The Rudolf Steiner Archive

9. The Siegfried Saga

[ 1 ] If we want to form a vivid picture of the origin of the Nordic saga world, the period before and after the first Christian century is particularly important. At that time, the northern regions of Europe were in a state of expectation. The event whose effect was to spread throughout Europe, the descent of the divine Father Spirit into a physical human being, was known to the initiates of the Nordic peoples; this was also recounted in the mysteries.

[ 2 ] In the ancient Druid mysteries in the north, initiations similar to those of other ascending peoples of that time were performed. However, a difference must be emphasized between what was being prepared in the north and what was happening in other regions. In order to form a conceptual view of this, we must look back to the emergence of the human races in the areas of the earth that were gradually developing into human dwellings. We can only speak of a physically habitable earth since the Lemurian root race. But this Lemurian period was preceded by an etheric earth, to which the legends about paradise are connected, as are the legends of the various peoples of the southern and northern hemispheres. These legends constitute the treasure of wisdom contained in the mysteries. The training in the mysteries consisted in gradually revealing to people, according to their level of understanding, what human souls were capable of receiving and processing. One can therefore speak of the common origin of the mysteries, which lies in the imaginative and inspired knowledge of their guiding teachers, and of the unity of the teachings that this gives rise to, but also of their diversity, which is due to the passage of time and the geographical and human environment. They were protected by the strictest secrecy, since immaturity would have led to evil instead of good, and the betrayal of the mysteries to immature people was punishable by death.

[ 3 ] But let us now shed some light on what were the common guidelines underlying the ancient Atlantean mysteries, which developed from the oracles into schools of initiation. Based on Neoplatonic sources and Plotinus, theosophical literature has linked its chronological investigations to the assumption that with Socrates, the historical moment arrived when the wisdom formerly inspired by divine beings and used as a tool by humans descended into humans, the Anthropos, and gradually became their good, their task, their duty. Socrates had to suffer death for imparting truths from the mysteries to his disciples. He willingly and consciously accepted the death imposed on him. But the metamorphosis of this idea of consciously experienced death, which leads to true life, was only to come to maturity among the Nordic peoples, who were slowly and gradually prepared for it by what lived in their own mysteries and who, through a long period of waiting, were led to a greater maturity of their soul organism. Buddha was expelled from his religious community because he went out, wandered from place to place, and taught people about liberation through death. This was a mystery truth that was not yet allowed to be taught. It could only come into its own in a distant time and could now only live in individual fiery souls, preparing for that distant time. It was only to be fulfilled through Christianity. But until that time of fulfillment, certain peoples had to receive an education through their mysteries that would predestine them as the substance of the people for the distant tasks of human civilization.

[ 4 ] There were four root races before us; we are in the fifth root race, the post-Atlantean. The names given to the first sub-races – cultural epochs – of this post-Atlantean period can be roughly translated into English as: the sub-races of the spirit, the flame, and the stars. The first sub-race, the race of the spirit, was first given the content of the fifth root race in spiritual form by the Manu; it encompasses the Indian people. The second subrace is the race of the flame, to which Zarathustra gave a religious creed. The third subrace was the race of the stars, which gave rise to the Chaldeans, Babylonians, Assyrians, and later the Israelite tradition. The Greek-Latin peoples, who had their main representatives in Greek and Roman civilization, became the fourth sub-race. It is the one in which Christianity first took root in Asia Minor, Greece, and Rome. It was destined to be most strongly influenced by Christianity, but it was not yet able to grasp its meaning, which was beyond human comprehension. This required a long period of preparation. This had already been provided by the world of legends that had developed in the Nordic mysteries, which lived on in songs and epics, was carried from country to country by rhapsodes, and grew into religious fervor.

[ 5 ] Our fifth subrace has handed down the Christianity established at the beginning of our era. However, several centuries before Christianity was brought to the northern regions, and even in earlier times, the ancient Druidic initiations existed. These lasted until it was clear that the twilight of this preparatory Celtic culture had now begun. You must imagine that all the influences that had spread over other peoples did not reach these northern regions. All the currents belonging to the race of the flame and the race of the stars did not penetrate as far as the Nordic regions. In the north, something remained of the remnants of the Atlantean culture that had been carried over by initiates. Wotan was the initiate of the Nordic peoples who had brought the elements of Atlantean culture to these regions.

