The Rudolf Steiner Archive

21. Law School and Theosophy

[ 1 ] If it might seem far-fetched to discuss any topic related to theosophy, this would certainly apply to today’s topic, in which we wish to attempt to view our legal studies and our legal lives in connection with what we call the theosophical movement. Only those who are fully aware of how deeply the Theosophical Movement is understood by its members—those who know its full significance—as a practical movement can initially recognize this as justified. The true Theosophist cares least of all for theories and dogmas. The essence of the Theosophical Movement, however, is that it intervenes in immediate life. And if, for example, the Theosophical Movement is spoken of as one that is supposed to be far removed from the practice of life, this can only stem from a complete misunderstanding or misinterpretation of this movement.

[ 2 ] Compared to the Theosophical Movement, a large number of other movements appear eminently impractical because they are partial movements, lacking an understanding of the greater context and the great principles of life. It is precisely in this regard that certain questions of life will have to occupy us today. What could have a deeper impact on our lives than that which stems from jurisprudence? In the context of the theosophical worldview, we naturally have less to do with what is called law or legislation. Rather, we are concerned with the actual circumstances as they present themselves to us—specifically those that confront us in the form of human beings themselves, and indeed, in our jurisprudence, in the form of our practicing lawyers themselves. It is therefore no coincidence that the topic bears the title “The Law School and Theosophy.”

[ 3 ] Above all, the question is: How do we train those who are called to intervene when justice has been violated and to restore balance to that violated justice? How does the university cultivate the necessary elements, how does it train lawyers? In the last lecture on the theological faculty and theosophy, which was able to explain the relationship between theosophy and our university in much greater detail, I had to draw attention to how things stand in this regard. It is not so much the materialistic way of thinking as the deep habits of thought of our time, rooted in the minds and souls of people, that impart a certain fundamental character to our lives. This will occupy us even more today.

[ 4 ] You see, with a single fact I could describe to you the situation we find ourselves in when we touch upon today’s topic: the law school and the Theosophical Movement. Anyone who has even a passing familiarity with the law school knows the name Rudolf von Jhering not only from his work: “The Struggle for Law.” Everyone also knows the significance of his great work: “The Purpose of Law.” In this work, he created something that is fundamental to a whole body of principled views in our conception of law and in our jurisprudence. Jhering was undoubtedly one of our most significant legal scholars. Anyone who has had the good fortune to attend one of Jhering’s lectures knows what forceful language this legal scholar used. There was something sincere in Rudolf von Jhering’s nature. I still remember how it happened that Jhering said during a lecture: “I spoke about this or that question last time; I have reconsidered the matter and must now report some significant changes.” — Among those who have achieved similar feats in other fields, the physicist Helmholtz might also be mentioned, who achieved such great success through his significant works, despite the modest manner in which he conducted his work. I cite Jhering because he had an original and profound impact. He was an outstanding jurist who made a deep mark on the jurisprudence of our time. In his work *The Purpose of Law*, you will find a significant passage. I would like to read the passage verbatim: “If I have ever regretted that my development fell into a period when philosophy had fallen into disrepute, it is with regard to the present work. What the young man failed to do at that time under the unfavorable prevailing mood could not be made up for by the mature man.” Such a statement points to a profound deficiency in the education of lawyers. What was lacking here is reflected not only in all of public life, insofar as it depends on legal conditions, but also in literature—not just legal literature, but all literature, insofar as it is influenced by legal thinking. You will find it further in all reform literature. You will find it everywhere, even in practical life, because the most important thing is missing: namely, a true understanding of life and the human soul.

[ 5 ] Why is it missing? Because our impractical practitioners have no idea how everyday life is connected to the deep principles of the individual human soul. Take a look at our economists; take a look at those who write or speak in the service of a reform movement. Anyone with a mathematically trained mind, anyone capable of constructing a strictly logical train of thought, will see that it is missing everywhere, and will recall a significant speech given by John Stuart Mill, in which he says that, above all else, it is necessary for a true training of the mind—a training in the most elementary principles of the life of the soul—to penetrate our public affairs.

