The Rudolf Steiner Archive

The Life and Work of Rudolf Steiner

1913

Four facts give a special character to the year 1913 in the life of Rudolf Steiner and the history of the Movement: the constituting through a meeting of February 2 and 3 of the Anthroposophical Society, already determined upon and founded in 1912; the first presentation of Rudolf Steiner’s fourth Mystery Drama, The Soul's Awakening; the first presentation of the art of “Eurythmy” in August 1913; and, as the central of these events, the laying of the foundation stone of the Dornach building at Michaelmas 1913.

The year began with the continuation and supplementing of cycles of lectures initiated at the end of 1912 on The Bhagavad Gita and the Epistles of St. Paul and Life Between Death and a New Birth in Relation to Cosmic Facts. At the same time lectures in the Berlin Architektenhaus presented discussions of personalities of the past and the present: on January 9, Jacob Boehme; on January 16, the world view of a researcher in culture of the present time, Herman Grimm. The significance of this sensitive historian and philosopher of culture, well known because of works on Raphael and Michelangelo and especially his lectures on Goethe, was mentioned by Rudolf Steiner also many times in the following years. Addresses to the members of the Society constantly called attention to the need for being alert in the presence of dangerous influences in the contemporary world; the work of Ahriman and Lucifer in the contemporary spiritual life, and other influences. For what took place in the succeeding years, even to the catastrophe of the World War, was the result on earth of the struggle of Spiritual Powers, ceaselessly battling for the control of the human soul.

Between January 19 and 28, Dr. Steiner remained in Austria. He spoke in Vienna on The Supersensible Worlds and the Nature of the Human Soul; in Graz on The Influence of Anthroposophical Truths upon the Relation between the Dead and the Living. The fundamental question of Anthroposophy was presented in Klagenfurt: Why is it possible for the human being to know scientifically the supersensible worlds? In Linz the theme dealt with throughout this whole winter half-year came into prominence: Life between Death and New Birth and The Nature of the Human Soul and the Significance of Death. Humanity was approaching an epoch in which death would unfold its most tremendous power in the World War, permeating all spheres of existence, spiritual and earthly, with its being, and the saying of Conrad Ferdinand Meyer became a mysterious truth: “We dead, we dead are a greater army than you on the land, than you on the sea.” We are fascinated as if present at a previewing of those approaching apocalyptic times when we observe how Rudolf Steiner, during the preceding, apparently peaceful years, constantly impressed upon the consciousness of human beings the realm of existence and power of the dead, of those at work between death and rebirth.

In Prague he spoke admonishingly on January 28 on Truths and Errors in Spiritual Research. In that struggle between the Helping and the Hindering Powers, he himself was called to intervene at that time.

On January 2 and 3 occurred the General Meeting for founding and constituting the Anthroposophical Society. Members from many countries had gathered in Berlin, or sent their representatives, in order to give a new form to what Rudolf Steiner had himself developed as a social community since 1902. The Society as it was now to be constituted was to give to the united work also an external form. According to his own words, this is imperative for bringing into earthly relations spiritual truths. The Society was to be strengthened, relieved of all undesirable accretions, and prepared for its future course. Humanity was approaching difficult spiritual and earthly decisions. Those who still desired to steer by the lights of the past and the Orient were to be left free to follow the course they desired. But Rudolf Steiner, and those who desired to seek the spiritual light out of the original sources of the Occident, had to separate from those so minded, and proceed toward the goal destined for the Occident. Such decisions are possible in crucial moments only through a clear-cut yes and no; they are not possible without much that is hard or without an appeal to the logical power of decision on the part of the individual. We have already indicated how the Orientalizing direction of the so-called “Theosophists” grouped around the Indian center of Mrs. Besant had been led to absurd distortions of spiritual ideas—even to the senseless proclaiming of a Hindu boy, Krishnamurti, as the coming Christ, and to the vilification of all—especially Rudolf Steiner—who opposed such things. We have explained how, since his invitation from Theosophists in the year 1902 to give lectures, he had stipulated from the beginning his complete freedom, and had presented from the beginning in these circles his “Anthroposophy.” He had first warned Mrs. Besant and her representatives when this freedom was infringed, and then, on the unusual occasions of meetings, in Munich and Budapest, in 1907 and 1909, he carried out the inner and the outer separation.

Since that time, the relation had been merely formal. Finally, the fact that the two fundamental directions were separating from each other led to the definitive conclusion for all concerned. In December 1912, after the Anthroposophical Society had already been determined upon, those who still belonged formally to the Theosophical Society presented a decision of the Central Council (Vorstand) of the German Section of December 8, 1912, to those members who wished to continue working together with them. This was the requirement that such members withdraw from the so-called “Star of the East” of Mrs. Besant, or be excluded from the German Section of the Society, since membership in both institutions was held to be irreconcilable. The result was unmistakable. Almost all members who had been working together with Rudolf Steiner had never joined the “Star of the East,” and even those few who had been confused and had fallen in with this movement recognized the seriousness of the moment and withdrew.

At the same time, in accordance with the decision of December 11, 1912, a telegram was dispatched to Adyar, Mrs. Besant’s center in India, requesting her resignation. In a letter of January 14, 1913, she in turn cancelled the foundation document of the German Section, which rendered formal the already existing separation.

Mrs. Besant had before this endeavored to influence the members by senseless vilifying of Rudolf Steiner—making the grotesque assertion, for instance, that he was a pupil of the Jesuits. All such attacks remained without effect; all those associated with him knew they were false. They were aware that in the Karlsruhe cycle of 1911 he had expressed his opposition to the Jesuitical conception of the Christ and also in many other lectures. Whereas all the accusations were futile, there arrived from many lands where members of the Society were rightly informed about the real activity of Dr. Steiner numerous telegrams and letters supporting his position and that of the Central Council and requesting the definitive separation from the circles of Mrs. Besant.

The Assembly of February 2 and 3 had now to reach a formal conclusion in regard to these matters. On the first day, Rudolf Steiner emphasized the fact that the Assembly could not have anything to do with the Theosophical Society, but must be viewed as an original meeting with the task of preparing for the decisions of the Anthroposophical Society on the following day. He once more described briefly the history of these discussions, saying among other things:

“No one who really wishes to work together with us ought to be able to feel that, because of his view, his standpoint, his attitude of mind, he had been expelled from the German section. ... Only after we saw ourselves hindered in all directions in our positive work by the members of the ‘Star of the East’ did we give consideration to a defense...

“You see what has remained unaltered. You see what has been altered. What has remained unaltered? The constant advance of our positive work as we once began this in the German Section. What has been altered? During the first years, Mrs. Besant gladly supported our positive work. But there came times in which a feeling developed in her that it was impossible to conceive that there were people who said something different from what she herself said.”

He laid bare the fundamental differences in the spiritual directives, in the conception of the Christ, in scientific methods, and characterized the absurdities of the newest proclamation from Mrs. Besant in the “Star of the East,” and even felt compelled to mention the absurd personal attacks against him. For he considered personal vilification as a weapon in a spiritual conflict altogether intolerable. He asked the members whether, for this reason, they would like to hear during the next few days “a brief sketch, a brief excerpt, out of my course of life.” “If you would investigate you would see with how much patience and how much forbearance we have proceeded, and that this patience and forbearance, nevertheless, could bring us to the point where Mrs. Besant could reach the level of that Jesuit accusation.” He felt compelled, therefore, to present as a defense against these crude untruths those facts which were unmistakable in their meaning and could be tested by any one living in Europe. In conclusion he said: “I assert, therefore, that I will have nothing more to do with Mrs. Besant since she has added this piece to all the other objective untruths.” At the end of the meeting Rudolf Steiner acknowledged: “It has really been a martyrdom to work within the Theosophical Society.”

After a resolution of the Council had established the definitive separation from the Theosophical Society, he declared in conclusion: “The German Section, as this has existed since its founding, has hereby ended its existence, and all functions of the German Section have thus come to an end.” A great number of other Sections and Groups in various countries joined in these decisions. Regarding the further development of work in the already organized Anthroposophical Society discussion was to occur in its general meeting the next day.