[ 6 ] In these Nordic regions, the Druidic initiation was prevalent everywhere. I have already mentioned that one of the founders, one might say the principal founder of these places of initiation, was called Sig or Sigge. And here in these Nordic regions something similar happened to what later happened in Palestine with the founding of Christianity: Sig gave up his body and placed it at the disposal of a higher individuality. That is why the transformed Sig was later called Odin; he was the highest initiate of the Nordic mysteries; Odin was the bearer of spiritual culture at that time. Sig was thus the chela in the north who placed his body at the disposal of the higher, more spiritual Odin. He himself lived on later as an initiated master. Sig is a very special case. He could not initiate a movement as the master Jesus did after Christianity was founded. Sig had to lead this Nordic culture, which had established itself here, to its downfall. He was called to lead the Nordic peoples until Christianity came to them from the south through the fourth subrace of the fifth root race. The old Chela Sig is the one who had to lead the Nordic peoples into their tragic downfall. That is why he is also called Sigurd, which means the one who leads into the past. Urd is the Norn of the past. Fried means the same thing, that which leads to peace, that is, to death, to destruction. This is still preserved in the word cemetery: that which has been led to death. The same disciple who paved the way for the great initiate is to lead the Nordic culture to destruction. Its spiritual content is going under and being replaced by the approaching Christianity. What I have just said is prophetic content that was described many times in the later mysteries of the Nordic peoples: We must be a tribe that is led to peace — that is the message that comes out of the various mysteries of these Nordic peoples. The entire future process, which had been recorded in the scriptures since ancient times, was proclaimed as a prediction in the Nordic mysteries, and from these predictions arose what later became the content of the Nibelungenlied and the Siegfried saga. In the second part of the Nibelungenlied, the karma of the Nibelungs is brought to a conclusion.

[ 7 ] I must mention a peculiarity that always occurs in such cases in the development of humanity: before a new phase takes hold, the earlier phase of development must be briefly repeated. Here in the north, this repetition of earlier phases is particularly evident. We are shown how what has been experienced here in the north since the Lemurian and Atlantean periods must be overcome before these Nordic peoples can mature and develop into the Christianized fifth subrace. The one in whom the entire history of Nordic culture lives is the initiated Siegfried. Let us briefly review the main points of the Siegfried saga.

[ 8 ] First, we are presented with the lives of the three heroes Gunther, Hagen, and Giselher at the court in Worms. We hear how the hero Siegfried woos Brünhilde for Gunther. We hear that Siegfried is recognized as an extraordinary personality at the court in Worms. He is indeed extraordinary, for he is invulnerable, he has killed the owner of the Nibelungen treasure, he has made his body completely horned in his fight with the dragon, and he has conquered the magic helmet. He thus possesses two qualities that the initiates of pre-Christian times always display: they are invulnerable and they are unrecognizable. They are invulnerable through their initiation. In the Gospel it says: Three are there that bear witness: blood, water, and the Spirit. Blood and water must be defeated. What made people invulnerable in the times before Christianity were blood and water. However, these invulnerable initiates are always vulnerable in one place. Achilles represents an initiate from the previous era. He was dipped in the Styx and was vulnerable at the heel. Siegfried was dipped in the blood of the dragon and is vulnerable between the shoulder blades. The initiate can make his true self unrecognizable by wearing the magic helmet, which makes the possessor of these higher occult abilities invisible to the outside world. The possessors of the Nibelungen treasure had these occult abilities. They were descended from the Atlantean race, and the initiates of the Atlantean root race in particular possessed these abilities; however, they were also present in the initiates of the fifth root race and therefore also in Siegfried. When Siegfried slew the dragon, he came into possession of the Nibelungen treasure. What is the Nibelungen treasure? It expresses that the Nordic peoples, so to speak, gave up the land from which the fifth sub-race could arise. The fifth sub-race is also called the race of great inventions and discoveries, which conquers the entire physical plane and becomes great in possession of the outer world. On the one hand, it is to possess, and on the other hand, it is to develop this possession into wisdom. In the Nibelungen treasure, we see nothing other than a linguistic transformation of the old word Nifelheim, Nebelheim. It is therefore what was known in the north as the physical earth, the earth at the moment of becoming physical. A fixed possession is what this preparatory race spread around itself and opposed to Christianity. The gold of the Nibelungen hoard is earthly possession, the representative of earthly possession. This is something that the initiate possesses and is allowed to possess because he can watch over it in the appropriate manner.

