state of stupefaction analogous to what occurs when experiences of waking life have sunk into subconsciousness and are brought up again in a dream.

Psychoanalytic theory is a very tricky business, and if you dwell on it long enough, it gives rise to certain forms of thought that spread and affect all your thinking. As you can see, this has something to do with why Goesch came up with such a crazy idea.

In addition, as I have said before, the concept of physical contact plays an important part. I am now going to read certain passages from one of Dr. Freud's books, a collection of essays from the Freudian magazine Imago, and I ask you to pay close attention to them.5Sigmund Freud, Totem and Taboo, tr. James Strachey, copyright 1950 by Routledge & Kegan Paul Ltd. (New York and London: W. W. Norton & Company). In the magazine Imago, vols. I and II (1912 and 1913), these articles appeared under the title, “Some Correspondences in the Inner Life of Savages and Neurotics.” But I must precede that with something else concerning the Goesch-Sprengel case. Those of you who have known Miss Sprengel for some time will recall that she was always very concerned about protecting herself from other people's influence on her aura—she lived in horror of having to shake hands and things like that. Even before Goesch arrived on the scene, she had already gotten the idea that shaking hands is a criminal act in our esoteric circles. The following incident is absolutely typical: I had business to do in Dr. Schmiedel's laboratory and happened to meet Miss Sprengel there.6Dr. Oskar Schmiedel, 1887–1959, a chemist, was head of the laboratory producing the plant pigments needed in building the first Goetheanum. I extended my hand to her, which gave her grounds for saying, “That's how he always does it—he does whatever he wants to you and then shakes hands, and then you forget all about it.” There you have the origin of that theory about handshaking. Yesterday you all heard what this theory became in Miss Sprengel's confused mind with the help of Goesch. He contributed his understanding of Freud's theories and combined things systematically with Freudian ideas.

The following passage is from page 29 of the above-mentioned book by Freud:

The principal characteristic of the psychological constellation which becomes fixed in this way is what might be described as the subject's ambivalent attitude (to borrow the apt term coined by Bleuler) towards a single object, or rather towards one act in connection with that object. He is constantly wishing to perform this act (the touching), [and looks on it as his supreme enjoyment, but he must not perform it] and detests it as well. The conflict between these two currents cannot be promptly settled because—there is no other way of putting it—they are localized in the subject's mind in such a manner that they cannot come up against each other. The prohibition is noisily conscious, while the persistent desire to touch is unconscious and the subject knows nothing of it. If it were not for this psychological factor, an ambivalence like this could neither last so long nor lead to such consequences.7Freud, op.cit., p. 29.

This is followed by a long discussion of the role fear of physical contact plays in cases of neurosis:

In our clinical history of a case we have insisted that the imposition of the prohibition in very early childhood is the determining point; a similar importance attaches in the subsequent developments to the mechanism of repression at the same early age. As a result of the repression which has been enforced and which involves a loss of memory—an amnesia—the motives for the prohibition (which is conscious) remain unknown; and all attempts at disposing of it by intellectual processes must fail, since they cannot find any base of attack. The prohibition owes its strength and its obsessive character precisely to its unconscious opponent, the concealed and undiminished desire—that is to say, to an internal necessity inaccessible to conscious inspection. The ease with which the prohibition can be transferred and extended reflects a process which falls in with the unconscious desire and is greatly facilitated by the psychological conditions that prevail in the unconscious. The instinctual desire is constantly shifting in order to escape from the impasse and endeavours to find substitutes—substitute objects and substitute acts—in place of the prohibited ones. In consequence of this, the prohibition itself shifts about as well, and extends to any new aims which the forbidden impulse may adopt. Any fresh advance made by the repressed libido is answered by a fresh sharpening of the prohibition. The mutual inhibition of the two conflicting forces produces a need for discharge, for reducing the prevailing tension; and to this may be attributed the reason for the performance of obsessive acts. In the case of a neurosis these are clearly compromise actions: from one point of view they are evidences of remorse, efforts at expiation, and so on, while on the other hand they are at the same time substitutive acts to compensate the instinct for what has been prohibited. It is a law of neurotic illness that these obsessive acts fall more and more under the sway of the instinct and approach nearer and nearer to the activity which was originally prohibited.8Ibid., p. 30.

Considering the obsessions involved in fear of physical contact, you can well imagine how it would have been if Miss Sprengel, as a person suffering from this fear, had ever been seen by a psychoanalyst who, in line with usual psychoanalytic practice, would have questioned her about her fear of contact and tried to discover what caused it.

A third factor I want to emphasize is the relationship of Miss Sprengel to Mr. Goesch. According to psychoanalytic theory, this relationship would of course be characterized by the presence of repressed erotic thoughts. I mean that quite objectively...9Apparently, the next few lines dealt with the connection between the Goesch-Sprengel case and psychoanalysis, but the stenographer only caught the words, “It is important how the connection is drawn… with disguised drives like these… especially between two personalities of this sort...”

At this point, my friends, we must look a bit more closely at the whole system of psychoanalysis. As I have just outlined for you, psychoanalysis lifts up into consciousness certain “islands” in the unconscious psyche, and it assumes that the majority of these islands are sexual in nature. The psychoanalyst's task, then, is to reach down to the level of these early experiences that have sunk into subconsciousness and lift them up again for purposes of healing. According to Freudian theory, healing is brought about by lifting hidden sexual complexes up from the depths of the subconscious and making the person aware of them again. Whether this method is very successful is a matter of much discussion in books on the subject.

As you can see, psychoanalysts' thinking is often colored by an underlying pervasive sexuality, and this is taken to extremes when psychoanalysis is applied to any and all possible phenomena of human life. For example, Freud and his disciples go so far as to interpret myths and legends psychoanalytically, tracing them to repressed sexuality. Consider, for example, how they interpret the story of Oedipus.10Sigmund Freud dealt with the Oedipus complex for the first time in The Interpretation of Dreams, tr. James Strachey, Chapter V, Section D, (New York: Avon, 1965). In brief, the content of this legend is that Oedipus is led to kill his father and marry his mother. When psychoanalysts ask what this story is based on, they conclude that such things always rest on unconscious, repressed sexual complexes usually involving sexual experiences in earliest childhood. The Freudians are firmly convinced that a child's relationship to his or her father and mother is a sexual one right from birth, so if the child is a boy, he must be unconsciously in love with his mother and thus unconsciously or subconsciously jealous of his father.

At this point, my friends, we might be tempted to say that these psychoanalysts, if they actually believe in their own theory, should apply it to themselves first and foremost, and admit that their own destiny and outlook stem from an excess of repressed sexual processes experienced in childhood. Freud and his disciples should apply this theory to themselves first. They derive the Oedipus legend, for instance, from their assumption that most little boys have an illicit emotional relationship to their mother right from birth, and are thus jealous of their father. Thus, the boys' father becomes their enemy and works on as such in their troubled imagination. Later, however, they realize rationally that this relationship to their mother is not permissible, and so it is repressed and becomes subconscious. The boys then live out their lives without becoming aware of their forbidden relationship to their mother and their adversarial relationship to their father, whom they experience as a rival.

According to psychoanalytic theory, then, what we need to do in cases of defective psyches is to look for psychological complexes, and we will find that if these are lifted up into consciousness, a cure can be effected. It's too bad that I can't present these things in greater detail, but I will try to give you as exact an outline of them as possible. On page 16 of the above-mentioned book, for instance, you can read the following:

There has been little opportunity in the preceding pages for showing how new light can be thrown upon the facts of social psychology by the adoption of a psycho-analytic method of approach: for the horror of incest displayed by savages has long been recognized as such and stands in need of no further interpretation.11Freud, Totem and Taboo, p. 16.

This essay explains why primitive peoples so strictly enforce the ban on marrying one's mother or sister and why relationships of this type are punished. “Incest” is love for a blood-relative, and one of the first essays in this book is entitled “The Horror of Incest.” This fear is explained by assuming the existence of a tendency to incest on the part of each male individual in the form of a forbidden relationship to his mother.

All that I have been able to add to our understanding of it is to emphasize the fact that it is essentially an infantile feature [that is, primitive people retain this for a lifetime, while in civilized children it is repressed into the subconscious] and that it reveals a striking agreement with the mental life of neurotic patients. Psycho-analysis has taught us that a boy's earliest choice of objects for his love is incestuous and that those objects are forbidden ones—his mother and his sister. We have learnt, too, the manner in which, as he grows up, he liberates himself from this incestuous attraction. A neurotic, on the other hand, invariably exhibits some degree of psychical infantilism. He has either failed to get free from the psycho-sexual conditions that prevailed in his childhood or he has returned to them—two possibilities which may be summed up as developmental inhibition and regression. Thus incestuous fixations of libido continue to play (or begin once more to play) the principal part in his unconscious mental life. We have arrived at the point of regarding a child's relation to his parents, dominated as it is by incestuous longings, as the nuclear complex of neurosis.

Thus, according to psychoanalytic theory, the central complex involved in neurosis is a boy's forbidden sexual attraction for his mother and sister.

This revelation of the importance of incest in neurosis is naturally received with universal skepticism by adults and normal people. Similar expressions of disbelief, for instance, inevitably greet the writings of Otto Rank, which have brought more and more evidence to show the extent to which the interest of creative writers centres round the theme of incest and how the same theme, in countless variations and distortions, provides the subject-matter of poetry. We are driven to believe that this rejection is principally a product of the distaste which human beings feel for their early incestuous wishes, now overtaken by repression. It is therefore of no small importance that we are able to show that these same incestuous wishes, which are later destined to become unconscious, are still regarded by savage peoples as immediate perils against which the most severe measures of defence must be enforced.12Ibid., p. 17.

