The Humour of Life

One suffers at times a kind of pain when one comes into an assemblage of Anthroposophists. Such a heaviness in the air! No inducing the members to get a move on! If one begins a discussion, no one else so much as opens his mouth; why, their very tongues are heavy — heavy as lead! And they pull such long faces! Out of the question to expect them to look happy or to laugh! And yet, do you know what is the first and most essential qualification for a teacher of these children? Humour! Yes, real humour, the humour of life. You may have mastered every possible clever method and device, but you will not be able to educate these children unless you have the necessary humour.

There will have to be a feeling and understanding in the anthroposophical movement for what “movement”, mobility, really is!

-Rudolf Steiner 

JESUS IN THEOSOPHICAL HISTORY- the 100 B.C. date

Some Theosophical leaders have taught that Jesus lived about 100 B.C., and that he was not crucified; they identify him with Jeschu Ben Pandera (the spelling varies, and will do so in this note) of Jewish tradition, who was stoned. This effectively undercuts orthodox Christianity - if there was no suffering “under Pontius Pilate”, then there was no conventional Atonement, and if the New Testament can be wrong on so important a matter as the date and manner of death of its main character then its reliability is low.

The 100 B.C. theory (the precise date is sometimes given differently) was introduced by H.P. Blavatsky in “Isis Unveiled” Vol. 2 p. 201. She cites Eliphas Levi “La Science Des Esprits” (Paris, Germer Balliere, 1865, a publisher with offices in London and New York also.) Levi there printed the Jewish accounts. His book has not been translated, but it is in the S.P.R. Library. Although she did not always commit herself to the theory, H.P.B. did endorse it in several places, notably in 1887 in two articles “The Esoteric Character of the Gospels” and her response in French to the Abbe Roca’s “Esotericism of Christian Dogma”. Both are in Collected Writings Vol. 8 - see especially pages, 189, 224, 380-2 and 460-1. Among scholars she cited Gerald Massey in support, but added (p. 380) “Our Masters affirm the Statement.”

The anti-Semitic writer Nesta H. Webster “Secret Societies and Subversive Movements” (London, 1928), quoting this same article asks “Who were the Masters whose authority Madame Blavatsky here invokes? Clearly not the Trans-Himalayan Brotherhood to whom she habitually refers by this term, and who can certainly not be suspected of affirming the authenticity of the Toldoth Yeshu. It is evident, then, that there were other “Masters” from whom Madame Blavatsky received this teaching, and that those other masters were Cabalists.” (p. 297-8) Webster had already quoted the same Levi book (Webster p. 68), whose subtitle read in part “Revelation du dogme secret des Kabbalistes”.

Now the connections between Eastern and Western occult inspirers of H.P.B. are interesting and important, but Mrs. Webster’s distinction does not immediately work. We do find the Eastern masters supporting the 100 B.C. theory, though the references are not as full as might be wished for such a significant matter. K.H. for example speaks of “John the Baptist having never heard of Jesus who is a spiritual abstraction and no living man of that epoch.” (M.L. Sinnett 3rd ed. p. 409). Earlier the man “Jeshu” is called “but a mortal like any of us, an adept more by his inherent purity and ignorance of real Evil that by what he had learned with his initiated Rabbis and the already (at that period) fast degenerating Egyptian hierophants and priests.” (p. 339)

In 1881, too, K.H. wrote footnotes to some Levi articles, and said of the doctrine of Jesus, both public and private, “But he preached it a century before his birth.” (Paradoxes of the Highest Science”).

Whether Levi himself subscribed to the theory, I do not know; despite two recent biographies in English, Levi remains obscure, and in other books, speaks derisively of the theory (but was that to avoid legal trouble?) I hope to discuss his links with H.P.B. in a separate paper. (A useful starting point is the biographical essay by Boris De Zirkoff in C.W. Vol. 1. p. 491-5.) The theory about Jesus became entangled, in France especially, with anticlericalism, politics, antisemitism and occult streams little known in the English world, or to Theosophists generally.

Among later Theosophists, G. de Purucker was firm in support of the theory. His comments in 1934 about the “Real Birth-Date of Jesus” are included in “Studies in Occult Philosophy” (1945) p. 426-8. “The Statement” he noted “is made from our esoteric records; but these esoteric records also are largely based on astronomical and genuinely astrological wisdom.” Each Messianic Cycle of about 2160 years had its own Messiah “and the Messiah of the present Messianic Cycle was the power, the influence, working through H.P.B.”