[ 9 ] Now you all know how the Siegfried saga continues in this ancient form. It is not the oldest form of the saga, but the one that is relevant to us. As is well known, Gunther then woos Brünhilde of Isenland. Siegfried defeats Brünhilde twice. Gunther woos her, but Siegfried fights invisibly, armed with his magic helmet, at Gunther's side, and Brünhilde believes that her suitor Gunther has defeated her. Siegfried is happy that she is becoming Gunther's wife. Now, in a moment of weakness, Siegfried's wife Kriemhilde reveals to Brünhilde that it was not Gunther but Siegfried who defeated her invisibly. Brünhilde is outraged and plans to kill Siegfried. But first she must find out how he can be killed. She wins over Hagen von Tronje, who lives at court, to help her.

[ 10 ] Hagen is a figure known from the ancient Druid mysteries. Hagen is an important name among ancient Druid initiates. He is an initiate who represents the highest currents of spiritual life in the past, which are expressed in the fact that what has gone before always opposes what follows and comes into conflict with it. Siegfried belongs to the following current, which immediately precedes Christianity. Hagen belongs to the previous Druidic current. Hagen is therefore summoned to destroy Siegfried. To this end, Kriemhilde must reveal that Siegfried is vulnerable in one place. Here, the meaning of this place is revealed. Kriemhilde reveals that Siegfried is vulnerable between the shoulders, precisely where the cross must be carried. He does not yet have the cross. Christianity is still lacking among these primitive peoples. At this point, where the cross is to rest in order to be carried through the world, Siegfried is vulnerable—so says the Siegfried saga—because Christianity is still lacking. Siegfried, who brings peace and tranquility to the Sig initiates, is vulnerable at the point where Christianity later makes him invulnerable. He is overcome by the forces that remain from earlier cultures. Hagen, the representative of previous currents, kills him. This is an image of the replacement of the previous Nordic culture by the fifth subrace. The meaning of this replacement is depicted in the Siegfried legend.

[ 11 ] What are these Nordic races actually fighting against? By paving the way for Christianity, they are fighting against everything old that remains from the Atlantean era. They must continually defend themselves against this. The soul of the Nordic peoples must defend itself against what is still rushing toward it from the past, from the remnants of Atlantean culture. It is an earlier cultural layer that protrudes into the fifth cultural epoch. But those who have remained in Atlantean culture are a stumbling block to further development and must be fought.

[ 12 ] The later battles are depicted in an older version of the Gudrun saga. There, the soul of the Nordic peoples confronts us as Gudrun. She fights against the great initiate of the Atlanteans, Attila or Atli or Etzel, who comes from Asia with the remnants of an Atlantean race, the Turanians. The historical Attila and his people were also described by the European peoples as the “scourge of God.” Attila was an initiate who fought at the head of his people with very significant occult powers. Therefore, the Battle of the Huns is quite correctly depicted as the army fighting in the air. For anyone who knows and understands these things, it is clear what is going on here. Attila did not shy away from anything that stood in his way in Europe; he only voluntarily withdrew before the Pope, the representative of Christianity, because he was fully aware that he was powerless against the representative of Christianity. The Nordic peoples knew that they had to defend themselves against Eastern influences, but these were powerless against Christianity.