From this point of departure, an atmosphere of sexuality spreads until it pervades the psychoanalysts' whole field of activity. Their whole life is spent working with ideas about sexuality. That is why psychoanalysis has been the biggest contributing factor in making an unbelievable mockery of something quite natural in human life. This has crept into our life gradually, without people noticing it. I can sympathize deeply with an old gentleman by the name of Moritz Benedikt (who spent his life trying to bring morality into medicine) when he says that if you look around, you'll find that the physicians of thirty years ago knew less about certain sexual abnormalities than eighteen-year-old girls in boarding school do today.13Moritz Benedikt, 1835–1920, physician and criminal anthropologist. The exact quotation reads, “Nowadays we find that students at the best finishing schools are more informed on the topic of sexual perversions than we young doctors used to be, and I often wish beating could be instituted as a punishment for the 'liberated' women teachers who encourage this kind of knowledge.” Aus Meinem Leben. Erinnerungen and Erörterungen, Vienna, 1906, vol. II, p. 162. This is the truth, and you can really empathize with this man. I mention it in particular because it is really extremely important to regard certain processes in children's lives as simply natural, without having to see them in terms of sexuality right away.

Nowadays, these complicated psychoanalytic theories lead us to label a lot of what children do as sexually deviant, although most of it is totally innocent. In most cases, it would be enough to regard these things as nothing more than childish mischievousness that could be quite adequately treated with a couple of smacks on a certain part of the anatomy. The worst possible way of dealing with it, however, is to talk a lot about these things, especially with the children themselves, and to put all kinds of theoretical ideas in their heads. It is hard enough to talk about these things with grownups with any degree of clarity. Unfortunately for people who are often called upon to provide counseling, parents frequently come with all kinds of complaints, including some really dumb ones, about how their children suffer from sexual deviance. Their only basis for these complaints is that the children scratch themselves. Now, there is no more sexuality involved in scratching yourself anywhere else than there is in scratching your arm. Dr. Freud, however, upholds the idea that any scratching or touching, or even a baby's sucking a pacifier, is a sexual activity. He spreads a mantle of sexuality over all aspects of human life.

It would be good for us to look more closely at Freudian psychoanalysis in order to become aware of the excesses of materialistic science; specifically, of those of psychoanalysis in seeing everything in terms of sexuality. In a book introduced by Dr. Freud, the Hungarian psychoanalyst Ferenczi writes about the case of a five-year-old boy named Arpad.14Sandor Ferenczi, 1873–1933, a favorite pupil of Freud's who later went his own way in psychoanalysis. There is no doubt in his mind as to the sources of Arpad's interest in the goings-on in the chicken run:

The continual sexual activity between the cock and hens, the laying of eggs and the hatching out of the young brood gratified his sexual curiosity, the real object of which was human family life. He showed that he had formed his own choice of sexual objects on the model of life in the hen-run, for he said one day to the neighbour's wife: “I'll marry you and your sister and my three cousins and the cook; no, not the cook, I'll marry my mother instead.” 15Freud, Totem and Taboo, p. 131. Ferenczi's report appeared in English as “A Little Chanticleer” in Contributions to Psycho-Analysis, 1916, p. 270.

We could wish for a return of the days when it was possible to hear children say things like this without immediately having to resort to such awkward sexual explanations. I can only touch on this subject today, but I will discuss it at greater length sometime in the near future in order to reassure all you fathers and mothers.16It has not been possible to determine whether or not this actually happened. But of course, Freud's theory, which is spreading widely without people noticing it, is only a symptom of a worldwide tendency. And when parents come with the complaint that their four- or five-year-old sons or daughters are suffering from sexual deviance, in most cases the appropriate response is, “The only deviant thing in this case is your way of thinking about it!” In most instances, that is really what's wrong.

My intention in telling you all this has been to point out the kind of atmosphere Freudian psychoanalysis is swimming in. I am well aware that the Freudians would take issue with this brief characterization. But we are fully justified in saying that psychoanalysis as a whole is positively dripping with this psychosexual stuff, as its professional literature reveals.

Suppose the assumption that psychosexual islands exist in the human subconscious actually proves to be true in the case of a certain individual. A Freudian theorist might subject that person to questioning and be able to add a new case history to the annals of Freudian psychoanalytic theory. In the case concerning us, Goesch might have undertaken this line of questioning and made some discoveries among those psychosexual islands that would have served to verify Freud's theories. But to do that, Goesch would have needed to be stronger in his own soul. As it was, however, he succumbed to a certain type of relationship to his new lady friend. The material in our possession supplies ample evidence of this relationship and will allow anyone who applies it in the right way to describe their relationship with clinical, objective precision.

Since what can be learned from a specific case is often of greater significance than the actual case itself, let me point out that this case can lead us to the same conclusions I presented in my essay, published in the Vienna Clinical Review in 1900, entitled “The Philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche as a Psychopathological Problem.” 17“The Philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche as a Psychopathological Problem,” in Friedrich Nietzsche: Fighter for Freedom, GA 5, (Englewood, NJ: Rudolf Steiner Publications, 1960). Notwithstanding all the contributions Nietzsche's genius made to the world, it was necessary to point out that Nietzsche would be misunderstood if the psychopathological factor in him were not taken into account. It is important for our Society that psychopathological elements not gain the upper hand, that they be eradicated from our minds and seen in the right light so that psychopaths are not looked upon as some kind of higher beings. That is why it is also important to see the current case in the right light and assess what is actually involved from the right standpoint.

It is already too late for me to describe now at length how the storm developed. When I was in Vienna in May of this year, one of our members wrote me a letter I had to tear up on returning here, since taking letters across the border is no longer allowed. This letter contained accusations very similar to those raised by Goesch under the influence of Miss Sprengel and showing a similar involvement in Freudian psychoanalysis. They came from the same quarter; the same wind was blowing in both sets of accusations. In fact, if I could have read you some sentences from that letter, they would have sounded remarkably like what Miss Sprengel inspired in Goesch.

What, then, was actually going on in the Goesch-Sprengel case? Goesch could not really function as a psychoanalyst, because to do that his relationship to Miss Sprengel would have had to be an objective one like that of a doctor to a patient. Her influence on him was too overwhelming, however, and thus his involvement in the examination was not fully conscious and objective. In Freudian terms, everything at work in the psyche of his friend, the “keeper of the seal,” came out, but since it sank down into Goesch's unconscious, it was masked by the whole theory that came to light in his letter.

The Goesch-Sprengel case grew out of one of the greatest mistakes and worst materialistic theories of our time, and we can only deal with it by realizing that both people involved threw a mantle of secrecy over their human, all-too-human relationships. In essence, this consisted of shrouding their relationship in Freudian psychoanalytic theories, as the documents very clearly reveal.

When we attempt to help people who come to us in such a confused psychological state, they are often fawning, enthusiastic supporters to begin with, but later on their adulation changes into enmity. That, too, can be explained in psychoanalytic terms. However, our most urgent concern at the moment is our relationship to the rest of the world. Just as we are now experiencing hostility coming from the direction of psychoanalysis, steeped as it is in sexuality, we can expect to encounter at any moment new opposition from all kinds of aberrations resulting from other all-too-human impulses.

This shows us that we must study such cases; they should be of great interest to us precisely because our Society represents a spiritual movement. I could speak at much greater length on this subject, but I must stop for today because you need to get on with your deliberations. I simply wanted to point out the first tentative steps we must take in seeing where the dangers for our movement lie and how urgent it is that we all do as much as we can to help the world out there learn that we are not chicken-livered. We know how to stand up for ourselves. When things come up in disguise as they did in this letter, we must rip off the mask and expose where they come from. Their origins lie much deeper than we usually think; they originate in the materialistic outlook of our times, which has not only become the dominant view in science but has contaminated our life as a whole. Combating it is our movement's very reason for existence, but we must keep our eyes wide open and see what is going on in the world. We must recognize what the people coming to us have learned out in the world and what they bring with them when they come to us.

Vierter Vortrag

Gedankengänge und Methoden der Freudschen Psychoanalyse

Meine lieben Freunde! Ich muß annehmen, daß innerhalb der Verhandlungen, die jetzt gepflogen werden, die Köpfe augenblicklich weniger bereit sein könnten, einen Vortrag entgegenzunchmen, der sich mit dem Thema befaßt, das als Fortsetzung des gestern angeschlagenen zu gelten hat. Ich werde darum für diejenigen, die daran teilnehmen wollen, diesen Vortrag morgen halten und möchte heute über etwas sprechen, was in der einen oder anderen Weise in Zusammenhang stehen wird mit den Angelegenheiten, die die Gemüter jetzt unmittelbar ja beschäftigen und beschäftigen müssen.1Siehe im Anhang.

Zunächst möchte ich in ganz bestimmter Weise die Frage aufwerfen: Was liegt uns denn eigentlich in dem Falle Goesch-Sprengel in Wirklichkeit vor? Wie kann sich uns dasjenige ergeben, von dem ich gerade in den Vorträgen der letzten Wochen öfter gesprochen habe, nämlich daß es wichtig ist, einer Sache gegenüber den richtigen Gesichtspunkt zu finden. Also die Frage möchte ich aufwerfen: Wie kann man allmählich durch ein ganz objektives Studium dieses Falles zu einem richtigen Gesichtspunkt darüber kommen?

Wenn man einen solchen Fall objektiv behandeln will, dann muß man ihn erstens aus seinem persönlichen Zusammenhang herauslösen und zweitens ihn in einen etwas größeren Zusammenhang hineinstellen. Und wenn sich dann, wie ich glaube, ergibt, daß gerade dieser größere Zusammenhang das Wichtigste für uns ist, insofern wir von uns als unserer Bewegung sprechen, dann obliegt es uns geradezu, ich möchte sagen, zu unserer Belehrung, um der Geisteswissenschaft selber willen, einen solchen Fall zu studieren. Nun steht der ganze Fall allerdings in einem größeren Zusammenhang darinnen; inwiefern, das kann sich ergeben, wenn man den Brief, den Herr Dr. Goesch am 19. August 1915 geschrieben hat, in bezug auf seine Hauptbeweggründe, in bezug auf seine Hauptargumente einmal ins Auge faßt.