Another fact which came to discussion in this General Meeting must here be briefly mentioned, since it is characteristic of later occurrences and even now completely actual: the fact that, even then, certain authors in the external world began to extract single statements or large parts of the substance for their publications out of the works of Rudolf Steiner without any mention of the source. One who has had opportunity to observe these things can discover three phases in this process: In the first phase, the work of Rudolf Steiner is absolutely opposed, ridiculed, or left without mention; in the second phase, when it has become clear that certain of his statements previously opposed have been clearly confirmed, these statements are simply taken over boldly as if they were something one had always known. In such cases there may be an inconspicuous footnote indicating that Rudolf Steiner “also” had made such a statement. But in many cases these persons proceeded immediately to the third phase: simply taking statements of Rudolf Steiner and promulgating them as their own. Such occurrences can be found in almost all fields—the religious, scientific, agricultural, medical, pedagogical, artistic, and social realms. It is a characteristic phenomenon of our age.

One of the first examples of this kind appeared in the year 1912. Rudolf Steiner, therefore, mentioned in that meeting on February 2, 1913, that a certain bookshop had sent out an announcement of so-called “Rosicrucian Letters of Instruction” with the comment: “These Rosicrucian Letters of Instruction present a conclusive total picture of Rosicrucian research and world view. The beginnings of their development are to be found on German soil. In the etheric atmosphere of California, far more favorable for Rosicrucian research, they have been further developed...” These “Letters of Instruction,” supposed to have come into existence on German soil, had appeared in the English language under the pseudonym Max Heindel. With regard to these publications, Rudolf Steiner made the following statement to the Assembly:

“It would be well to see what has really ripened in California. That it may be possible to form a correct judgment if this is desired, I will indicate by reading to you a letter from some one whose eyes have been opened: ‘Dear Sir: May I venture to address to you a question, or even more than one question? I must first mention that I am staying here for a short time on a visit and that my place of residence is in Salina, Kansas, U.S.A. Two friends and I some time ago had a book which had been recommended to us sent here by the Esoteric Library in Washington, D.C. The title of this is Rosicrucian Cosmo-Conception or Christian Occult Science, by Max Heindel. In the preface we were curiously impressed by the manner in which Mr. M. H. refers to the name of Dr. Rudolf Steiner, whose teaching he says is in its main outlines similar to his own, etc. In short, the preface led me and later my friends to read your book Theosophy and also Initiation and Its Results. It is a riddle to us how it could occur that entire sentences in Cosmo-Conception, almost word for word, are to be compared with those contained in your books, and thus the thought came to us to wonder whether that gentleman Max Heindel borrowed the teaching from you?’

As to this Rudolf Steiner commented:

“This is a letter from some one who considered the matter and came to a conclusion. It was necessary for me only to reply with the fact that Max Heindel, under a different name—Grashof—lived among us and heard many of my lectures and cycles of lectures and made copies. And what we are confronted with is that a certain fundamental direction was established in Germany and that Max Heindel then, in a truly remarkable way, discovered a form that is suited to the times ... etc...

“The gentleman in question then went away, and he has pieced something together out of lectures of mine and presented it as a new thing.

“We observe truly strange things. Our work is here represented, on the one hand, as autocratic and one-sided; in the ether atmosphere of California it is circulated further as matured, transformed. Perhaps we may some day even have the occurrence that Max Heindel will be simply translated into German and then attack me with things which originated from me myself ... I beg you, therefore, to give a little closer attention to things.”

The occurrence which Rudolf Steiner foresaw actually occurred. A few years later those “Letters of Instruction” of Herr Grashof, alias Max Heindel, were retranslated out of the English edition which had appeared in California into German, and published in a large edition in Middle Europe as a spiritual production of the person in question. A typical example: A certain Herr Grashof hears in Germany, as can be proven, numerous lectures and cycles of lectures of Rudolf Steiner, publishes a great part of the content as his own production in a diluted form in the English language in California; founds there a society for their sale; but does this so unskillfully that American readers who happen to know also Rudolf Steiner’s original works establish the fact themselves that “entire sentences are to be compared almost word for word”; he indicates at the beginning feebly and inaccurately the source, an acknowledgment simply omitted, however, in later editions; and these productions are even today distributed in great numbers in America and Europe as the original works of Max Heindel. Similar instances—not quite so crude, somewhat more skillfully performed—can be found in great numbers in other publications, even of academically educated authors. People oppose a certain person and his works, but are inspired by him, “borrow” certain content from these works, and present this to the world as their own knowledge, continuing to ignore the original source and even opposing it. The temporary success of such methods will ultimately be reversed.

Out of all of these facts, and the resulting necessity for a community of persons not only to foster the work of Rudolf Steiner but also to protect it during his life and after his death, the important task of an Anthroposophical Society became all the clearer, and the Society was constituted on the next day in a structure suitable to that time.

On February 3, 1913, Rudolf Steiner opened the General Meeting of the Anthroposophical Society with the following words:

“Perhaps, I may call your attention to the fact that, at this point of time, we stand at the beginning of a significant—not new work, but at the beginning of a significant endeavor to consolidate and expand the old work. In what I had to say yesterday I introduced all the feeling which I should like to place in your hearts and souls as a new coloring for our work. I hope that we shall find the ways and means for representing so far as possible still more strongly, still more devotedly in this new time now coming, what we have fostered in the old form. What has been rescued out of such difficulties must be rooted in your hearts, and it would be something beautiful if every one of us could really feel this, every one of us who can be completely identified with that which we desire. If we feel that what we designate as Anthroposophy is a necessity in our age, and also recognize that it must flow into our contemporary cultural life so that it can become a ferment in all domains, —if we feel that Anthroposophy can become and wills to become all that, we shall then find the possibility of working in the right way. And the best thing with which to confront all this at the present time is not words, but your feelings and sensitivities, your purposes, the fundamental principles which you take into yourselves in order to develop your own individual powers. What we must concern ourselves with is the finding of the right ways, in order that we may render it possible for every one who desires to unite with us to find access to us. No one who desires to join us needs to be hindered even though, on the other hand, we need to watch carefully over the sacredness and unimpeachable character of our purposes. It will, perhaps, be more necessary than ever that we shall completely trust one another, that we shall be able to rest assured that those who enter upon our spiritual path will find what is right out of their own hearts and that those shall be deterred who do not desire something for their souls, in order that all who unite with us shall truly in one way or another be with us. Seriousness and dignity should govern all our conduct, and we can then rest assured that we shall have confidence one in the other, that we shall everywhere eliminate the personal; that we shall look upon people only in an objective manner. Then shall we progress. It is not easy to eliminate the personal. But this fact does not mean we should be indulgent with ourselves or with others; but, rather, that we constantly test ourselves to discover whether one or another personal element influences us. We shall discover in a greater degree than we suppose that the human being has great difficulty in surmounting the personal element which inheres in his soul. Many a person will come to the conclusion that, in some judgment he formed, it was not objective reasons which were decisive but sympathy and antipathy. Self-examination is simply essential if one wishes to participate in a spiritual movement.

“My intention in these words has been, not so much to emphasize what the words signify literally, but what these words may become if your hearts lay hold upon them in the sense that I have intended. Perhaps, they may serve as the point of departure on the path, in the use of the means which we need if we wish to advance on that path we have already determined upon.”

In the further course of the meeting, Rudolf Steiner was urged to accept the position of “Honorary President.” Thus, as he frequently emphasized later, he was not an officer of the Society during the following years of further development up to 1923 but served as the teacher and counselor for the Society, administered by officers whom the Society itself had chosen. Not until 1923 did Rudolf Steiner unite himself with the General Anthroposophical Society founded by him and personally assume as President its leadership. From 1913 until 1923, he was the teacher and counselor of the Society; only after the Christmas Foundation Meeting in 1923 did he, as the creator of the Movement, become by his own decision an officer in the organism of this living being, which had matured in the intervening period, as we shall now describe.

On February 4, the day after the end of the meeting just described, Dr. Steiner gave what he called the “sketch of an excerpt from a life,” based upon his youth—which might be considered in a way the beginning of the autobiography, The Course of My Life, published serially in the weekly Das Goetheanum after the refounding of the Society at Christmas 1923. In the sketch given in 1913, he spoke in a characteristic way in the third person about his earlier experiences, in order to permit an objective consideration on the part of his hearers.