[ 6 ] It truly takes very little to train one’s mind in the way necessary to become a true reformer. Three weeks would suffice if one were to engage in a genuine study of the principles of thought. Of course, one would then only have the ability to think correctly and with discipline, but anyone who thinks correctly and with discipline will in any case set aside much of what is written today, because they cannot bear the jumble of impossible thinking contained therein. Just realize for a moment that this is, in the most eminent sense, a tangibly practical question. If someone wanted to build a tunnel and, with the knowledge of an ordinary bricklayer, began chiseling and digging on one side of the mountain, believing he would certainly emerge on the other side and have built a great tunnel, you would probably consider him a fool. But in all areas of life today, people do almost exactly the same thing. What does it take to build a tunnel, a railroad, a bridge? Knowledge of the first principles of mathematics and mechanics, and everything that enables us to foresee from the outset the layers and formations of the mountain into which one intends to work. Only a trained engineer is capable of truly initiating such a project, and the true practitioner is the one who approaches practice on the basis of the entire theory. This is precisely what the world completely overlooks when it comes to the most important questions of life; indeed, it is precisely those who believe that a foundation of knowledge is necessary to solve the great questions of life who are called impractical. Thus we see today the tunnel diggers in all areas of human life lacking sufficient fundamental understanding, without realizing that before one approaches a practical reform movement, it is necessary to acquire the full range of fundamental knowledge and insights into the human soul and to gain clarity regarding the possibilities and impossibilities in this or that field.

[ 7 ] This is what emerges, more or less, from what this great jurist says regarding a foundational education. For he has honestly admitted that he lacked such a foundational philosophical education in relation to his field of study. Therefore, you will see how far I am from criticizing any individual or institution. I merely wished to offer a characterization of the circumstances as they present themselves to us in life. Then the question of what practical significance the Theosophical Movement has for jurisprudence will be easiest for us to answer.

[ 8 ] Jurisprudence has developed in the most unfavorable way possible in the course of historical circumstances, because, as it is expressed today in the most diverse legal systems and schools of law, it first took shape at a time when materialistic thinking had already taken hold in all circles. The other sciences date back to earlier times, and those based on natural science have in their established facts a foundation that does not allow them to stray in all directions so easily.

[ 9 ] Anyone who builds a bridge incorrectly will, of course, very soon realize the consequences of their amateurish approach. But it is not that simple when it comes to the facts we encounter in the realm of the mind. There, one can botch things up, and one can argue about whether something is good or bad. There seems to be no objective criterion. Gradually, however, objective criteria will emerge in this regard as well. I said that Jhering lacks a philosophical foundation in his work. And I say that this can be found lacking wherever one intervenes in our lives.

[ 10 ] Now you might say, “But philosophy is not theosophy.” That is precisely the point. For a time—take the 16th, 17th, and even the 18th centuries, right up into our 19th century—philosophy was, in a certain sense, the foundational discipline for all other studies. We saw last time what disadvantage it has brought to theology that philosophy is no longer this foundation of studies. But in theology there is a substitute for the lack of philosophical study. There is no substitute, however, in the legal field. When the old gymnasiums emerged from the old schools, philosophy became something that, so to speak, fell between two stools. In the past, there were preparatory schools at all universities where students were offered an overview of various disciplines, through which they could also gain an understanding of the laws of life. No one advanced to the higher faculties without having acquired a genuine understanding of the laws of life. Now, philosophizing is considered superfluous because it is believed that the high school provides a general education. But even that has disappeared from high schools today. Only a few old-fashioned people still hold the view that a little logic and psychology should also be taught in high school.

[ 11 ] This is how it came to be that the legal profession pursued a one-sided specialized course of study. The other faculties, for the most part, also lack their own preparatory program that imparts a general, genuine understanding of life and a deep insight into life’s mysteries and questions. Thus, students are introduced to specialized questions at an early stage and are necessarily forced to delve deeper and deeper into these specialized topics. This is why the lawyer is steered in a very specific direction even during his training. This does not refer to details; but he who has been filled with certain forms of concepts over the years can no longer break free from these concepts. The conditions are such that he must regard as a fool anyone who has retained a certain freedom of thought regarding concepts that have become completely fixed for him during his years of study.