Nun möchte ich Sie, da Sie vor wichtigen Verhandlungen stehen, nicht allzulange aufhalten und zunächst nur einige wesentliche Hauptpunkte herausheben. Ein solcher Hauptpunkt ist erstens der Vorwurf des Nichthaltens von Versprechen. Wenn Sie den Brief aufmerksam angehört haben, werden Sie bemerkt haben, daß das Schwergewicht nicht in dem bloßen Vorwurf des Versprechengebens und -Nichthaltens liegt, sondern daß der Hauptvorwurf der ist, daß von mir geradezu eine Methode gesucht werde und darin geradezu systematisch vorgegangen würde, den Mitgliedern Versprechungen zu geben und diese nicht zu halten; und daß die Mitglieder wenn sie merken, daß die Versprechungen nicht gehalten werden dann in einen gewissen Geisteszustand versetzt würden, der ihnen auferlegt, sich zu demjenigen, der das Versprechen gegeben und nicht gehalten hat, in ein gewisses Verhältnis zu setzen, und dadurch eine Akkumulation von Kräften entstehe, welche, indem sie sich in der Seele anhäufen, nach und nach zur Verblödung der Mitglieder führen müsse.

Das ist die erste Hypothese, die aufgestellt wird. Wir haben es also mit der Behauptung zu tun, daß systematisch versucht wird, die Verblödung, das heißt die Umdüsterung der Mitglieder herbeizuführen, daß das absichtliche Geben und Nichthalten von Versprechungen ein Mittel sei, um den normalen Bewußtseinszustand der Mitglieder abzudämpfen, so daß sie in eine Art von Verblödung und Vertrottelung hineingeführt würden. Das ist in dem Briefe als erstes ausgesprochen.

Als zweites ist darin ausgesprochen, daß eines der Mittel, mit dem operiert werde, das sei: Händedrücke zu geben, freundliche Gespräche zu führen und dergleichen, kurz, eine gewisse Art von Berührung mit den Mitgliedern herbeizuführen, welche wiederum durch ihre besondere Artung und durch die Einflüsse, die auf die Mitglieder damit ausgeübt werden, geeignet ist, in den Seelen der Mitglieder etwas hervorzurufen, was eben beabsichtigt sei und was auf dem Wege der Berührung hervorgerufen werden soll, sei es durch Händedrücken, sei es durch das Gespräch.

Als drittes, das ins Auge zu fassen ist - und das ist das tragende Gerüst in dem ganzen Briefe des Herrn Dr. Goesch, das ihn so ganz durchzieht -, das ist die Art des Verhältnisses von Fräulein Sprengel zu Herrn Dr. Goesch.

Diese drei Punkte, die vermehrt werden könnten, seien zuerst herausgehoben.

Nun fragt es sich in erster Linie: Wie kommt Dr. Goesch dazu, auf Grundlage der zwei ersten Punkte eine so systematische Theorie aufzubauen über die Art, wie Mittel verwendet werden, um die Mitglieder in ihrem Bewußtseinszustand zu schädigen? Dem muß man nachgehen und zu erfahren suchen: Woher kommt so etwas? Und da wird man bei Herrn Dr. Goesch geführt auf sein jahrelanges Darinnenstehen in der sogenannten Freudschen psychoanalytischen Theorie. Und wenn man sich mit dieser Theorie studierend beschäftigt, dann wird man bemerken, daß diese innig zusammenhängt mit der ganzen Art und Weise, wie sich das pathologische Bild in dem Briefe darlebt; daß man gewisse Fäden ziehen muß von diesem pathologischen Bilde in bezug auf die zwei ersten Punkte zu dem Darinnenstehen des Herrn Dr. Goesch in der Freudschen psychoanalytischen Weltanschauung.

Nun bin ich selbstverständlich nicht in der Lage, Ihnen in Kürze ein umfassendes Bild der Freudschen psychoanalytischen Theorie geben zu können. Ich will nur einiges ausführen, was zur Aufklärung des Falles Goesch-Sprengel dienen kann. Aber ich darf sagen, daß ich mich in gewisser Beziehung berechtigt fühle, auch über die Psychoanalyse zu sprechen, da einer derjenigen medizinischen Gelehrten, der an deren Ausgangspunkt, an deren Begründung beteiligt war, der aber später, nachdem die Entartung der Psychoanalyse im späteren Leben des Dr. Freud stattgefunden hatte, die psychoanalytische Theorie wieder verlassen hat, in früheren Jahren in freundschaftlicher Beziehung zu mir gestanden hat.

Fassen Sie also das, was ich nun sagen werde, nicht als vollständige Charakterisierung der Freudschen psychoanalytischen Theorie auf, sondern nur als ein Herausheben einiger Punkte.

Zunächst geht der Psychoanalytiker Freudscher Art davon aus, daß neben dem bewußten noch ein unbewußtes Seelenleben vorhanden ist, das heißt, daß außer dem Seelenleben des Menschen, das bewußt abläuft, noch ein unbewußtes Seelenleben vorhanden ist, mit einem Inhalt, über den sich der Mensch im gewöhnlichen Bewußtsein nicht klar ist. Nun bildet einen wichtigen Teil der Psychoanalyse die Lehre, daß gewisse Erlebnisse, die ein Mensch im Laufe seines Lebens haben kann, auf ihn einen Eindruck machen können, aber so, daß der Eindruck aus dem Bewußtsein in das Unterbewußtsein verschwindet und dort fortlebt. So daß also nach der Anschauung des Psychoanalytikers nicht voll zum gegenwärtigen Bewußtsein zu kommen braucht, was in das Unbewußte hinuntergeht; daß zum Beispiel der Mensch während seiner Kindheit irgendeinen Eindruck gehabt haben kann, der ihm nicht voll zum Bewußtsein kommt, aber doch so stark auf seine Seele wirkte, daß er ins Unbewußte hinunterging und da weiterwirkt. Die Wirkung bleibt vorhanden. So daß man also vor den Fall gestellt sein kann - ich will gleich, indem ich viele Mittelglieder auslasse, das Ergebnis der ganzen Sache kurz vor Augen führen -, daß die Wirkung später zu einem gestörten Seelenleben geführt hat und man sagen kann: Da muß im Unterbewußtsein so etwas wie eine Art Seeleninsel drunten sein, das als Erlebnis in früherer Zeit, meist in der Jugend, vorhanden war, was dann fortwuchert. Wenn man in der geschilderten psychoanalytischen, katechisierenden Weise den Dingen nachgeht, so kann man solche Seeleninseln, die im Unterbewußtsein wuchern, ins Bewußtsein heraufheben. Und dadurch, daß man dieses Unterbewußte in den Bewußtseinskomplex heraufhebt, zum Bewußtsein bringt, heilt man den Menschen in der Richtung, in der er einen solchen Seelendefekt hat.

Am Ausgangspunkte der psychoanalytischen Bestrebung war, namentlich von Dr. Breuer, die Praxis befolgt worden, diese Katechisierung in der Hypnose vorzunehmen. Davon war aber abgegangen worden; die Freudsche Schule macht diese katechisierende Analyse jetzt beim Wachbewußtsein. Es sind also fortwuchernde Seeleninseln vorhanden, die aber nicht im Bewußtsein sind.

Nun hat sich diese psychoanalytische Weltanschauung nach und nach über alle möglichen Lebenserscheinungen verbreitet, und sie versucht, dafür Erklärungen zu geben vor allem auch in bezug auf die Traumerscheinungen des Menschen. Und da - ich habe das schon einmal in einem Vortrage vor unseren Freunden an irgendeinem Orte ausgeführt - ergeht sich die Freudsche Schule schon in den allergewagtesten Vorstellungen. Sie sagt, daß im Traume vorzugsweise unerfüllte Wünsche des Menschen eine Rolle spielen. Es sei ein sehr häufiger typischer Fall, daß der Mensch im Traume oftmals etwas aus dem Grunde erlebt, weil es ein unerfüllter Wunsch ist, ein Wunsch, der im äußeren Leben nicht erfüllt werden kann.

Nun kann es vorkommen - und das würde vom Standpunkte der psychoanalytischen Theoretiker das Bedeutsame sein -, daß ein solcher Wunsch, der in einer also unbewußten Seeleninsel vorhanden ist, vom Traum heraufgehoben wird und eine Umkleidung sein kann von einem Impuls, der schon in früher Jugend auf den Menschen ausgeübt worden ist.

Sie sehen, meine lieben Freunde, daß gerade in diesen Gedankengängen etwas höchst Eigentümliches liegt, nämlich daß vorausgesetzt wird, daß der Mensch zum Beispiel als junger Bursche oder als junges Mädchen ein Erlebnis gehabt hat, das ins Unterbewußte hinuntergegangen ist und sich dann als Trübung des Bewußtseins, als Phantasie-Erlebnis auslebt.

Nehmen Sie jetzt das Schema: Tageserlebnisse werden hinuntergedrückt in das Unterbewußte, sie leben da weiter und führen zu einem geschwächten Bewußtsein - dann haben Sie genau das Schema, das Dr. Goesch aufbaut in bezug auf das Versprechengeben und deren Nichthalten, das Weiterwirken im Unterbewußtsein, und daß damit beabsichtigt werde, im Unterbewußtsein etwas zu bewirken wie die Inseln der Freudschen psychoanalytischen Theorie, und daß jetzt in raffiniert-systematischer Weise operiert werde und ein Zustand der Verblödung hervorgebracht werde, wie sonst ihn in der Seele der Traum hervorbringt durch das, was durch die in das Unterbewußte hinuntergesunkenen Tageserlebnisse hervorgebracht wird.

Eine vertrackte Theorie, die, wenn man in ihr lebt, gewisse Gedankenformen auslöst, die sich dann auf das ganze Denken übertragen. Mit dieser Theorie hängt es zusammen, warum bei Dr. Goesch, wie Sie finden können, ein so waghalsiger Gedanke überhaupt auftreten kann.

Weiter habe ich gesagt: Die Berührungsvorstellung spielt eine große Rolle. Meine lieben Freunde, ich will Ihnen nun einige Stellen aus einem der Bücher des Prof. Sigmund Freud vorlesen, bei denen ich Sie bitte, auf einiges achtzugeben. Ich muß aber, bevor ich diese Stellen vorlese - sie sind aus einem Buche, in dem Freudsche Aufsätze aus der Freudschen Zeitschrift «Imago» gesammelt sind -, etwas anderes vorausschicken, weil es mit dem Fall Goesch-Sprengel zu tun hat.