On February 5 there was a General Meeting of the “Johannes Building Association,” at which Rudolf Steiner gave his explanation regarding architecture, for the realization of which a foundation stone was laid in Dornach at Michaelmas of this year.

He now took up his lecturing activity immediately, beginning on February 3 with a cycle of lectures on The Mysteries of the Orient and of Christianity. In these lectures he gave “a picture of the nature of the Mysteries and their harmonious relation with the spiritual life of humanity,” in the course of which the fact of reincarnation and the resulting participation of every human being in the various phases of evolution in the successive epochs of history became quite clear. He said in his introduction:

“Just as the evolution of man in the various regions and in these successive periods of human life takes on different forms, such is the case also with everything that we designate as ‘the system of the Mysteries.’ We do not pass in our soul through successive lives on earth meaninglessly, but for the reason that we experience something new in every incarnation and can add this to what we have united with our soul life in the preceding incarnations. The visible external world has in most cases completely changed its appearance when we enter again through birth into the physical existence of the human being, after having passed through the spiritual world between death and this new birth. For reasons, therefore, easily understood, the nature of the Mysteries, the principle of initiation, must change in the successive epochs.

“In our own age the principle of initiation has, indeed, undergone a tremendous change, since, up to a certain grade, a certain stage, initiation can be achieved without any individual guidance—by reason of the fact that in the present age the principle of initiation can be made clear to the public to the extent that this has been done, for instance, in my book Knowledge of the Higher Worlds and Its Attainment. Any one who earnestly seeks to pass through the experiences which are described in this book can progress very, very far at the present time with respect to the principle of initiation. Through the application of what is there set forth within his own soul he can progress to the degree that the existence of the spiritual worlds becomes a matter of knowledge, just as much a matter of knowledge as is the knowledge of the external physical world. This is true because of the simple fact that, through the application to his own soul of what is described in the book, he can by successive stages, slowly and gradually, make the leap into a comprehension of spiritual worlds.”

The cycle then proceeds to describe in new aspects the stages of contemporary initiation which are to be achieved through exercises in meditation, concentration, and contemplation. It describes the harmony thus to be recognized between natural laws and moral laws in the cosmic process of development; the insight to be achieved “that forces are projected out of the supersensible worlds in order to bring about the processes in the various realms of nature, in the sense world.” He then rendered clear the various stages of evolution—as these appear in the ancient Egyptian Hermes initiation, in the Greek Mysteries, and in their culmination in Christian initiation in connection with the Knights of King Arthur’s Round Table, in the Grail circle, in the great antagonists Parsifal and Klingsor, and in modem methods of initiation in our own time.

He contrasted this picture of the world with the materialistic manner of viewing the world, which is inclined to consider human thinking a product of the evolution of the brain, whereas a right observation of history shows that the spiritual functioning of the human being has brought about the evolution of the organ of thinking, the brain. Indeed, in the final parts of this lecture the dangers were pointed out in the contemporary materialistic thinking especially with relation to future evolution:

“Thus all activity of the brain is the result of thinking—not the reverse—even in the course of history. The brain has been plastically moulded by thinking. If only such thoughts are formed as are customary at the present time, if thoughts are not permeated by the wisdom of the Spirit, then the souls of human beings who occupy themselves today only with materialistic thinking will not be able in later incarnations rightly to mould their brain, since their forces will no longer be able to take hold of the brain, having become too weak.”

The contemporary materialistic thinking of the human being thus becomes a danger, not only for the development of consciousness but even for the development of the body. Not only is the Spirit driven out of consciousness by such thinking, but the body becomes gradually more and more incapable of serving as the vessel and organ of spiritual experience. As this was expressed in the picture-language of the Grail circle, Amfortas, as the denier of the spirit, has to die from wounds in his body, and Parsifal gains the victory only if he overcomes “dullness and doubt”:

“Thus one who approaches the modem Mystery must really feel that he confronts himself in such a way that he strives to become a person who is seeking to achieve the virtues of Parsifal, and who knows, nevertheless, that he is still a different person: that, because of all the conditions of the modem age as these have been described, because he is a human being of the modem age, he is really the wounded Amfortas. The human being of the modem age possesses this double nature: the striving Parsifal, the wounded Amfortas. He must conceive himself thus in his self-knowledge.”

This self-knowledge of the present-day human being, a true Anthroposophy, then impels him, in the midst of the tasks of his busy daily life, to follow the path of Parsifal and thus fulfill the Mysteries of Christianity.

On February 8 Rudolf Steiner spoke again, in connection with the lecture of a physician, Dr. Peipers, on The Grail Ideal in the Light of Natural Science. Thus there always met together in his work the Christian initiation and modem scientific research.

As already mentioned, the artistic tasks of the Movement were fostered at that time through programs in the “Art and Music Rooms” of the Branches in Munich and Berlin. Thus on February 9 he spoke on the nature of the folk songs. A public lecture in the Berlin Architekenhaus dealt with Raphael’s Mission in the Light of the Science of the Spirit, and Leonardo’s Spiritual Greatness at the Turning Point to the Modern Age. At the same time the cycle of lectures was continued which had been begun the previous year concerning Life between Death and a New Birth. These subjects were dealt with further during a visit to German cities in February, especially in lectures entitled Concerning the Relations of the Living with the Dead. A time was approaching in which, through the death of millions of persons in the World War, this problem would become a question of destiny for every family and every individual person.

In public lectures in Karlsruhe and Frankfurt, on May 1 and 3, he spoke on Spiritual Science and Natural Science in Their Relation to the Riddles of Life; in Munich and Augsburg once more on The Spiritual Life after Death. For members, the pedagogical task was once more brought in. He explained the interaction of the good, progressive spiritual Powers and the retarding Ahrimanic and Luciferic forces, and threw light on the significance of this knowledge for the teacher.

The second of nine journeys abroad in this year took Dr. Steiner to Holland for the period of March 18-30. After a description of cosmic facts following after death, the cycles of lectures delivered in The Hague dealt once more with the most intimate, individual schooling of the human being in the earthly life, under the title What Significance Has Occult Development of the Human Being for His Sheaths (Physical Body, Ether Body, Astral Body) and His Self? Since many members in the audience on such occasions came from various countries, and many of these could study the context of these lectures in the form of copies, the students were in this way at times kept in a great pendulum movement between the expanses of the cosmos and the innermost depths of the soul, and all one-sidedness was thus excluded. Whereas the preceding cycle of lectures on life after death had thrown light upon the existence of the human being freed from the bodily organism, the cycle now given in The Hague cast special light upon those earthly sheaths into which the ego-being of man is immersed during the earthly life, and upon which he believes himself to be so completely dependent during this life. Rudolf Steiner had always rejected every exaggeration but also every underestimating of this dependence of the human being upon his bodily sheaths. The actual state of affairs he did not consider subject to explanation either on the basis of a Darwinism, which looks upon the spiritual as a product of the body, or in an asceticism, which believes that the spiritual can be strengthened by one-sided negation or suppression of the physical. The unitedness of spirit, soul, and body of man on earth is a primal phenomenon in the Goethean sense. To ignore either spirit or body is merely a form of self-delusion. Only a concrete explanation of the interwoven relation of both elements, a knowledge of the real processes through which spirit and body reciprocally interpenetrate, working either harmoniously or disturbingly one upon the other, can contribute to the inner freedom and healthfulness of the human being.

In this connection Rudolf Steiner dealt quite concretely with the bodily processes, questions of nutrition, the influence of the temperaments, of the senses, of the system of organs and the whole integration of man’s nature. He never dealt with such subjects in a dogmatic way but only with the content of actual knowledge, which of itself brings a solution of all questions pertaining to the human being. Thus, for instance, both opponents and also many students, unable to look upon his explanations in the form of knowledge but only as moral principles, often undertook to make a dogma out of the fact that Rudolf Steiner himself was a vegetarian. But it can easily be proven out of actual statements and of the lectures in question that he rejected every such interference with the freedom of man’s nature and will. He affirmed the superiority of plant food in comparison with animal food on the ground that, with the former, “man simply continues the organizational process where the plant has left off,” whereas in eating animal substance, in which the vegetable matter has already been further worked over, man “permits the animal to take over a part of the work which he himself would have to perform if he used plants as food.” Thus vegetable food requires a more intense application of the forces than the working over of animal substances in the process of nutrition. “When, therefore, he eats animals, he condemns a certain portion of the forces within himself to inactivity.” This can become a greater or a lesser disadvantage in proportion to the state of health and the individual structure of forces of each person in health and illness. In each case consideration must be given to the question how much each person can and should demand of his forces. But this is a question of knowledge, and not a dogma.