[ 12 ] Now, precisely during the period in which our modern way of thinking took shape, philosophy has become something that, in a certain sense, stands apart from life. In the Middle Ages, there was no philosophy that was separate—I mean, practically separate—from theology. Everything philosophy dealt with was connected to the great and comprehensive questions of existence. That has changed in more recent times. Philosophy has emancipated itself; it has become a science because it no longer has a direct connection—and I will elaborate on this further in the lecture on the philosophy department—with the central questions of life. That is why it came to pass that, for centuries, one could study philosophy without connecting the terminology to anything truly alive. In the 18th century, there was still something that made philosophy a wisdom of the world. When Schelling, Hegel, and Fichte came along, they grasped immediate life. But these minds were not understood. There was a brief heyday in the early 19th century. But this was followed by a general misunderstanding regarding the need to view philosophy in a genuine connection with life, and to establish between life and the highest principles of thought in all fields a connection such as exists between mathematics, differential calculus, and bridge-building,

[ 13 ] We want those who work on life to realize that certain prerequisites are necessary, just as one must have studied mathematics to build a bridge. Theosophy does not seek to teach dogmas, but rather a way of thinking and a view of life; a view of life that is the opposite of all frivolity, one that establishes a conception of life grounded in serious principles. One need not know anything about these principles and can still be a good theosophist if one simply seeks to go to the origin of things. Philosophy has only itself to blame if it has fallen into disrepute among those who are preparing to address the great questions of life, for it was meant to be a kind of worldly wisdom. Those who developed our legal wisdom into a system could not build upon the philosophical mindset. Natural science, of course, still ties in with mathematics, with the rational, with mechanics, and so on, and one cannot be a natural scientist who does not truly know these first principles.

[ 14 ] Now, the development of law is linked to the acquisition of an awareness that law, too, must arise from a fundamental foundation that is just as certain and secure as that of mathematics. It is interesting that the very people who developed the law in the most eminent sense—and who rose to prominence in the history of human development precisely through the development of the law—namely the Roman people, who were magnificent in this very field, were lacking in the kind of thinking that is also required in this area: the Romans did not produce a single mathematical theorem! A completely non-mathematical and inexact way of thinking underlay Roman thought. Hence, over the centuries, the prejudice has crept in that it would not be possible to have for the fields of jurisprudence and the social sciences a foundation such as one has for the other, technical fields.

[ 15 ] I would like to cite a characteristic example of this fact. Fifteen years ago, a prominent jurist, Adolf Exner, assumed the rectorship of the University of Vienna. He was a distinguished professor of Roman law. In his inaugural address, he spoke about political education. The whole point of his lecture was that it would be a mistake to place such great value on the natural sciences, for scientific thinking is not suited to intervening in any practical way in the social and ethical questions of existence. In contrast, he emphasized the necessity of an understanding grounded in the conception of legal relationships. And then he explained how legal relationships cannot possibly be influenced by scientific thinking. He says: In the natural sciences, we see right down to the first principles. We see how things appear in simple cases, but in the complicated cases of life, no one can reduce things to such simple terms. — It is characteristic that a great man of our time does not even realize that it is our task to create thinking in the realm of life that is just as clear and transparent as we have been able to create in the realm of external sensory natural phenomena. This must be precisely our task: to realize that we can only be practically effective in the external realm of large-scale tunnel construction if we are able to reduce all aspects of life to precise concepts just as we are able to reduce the gross phenomena to mathematical concepts. Jhering says in his *Purpose in Law* that there is a great deficiency in our legal education as well as in our practical legal life in that people who are to be introduced to the law in any way are not trained to work in life in a directly educational, directly technical manner—learning, teaching, and acting. Now he says that one can be a lawyer just as one is a mathematician who has solved his problem once he has carried out his calculation. Again, Jhering fails to see that mathematics has only had real significance since the thinking of the natural sciences has gained significance. One has found the path from the head to the hand when something becomes a practical application. Then everything related to jurisprudence and social ethics will also be of practical significance, provided it is as clear as the mathematics required when building a tunnel. Then one will also realize that all partial efforts look as if someone were hewing stones, throwing them at one another, and then believing that a house would arise from them. Nothing is conquered or built in the realm of the women’s movement or any other social movement unless the whole is based on a plan. Otherwise, hewing stones is an eminently impractical task.