Erinnern Sie sich - diejenigen, die Fräulein Sprengel längere Zeit kennen, werden es wissen -, daß bei ihr eine große Rolle die Tatsache spielt, daß sie ihr Äußeres bewahrt haben will vor Leuten, die einen Einfluß auf die Aura haben, daß sie einen Horror hatte, einem die Hand zu geben und dergleichen. Die Vorstellung, daß das Händegeben ein Kapitalverbrechen sei in unserer Esoterik, das ist eine Vorstellung, die sie sich bildete schon zu einer Zeit, als Dr. Goesch noch nicht hier war. Zur Charakteristik der Sache will ich einen Vorgang schildern. Ich hatte in dem Laboratorium von Dr. Schmiedel etwas zu tun und traf darin auch Fräulein Sprengel. Ich gab ihr die Hand, und dies gab ihr die Veranlassung, zu sagen: So ist es immer bei ihm; er tut einem alles mögliche an, gibt einem dann die Hand, und dadurch wird alles vergessen gemacht. - Da haben Sie den Urkeim von der Theorie mit dem Handgeben.

Gestern wurde Ihnen vorgelesen, was in Fräulein Sprengel, in ihrer vertrackten Seelenkonstitution, aus dieser Theorie mit Hilfe von Dr. Goesch geworden ist: Er brachte ihr die Freudschen Theorien entgegen und konnte die Dinge systematisch mit den Freudschen Gedankenformen verbinden. Auf Seite 27 des genannten Buches von Freud befindet sich nun folgende Stelle:

«Der Hauptcharakter der psychologischen Konstellation, die so fixiert worden ist, liegt in dem, was man das ambivalente Verhalten des Individuums gegen das Objekt, vielmehr die eine Handlung an ihm, heißen könnte. (Nach einem trefflichen Ausdruck von Bleuler.) Es will diese Handlung - die Berührung - immer wieder ausführen, es sieht in ihr den höchsten Genuß, aber es darf sie nicht ausführen, es verabscheut sie auch. Der Gegensatz der beiden Strömungen ist auf kurzem Wege nicht ausgleichbar, weil sie - wir können nur sagen - im Seelenleben so lokalisiert sind, daß sie nicht zusammenstoßen können. Das Verbot wird laut bewußt, die fortdauernde Berührungslust ist unbewußt, die Person weiß nichts von ihr. Bestünde dieses psychologische Moment nicht, so könnte eine Ambivalenz weder sich so lange erhalten, noch könnte sie zu solchen Folgeerscheinungen führen.»

- Hier ist sehr viel geredet darüber, wie die Berührungsangst eine gewisse Rolle spielt bei den Neurotikern.—

«In der klinischen Geschichte des Falles haben wir das Eindringen des Verbotes in so frühem Kindesalter als das maßgebende hervorgehoben; für die weitere Gestaltung fällt diese Rolle dem Mechanismus der Verdrängung auf dieser Altersstufe zu. Infolge der stattgehabten Verdrängung, die mit einem Vergessen - Amnesie - verbunden ist, bleibt die Motivierung des bewußt gewordenen Verbotes unbekannt und müssen alle Versuche scheitern, es intellektuell zu zersetzen, da diese den Punkt nicht finden, an dem sie angreifen könnten. Das Verbot verdankt seine Stärke seinen Zwangscharakter - gerade der Beziehung zu seinem unbewußten Gegenpart, der im Verborgenen ungedämpften Lust, also einer inneren Notwendigkeit, in welche die bewußte Einsicht fehlt. Die Übertragbarkeit und Fortpflanzungsfähigkeit des Verbots spiegelt einen Vorgang wider, der sich mit der unbewußten Lust zuträgt und unter den psychologischen Bedingungen des Unbewußten besonders erleichtert ist. Die Trieblust verschiebt sich beständig, um der Absperrung, in der sie sich befindet, zu entgehen, und sucht Surrogate für das Verbotene - Ersatzobjekte und Ersatzhandlungen - zu gewinnen. Darum wandert auch das Verbot und dehnt sich auf die neuen Ziele der verpönten Regung aus. Jeden neuen Vorstoß der verdrängten Libido beantwortet das Verbot mit einer neuen Verschärfung. Die gegenseitige Hemmung der beiden ringenden Mächte erzeugt ein Bedürfnis nach Abfuhr, nach Verringerung der herrschenden Spannung, in welchem man die Motivierung der Zwangshandlungen erkennen darf. Diese sind bei der Neurose deutliche Kompromißaktionen, in der einen Ansicht Bezeugungen von Reue, Bemühungen zur Sühne und dergleichen, in der anderen aber gleichzeitig Ersatzhandlungen, welche den Trieb für das Verbotene entschädigen. Es ist ein Gesetz der neurotischen Erkrankung, daß diese Zwangshandlungen immer mehr in den Dienst des Triebes treten und immer näher an die ursprünglich verbotene Handlung herankommen.»

Nehmen Sie diesen ganzen Zwangsvorstellungsprozeß der Berührungsangst, und denken Sie sich, Fräulein Sprengel wäre als solches Objekt der Berührungsangst einem Psychoanalytiker gegenübergestellt worden und dieser hätte seine gewöhnliche psychoanalytische Praxis ausgeübt, hätte sie katechisiert wegen der Berührungsangst und hätte zu finden gesucht die Voraussetzung, die zu ihrer Berührungsangst geführt hat.

Ein drittes Moment, das ich herausheben wollte, ist das Verhältnis von Fräulein Sprengel zu Herrn Goesch. Dieses Verhältnis müßte — nach psychoanalytischer Theorie - selbstverständlich so gekennzeichnet werden, daß da maskierte erotische Vorstellungen spielen. Ich meine das ganz objektiv. (...) 1Bei der folgenden Ausführung wurde offensichtlich die Verbindung vom Fall GoeschSprengel zur Psychoanalyse aufgezeigt. Der Stenograph konnte jedoch nur die Worte festhalten: «Nun handelt es sich darum, wie wird eine Verbindung geschaffen ... indern solche maskierten Triebe vorhanden... gerade zwischen zwei Persönlichkeiten dieser Art ...»

Meine lieben Freunde, da müssen wir noch ein bißchen weiter in das ganze Gefüge der psychoanalytischen Weltanschauung hineinschauen. Nach dem, wie ich sie Ihnen jetzt analysiert habe, werden also gewisse Seeleninseln aus dem Unterbewußtsein heraufgeholt, und es wird vorausgesetzt, daß alle diese Seeleninseln in weitaus überwiegendem Maße sexueller Natur sind, so daß die Aufgabe des Psychoanalytikers darin besteht, auf solche während der ersten Zeit des Lebens geschehene und dann in das Unterbewußtsein hinuntergegangene Erlebnisse zu kommen und sie zum Zwecke der Heilung wieder heraufzuholen. Die Heilung wird nach Freudscher Theorie gerade dadurch bewirkt, daß man verborgene sexuelle Komplexe aus den unterbewußten Gründen des Seelenlebens ins Bewußtsein heraufholt. Wie viele Erfolge diese Methode, um Patienten zu heilen, gehabt hat, das wird in den darauf bezüglichen Büchern viel erörtert.

Sie sehen, wie die Grundnuance des ganzen Denkens der Psychoanalytiker vielfach ein von psychischer Sexualität durchdrungenes ist. Das geht so weit, meine lieben Freunde, daß die PsychoanaIyse auf alle möglichen anderen Erscheinungen des Lebens angewandt wird. Das geht so weit, daß zum Beispiel die Mythologie, die Sagenkunde, von Anhängern Freuds und von Freud selber im psychoanalytischen Sinne so gedeutet wird, daß immer - das ist in dem weitaus größten Maße der Fall - auf verborgene psychische Sexualität geschlossen wird. Sie wollen zum Beispiel die Ödipussage, das Ödipusproblem erklären. Der Inhalt der Ödipussage ist ja kurz gesagt der, daß Ödipus dazu geführt wird, seinen Vater zu töten und seine Mutter zu heiraten. Nun fragt der Psychoanalytiker: Worauf beruht so etwas? - Und er sagt: Solche Dinge beruhen immer auf den in das unbewußte Seelenleben hinuntergedrängten sexuellen Komplexen, bei denen es sich gewöhnlich um ein sexuelles Erlebnis handelt, das in der allerersten Kindheit stattgefunden hat. Und da das Verhältnis des Kindes zum Vater und zu der Mutter schon von der Geburt an ein sexuelles ist - es ist dies eine feststehende Freudsche Anschauung -, so ist das Kind, wenn es ein Knabe ist, unbewußt verliebt in seine Mutter und daher unbewußt, unterbewußt, eifersüchtig auf den Vater.

Sie sehen, meine lieben Freunde, hier beginnt die Theorie dasjenige zu werden, was einen dazu verleiten kann zu sagen, diese Psychoanalytiker sollten ihre Theorie, wenn sie an sie glauben, vor allen Dingen auf sich selber anwenden; sie sollten sie darauf anwenden, daß ihr Schicksal, ihre Anschauung davon herrührt, daß sie in der Kindheit zu viele sexuelle Prozesse gehabt haben, die ins Seelenleben hinuntergesenkt worden sind. Diese Theorie muß vor allen Dingen auf Freud und seine Bekenner selber angewendet werden.

Die Entstehung von so etwas wie die Ödipussage wird also, wie gesagt, darauf zurückgeführt, daß im Grunde genommen die meisten Knaben, bei ihrer Geburt beginnend, ein unerlaubtes Verhältnis zu ihrer Mutter hätten und daher auf ihren Vater eifersüchtig seien. Der Vater wird ihr Feind, und die Folge davon ist, daß in der trüben Phantasie der Knaben der Vater in irgendeiner Weise als Feind fortwuchert. Weil aber später durch den Verstand bewirkt wird, daß man kein Verhältnis zu der Mutter haben darf, so wird dieses Verhältnis hinuntergedrückt in das Unterbewußte. Der Knabe geht dann durch das Leben mit etwas, was nie zu seinem Bewußtsein kommt, das aber ist etwas wie ein unerlaubtes Verhältnis zu seiner Mutter und wie ein konträres Verhältnis zu seinem Vater, weil er ihn als Nebenbuhler empfindet.