Rudolf Steiner rejected the idea of many fanatical vegetarians that— as the poet Christian Morgenstern ridiculed the idea—“they could mount up morally on vegetarian thoughts.” One does not become more moral or more spiritual on a vegetarian diet, but at most stronger. Each person must look into this matter for himself and make his own decision. One can be a good or a bad student of spiritual science either as a vegetarian or a non-vegetarian.

Far more significant than these questions of nutrition is the problem of alcohol, but here again in the sense of observation of phenomena and their effects, not out of subjective dogmatism. Nutrition affects primarily the bodily systems; alcohol, on the contrary, the consciousness of man. In this relation one who looks upon the strengthening of consciousness as man’s loftiest task is confronted with a completely free choice, altogether objective—an either or. In discussing these problems, Dr. Steiner proceeded from the factual and concrete process of alcoholic development in plants, described the effect of these substances and processes on the blood, and showed that the blood, in turn, is connected in its forces with the ego-consciousness of man. He declared that “through the use of alcohol, the activity of the ego in the blood is eliminated.” Alcohol proves factually to be “an oppositional power in the human organism” in contrast with the ego-consciousness. “For that reason, one who makes spiritual science the central element of his life feels the effect of alcohol in his blood as a direct battle against his ego; and it is only natural, therefore, that a real spiritual development can proceed without difficulty only if one does not create this hindrance against it.”

Man is by nature free to choose the path of strengthening or of weakening his consciousness. If he looks upon the strengthening of consciousness as his most important task, he will refrain through his own free decision from weakening it through the use of alcohol. I take the liberty of mentioning here also an explanation given to me by Rudolf Steiner once in conversation. I asked why the Pythagorians prohibited beans. He answered: “In the Greek period the effect of beans on the astral body, then dominant in the human organism, was harmful, just as at present the effect of alcohol is harmful to the ego. For people of the present time, therefore, the Pythagorian objection to beans is no longer valid, but the harmful effect of alcohol for the now essential ego-organization.”

In the cycle of lectures of March 1913, Rudolf Steiner dealt with the most varied constituents of human nourishment—for example, albumen and fat, sugar and starch, the beverages, etc. Here again there was manifest the extraordinary potentialities in knowledge, due to the fact that he united in a single person the total equipment of natural-scientific knowledge and the results of spiritual-scientific research, and could for that reason give insights which could not be achieved out of a one-sided materialistic or spiritual consideration. The most significant experience of those who have studied these statements and carefully weighed them is that, unlike what so often happens in dealing with these questions, the student never feels under any moral pressure or that he is confronting insoluble riddles and constantly varying conceptions. On the contrary, he feels that he has before him as a content in knowledge the totality of the spiritual, psychic, and bodily aspects of the problems. Dr. Steiner simply set forth spiritual and bodily complexes of fact and thus gave to the student the unlimited possibility of drawing his own conclusions on the basis of his free insight.

The way in which he thus protected the freedom of the individual, and yet helped him in further progress, I take the liberty of illustrating on the basis of a personal experience. When one, as a younger person, approached Rudolf Steiner with the request for advice one often put the request in the form of a question: “Is it right to do this?” Or: “Ought one not to do that?” etc. He very kindly but systematically got us over the habit of such a form of question. I should like to illustrate with respect to smoking. When I became acquainted as a young man with Rudolf Steiner and then frequently accompanied him in person on his trips—as to which experience I shall say more later on—it had become an inevitable habit out of the period of my university studies that I liked to smoke and, I must confess, smoked a great deal. There were some among the members of the Society who had not yet overcome the habit of “You ought” or “You ought not.” And these immediately informed me with lifted finger that smoking in the presence of Dr. Steiner was something unheard of. In the first place, I knew that, although Dr. Steiner no longer smoked, he had smoked at an earlier time and—I may remark aside—still enjoyed, according to the old custom, snuff. In the second place, even if this had not been the case, I felt that it would be inwardly untrue to behave in his presence as if I did not smoke in spite of the fact that I enjoyed doing so. I was also more firmly convinced of his capacity to see into my soul, after many perfectly clear experiences, than many others were who spoke of this but did not take it quite realistically. I continued, therefore, to smoke, knowing that he would know of this habit of mine and take whatever attitude toward it he thought right. As a matter of fact, he was not at all offended by this although I was in his presence daily more than those who had warned me. When he himself had said nothing about this for a long time, I could not refrain from questioning him directly when we took an automobile trip together from Stuttgart to Basel: “Doctor, should one really smoke or not?” I had forgotten that he never answered questions put in that form, but generally threw light upon them in a picture or an anecdote. In reply to my question, he told me the following: “Early this morning I was in the clinic of Dr. Palmer in Stuttgart. A patient there asked me: ‘Doctor, does my illness come from smoking?’ I asked him: ‘How many cigarettes do you smoke in a day?’ He answered: ‘Forty.’ I then said to him: ‘Your illness does not come from smoking, but, if you would smoke, let us say, only twenty cigarettes a day instead of forty, that would be much better.’ ” This anecdote was Rudolf Steiner’s entire answer to my question, which had aimed at a final expression of judgment about smoking.

Another small but characteristic experience in this question:—One of his students had the misunderstanding that one “ought not” to eat any flesh. He endeavored abruptly to cease doing so, although he had a strong desire for meat. He felt proud about his achievement, and he said one day to Dr. Steiner: “Doctor, I used to be so very fond of ham. I no longer eat any, but I still have to think about it a great deal.” Instead of complimenting him as he had expected, Rudolf Steiner answered only: “Better eat ham than to think ham.” The young ascetic was cured of his false, method. Dr. Steiner never played the schoolmaster toward his students; never made any demand without factual explanation. He made it clear that any egotistic and vain form of asceticism is inwardly untrue. He appealed only to the clarification of consciousness in his students and their free act of cognition.

This brief insertion is introduced to defend Dr. Steiner against the utterly untrue charge that he represented fanatically some sort of theoretical rules of life. He desired free, self-sufficient human beings around him. I never became acquainted with any one in whose presence people felt more completely free from interference. This is mentioned at this point especially for the reason that the cycle of lectures delivered at The Hague, and also later lectures of a similar content, dealt with individual questions of daily life within the framework of spiritual schooling. The last lectures of this cycle showed how, by the development of spiritual organs of perception which extend into new realms the area of observation of the sense organs, man can penetrate into the cosmic, earthly, and human forces and substances in such a way that these reveal to him, as it were, their own evolutionary history:

“Thus we see that the spiritual development is such that a personality in the process of such a development becomes, instead of merely a physical microcosm, more and more a spiritual microcosm. That is, that such a person shows in himself the pictures not only of planets and suns, but of Beings of the Higher Hierarchies. ... The etheric body is, in other words, really a narrator. It narrates the process of the development of the world. Whereas the physical body of the human being is like a totality of paintings, painted by an unknown artist, the etheric body proves to be a sort of narrator which narrates cosmic history within its own processes. The more a person is actually in a process of evolution, so much more expansive are the scopes of the narrations. ... But the further the development of a personality goes, so much the more is it possible to see in the etheric body the cultures of humanity, individual incarnations of one or another individuality—indeed, even to ascend to the cosmic process of development and the participation of Spirits of the Higher Hierarchies in the cosmic process of development.

“The astral body of man can be observed through ordinary observation only through its shadow image, so to speak—through its experiences in thinking, willing, feeling. But it becomes more and more an expression of what the human being is worth in his real nature in the cosmos. I beg you to take this description as something very important. The astral body of a person engaged in a process of spiritual development becomes more and more an expression of the value of this person in the cosmos.”