[ 16 ] It is not a matter of cramming ourselves full of theories and believing that, once we have grasped the system, we can then derive all the details from the great principles. We must act without amateurism and apply the great principles to life, to immediate life. We must act as an engineer acts with what he has learned, even though his task is much more modest—namely, to intervene in lifeless existence. We must act as he acts after having explored and correctly understood all the principles. That is what it is all about: to recognize and be in harmony with the real principles of existence. Otherwise, nothing can be achieved, especially in the legal field. It is quite impossible for anything other than a lawyer prejudiced by a conceptual system to emerge from our institutions if he has not first become acquainted with the science of life to the greatest possible extent. It is, after all, difficult to speak popularly about this very question today. It is certainly impossible to go into specific examples of legal practice, for it is unfortunately a fact today that jurisprudence is the most unpopular of the sciences, not only because it is the least loved, but also because it has the least impact.

[ 17 ] Legal thinking is a form of thought that can hardly be reconciled with sound reasoning, much less brought into harmony with life. There will also be many among you who doubt that one can arrive at firm principles in jurisprudence and social life, as one can in the natural sciences, which are directed toward the sensory. One requirement would be for our time to once again engage in seeking out where people once stood on a higher plane of precise thinking and where attempts were made to express certain concepts in a clear, mathematics-like form. Everyone has the opportunity to familiarize themselves with this in a simple way. Pick up a small Reclam booklet: “The Closed Commercial State” by Johann Gottlieb Fichte. I am far from defending the content of this booklet or attributing any significance to it for our lives today. I merely wanted to show how one can proceed just as practically in this field as mathematics does in bridge-building. But life does become something special in individual cases. Those who establish general principles will not be able to apply them in life. It is exactly the same in the natural sciences. Nowhere are there real ellipses, nowhere are there real circles. You know that one of Kepler’s laws is that the planets move around the sun. Do you believe that this is applicable in such simplicity? Consider for a moment whether the Earth truly describes what we call an ellipse and write on the blackboard. Nevertheless, it is absolutely necessary that we approach reality with such concepts, even though they do not actually exist.

[ 18 ] Mathematics is not present in everyday life, and yet we use it in everyday life. Only when one comes to realize that there is something—even in relation to legal life—that stands to this life as mathematics does to nature, will one be able to regain a sound perspective on this legal life. But now there is the realization that there is a mathematics, a way of thinking similar to mathematics, for all of life; this realization and nothing else is theosophy!

[ 19 ] Mathematics is nothing other than an inner experience. Nowhere can you learn externally what mathematics is. There is no mathematical theorem that has not sprung from self-knowledge—the self-knowledge of the mind in the realms of time and space. Such self-knowledge is necessary for us. Such self-knowledge also exists for the higher realms of existence. There is a Mathesis, as the Gnostics say. It is not mathematics that we apply to life, but something similar. Such a thing also exists in relation to jurisprudence and in relation to medicine, as well as in relation to all areas of life and, above all, in relation to the social interaction of human beings. All talk of mysticism as something obscure is based on not knowing what mysticism is. That is why the Gnostics, the great mystics of the first Christian centuries, called their teachings a Mathesis, because they derived a self-knowledge from them. Once one has recognized this, one will also know what Theosophy aims for, and how, without a theosophical mindset, one should shy away from even lifting a finger regarding the practical questions of life, just as one must shy away from digging into the Simplon Pass without knowledge of geology and mathematics.