Also nach psychoanalytischer Theorie muß man bei defekten Seelen nach Seelenkomplexen suchen, und dann wird man finden, wenn sie ins Bewußtsein heraufgehoben werden, daß eine Heilung eintreten kann. Es ist schade, daß ich die Dinge nicht weiter ausführen kann, aber ich will versuchen, sie so genau als möglich anzudeuten. In der Schrift, von der ich eben gesprochen habe, finden Sie zum Beispiel auf Seite 16 das Folgende:

«Wir haben in den vorstehenden Ausführungen wenig Gelegenheit gehabt, zu zeigen, daß die Tatsachen der Völkerpsychologie, durch die Anwendung der psychoanalytischen Betrachtungen, in neuem Verständnis gesehen werden können, denn die Inzestscheu der Wilden ist längst als solche erkannt worden und bedarf keiner weiteren Deutung.»

In diesem Aufsatz wird nämlich ausgeführt, warum der Wilde das Verbot der Ehe mit Mutter und Schwester so strikt durchführt, warum unerlaubte Verhältnisse zu Mutter und Schwester bestraft werden. «Inzest» ist die Liebe zu Blutsverwandten, und einer der ersten Aufsätze in diesem Buche heißt «Die Inzestscheu». Diese wird auf die Weise begründet, daß eigentlich ein Inzesthang, namentlich bei jedem männlichen Individuum, vorhanden sei, weil ein gewisses, unerlaubtes Verhältnis zur Mutter vorhanden sei.

«Was wir zu ihrer Würdigung hinzufügen können, ist die Aussage, sie sei ein exquisit infantiler Zug

- das heißt, der Wilde behält ihn das ganze Leben, beim Kinde ist er ins Unterbewußte hinuntergedrückt—

und eine auffällige Übereinstimmung mit dem seelischen Leben des Neurotikers. Die Psychoanalyse hat uns gelehrt, daß die erste sexuelle Objektwahl des Knaben eine inzestuöse ist, den verpönten Objekten, Mutter und Schwester, gilt, und hat uns auch die Wege kennen gelehrt, auf denen sich der Heranwachsende von der Anziehung des Inzests frei macht. Der Neurotiker repräsentiert uns aber regelmäßig ein Stück des psychischen Infantilismus, er hat es entweder nicht vermocht, sich von den kindlichen Verhältnissen der Psychosexualität zu befreien, oder er ist zu ihnen zurückgekehrt. (Entwicklungshemmung und Regression.) In seinem unbewußten Seelenleben spielen darum noch immer oder wiederum die inzestuösen Fixierungen der Libido eine Hauptrolle. Wir sind dahin gekommen, das vom Inzestverlangen beherrschte Verhältnis zu den Eltern für den Kernkomplex der Neurose zu erklären.

-Der Kernkomplex der Neurose ist nach psychoanalytischer Theorie der unerlaubte Sexualhang des Knaben zu Mutter und Schwester.—

Die Aufdeckung dieser Bedeutung des Inzests für die Neurose stößt natürlich auf den allgemeinsten Unglauben der Erwachsenen und Normalen; dieselbe Ablehnung wird z.B. auch den Arbeiten von Otto Rank entgegentreten, die in immer größerem Ausmaß dartun, wie sehr das Inzestthema im Mittelpunkte des dichterischen Interesses steht und in ungezählten Variationen und Entstellungen der Poesie den Stoff liefert. Wir sind genötigt zu glauben, daß solche Ablehnung vor allem ein Produkt der tiefen Abneigung des Menschen gegen seine einstigen, seither der Verdrängung verfallenen Inzestwünsche ist. Es ist uns darum nicht unwichtig, an den wilden Völkern zeigen zu können, daß sie die zur späteren Unbewußtheit bestimmten Inzestwünsche des Menschen noch als bedrohlich empfinden und der schärfsten Abwehrmaßregeln für würdig halten.»

Von diesem ausgehend, meine lieben Freunde, verbreitet sich eine Atmosphäre von sexuellen Vorstellungen über das ganze Gebiet der Psychoanalytiker. Sie leben und weben gleichsam in Sexualvorstellungen. Daher hat nichts mehr als die Psychoanalyse dazu beigetragen, daß die unglaublichste Verhöhnung des Natürlichen im Menschenleben wirklich sich nach und nach, ich möchte sagen, ohne daß es die Leute bemerken, in das Leben einschleicht. Und ich muß sagen, tief kann ich es nachfühlen einem alten Herrn, der sein Leben lang sich bemüht hat, auch etwas beizutragen zum Hereinbringen von Moral in die Medizin, Moritz Benedikt, wenn er sagt: Wenn man Umschau hält, kann man bemerken, daß wir Ärzte vor 30 Jahren von gewissen sexuellen Abnormalitäten weniger gewußt haben als die heutigen achtzehnjährigen Pensionatsmädchen. Nachfühlen kann man dies diesem Manne, denn es entspricht der Wahrheit. Ich möchte dies insbesondere darum erwähnen, weil es außerordentlich wichtig ist, gewisse Vorgänge des Kindeslebens auf naturgemäße Weise anzuschauen und sie nicht unnötig sogleich unter dem Aspekte der Sexualität zu sehen.

Bei Kindern ist lange etwas eine unschuldige Handlung, was heute, aus vertrackten Theorien heraus, irgendwie als sexuelle Verirrung angesehen wird. Und weiter braucht man in den meisten Fällen nicht zu gehen, als die Dinge als nichts anderes denn als kindlichen Unfug anzusehen. Ein paar Klapse auf eine gewisse Stelle des Körpers genügen als hinreichende Kur. Die schlechteste Kur aber ist diese, wenn man viel redet über diese Dinge oder gar viel redet mit den Kindern selber und ihnen allerlei Theorien beibringt. Es ist schwierig, selbst mit Erwachsenen, über diese Dinge ganz deutlich zu sprechen. Aber dem, der oftmals Ratschläge in mannigfaltigster Beziehung zu geben hat, kommt es leider oft vor, daß Eltern mit Klagen kommen, mitunter ganz dummen Klagen, unter anderem auch mit der Klage, daß Kinder unter sexueller Verirrung leiden. Und was lag dem zu Grunde? Nur das lag dahinter, daß das Kind sich kratzte. Es war kein anderer Anlaß, als daß das Kind sich kratzte. Und ebensowenig, wie das Kratzen am Arme ein sexueller Akt ist, ebensowenig ist das Kratzen an einer anderen Stelle ein sexueller Akt. Dr. Freud allerdings vertritt die Idee, daß jedes Kratzen, jede Berührung, die Berührung des Mundes mit dem Schnuller ein sexueller Akt ist. Dr. Freud gießt über das ganze Leben des Menschen die Aura der Sexualität aus. Es wäre wirklich gut, sich ein wenig mit diesen Dingen zu beschäftigen, um so die Auswüchse der materialistischen Wissenschaft kennenzulernen, sich also etwas zu beschäftigen mit dem, was man die Freudsche Psychoanalyse nennt. So wird also alles in diese Atmosphäre hineingeführt, gleichsam sub spezie dieser Dinge gesehen.

Ein ungarischer Psychoanalytiker schreibt in einem Buche, das Dr. Freud anführt, über einen fünfjährigen Knaben namens Arpad, über dessen Quelle seines Interesses für das Treiben im Hühnerhof nach diesem ungarischen Psychoanalytiker Ferenczi kein Zweifel blieb: «Der rege Sexualverkehr zwischen Hahn und Henne, das Eierlegen und das Herauskriechen der jungen «Brut» befriedigten seine sexuelle Wißbegierde, die eigentlich dem menschlichen Familienleben galt. Nach dem Vorbild des Hühnerlebens hatte er seine Objektwünsche geformt, wenn er einmal der Nachbarin sagte: «Ich werde Sie heiraten und Ihre Schwester und meine drei Cousinen und die Köchin, nein, statt der Köchin lieber die Mutter.»

Man möchte lieber die Zeiten zurücksehnen, wo man solche Dinge bei den Kindern anhören konnte, ohne daß man zu sexuellen Theorien so vertrackter Art seine Zuflucht nehmen mußte. Ich möchte, meine lieben Freunde, dieses Thema nur andeuten, aber es wird in der nächsten Zeit gerade über diesen Punkt zur Beruhigung von Vätern und Müttern einmal gesprochen werden können. Denn ganz unvermerkt verbreitet sich stark und ohne daß die Leute es immer merken, die Freudsche Theorie, die allerdings nur ein Symptom dafür ist, daß ein solcher Trieb durch die Welt geht. Wenn Eltern mit der Klage kommen, daß ihre vier- bis fünfjährigen Söhne oder Töchter unter sexuellen Verirrungen leiden, so muß man zumeist die Antwort geben: Die Verirrungen bestehen in der Hauptsache in der Art und Weise, wie Ihr über den Fall denkt. - Das ist zumeist die größte Verirrung.

Da haben Sie die Atmosphäre, in der die Freudsche Psychoanalyse plätschert. Ich weiß selbstverständlich, daß Freudianer etwas hiergegen sagen können, wenn man so etwas in Kürze darstellt. Aber der Ausdruck ist voll berechtigt, daß in diesen psychosexuellen Dingen die ganze Psychoanalyse plätschert, ja sie trieft nur so davon, wie dies in ihren Abhandlungen zutage tritt.