[ 13 ] Now, in the later Nibelungen saga, we are told that Kriemhild conceived a plan to take revenge on those who had killed Siegfried. She takes revenge by joining forces with the Atlantean elements. She accepts Attila's proposal of marriage and becomes the wife of the Hun king Attila. After Siegfried's death, she lived for a time at the Burgundian court. She had come into possession of the Nibelung treasure and used it as a great benefactor. But her enemies, who came from earlier epochs and were represented by Hagen, sank the Nibelung treasure into the Rhine. Kriemhild sticks to her plan to destroy the old Nordic enemies with Attila's help. Kriemhild's plan of revenge lures the Nibelungs down to Attila's court, where they encounter the very spirit that is to replace them. On the Danube, they encounter Christianity in the form of Rüdiger von Bechlaren and his wife Gotelinde. This is the dawn of Christianity, which is to replace the cultures of the northern European peoples. The Nibelungs are doomed; they are murdered at the Hun court. Kriemhild takes revenge, but must herself perish. And how does she perish? She, who is the converted Gudrun, the soul of the Nordic culture, unites herself with Atli-Attila-Etzel, the Atlantean, and takes revenge on the representative of her own culture who had killed the initiates. She herself is destroyed.

[ 14 ] If you look at the legend purely from an aesthetic point of view, you will naturally ask yourself: How is it that at the end, Dietrich von Bern, Hildebrand, and all the other heroes, who belong to a class that has already converted to Christianity, are introduced at the Hun camp? These are already Christian heroes. Christianity brings death to the old folk soul; it overcomes the old folk soul. This is not something that was added to the legend after the fact, but something that lived as a prophecy long before the advent of Christianity within the mysteries. These events were the subject of the mystery initiations. The mystery initiations included not only initiation into the truths of the present, but also into those of the past and the future. Apocalypticism was always part of this. The Siegfried legend has long been the apocalypse of the Nordic people. This saga is not fiction that somehow arose among the people from individual pieces, as philologists imagine. The people do not compose poetry. Only someone who has no idea what goes on in the soul of a people can say that. The sagas are nothing more than renditions of what took place in the crypts of the mysteries. What we have in legends is nothing more than the reproduction of mysterious events. Such an event, for which the word “mystery” was used in the south, was called a “maere” in the north, from which the word “fairy tale” for smaller events then developed. “Uns ist in alten maeren wunders vil geseit” (“We have heard many wonders in old tales”). “Wunders” is nothing other than a “sign,” a sign for things that are to be regarded as events on higher planes.

[ 15 ] The Nordic world of legends is so interesting because it represents something that cannot be found in the entire southern world of legends. What the southern peoples represent in their legends always signifies an ascent; they have always absorbed something, received something that leads to a higher level. The Indian, Persian, Babylonian, Chaldean peoples and those who replaced them also have tragic figures; I need only recall the legend of Cronus. But here in the north, the tragic is most highly developed because these peoples had to wait a long time. It was a long preparatory culture with a high level of initiation which – and this is the important point – was a culture that descended so far that the initiate was the human being. The initiate of the Indians is the Bodhisattva, then there are the Rishis, and later, among the Greeks, the initiates are the sons of the sun, such as Heracles and Achilles. Only after the ladder of the initiated had descended so far did the initiated human being arrive here in the north, lacking only one thing, namely what Christ is, the God-become-human. The human being in the north meets us in a waiting attitude; he is vulnerable at the point where Christianity must begin.

[ 16 ] So we have four “layers” to consider:

[ 17 ] First: Wotan. He runs parallel to what develops in the south in the first subrace of the fifth root race.

[ 18 ] Second: Odin. He runs parallel to the second subrace of the fifth root race.

[ 19 ] Third: Baldur, the sun hero. He runs parallel to what develops in the south as the Babylonian-Chaldean-Assyrian epoch. However, what is an ascending culture there is a culture of waiting in the north.

[ 20 ] Initiators of the culture of waiting, in which tragedy is expressed everywhere. Because the old forces are coming to an end, we see the tragic death of Baldur and the tragic death of Siegfried.