[ 20 ] This is the profound seriousness that underlies the theosophical worldview, and it is what must become clear to us when we discuss issues such as jurisprudence. Only then will we once again have a sound legal education, when our greatest jurists no longer have to complain about a lack of foundation in our knowledge, when a consciousness has been developed once more of what I have indicated. This is the misfortune of jurisprudence as it has developed over the last few centuries, when people no longer knew that there was such a thing as a Mathesis. The great philosopher Leibniz was a great jurist, a great practitioner, and a great mathematician; anyone familiar with philosophy knows him well enough. That may serve as a guarantee to you that Leibniz had a correct view of these matters. What does he say, then, about what legal education would be like without the foundation of practical training? He says: In legal life, you will be no different than if you were in a labyrinth from which you cannot find a way out. — Thus, we see today that certain reforms are being sought, particularly with regard to legal life. There is a legal association; it is led by a former theologian. He is attempting, in a certain way, to replace our legal concepts with something more sound. But here, too, one sees that nothing fruitful comes from the sciences that are less accustomed to precise thinking than mathematicians and natural scientists. You will find everywhere that a true understanding of the question of guilt is lacking. Only when one recognizes what is at stake here will one be clear about how one must understand life before one has the norms of life. Only then will we have a healthy study.

[ 21 ] The first thing a lawyer should study is an understanding of life. How does today’s lawyer approach questions of the inner life, and how should he approach them? Not merely by relying on experts. He stands before these matters as a complete amateur. Only a deep insight into the life of the soul is capable of enabling one to draft a law. But it is also the only thing capable of judging those who have deviated from the law. You can only put yourself in the place of the law of human life if you have studied the science of the soul. I do not wish to speak of the theosophical view of the development of the human soul. The world is still too far behind to have a deeper understanding of the more intimate problems of life. But everyone should actually realize what is meant by the words: true study of the soul and of social life.

[ 22 ] This should be the foundation, the first instruction that a law student receives in college: the study of human nature in the broadest sense. Only then, when he has studied human beings as such, including their souls, and in a sphere as ethereally pure as that in which the natural scientist attempts to study scientific problems, only then, when he can immerse himself in the life of the soul in a mystical sense, only then is he ready to address genuine questions of the soul—questions that have an impact and are organized according to a plan in public life.

[ 23 ] Is it not regrettable that the most incredible ideas are circulating in economics today, even among so-called experts? Consider that even simple concepts, which an economist should be able to grasp, have not yet been clearly defined. Take the difference between productive and unproductive labor. You cannot make up your mind on this unless you understand how productive and unproductive labor function in public life. Without this clarity, any such work is completely useless. Nevertheless, it can happen that two prominent economists argue over whether a branch of public life, such as commercial activity, is a productive or unproductive activity.

[ 24 ] In a certain sense, it is a slander against Theosophy to attribute any kind of nebulous obscurity to it. Those who look into what Theosophy aims for will repeatedly emphasize that what it strives for is the utmost clarity, an absolutely serene way of thinking in all areas of life, modeled after mathematics. If that is the case, then the most favorable outcome must be predicted for the enrichment of our legal life through our movement. Then the result of such enrichment will be that the individual, as a budding jurist, is introduced to the way in which spiritual realities operate in human life. They will see that entire fields remain unproductive because they cannot engage with the understanding of suggestion or with the things that arise from the influence of the external world on human beings and from what human beings must attribute to themselves internally with regard to their actions.

[ 25 ] Suggestions have such a tremendous effect on our public life that one can clearly see how, in large gatherings attended by thousands of people, the audience is not influenced by what is called free conviction, but simply by what the speaker conveys to them through suggestion. And those who have listened carry the suggestion forward, so that much of what is done today has come about under the power of suggestion. But anyone who intervenes in practical life must be aware of and observe such intangible factors. If one knows how to observe this process closely, one also comes to understand how such suggestions work.