Nun denken Sie sich aber einmal, meine lieben Freunde, daß bei jemandem die Voraussetzung, daß im menschlichen Unterbewußtsein psychosexuelle Inseln seien, wirklich zutrifft. Was kann da eintreten? Es kann das eintreten, daß der betreffende Freudsche Theoretiker sich den Betreffenden, bei dem er das voraussetzt, vornimmt und ihn katechisiert und dadurch ein neues Kapitel oder einen neuen Fall zu der Freudschen psychoanalytischen Theorie hinzubringt. Es hätte in dem uns beschäftigenden Fall eintreten können, daß Herr Dr. Goesch sich gesagt hätte, das werde ich einmal katechisieren, dann werde ich manches finden in diesen psychosexuellen Inseln, was mir dienlich ist, die Freudschen Theorien zu belegen. - Dazu hätte aber etwas gehört, was man nur so bezeichnen könnte, daß man sagte: Die Seele des Herrn Dr. Goesch hätte stärker sein müssen. Sie erlag aber einer gewissen Art des Verhältnisses zu seiner neu gewählten Freundin, und für das ganze Verhältnis ist das Material, das vorliegt, das ausgezeichnetste. Wer dieses in der richtigen Weise verwendet, findet die Möglichkeit, das ganze Verhältnis in der allerausgezeichnetsten Weise mit objektiv-klinischer Genauigkeit zu bezeichnen. Und da es bei vielem nicht so sehr darauf ankommt, ob man es mit einem wichtigen oder mit einem unwichtigen Fall zu tun hat, sondern auf das, was man aus dem Fall lernen kann, so muß ich sagen, daß schließlich der Fall etwa zu einer solchen Betrachtung führen kann, wie ich sie geliefert habe im Jahre 1900 in einem Aufsatz in der «Wiener klinischen Rundschau» über «Die Philosophie Friedrich Nietzsches als psychopathologisches Problem». Denn man mußte neben alledem, was die Genialität Nietzsches der Welt gegeben hat, auch die Verpflichtung fühlen, zu zeigen, wie die Welt sich falsch zu Friedrich Nietzsche stellt, wenn sie das Psychopathologische bei ihm nicht berücksichtigt. Für unser Gesellschaftsleben ist es wichtig, daß das Psychopathologische nicht überhand nimmt, daß es in den Gemütern ausgemerzt wird und im richtigen Lichte geschaut werden kann und daß nicht der Psychopath als Wesen höherer Art angesehen wird. Daher ist es wichtig, auch solche Fälle in richtiger Weise ins Auge zu fassen und von einem richtigen Standpunkte aus zu beurteilen, um was es sich dabei handelt.

Die Zeit ist schon zu weit vorgeschritten, als daß ich ausführen könnte, wie das Unwetter nach und nach heraufgezogen ist. Als ich im Mai dieses Jahres in Wien, in Österreich war, da schrieb mir eines unserer Mitglieder einen Brief, den ich, weil man jetzt Briefe nicht über die Grenze tragen kann, beim Zurückkehren hierher zerreißen mußte, in dem aber ungefähr dieselben Vorwürfe erhoben worden sind, auch unter der Mitwirkung der Freudschen Psychoanalyse, so wie sie sich bei Dr. Goesch unter dem Einfluß von Fräulein Sprengel ergeben haben. Die Vorwürfe in jenem Brief kamen aus derselben Ecke; es ist sozusagen derselbe Wind. Manche Sätze würden sogar, wenn ich sie Ihnen vorlesen könnte, wunderbar übereinstimmen mit dem, was Fräulein Sprengel in Dr. Goesch hineininspiriert hat.

Was liegt nun aber eigentlich in dem Fall Goesch-Sprengel vor? Es liegt nicht nur das vor, daß Dr. Goesch nicht der richtige Psychoanalytiker gewesen ist, denn dazu hätte er ein objektives Verhältnis, wie dasjenige eines Arztes zu dem Patienten, zu Fräulein Sprengel gebraucht. Sie wirkte aber zu überwältigend auf ihn, und daher wurde nicht nur das Oberbewußtsein von Herrn Goesch zum Examinator. Nach der Freudschen Theorie kam also alles das heraus, was in der Seele der Freundin, der «Siegelbewahrerin», lebte. Weil es aber ins Unbewußte hineinging, wurde es kaschiert durch eine ganze Theorie, die in dem Briefe von Dr. Goesch vorliegt.

Mit dem Fall Goesch-Sprengel, der aus einem der größten Irrtümer, der aus einer der schlimmsten materialistischen Theorien unserer Zeit entstanden ist, kommt man nur zurecht durch die Erkenntnis, daß beide Persönlichkeiten über ihre menschlich-allzumenschlichen Verhältnisse ein mystisches Mäntelchen geworfen haben, das im Wesentlichen - und diese Seite ist durch ausgezeichnete Dokumente ja genugsam bezeugt - die Ummantelung eines menschlichallzumenschlichen Verhältnisses mit psychoanalytischen Theorien Freudscher Art ist.

Wenn wir dann das Bestreben haben, solchen Menschen, die mit solchen vertrackten Seelenkonstitutionen zu uns kommen, zu helfen, dann, meine lieben Freunde, tritt sehr häufig das auf, daß diese Menschen, die zuerst ziemlich wedelnde Anhänger waren, ihre Anhängerschaft später in Feindschaft verwandeln. Das ist sogar auch etwas, was ganz psychoanalytisch erklärt werden kann. Uns aber ist es dringend nötig, uns um die Welt zu kümmern. Denn geradeso, wie von dieser Seite, von Seite der von sexuellen Vorstellungen überschwemmten psychoanalytischen Strömung, jeden Tag neue Feindschaften uns erwachsen können, so kann uns von allen möglichen anderen Verirrungen in der Zeit, in die sich Menschliches-Allzumenschliches hinein verrannt hat, Feindschaft entgegenkommen.

Sie sehen, hier haben Sie auch ein Beispiel, wie wir es gar sehr nötig haben, solche Fälle zu studieren, die uns, weil unsere Gesellschaft schon einmal eine geistige Bewegung darstellt, voll interessieren müssen.

Ich könnte noch lange fortreden, ich will und kann es aber heute nicht tun, weil Sie verhandeln müssen. Aber ich wollte die ersten tappenden Schritte des Weges andeuten, auf dem gesucht werden muß, wenn man sehen will, wo die Gefahren für unsere Bewegung liegen, und wie dringend notwendig es ist, daß wir - jeder so viel wie er kann - arbeiten gegenüber der Welt, damit die Welt draußen weiß, daß sie keine furchtsamen Hasen vor sich hat, sondern Leute, die wissen, ihren Mann und - verzeihen Sie - auch die Frau zu stellen. Wenn sich Dinge ergeben, die sich aufspielen in der Maske, wie es hier in diesem Briefe geschieht, so obliegt es uns, diesen Dingen die Maske herunterzureißen und zu zeigen, wo die Ursprünge liegen. Sie liegen viel tiefer, als man sie gewöhnlich sucht; sie liegen in jener materialistischen Richtung unserer Zeit, die nicht nur wissenschaftliche Richtung geworden ist, sondern unser ganzes Leben verpestet und zu deren Bekämpfung unsere Bewegung eigentlich da ist, zu deren Bekämpfung wir uns aber auch bereit machen müssen und nicht fortdösen dürfen in der Art, daß wir nur die allernotwendigsten Begriffe aufnehmen, sondern daß wir die Augen aufmachen und sehen, was in der Welt vorgeht, was die Leute, die zu uns kommen, in der Welt gelernt haben und was sie von dem Gelernten zu uns hereintragen, wenn sie zu uns kommen.

Fourth Lecture

Thought Processes and Methods of Freudian Psychoanalysis

My dear friends! I must assume that, in the midst of the negotiations that are currently underway, minds may be less receptive at the moment to a lecture that deals with the topic that is to be considered a continuation of yesterday's. I will therefore give this lecture tomorrow for those who wish to attend, and today I would like to talk about something that will be related in one way or another to the matters that are now immediately occupying our minds and must occupy them. 1See appendix.

First of all, I would like to raise the question in a very specific way: What are we actually dealing with in the Goesch-Sprengel case? How can we arrive at what I have often spoken about in my lectures over the last few weeks, namely that it is important to find the right point of view on a matter? So I would like to raise the question: How can we gradually arrive at the right perspective on this issue through a completely objective study of this case?

If we want to treat such a case objectively, we must first remove it from its personal context and secondly place it in a somewhat larger context. And if, as I believe, it turns out that this broader context is the most important thing for us, insofar as we speak of ourselves as our movement, then it is incumbent upon us, I would say, for our own instruction, for the sake of spiritual science itself, to study such a case. Now, the whole case is, of course, part of a larger context; to what extent this is the case can be seen when one considers the letter written by Dr. Goesch on August 19, 1915, with regard to his main motives and his main arguments.

Now, since you are facing important negotiations, I do not want to keep you too long and will first highlight only a few essential main points. One such main point is, first, the accusation of not keeping promises. If you have listened carefully to the letter, you will have noticed that the emphasis is not on the mere accusation of making and breaking promises, but that the main accusation is that I am deliberately seeking a method and proceeding systematically to make promises to members and not keeping them; and that when members realize that the promises are not being kept, they are put into a certain state of mind that compels them to relate to the person who made the promise and did not keep it, thereby creating an accumulation of forces which, as they accumulate in the soul, must gradually lead to the stupefaction of the members.

This is the first hypothesis that is put forward. So we are dealing with the assertion that systematic attempts are being made to bring about the stupefaction, that is, the darkening of the members' minds, that the deliberate making and breaking of promises is a means of dulling the normal state of consciousness of the members, so that they are led into a kind of stupefaction and idiocy. This is stated first in the letter.

Secondly, it states that one of the means used is to shake hands, engage in friendly conversation, and the like, in short, to bring about a certain kind of contact with the members, which in turn, due to its special nature and the influences it exerts on the members, is suitable for evoking something in the souls of the members that is intended and that is to be evoked by means of contact, be it through handshakes or conversation.

The third point to consider—and this is the supporting framework throughout Dr. Goesch's entire letter, which pervades it so completely—is the nature of the relationship between Miss Sprengel and Dr. Goesch.

These three points, which could be expanded upon, should be highlighted first.