What is essential about a true spiritual schooling is that it shall never be undertaken for egoistic reasons: not, for instances, only for the development of oneself, or only out of curiosity and the like. The required discipline must be exercised in order that the person concerned may become the means for a penetration of the spiritual world into the physical realm. All work on oneself, as spirit, soul, and body, must be directed toward the objective of knowledge,

“in order that we ourselves, while progressing, shall achieve independently a piece of work in the evolution willed by the spiritual world. One who understands how to grasp this sentence in its entire grandeur, in its significance which should create enthusiasm and inspiration—one who understands this thought in such a way that it causes evolution, spiritual development in the noblest sense, to seem his duty, one who is able to feel in this way, feels the beginning of that which—though accompanied by all manner of danger, all manner of struggle, all manner of confusion, all manner of hindrances—is connected, nevertheless, with the whole of evolution: the beginning of the fact that one is moving toward the bliss of the spiritual worlds. For, when one senses this idea of the exalting power of the ideal of evolution, one can begin to feel the blessedness of evolution. But this blessedness means that this evolution, this spiritual progress, must be recognized as a necessity. This will be characteristic of the future of such spiritual-esoteric movements as ours: that the spiritual development of the human soul shall be looked upon more and more as a necessity and that the exclusion of spiritual development, an attitude of hostility toward this, will signify the uniting of oneself with those cast off products of the earthly in process of destruction in their own earthly heaviness; will mean that one is breaking a connection with the evolution of the universe willed by God.”

This peril of going to ruin “in one’s own earthly heaviness” of “breaking one’s connection with the evolution of the universe willed by God,” confronted all human beings in its altogether demonic character in the then approaching years of catastrophe of the World War. But the warning of the Abyss which would result from these events had so little effect in arousing humanity as a whole that similar events were repeated a few decades later. They will be repeated again and again until this dumb plunging of the individual into mass occurrences shall be replaced by the spiritual strengthening of the individual for the benefit of the totality. Even at the time of which we are speaking this ought to have been consciously seen to be the most impelling necessity for future development. In contrast with the trend of occurrence in mass, the human individuality should have been represented with his inner access to the creative spiritual world. For only one who presses forward to the spiritual fountainhead can really render help to a fellow man. For this reason the lectures of Rudolf Steiner also in the following months were again and again devoted to these themes. On April 6 and 7 he lectured in Breslau and Dresden on The Results of Spiritual Research in Problems of Life and the Riddle of Death; Why Is It Possible for the Human Being to Know about the Supersensible World?; on April 12 in Weimar on Natural-Scientific Research and Research in the Supersensible Worlds; and in other cities on The Senses of the Human Being and the Relation with the Dead; The Supersensible Worlds and Research Regarding Immortality.

In the beginning of May, the third of nine trips abroad during this year took Dr. Steiner to England and France. In London he spoke on May 1 and 2 on Occult Science and Occult Development and Christ at the Time of the Mystery of Golgotha and Christ in the Twentieth Century. In Paris on May 4 the St. Michel Group was founded, and he spoke there during May 5-9 on The Relation between Macrocosm and Microcosm. In all possible countries the consciousness of the union of the spiritual world and the earthly world was to be awakened, in order to guard human beings against the one-sided submersion in the earthly sphere and the daily occurrence. No other person in Europe at that time in equal degree opened the spiritual doors to all the peoples of Europe in order that, at the crossroads, they might center their thought before the catastrophe upon their common objectives, and decide in favor of the path leading to spiritual evolution.

During the following weeks, the same content of knowledge was presented in many cities of Middle Europe. In Strassburg, for instance, he spoke on May 13 and 14 on Life after Death and Truths and Errors in Spiritual Research. The road-markers on the path toward the Spirit bore a clear inscription.

During these days Rudolf Steiner now took one of the most decisive steps of his entire life. On May 15 and 16 he went to Switzerland, to inspect the building site at Dornach bei Basel which had been rendered available by friends there for the erection of a central building of the Movement. Indeed, as we have mentioned in connection with the fourth cycle on the Gospels, he had visited this Dornach hill at Michaelmas in 1912. A Swiss member, Dr. Emil Grosheintz, had acquired land in the midst of this wonderful mountain environment of the Jura mountains on this hill, which overlooks in that area of union of several countries Switzerland, Germany, and France. Other friends were prepared to acquire additional land. When supplemented and rounded out by the Building Association, this comprised a uniquely beautiful area.

It must have been a significant experience for Rudolf Steiner when he stood on that hill which had drawn to itself so many events of the past important in world history, and where now the center was to be erected at which he was to crown his lifework, and, twelve years later, to return through death into the spiritual world—but only after he had laid the foundation stone of his two tremendous buildings in succession in the soil of that hill, and also in the hearts of all those belonging to the Movement in all parts of the world. In this way he could render secure the future destiny of his lifework, creating a spiritual center destined to safeguard the continuity of the human stream inaugurated by him. It must be left to future generations to realize fully the wisdom of his decision at this time. If this decisive purpose had not come to birth at that time and had not been realized, how would it have been possible otherwise through all the catastrophes which have since followed to provide a secure center of work for this spiritual Movement? In that moment, Rudolf Steiner reached a decision justified before a profound prevision of coming times, and justified since then also through the course of history.

Having reached this decision on the Dornach hill, he proceeded in his characteristic way, without regard to difficulties and hindrances, toward the external realization of his inner decision. Even on May 18, he spoke in Stuttgart about the new building project, about the plan to transfer this to Dornach. In two lectures just after this he introduced the members to the spirit of the age, which is under the sign of the Archangel Michael. This was preliminary to what he later announced in Dornach as the nature of the Michael Age, as he described in these two lectures the way in spiritual history “from Gabriel to Michael.” He described how, in the change from one to another of the successive epochs, the influences of definite Spiritual Beings find expression, and how the human activity of thinking—for example, the change from a passive to an active thinking—is developed under the influence of such Beings. At the present turning point in history, Michael has become the “Time Spirit” of the coming epoch.

We shall deal with these stages in spiritual history in connection with the first lecture cycle of the year 1919 in Dornach on The Michael Impulse. We call attention here to the inner relation between the decision on the Dornach hill and the immediately following announcement of these facts.

During the following days, Dr. Steiner traveled to Finland and Scandinavia, where he continued in Helsingfors and Stockholm his challenge to the peoples of Europe. In Helsingfors, where a large number of members had gathered from Middle Europe, Western Europe, and Russia, he introduced them to the spiritual sources of the Orient and the Occident. Between May 28 and June 5, he gave a cycle of nine lectures on The Occult Foundations of the Bhagavad Gita, where he guided his hearers from the lofty wisdom of the Orient in the past to the spiritual task of the Occident in the present. He began the cycle of lectures in Helsingfors with the words:

“Somewhat more than a year has passed since I had the privilege of speaking in this place about those things which concern us all so deeply, about those things which, in our judgment, must be woven into human knowledge at the present time; since, from our time on, human souls will feel more and more that a knowledge of these things really belongs to the necessities, to the profoundest cravings, of the human soul. And it is with profound satisfaction that I greet you for a second time in this place, together with all of those who have come here in order to show in your midst how they are united in heart and soul with our sacred cause over the entire earth.”

He referred in the introduction to Wilhelm von Humboldt, who declared that he must consider himself fortunate to be living at a time when he could become acquainted with the wonderful content of the Bhagavad Gita. He then elucidated the significance of the sublime pictures of this Oriental wisdom in which there stand before us spiritual figures such as Krishna and Arjuna. He described the inner heroism which has to be manifested today as then by man in taking his course into the supersensible worlds. But the manner in which this is accomplished rightly in our age is different from that of the Orient.

We are impressed especially at present when we recognize that Rudolf Steiner even then called attention to the dangerous one-sidedness of the Occidental world conception of Darwin, Newton, and especially also of Woodrow Wilson. He explained how the true opposing force against such perils in our age “has been developed in man out of supersensible forces as the organ of self-consciousness,” and how it is necessary to learn on the path of schooling at the present time the dangers of one-sided Oriental or Occidental processes of thinking.

He declared that the contemporary indolence or hostility with reference to research in the reality of the spiritual processes arises in most human beings out of a subconscious feeling of fear, a negative force, which he designated as Ahrimanic:

“One who has a survey of reality sees in a materialistic gathering that every materialist harbors a fear in his subconsciousness before the Spirit. Materialism is not logic, but indolence, with regard to the Spirit. What materialism spins out of itself is nothing else than an opiate for subduing the fear. In reality Ahriman, the bringer of fear, holds every materialist by the nape of his neck.

The attitude of soul of Oriental wisdom harbors the opposite peril.