[ 26 ] Now you already have such a web that extends over our lives. Someone tells us what is supposed to happen in this or that area of life. If we know life, we know that it offers us nothing at first but a sum of suggestions. One person gives them to us regarding the social question, another regarding the national question, and a third regarding a third question. When Theosophy has become the common heritage of humanity, it will never be possible for anyone involved in public life not to see through such a thing. And when you realize how these suggestions work their way down and determine our legal conditions, then you will realize that only through the theosophical way of thinking can a remedy be brought into these circumstances. Then it will also become clear that a substantial part of what is done in our law school—a large portion of the purely theoretical—could be eliminated, since the lawyer can acquire that knowledge through practical experience. Everyone knows what practical work is. The practical can be mastered in much less time once one has immersed oneself in the great questions of existence, into which the great questions of life naturally integrate themselves—the questions that the lawyer cannot address, such as the question of responsibility. How this is debated—as, for example, in Italy by Lombroso. — For those who see through it, it is impossible to put forward such pros and cons as is usually done. This is only possible because people who are not practically trained are having a say in the matter.

[ 27 ] What right do we have to punish? This is another question to which there are answers of the most varied kinds. None of these issues can be resolved by the means of our current practical jurisprudence. But if the jurist cannot engage with them more deeply, he acts without understanding the ultimate principles. He must then act without freedom. But how could a jurist not be a truly free man? We should be able to demand this from no one more than from jurists. Savigny, the eminent legal scholar, once said: law is not an end in itself, but an expression of life; therefore, it must also be created out of life.

[ 28 ] Consider the wide variety of views on law that emerged throughout the 19th century, and you will see how little these views were rooted in actual practice. There are schools of natural law that believe they can derive law from human nature. Later, it was said: One person conceives of law this way, another that way; one people this way, another that way. — Then came historical law. Recently, an interesting attempt was also made with positivist law. Various attempts have been made that do not stem from the mindset indicated. Having a historical view of law is just as impossible as having a historical view of mathematics. It is therefore impossible to establish law historically. — It is not possible to prove this important proposition at present. — To investigate something “positivistically” would mean that one does not construct purely mental constructs with mathematics, but rather brings three rods together, measures the angles, and then derives the mathematical law of the sum of the angles in a triangle from them. That would be a “positivistic” justification.

[ 29 ] I wanted to speak only about the foundation of one’s mindset and about the relationship to what Theosophy can be in the practice of life. I wanted to show how, in all fields—and particularly in this one—the Theosophical way of thinking and Theosophical mindset must be fruitful and useful. There is, of course, a widespread prejudice that Theosophy is something people invent for their own personal satisfaction. But anyone who holds this view is a poor Theosophist. The true Theosophist is the one who realizes that Theosophy is life itself, whereas in so-called practical life, so many endeavors are eminently impractical. It is painful that we see seeds everywhere in individual endeavors, where everyone wants to meddle in public life; if all these impractical movements were to come together in the great circle that does not stand alien to life but seeks to embrace it, then an improvement might well result. Theosophy cannot solve the problem on its own. But life flows from what it offers. Next time we will see how, through the physicians, when they become practical theosophists, a completely different current will enter our lives. This is the current in question, this fundamental tone of a renewed life. If we understand this, a breath of theosophical spirit will have to spread across all branches of practical life reform. Then people will understand the Theosophical Movement and all of life itself.

[ 30 ] This has been emphasized time and again for the simple reason that certain problems cannot be resolved as long as people are unwilling to truly engage with the issues at hand, because they pass judgment long before they have acquired the most precise knowledge of the matters in question. Those who wish to take practical action within the Theosophical Movement itself would find it easy to meddle in other endeavors as well. It would be easy to get involved in certain areas if we could only expect the slightest benefit from it, as long as we do not develop the practical sense that many consider so impractical. It would be easy if we did not know that, before moving to the periphery, the center must be mastered. It would be easy if we did not know that this is true: If you wish to create better conditions in the world, you must give people the opportunity to better themselves. In no field is this statement more justified than in the field of jurisprudence. If the Theosophical Movement attempts to exert a practical, invigorating influence in this field as well, then we shall see how all the disputes between Romanists and Germanists, between historians and natural law theorists, and so on, will disappear. When we come to what is true movement and life, when we attain the mindset that proves itself even in the face of external, sensory work—for life itself would rebuke us if we could not approach it in a proper manner—then we have become Theosophists and true practitioners.