Now the first question is: How does Dr. Goesch come to construct such a systematic theory, based on the first two points, about the way in which means are used to damage the members' state of consciousness? This must be investigated and we must seek to find out: Where does something like this come from? And here we are led to Dr. Goesch's years of immersion in so-called Freudian psychoanalytic theory. And if one studies this theory, one will notice that it is closely related to the whole way in which the pathological picture is presented in the letter; that one must draw certain threads from this pathological picture in relation to the first two points to Dr. Goesch's immersion in the Freudian psychoanalytic worldview.

Now, of course, I am not in a position to give you a comprehensive picture of Freudian psychoanalytic theory in a few words. I will only elaborate on a few points that may serve to clarify the Goesch-Sprengel case. But I may say that I feel justified in speaking about psychoanalysis in a certain respect, since one of the medical scholars who was involved in its inception and its foundation, but who later, after the degeneration of psychoanalysis in Dr. Freud's later life, abandoned psychoanalytic theory, had been a friend of mine in earlier years.

So please do not take what I am about to say as a complete characterization of Freudian psychoanalytic theory, but only as a highlighting of a few points.

First of all, psychoanalysts of the Freudian type assume that, in addition to the conscious mind, there is also an unconscious mind, that is, that in addition to the conscious mind, there is also an unconscious mind with content that is not clear to the person in their normal state of consciousness. Now, an important part of psychoanalysis is the teaching that certain experiences that a person may have in the course of their life can make an impression on them, but in such a way that the impression disappears from consciousness into the subconscious and lives on there. So, according to the psychoanalyst's view, what sinks into the unconscious does not need to come fully into present consciousness; for example, a person may have had some impression during their childhood that does not come fully into their consciousness, but which had such a strong effect on their soul that it sank into the unconscious and continues to have an effect there. The effect remains. So that one may be faced with the situation—I will now briefly outline the result of the whole matter, omitting many intermediate steps—that the effect later led to a disturbed mental life, and one can say: there must be something like a kind of mental island down there in the subconscious, which was present as an experience in earlier times, usually in youth, and which then continues to grow. If one pursues things in the psychoanalytical, catechizing manner described, one can bring such islands of the soul, which proliferate in the subconscious, up into consciousness. And by raising this subconscious into the consciousness complex, bringing it to consciousness, one heals the person in the direction in which he has such a defect of the soul.

At the outset of psychoanalytic endeavors, particularly by Dr. Breuer, the practice was to carry out this catechizing under hypnosis. However, this was abandoned; the Freudian school now performs this catechizing analysis in the waking consciousness. So there are proliferating islands of the soul, but they are not in the consciousness.

Now this psychoanalytic worldview has gradually spread to all possible phenomena of life, and it attempts to provide explanations for them, especially in relation to human dreams. And here—I have already explained this in a lecture to our friends somewhere—the Freudian school indulges in the most daring ideas. It says that unfulfilled desires play a major role in dreams. It is a very common and typical case that people often experience something in their dreams because it is an unfulfilled desire, a desire that cannot be fulfilled in their outer life.

Now it can happen — and this would be significant from the point of view of psychoanalytic theorists — that such a wish, which exists in an unconscious island of the soul, is brought up by the dream and can be a re-enactment of an impulse that was exerted on the person in early youth.

You see, my dear friends, that there is something highly peculiar in these lines of thought, namely that it is assumed that the person, for example as a young boy or girl, had an experience that sank into the subconscious and then manifests itself as a clouding of consciousness, as a fantasy experience.

Now take the following scenario: daily experiences are pushed down into the subconscious, where they continue to live and lead to a weakened consciousness — then you have exactly the scenario that Dr. Goesch builds up in relation to making promises and not keeping them, the continuing effect in the subconscious, and that the intention is to bring about something in the subconscious, like the islands in Freud's psychoanalytic theory, and that now a sophisticated and systematic method is being used to bring about a state of stupidity, similar to that which dreams bring about in the soul through what is produced by the daily experiences that have sunk into the subconscious.

A complicated theory which, when one lives by it, triggers certain thought forms that then transfer to one's entire thinking. This theory explains why, as you will see, such a reckless idea could arise in Dr. Goesch's mind in the first place.

I went on to say: The idea of contact plays a major role. My dear friends, I would now like to read to you a few passages from one of Prof. Sigmund Freud's books, in which I ask you to pay attention to a few things. But before I read these passages – they are from a book that collects Freudian essays from Freud's journal “Imago” – I must preface them with something else, because it has to do with the Goesch-Sprengel case.

Remember—those of you who have known Miss Sprengel for a long time will know this—that the fact that she wanted to preserve her appearance in front of people who had an influence on her aura played a major role, that she had a horror of shaking hands and the like. The idea that shaking hands is a capital offense in our esotericism is an idea she formed at a time when Dr. Goesch was not yet here. To illustrate the nature of the matter, I will describe an incident. I had something to do in Dr. Schmiedel's laboratory and met Miss Sprengel there. I shook her hand, and this prompted her to say: “It's always like that with him; he does all sorts of things to you, then shakes your hand, and that makes you forget everything.” There you have the germ of the theory about shaking hands.

Yesterday, you were read what became of Miss Sprengel, with her complicated mental constitution, as a result of this theory with the help of Dr. Goesch: he introduced her to Freud's theories and was able to systematically connect things with Freud's thought forms. On page 27 of the aforementioned book by Freud, the following passage can be found:

"The main characteristic of the psychological constellation that has been established in this way lies in what could be called the ambivalent behavior of the individual toward the object, or rather, toward a particular action performed on it. (According to an apt expression by Bleuler.) It wants to perform this action—the touch—again and again, it sees it as the highest pleasure, but it must not perform it, it also abhors it. The contrast between the two currents cannot be reconciled in the short term because they are—we can only say—located in the soul in such a way that they cannot collide. The prohibition is consciously acknowledged, while the persistent desire for contact is unconscious; the person is unaware of it. If this psychological moment did not exist, ambivalence could neither be maintained for so long nor lead to such consequences.

Here, there is much talk about how fear of contact plays a certain role in neurotics.

- There is a lot of talk here about how fear of touch plays a certain role in neurotics.—

"In the clinical history of the case, we have emphasized the intrusion of the prohibition at such an early age as the decisive factor; for the further development, this role falls to the mechanism of repression at this age level. As a result of the repression that has taken place, which is associated with forgetting—amnesia—the motivation for the conscious prohibition remains unknown, and all attempts to intellectually break it down must fail, as they cannot find the point at which they could attack it. The prohibition owes its strength to its coercive nature—precisely its relationship to its unconscious counterpart, the hidden, unbridled desire, i.e., an inner necessity that lacks conscious insight. The transferability and reproducibility of the prohibition reflects a process that occurs with unconscious desire and is particularly facilitated under the psychological conditions of the unconscious. The instinctual desire constantly shifts in order to escape the barrier in which it finds itself and seeks to gain surrogates for the forbidden—substitute objects and substitute actions. That is why the prohibition also wanders and expands to the new targets of the frowned-upon impulse. The prohibition responds to each new advance of the repressed libido with a new intensification. The mutual inhibition of the two contending forces creates a need for release, for a reduction of the prevailing tension, in which one can recognize the motivation for the compulsive actions. In neurosis, these are clear acts of compromise, in one view expressions of remorse, efforts at atonement and the like, but in the other view, at the same time, substitute acts that compensate for the urge for the forbidden. It is a law of neurotic illness that these compulsive actions increasingly serve the drive and come ever closer to the originally forbidden action.

Take this whole process of compulsive ideas of fear of contact, and imagine that Miss Sprengel had been confronted with a psychoanalyst as such an object of fear of contact, and the latter had practiced his usual psychoanalytic practice, had questioned her about her fear of contact and had sought to find the prerequisite that had led to her fear of contact.

A third point I wanted to highlight is Miss Sprengel's relationship with Mr. Goesch. According to psychoanalytic theory, this relationship would naturally have to be characterized as involving masked erotic fantasies. I mean this quite objectively. (...) 1In the following explanation, the connection between the Goesch-Sprengel case and psychoanalysis was obviously pointed out. However, the stenographer was only able to record the words: “Now it is a question of how a connection is created ... when such masked drives are present ... precisely between two personalities of this kind ...”

My dear friends, we need to look a little further into the whole structure of the psychoanalytic worldview. According to what I have now analyzed for you, certain islands of the soul are brought up from the subconscious, and it is assumed that all these islands of the soul are predominantly sexual in nature, so that the task of the psychoanalyst is to uncover such experiences that occurred during the early stages of life and then sank into the subconscious, and to bring them back up again for the purpose of healing. According to Freudian theory, healing is achieved precisely by bringing hidden sexual complexes from the subconscious depths of the psyche into consciousness. How successful this method has been in healing patients is much discussed in the relevant books.

You can see how the basic nuance of the entire thinking of psychoanalysts is often permeated by psychic sexuality. This goes so far, my dear friends, that psychoanalysis is applied to all kinds of other phenomena in life. It goes so far that, for example, mythology and legend are interpreted by Freud's followers and by Freud himself in a psychoanalytical sense in such a way that hidden psychic sexuality is always inferred – at least in the vast majority of cases. For example, they want to explain the Oedipus myth, the Oedipus problem. In short, the content of the Oedipus myth is that Oedipus is led to kill his father and marry his mother. Now the psychoanalyst asks: What is the basis for such a thing? And he says: Such things are always based on sexual complexes that have been repressed into the unconscious psyche, usually involving a sexual experience that took place in early childhood. And since the child's relationship to the father and mother is sexual from birth—this is a fixed Freudian view—the child, if it is a boy, is unconsciously in love with his mother and therefore unconsciously, subconsciously jealous of the father.

You see, my dear friends, this is where the theory begins to become something that might lead one to say that these psychoanalysts, if they believe in their theory, should apply it first and foremost to themselves; they should apply it to the fact that their fate, their view of it, stems from the fact that they had too many sexual processes in childhood that were lowered into their inner life. This theory must above all be applied to Freud and his followers themselves.

The origin of something like the Oedipus complex is thus attributed, as I said, to the fact that, basically, most boys, starting at birth, have an illicit relationship with their mother and are therefore jealous of their father. The father becomes their enemy, and the result is that in the boys' murky imagination, the father continues to grow in some way as an enemy. But because later on, reason dictates that one must not have a relationship with one's mother, this relationship is suppressed into the subconscious. The boy then goes through life with something that never comes to his consciousness, but which is something like an illicit relationship with his mother and a contrary relationship with his father, because he perceives him as a rival.