“It is necessary to presuppose an entirely different constitution of the spirit and soul if the souls in the time of the Bhagavad Gita are to be understood. There everything is passive; there one lays oneself open to the world of images; everything is like a surrender to a streaming world of pictures. Compare with this our entirely different kind of world at the present time. Surrender does not aid us at all in arriving at understanding. But there are very many persons who still cling to what has been left behind; who are unwilling to rise to what must come about in our own time. Yet it must come about for our epoch.”

Between materialistic thinking and action out of fear before the Spirit in the Occident and passive surrender to a world of pictures which has become unreal in the Orient, the human being of the Middle must achieve an upright posture in the ego. Out of fear and passivity there arises an untrue picture of the world which confuses the present age. There must be set up against this, out of courage in cognition and active research in nature and in the Spirit, a true life in the sensible and in the supersensible if we are to master the problems and tasks of the present age. In concluding, Dr. Steiner said:

“The fact that we do not work in a one-sided direction of thinking,—I hope that this may have become clear to you once more out of this cycle of lectures, which gives full value to the present, the past, and what preceded the past, in order to be able to point out what constitutes the genuine and only fundamental impulse in the evolution of humanity. So I may, perhaps, take the liberty of saying here that I myself, having been privileged to deliver this cycle of lectures, am filled with profoundest satisfaction; that we may cherish the hope—the evidence for this is the fact that you are sitting here— that there are still human souls which feel the impulse, the inclination, the attraction to that which, in the supersensible realm, uses nothing else in its effort than honest truthfulness. . . . For it is necessary that those who wish to work with us shall know that our coat of arm is an unconditional, modest but honest striving in truth to ascend into the higher worlds.”

During the course of these lectures he delivered a special address to those who had come out of Russia to Helsingfors, who had the greatest difficulty in their position between the Oriental and the Occidental spirituality.

From Helsingfors he journeyed to Stockholm, where on June 8 Swedish friends who had been working with him from the beginning were constituted into the Swedish Branch of the Anthroposophical Society. In Stockholm he spoke during the period from June 8 to 10 on Nature and Spirit; The Freedom of the Soul; and Knowing and Experiencing Immortality.

July of 1913 was once again devoted to preparation for the festival plays in Munich, this time also for a Eurythmy performance. This new art appeared before the world for the first time in August of this year. On August 20, 22, and 23 a reverent audience had the experience of viewing the two Mystery Dramas, The Guardian of the Threshold and The Soul's Awakening. This was the last presentation in Munich, as the war had begun before August of the next year. The Mystery Dramas were revived later in the building belonging to the Movement in Dornach, where a more intensely practiced representation was possible. Immediately after the presentation of the dramas in Munich, Rudolf Steiner gave during the period of August 24-31 a cycle of eight lectures on The Mysteries of the Threshold. Those wishing to attend were so numerous that the lectures had to be delivered a second time. He had on similar occasions declared that he preferred to speak twice to somewhat smaller audiences rather than to give such lectures in a large hall. In this cycle of lectures he brought out clearly that, not only the individual human being but the whole of humanity, is placed by the Guiding Powers in evolution as a matter of destiny at the Threshold to the spiritual world; that this is a primary phenomenon of the present age.

Once more, it is extremely characteristic that in these lectures he rendered clear the cosmic backgrounds of the existing world situation, in which the decision had to be reached whether openness of humanity to the Spirit in the Orient should lose its proper direction and that the spiritual world should be cut off in the Occident permanently by impenetrable walls. Rudolf Steiner had the capacity to perceive these symptoms of contemporary events, as they confronted him everywhere in his journeys through Europe. He began the first of these lectures, therefore, as follows:

“For an observation which penetrates deeply, it is strange how folk-souls are crowded together in a significant manner in Eastern Europe; that very much occurs there which can be understood only if one is able to include in observation what is occurring beneath the surface of the physical and sensible world in cosmic waves which beat upon the life of these peoples. It is in a certain way strange how little really the intellectual thinking of Western Europe even attempts to bring to an understanding of heart and soul the deeper reasons for these shattering events. . . . Imperceptibly for the external world, karmic events are occurring which are connected with that which comes to expression on the physical plane only in a symptomatic way.”

These words of admonition, pointing to the future, were spoken in August 1913.

Ahrimanic and Luciferic opposing forces were threatening in the West, the Middle, and the East. But he also warned his hearers that human souls cannot understand the destinies of the past and the future in fear and passivity and, most emphatically, not in the contemporary tumultuous state of mind, but only through a schooling to the profoundest calm and inner balance. Through the living examples in the Mystery Dramas, the Hierarchical opposing forces, Lucifer and Ahriman, were rendered clear, who threaten the path across the Threshold.

“In order to achieve the right relation with reference to the passage out of one world into the other, it is necessary that one should know what attitude to take towards these two kinds of Beings, the Luciferic and the Ahrimanic...

“It is not a question of exclusion, but that, just like the weights in the two pans of a balance, so must the Ahrimanic and the Luciferic forces in their influence upon the human being and upon other beings maintain a balance, must equalize one another.”

The Ahrimanic influences work always with the dying forces present in every human being. Their goal is to bring about the unliving, dead, materialistic thinking, directed only to the world of the senses, hardening nature and man—which is the peril of the Occident. The Luciferic influences are intent upon separating the human being too early from the sensible and physical, misleading him into day-dreams and illusions, which is the danger of the Orient.

“All unbalanced enthusiasm, all confusion of capricious opinions, all false sentimental idealisms,—these arise from the shadow side of the Luciferic impulse. But in a very special degree do the Luciferic and Ahrimanic elements confront us—if we have the clairvoyant consciousness in mind—in the significance of these elements of the borderline or the Threshold between the sensible and the supersensible.”

The humanity which stands at the Threshold and is drawing near to it because of various attitudes of soul must achieve the capacity to see the Adversaries, must recognize the altogether different laws of the elemental and spiritual worlds, must maintain an inner state of balance and confront the new conditions in a constant state of metamorphosis. “The dominance of the trinity, of polarity or contrast, of measured balance” is the primal law of spiritual dynamics. This is effective even in the world of the senses, in the destinies of peoples, in every individuality. Only when the human being finds access to his own higher Self, a spiritual being, can he see into the ongoing course of the world, can perceive “the Cosmic Word as the inspirer of human destiny,” and thus begin to be the master of his earthly destiny. Self-knowledge and self-control are the keys to the portal of initiation, the force by means of which to step across the Threshold, to know the ongoing course of the world. What has been foreseen in this plan of evolution will occur, but the human being of the present time can in full consciousness and responsibility work together with this.

The closing words of this cycle of lectures were: “That which is intended to occur, which must occur, will occur. Let us endeavor to bring it about that in this spiritual community of ours we shall become capable, to the extent that we are concerned, of making certain that, in what is to take place, in what must take place, we shall do what must be done.” While the world permitted itself to be driven with such terror-stricken passivity in the West and the East into the coming chaos, here the ceaseless challenge was to wakefulness. Very much would have occurred differently in the year 1914 if those who bore the external responsibility had been able to respond to this challenge.

In August 1913, the reality of the Spirit was set forth through word and through art. This month afforded a new spiritual implement, to bring the power of the word to expression in art itself: the first performance of Eurythmy. On August 28, 1913, Goethe’s birthday, Rudolf Steiner gave an address in connection with the first Eurythmy performance. He called this art “visible speech,” “visible song.” Like all the new impulses which he gave, this one also did not arise out of any sudden theoretical idea, but out of the concrete needs of certain human beings in a specific situation. In this case, a member of the Society, Frl. Lory Smits, had expressed the wish that she could devote herself to an art of movement, but was not satisfied with the so-called artistic style-dances and, therefore, had asked the advice of Rudolf Steiner. Just as Anthroposophical pedagogy, agriculture, the medical movement arose out of such concrete questions of persons active in those various fields, so likewise did the question from one member give the initial occasion out of which Rudolf Steiner was led to provide directives and concrete information for a new art which for the first time makes of the whole human organism an instrument for rendering visible the hidden spiritual tendencies of motion in speech and music.