Annie Besant popularised the theory in her “Esoteric Christianity”, in the chapter on “The Historical Christ”. She says “The Child whose Jewish name has been turned into that of Jesus was born in Palestine B.C. 105, . . “ Eventually “the human body of Jesus paid the penalty for enshrining the glorious Presence of a Teacher more than man”, apparently a reference to stoning by other Jews. (4th ed. Adyar T.P.H. 1946 p. 96, 100–1). Mrs. Besant enjoyed the clairvoyant assistance of C.W. Leadbeater on this as on other matters, though as made clear above, this theory was not a later development of Theosophy, but entered early. Leadbeater characteristically quoted “Esoteric Christianity” in his book “The Christian Creed” 2nd ed. T.P.H. 1917 p.13–c4), in which also the theory of a greater Master Christ possessing Jesus is deployed. In expounding the credal statement “was crucified, dead and buried” he was obliged to explain it as allegory” (P. 81) while Pontius Pilate, historical though he was, is held to have got into the story by mistranslation (p. 80).

In the background for both these writers is clairvoyant research carried out at the turn of the century in cooperation with G.R.S. Mead, the Theosophical scholar with a special interest in Christian origins. A valuable description of this research was given by C. Jinarajadasa “Occult Investigations” (T.P.H. 1938) p. 34–40—it is of course only one chapter in the investigations that the two made, the most famous perhaps being in occult chemistry. Jinarajadasa points out of Mead “in the end he lost all faith in the veracity of the investigations.” (P. 40) This was after he had left the T.S. and had developed doubts about his colleagues in other respects.

Mead himself alluded guardedly to these experiments in his book “Did Jesus Live 100 Years B.C.? (T.P.H. 1903) which was a careful account of the Jewish and early Christian material relevant to the question. Speaking of the occult researchers with whom he worked he observes “Now, this handful of friends of mine who are endowed in this special fashion are unanimous in declaring that “Jeschu”, the historical Jesus, lived a century before the traditional date.” (p. l9) He gives the impression that there were several researchers, but I suspect it was mainly Leadbeater. Mead did not commit himself in the end of the book, and he made no appeal to the authority of the Masters.

Another Theosophist of the time, who did eventually claim a mahatmic source (D.K.) was Alice Bailey. She taught much that was congenial to the Theosophy of her day; sometimes cited Mrs. Besant; and was aware of the symbolical value of the life of Jesus, with the crucifixion for example, representing one initiation for disciples—but she apparently had no interest in the 100 B.C. theory and accepted the traditional date. And Rudolf Steiner directly— indeed forcefully, challenged the theory. Claiming his own occult lineage, and a capacity to read the Akashic Records, he dated the crucifixion as 3rd April A.D. 33. He identified Jeschu ben Pandira as a forerunner and herald of Jesus of Nazareth. Pandira had lived a century before him, and was a very important individuality, the current holder in fact of the rank of Bodhisattva in the Theosophical scheme—but not the same as Christ Jesus. For good measure Steiner added that Jeschu ben Pandira was again in incarnation, preparing for the new perception of the etheric Christ in the twentieth century. Thus the clairvoyance of Steiner and Leadbeater was in opposition.

Mr. Jinarajadasa remained interested in the 100 BC theory to the end of his life. Reviewing a work on biblical criticism in “The Theosophist” June 1950, (Martin Dibelius “From Tradition to Gospel”) he argued that the events had probably taken place very much earlier that at the period narrated. In the July 1950 issue, he returned to the theory, suggesting that the Dead Sea Scrolls, found in 1947, supported the belief that the Essenes had had a Messiah who had been killed 100 years before the crucifixion.

Mr. Jinarajadasa was the last Theosophical leader to take a personal interest in the theory, but it still surfaces, both in expositions of H.P.B.’s teachings, and of those of her successors. In “The Theosophist” April 1985, Miss Rosamunde Prior, exploring the meaning today of “Gospel Truth” (p. 252) notes; “Occult Tradition with regard to the life of Jesus states that he lived a hundred years before the received date and was murdered at Lydd (or Ludd) about 70 B.C.” The reference in the Fourth Gospel to the High Priest’s fear that the Romans would come and take away to refer to about 70 B.C. their place and nation, is said (Lydda incidentally was a town about 25 miles from Jerusalem, an administrative centre, and the site of an early Christian community mentioned in Acts of the Apostles.)