So, according to psychoanalytic theory, one must search for soul complexes in defective souls, and then one will find that when they are brought up into consciousness, healing can occur. It is a pity that I cannot elaborate further on these things, but I will try to indicate them as precisely as possible. In the text I just mentioned, for example, you will find the following on page 16:

“In the preceding remarks, we have had little opportunity to show that the facts of ethnic psychology can be seen in a new light through the application of psychoanalytic considerations, for the aversion to incest among savages has long been recognized as such and requires no further interpretation.”

This essay explains why savages strictly enforce the prohibition of marriage with mothers and sisters, and why illicit relationships with mothers and sisters are punished. “Incest” is the love of blood relatives, and one of the first essays in this book is entitled “The aversion to incest.” This is justified by the fact that an incestuous tendency actually exists, especially in every male individual, because a certain illicit relationship with the mother exists.

“What we can add to its appreciation is the statement that it is an exquisitely infantile trait.”

- that is, the savage retains it throughout his life, while in children it is repressed into the subconscious—

and a striking correspondence with the mental life of the neurotic. Psychoanalysis has taught us that the boy's first sexual object choice is an incestuous one, directed at the taboo objects, mother and sister, and has also taught us the ways in which the adolescent frees himself from the attraction of incest. The neurotic, however, regularly represents a piece of psychological infantilism; he has either been unable to free himself from the childish conditions of psychosexuality, or he has returned to them. (Developmental inhibition and regression.) In his unconscious mental life, therefore, the incestuous fixations of the libido still or once again play a major role. We have come to explain the relationship with the parents, dominated by incestuous desire, as the core complex of neurosis.

According to psychoanalytic theory, the core complex of neurosis is the boy's illicit sexual attraction to his mother and sister.—

The discovery of this significance of incest for neurosis is naturally met with the most general disbelief on the part of adults and normal people; the same rejection will also be met, for example, in the works of Otto Rank, which demonstrate to an ever-increasing extent how much the theme of incest is at the center of poetic interest and provides material for countless variations and distortions in poetry. We are compelled to believe that such rejection is primarily a product of man's deep aversion to his former incestuous desires, which have since been repressed. It is therefore important for us to be able to show that primitive peoples still perceive the incestuous desires of humans, which are destined to become unconscious later on, as threatening and consider them worthy of the most severe defensive measures.

Based on this, my dear friends, an atmosphere of sexual ideas spreads throughout the entire field of psychoanalysis. They live and breathe in sexual ideas, as it were. Therefore, nothing more than psychoanalysis has contributed to the most incredible mockery of what is natural in human life gradually creeping into life, I would say, without people noticing. And I must say that I can deeply sympathize with an old gentleman who has spent his life trying to contribute something to bringing morality into medicine, Moritz Benedikt, when he says: If you look around, you will notice that 30 years ago, we doctors knew less about certain sexual abnormalities than today's 18-year-old boarding school girls. One can sympathize with this man, because it is true. I would like to mention this in particular because it is extremely important to view certain processes in a child's life in a natural way and not to immediately view them unnecessarily from the perspective of sexuality.

In children, something that is an innocent act has long been regarded as a sexual aberration based on convoluted theories. And in most cases, one need not go any further than to regard these things as nothing more than childish mischief. A few slaps on a certain part of the body are sufficient as a cure. The worst cure, however, is to talk a lot about these things or even talk a lot with the children themselves and teach them all kinds of theories. It is difficult to talk about these things clearly, even with adults. But those who often have to give advice on a wide variety of issues unfortunately often find that parents come to them with complaints, sometimes very silly complaints, including the complaint that children are suffering from sexual deviance. And what was the reason for this? The only reason was that the child was scratching itself. There was no other reason than that the child was scratching itself. And just as scratching one's arm is not a sexual act, scratching another part of the body is not a sexual act either. Dr. Freud, however, advocates the idea that every scratch, every touch, the touch of the mouth with the pacifier, is a sexual act. Dr. Freud casts an aura of sexuality over the whole of human life. It would be really good to look into these things a little, in order to get to know the excesses of materialistic science, that is, to look into what is called Freudian psychoanalysis. So everything is brought into this atmosphere, seen, as it were, sub specie of these things.

In a book cited by Dr. Freud, a Hungarian psychoanalyst writes about a five-year-old boy named Arpad, whose source of interest in the goings-on in the chicken coop left no doubt in the mind of this Hungarian psychoanalyst, Ferenczi: "The lively sexual intercourse between rooster and hen, the laying of eggs and the hatching of the young ‘brood’ satisfied his sexual curiosity, which was actually directed at human family life. He had modeled his object desires on the life of chickens when he once said to his neighbor: “I will marry you and your sister and my three cousins and the cook, no, instead of the cook, I'd rather have your mother.”

One would rather long for the days when one could hear such things from children without having to resort to such complicated sexual theories. I would like, my dear friends, to only touch on this topic, but in the near future it will be possible to discuss this very point in order to reassure fathers and mothers. For, quite unnoticed, the Freudian theory is spreading rapidly and without people always realizing it, although it is only a symptom of such a drive going through the world. When parents complain that their four- to five-year-old sons or daughters are suffering from sexual aberrations, the answer is usually: The aberrations consist mainly in the way you think about the case. That is usually the greatest aberration.

There you have the atmosphere in which Freudian psychoanalysis splashes about. I know, of course, that Freudians can say something against this when it is presented in such a brief form. But the expression is entirely justified that in these psychosexual matters, the whole of psychoanalysis splashes about, indeed it is dripping with it, as is evident in its treatises.

Now imagine, my dear friends, that someone's assumption that there are psychosexual islands in the human subconscious is actually true. What could happen then? What could happen is that the Freudian theorist in question takes up the person in whom he assumes this to be the case, interrogates him, and thereby adds a new chapter or a new case to Freudian psychoanalytic theory. In the case we are dealing with, it could have happened that Dr. Goesch would have said to himself, I will interrogate this person, then I will find many things in these psychosexual islands that will be useful to me in proving Freud's theories. But this would have required something that could only be described as follows: Dr. Goesch's soul would have had to be stronger. However, it succumbed to a certain kind of relationship with his newly chosen girlfriend, and the material available is the most excellent for the entire relationship. Anyone who uses this in the right way will find it possible to describe the entire relationship in the most excellent way with objective clinical accuracy. And since in many cases it is not so much a question of whether one is dealing with an important or an unimportant case, but rather of what one can learn from the case, I must say that ultimately the case can lead to a consideration such as I presented in 1900 in an essay in the Wiener klinische Rundschau on “The Philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche as a Psychopathological Problem.” For in addition to all that Nietzsche's genius has given to the world, one must also feel obliged to show how the world is wrong about Friedrich Nietzsche if it fails to take into account the psychopathological aspects of his personality. It is important for our social life that the psychopathological does not gain the upper hand, that it is eradicated from people's minds and can be seen in the right light, and that the psychopath is not regarded as a higher being. It is therefore important to consider such cases in the right way and to judge them from the right point of view in order to understand what they are all about.

Time has already progressed too far for me to explain how the storm gradually arose. When I was in Vienna in May of this year, in Austria, one of our members wrote me a letter which I had to tear up on my return here because letters cannot be carried across the border at present, but in which roughly the same accusations were made, also with the assistance of Freudian psychoanalysis, as those made by Dr. Goesch under the influence of Miss Sprengel. The accusations in that letter came from the same quarter; it is, so to speak, the same wind. Some of the sentences, if I could read them to you, would even correspond wonderfully with what Miss Sprengel inspired in Dr. Goesch.

But what exactly is the case of Goesch-Sprengel? It is not just that Dr. Goesch was not the right psychoanalyst, because for that he would have needed an objective relationship with Miss Sprengel, like that of a doctor with a patient. But she had too overwhelming an effect on him, and therefore it was not only Mr. Goesch's conscious mind that became the examiner. According to Freud's theory, everything that lived in the soul of his girlfriend, the “keeper of the seal,” came out. But because it entered the unconscious, it was concealed by an entire theory, which is presented in Dr. Goesch's letter.

The Goesch-Sprengel case, which arose from one of the greatest errors of one of the worst materialistic theories of our time, can only be dealt with by recognizing that both personalities threw a mystical cloak over their human, all-too-human circumstances, which is essentially—and this aspect is sufficiently attested to by excellent documents - the cloaking of a human, all-too-human relationship with psychoanalytic theories of the Freudian kind.

When we then strive to help such people who come to us with such complicated mental constitutions, then, my dear friends, it very often happens that these people, who were initially quite enthusiastic followers, later turn their allegiance into hostility. This is even something that can be explained entirely in psychoanalytical terms. But it is urgently necessary for us to take care of the world. For just as new hostilities can arise every day from this side, from the psychoanalytic movement flooded with sexual ideas, so too can hostility come our way from all kinds of other aberrations in the time in which the human-all-too-human has run astray.

You see, here you also have an example of how we very much need to study such cases, which must be of great interest to us because our society already represents a spiritual movement.

I could go on talking for a long time, but I cannot and will not do so today because you have to negotiate. But I wanted to indicate the first tentative steps on the path that must be sought if one wants to see where the dangers for our movement lie, and how urgently necessary it is that we—each as much as he can—work toward the world, so that the world outside knows that it does not have fearful rabbits before it, but people who know how to stand their ground and—forgive me—also the women. When things arise that play themselves out in the mask, as is happening here in this letter, it is incumbent upon us to tear off the mask and show where the origins lie. They lie much deeper than one usually looks for them; they lie in the materialistic direction of our time, which has not only become a scientific direction, but has also polluted our entire lives, and which our movement is actually there to combat, but which we must also prepare ourselves to combat and not doze off in such a way that we only take in the most necessary concepts, but that we open our eyes and see what is going on in the world, what the people who come to us have learned in the world and what they bring with them when they come to us.