In one of Dr. Steiner’s introductory addresses in connection with a Eurythmy performance, he stated the spiritual foundations and laws of development underlying this art:

“With respect to other forms of art, Anthroposophy is called upon to bring about a deepening, broadening, vitalizing. Eurythmy could actually come into existence only on Anthroposophical soil. It could arrive at its impelling initiative only through what can arise directly out of the Anthroposophical conception...

“The art of movement known as Eurythmy ... took its point of departure from the view of Goethe that all art is a revelation of hidden laws of nature which would remain hidden except for such a revelation. With this idea still another, also Goethean, may be united. In every individual human organism there is a law-conforming expression of the entire human form. Every individual member of the human being is, in a certain sense, a miniature human being, just as—in Goethe’s way of thinking—the leaf of a plant is a miniature plant. This idea may be reversed; one may see in the human being a total expression of what constitutes one of his organs. In the larynx and in those organs united with this in speaking and singing, movements are brought about through these activities, or only tend to be brought about, which become manifest in sounds or groups of sounds, whereas these movements remain quite unobserved in ordinary life. It is not so much these movements themselves as the inclinations to movement which are to be transformed by Eurythmy into movements of the whole body. Through the whole human being is to be made visible as movement and posture that which takes place imperceptibly in the forming of the sound and tones in every single system of organs. Through the movements of the limbs of a human being there comes to manifestation that which occurs in speaking and singing in the larynx and the neighboring organs. In movement within space and the forms and movements of groups of persons there is represented that which lives through the inner life of the human being in tone and speech. Thus this Eurythmic art brings about something in whose genesis those impulses have prevailed which have been at work in the evolution of all forms of art.”

In another place he says:

“When the human being manifests his soul nature through speech or sound, he is present in this with his whole being. In a certain potentiality, he is in movement as to his entire body. But he does not bring this potentiality to actual expression. He checks this movement in the moment of its genesis and concentrates upon the organs of speech and tone. Through sensible-supersensible vision—to use an expression of Goethe—it is possible to recognize what potentiality of movement of the entire corporeal human being lies at the basis of a tone or a sound in speech, a harmony, melody, a formulated expression in language. By this means it is possible to cause a person or group of persons to carry out movements which bring to expression the element of music or language in a visible form just as the organs of language and song do this in an audible form. The whole human being or group of human beings becomes a larynx; the movements speak or sing just as the larynx gives forth tones or sounds.

“Nothing in Eurythmy has an arbitrary foundation any more than is the case in speech or song. But it is just as meaningless to say that momentary gestures are preferable to Eurythmy as to say that an arbitrary tone or arbitrary sound is better than the sounds and tones inherent in the law-conforming modeling of speech or tone.

“But neither is Eurythmy to be confused with the art of the dance. Music which is actually sounding can be made into Eurythmy. Music is then not merely being danced but being visibly sung.

“The movements in Eurythmy are drawn out of the entire human organism just as completely in conformity with law as is speech or song.”

Having passed through a tremendous development in years of further schooling and experience, the new art of Eurythmy has made a profound impression throughout Europe and elsewhere in the intervening time. The art is being taught now in a multitude of places in various parts of the world. It is truly astonishing to observe how definite suggestions and inspirations coming from Rudolf Steiner within a limited circle of human beings soon expand far beyond the limits of the Society within which they originated, and establish themselves before a greatly expanded public.

Artistic Eurythmy has since that time become very influential as an element in pedagogy, and has brought about a special supplement in the form of “curative Eurythmy,” to which we shall refer later.

Even in its most primitive beginnings in August 1913, Eurythmy was capable of making a deep impression on those persons with adequate in210 sight. They saw the potentiality involved in the new art, and recalled the words of Capesius in one of Rudolf Steiner’s Mystery Dramas:

“I feel how such a picture healingly
Affects my soul, and likewise to all thinkingv Can give again the forces that were lost.”

What humanity has regained through this art is the lost spiritual force of the word.

An event of the greatest importance for the further development of the Anthroposophical Movement was the festival of the laying of foundation stone of the Dornach building. On September 20, 1913, at 6:30 o’clock in the evening, the friends assembled around Rudolf Steiner on the Dornach hill to carry out this ceremony. A cylindrical pit had been dug into the ground, with access to its bottom by nine steps. The foundation stone itself consisted of two interpenetrating pentagon-dodecahedrons, a larger and a smaller one, formed out of copper. This form was placed precisely under the spot over which would stand the speaker’s desk in the finished building, from which the word would pass out to human beings within the great domed hall. It was placed in the ground in such a position that the larger pentagon-dodecahedron pointed toward the east, the smaller one toward the west, interchanging the arrangement of the building itself, the smaller dome of which was on the east side and the larger one on the west. At the beginning of the ceremony, Rudolf Steiner called upon the spiritual Hierarchies to be “the Protectors and the Guides of this ceremony of ours.” In his ceremonial address regarding the foundation stone he said:

“As a symbol of the human soul, which is dedicated to our great work, we have formed this stone. It is a symbol to us in its double-twelve form, of the striving human soul enclosed as microcosm within the macrocosm, anthropos, the human being, as he is guided here by Beings of the divine-spiritual Hierarchies. Thus this foundation stone of ours is a symbol of our own souls which we incorporate into that which we consider to be the right spiritual striving for the present time. Thus shall we sink this stone, which is formed in accordance with the cosmic pictures of the human soul, into the kingdom of the elements.”

Within the stone was enclosed an original document of information indicating the day and the cosmic constellation of this hour of birth in the course of the year: “on the twentieth day of September, 1880 after the Mystery of Golgotha—that is, 1913 after the birth of Christ—when Merkurius as the evening star stood in Libra.” The foundation stone was entrusted “to the realm of the condensed element, the earth, into which our soul was sunk in order to develop in the course of humanity’s evolution that which constitutes the mission of the earth.”

In the solemn address following this ceremony in the evening of September 20 Rudolf Steiner summoned the members in the following words to an awareness of the significance of the moment, to an inner deed:

“Let us understand rightly today on this evening of solemn ceremony. Let us understand that this ceremony signifies in a certain sense for our souls a promise. Our striving has brought it about that we are permitted to set up this symbol of the spiritual life of our time in this place from which we can look out in the four elemental directions of the rose of Heaven.

“Let us understand that, on this day, as we feel our souls united with that which we have sunken into the earth as a symbol,—that we dedicate ourselves to this which we have recognized as the right spiritual stream of humanity. Let us endeavor for a moment to place within our souls this promise of the soul, that, for this moment, we separate ourselves from everything small in life, from everything which binds us, which necessarily binds us as human being with the life of every-day. Let us endeavor for this moment to awaken within us the thought of the uniting of the human soul with the endeavor of a turning point in time. Let us endeavor for a moment to think that, in having done what we will to do here this evening, we must carry within us the consciousness of looking out over vast, vast cycles of time, in order to become aware of how the mission of which this building is to be the symbol will be integrated into the great mission of humanity upon our earthly planet. Not in pride and vanity, but in humility, dedication, and willingness to sacrifice, let us endeavor to guide our souls to those great plans, those great goals of human endeavor on earth.”

He referred to the great figures of the proclaimers of the spiritual fife in the history of humanity, to the loss of a knowledge of the Spirit in the last centuries and of the longing of innumerable human beings of the present time, in spite of the Opposing Powers to receive this knowledge again. This building of truth was to serve for the fulfillment of this demand. The place chosen here at Dornach for this work possesses significance in spiritual history:

“Guided by karma, we stand at this moment at the place through which have passed vitally important spiritual currents. Let us feel within ourselves the seriousness of the situation this evening. Once upon a time humanity had come to the very end of the road in its struggle to achieve personality. When the ancient heritage from the Divine Leaders in the primordial beginning of earthly evolution had withered away in the development of this earthly personality, then appeared over there in the Orient the Cosmic Word: Tn the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and a God was the Word.’ And the Word appeared among human souls. And it spoke to the human souls: ‘Fulfill the earthly evolution in accordance with the meaning of the Earth.’ Now it has been taken up Itself by the spiritual aura of the Earth. In fourfold manner has the Cosmic Word been proclaimed through the centuries, which have now become almost two thousand years.”

He placed the Gospels, therefore, at the middle point in the history of the spiritual evolution. But this evolution has not come to an end; on the contrary, the Spirit which brought the Gospels into existence is still creatively active among us and will be until the end of the Earth period. In the close of his address he summoned human souls to maintain a consciousness of the significance, the seriousness and lofty significance of the ceremony which had just been performed, saying that they would then gain a confidence free of fear “in that which is able to proclaim the science of the Spirit, which is once more to unite what had to be separated for a time in the course of the evolution of humanity: religion, art, and science. Let us take this with us as something that we wish never to forget as our remembrance of this hour solemnized together. The ceremony of the laying of the foundation stone was thus brought to an end in the evening of September 20; the foundation stone was sunk into the earth on the Dornach hill in the light of torches. It became the foundation for the first and the second Goetheanum building. In the year 1923 Rudolf Steiner united it once more in a solemn ceremony with the hearts of all members over the entire earth.

How great were the influences for the future and the power of continuity which Rudolf Steiner knew to be embodied in this laying of the foundation stone which, “guided by karma,” he carried out at a place “through which important spiritual currents had passed” is evident from the following decision expressed by him at another hour of destiny. After the first Goetheanum building had become a sacrifice to the flames on New Year’s Eve of 1922—23, I asked him with regard to the decision to build the second Goetheanum whether he intended to have a new laying of a foundation stone. He replied: “This is not necessary, for the foundation stone of the first building is valid also for the second Goetheanum building.” Thus both buildings were connected with this dedication ceremony of the first laying of the foundation stone. It created a symbol, a center of force and influence, in the spirit-body of the earth.

From Dornach, Dr. Steiner went at the end of September again to Scandinavia, where he delivered a cycle of lectures between October 1 and 6 in Christiania under the title The Fifth Gospel. There is surely an utterance of destiny in the fact that this action followed immediately upon the laying of the foundation stone of the Dornach building. The central spiritual utterance and the primal motif of this cycle had been expressed already during that laying of the foundation stone. It is not possible in this biography to state the content of this gift to humanity, certainly unique in history. The fact that the gift of clairvoyance was here dedicated to research in the profoundest mysteries of Christianity, the life history and deed of Christ, constituted a bestowal upon humanity which can probably not be fully appreciated at the present time, but must gradually mature in the consciousness of man. But the time, under pressure from the most powerful forces of Demonic Beings, required such an evocation and clarification of the figure of the Christ: that human beings should see before them as example and guidance His mighty battle against these Opposing Powers. With the reverent modesty and the unfailing sense of responsibility which were characteristic of Rudolf Steiner, he offered this bestowal upon humanity during those first days of October of that year.

On October 9 he spoke in Bergen, Norway, publicly on The Riddles of Life and on October 10 and 11 for the members on Descriptions Out of the Spiritual World. On October 14 and 15, he spoke in Copenhagen on The Path of the Christ through the Centuries.

The spiritual content and the findings of research presented in the Christiania cycle were presented during the months of October and November in Berlin, Nuremberg, Hamburg, Stuttgart, Cologne, and Munich. He then took up the winter period of his lectures in the Berlin Architektenhaus on the theme Spiritual Science and Religious Creed; Regarding Death; The Meaning of the Immortality of the Human Soul.

The early part of December was spent in Dornach in conferences regarding the beginning of the work on the building. He spoke on December 1 in Basel on Spiritual Science and the Spiritual Goals of Our Time.

The central ideas presented in such varied forms during the activity of the year 1913 were summarized near the end of the year in a Leipzig cycle of lectures from December 28 till January 2, 1914, under the title Christ and the Spiritual World. The historical changes in the Christian experiences of humanity from the time of the Mystery of Golgotha—in Gnosis, in Hellenism, in Johannine Christianity, in the Middle Ages, in the Grail circle—were traced up into our own time. In setting forth the cosmic and Christian Mysteries, as they have been handed down in the Grail story of Wolfram von Eschenbach, Rudolf Steiner made it possible in an exceptional, human, and personal way for his hearers to have a glimpse into the individual struggle of the spiritual researcher when he is endeavoring to find his way into the real spiritual substance of what is presented pictorially in such mythical narratives in history. For instance, it is related in the myth that the name of Parsifal was inscribed upon the Grail chalice, and there occurs the mention of a viaticum (a sacred substance) which must be found in the cosmos. Whereas it was Dr. Steiner’s practice simply to state the results of spiritual research in such matters, with no mention of his own research effort, in this instance he gave a personal description of his struggle, of the obstacles hindering this research, of the gracious illumination in knowledge when the riddle was resolved. It was a glimpse into the workshop of the clairvoyantly investigating human being which was here communicated at the same time with the unveiling of the Mysteries of the Grail.

In additional lectures of this cycle, he spoke of past forms of clairvoyant consciousness in the prophets and Sibyls of antiquity which must be overcome in the spiritual battle of esoteric Christianity through higher forms of consciousness. He spoke also of the transformation of the sense organs and life organs of the human being as a result of this metamorphosis in consciousness; of the development of new spiritual organs in the last centuries and of the harmonizing of all these influences in the self-knowledge of the spiritually schooled human being of the present time.

In these lectures, Dr. Steiner also added a new chapter in the primal history of the spiritual development of the cosmos, in Christology, through the fact that, on the basis of clairvoyant vision, he revealed the deeds of Christ in the cosmos before his birth on the earth. For the very first time, the manner in which the Christ Being worked upon the spirit and the developing organs of soul, body, and senses in the human being in primeval times could be taken up into the thinking and the cognition of persons on earth. What was begun here at the end of the year 1913 as a deed of cognition was developed in March 7 and June 2, 1914, in further lectures to a picture of the cosmic and human metamorphoses through the Christ. In this way a new epoch in Christology was inaugurated.

In the month of December 1913, after this supplementing of a knowledge of the deeds of Christ in primeval times, Rudolf Steiner expanded also man’s knowledge regarding the life of Jesus on Earth. In two lectures in Cologne on December 17 and 18, on The Mystery of Golgotha, he spoke on the epochs in the life of Jesus from his twelfth to his thirtieth year, which had hitherto been so completely veiled from historical research that we have often asked ourselves with a certain feeling of shock how it could be possible that so little was known regarding the life of the greatest Being that had ever walked upon the earth. The spiritual significance of the gift which Rudolf Steiner entrusted to humanity in unveiling these lost treasures of spiritual history cannot be estimated at the present time, but must be left to the future.

At this point, I must admit that our knowing so little about the greatest Figure in world history for the reason that so many of the documents have been lost, reports of eye witnesses forgotten or distorted in the course of history, has contributed in part to my venturing upon this feeble attempt at a biography of a great proclaimer of the Spirit in our time in order to meet the justified criticism which we should deserve from those who follow us if we should not employ all that is possible for our so greatly inferior powers in order, as eye witnesses and participants in experiences, to preserve at least a fragment of the knowledge of the life and work of a great one of our time for commemoration, for broader and profounder research by the world that follows us. Although the means employed by Rudolf Steiner for research are not given to us, there live within us, nevertheless, so many personal words of admonition and encouragement given by him, that we should never lose our courage, should risk the first step on the path even if the path itself led into unattainable distances. When deeply buried treasures are to be disclosed, not only are those who know the nature of the treasure and the place called upon, but also those who are willing fumblingly to thrust the first spades into the earth.

The most important publication of Rudolf Steiner’s in the year 1913 was the book The Threshold to the Spiritual World. As is indicated in its introduction, he gave there “certain descriptions of those parts of the world and of the being of man which are seen when spiritual cognition crosses the Threshold separating the world of the senses from the world of spirit.” This borderline had, indeed, to be overcome if humanity willed to participate spiritually in the molding of its own destiny. The path in this direction was given by Rudolf Steiner in this writing through “clues to meditation material,” through which the human being can bring his consciousness closer to spiritual facts. The leaders of humanity in earlier epochs of culture knew the value of meditation, which must precede action in the world if this is to be directed toward a goal. The turning point between the years 1913 and 1914 placed man before the Threshold from two points of view: in spiritual experience and in external action. But the secular leaders of humanity no longer understood meditation; they practiced no inner concentration, no expansion into the spiritually creative realms, before external action. What took place on earth in the year 1914 was the result of the loss of meditation and concentration; it was action without meaning, without a consciousness of the influence of the spiritual world. Impulses and goals were drawn exclusively from the world on this side of the Threshold, and inexpressible suffering of peoples and human beings was brought about within this constricted circle of thinking.