A somewhat severe judgment of the theory is found in Gregory Tillett’s biography of Leadbeater “The Elder Brother” (1982). “There is not a single reputable Biblical scholar, archaeologist or historian who supports this claim, and, on the basis of modern research, there is no reason to seriously question the traditional date for the birth of Jesus at about 5 B.C.” (p. 272). As we have seen, however, this theory was not invented by Leadbeater, and has been held by persons at an opposite pole to him in theosophical thought. It is true, so far as I am aware, that the theory has not found any definite takers among biblical scholars, though the sceptical Professor George Wells who doubts if Jesus existed, more than once alludes to Mead. Even Jewish reference works accept the conventional dating. So independent a scholar as Professor Morton Smith, whose “Jesus the Magician” (1978) is of great interest to the student, accepts the fact that Jesus was executed by Pilate. Noting “the confusion produced in rabbinic material by several factors.” he explains “First, the rabbis are generally ignorant of chronology and constantly guilty of absurd anachronisms. Second, they habitually refer to their enemies by abusive nicknames and puns, usually bad. Third, in the case of Jesus, particularly, this practice of concealed reference has been carried to the extreme by manuscript copyists to avoid censorship.” (p. 47)

However, it may be that biblical scholars are confused by the material through not realising esoteric levels to it that would make it much clearer. And the mainstream labours of biblical scholars who accept the usual date have not resulted in a generally convincing interpretation of Jesus. What we need of course is a re-examination of the evidence that updates the scholarship from Mead’s time to the present; and with all respect to those who stand by occult tradition, unless this is done the case for the theory will partly go by default. Indeed it becomes one person’s reading of the akashic records, or otherwise secret records, set against another. The theory is not crucial for a gnostic or esoteric interpretation of Jesus. If it became known to Jewish students of the Kabala, and thence was transmitted to Gentile students, and was passed by some Western occultists to their oriental colleagues, we can see how both H.P.B. and K.H. could have come to espouse it. But should we accept it today without more study? Too much rests upon it for it to be a passing reference in the teachings.

NOTES

1. Mr. Leslie Shepard, who edited the University Books edition of “Did Jesus live 100 Years B.C.?” tells me that he has Gerald Massey’s annotated copy of the Rev. S. Baring-Gould’s book “The Lost and Hostile Gospels: An Essay on the Toledoth Jeschu and the Petrine and Pauline Gospels of the First Three Centuries of which Fragments Remain.” (1874). This is probably Massey’s main source of Jewish accounts of Jesus. Was Baring Gould’s account known to
H.P.B.?

2. It is important to recognise that the “Toldoth Jeshu” was not a novelty in France when Levi wrote. It had been praised by Voltaire who died in 1778. See Schonfield (cited below) p. 21. 3. 

Among later writers who briefly mention Mead, see:
a) “Jesus of Nazareth his life, times and teaching” by Joseph Klausner, Ph.D. (Heidelberg) who published the Hebrew edition in Jerusalem in 1922. Translated by Canon Danby, London 1925.
Includes a section on Hebrew sources. Argues that Jesus is understandable in terms of the Palestinian Judaism of his day.

This shocked his fellow Zionists, and will also irritate those who insist on seeing Jesus as obtaining his teaching outside Palestine, and outside Judaism.

b) “According to the Hebrews, a new translation of the Jewish Life of Jesus (Toldoth Jeshu”), with an enquiry into the nature of its sources and special relationship to the lost Gospel according to the Hebrews” by Hugh J. Schonfield (London, Duckworth, 1937).

c) “Christian Origins in Jewish Tradition” by Ernst Bammel in New Testament Studies 13 (1967) p. 317–35. (I would welcome details of later articles in theological journals that review this material.
There is much solid work being done at present on the relationship between Christianity and Judaism, but this often contains only passing references to the early Jewish traditions about Jesus.)

d) “Origen and the Jews, Studies in Jewish-Christian Relations in Third-Century Palestine” Nicholas R.M. De Lange. C.U.P. 1976 esp. p. 173.

4. The main text of this paper was included in my remarks to the T.S. conference “Rediscovering Gnosis: a renaissance in Christian thought?” in London on 16th June I was greatly interested that Nigel Blair, another speaker, independently raised the Steiner and Edgar Cayce teachings on the dating and background of Jesus.

A Theosophist would naturally write off Cayce’s revelations as trance fantasies, but if he did accurately foresee the finding of scrolls at Qumran, then perhaps he did have some clairvoyant capacity.

5. For Rudolf Steiner’s views, a starting point is “The Gospel of St. Matthew” 12 lectures given in Berne 1st-12th September 1910 4th ed. Rudolf Steiner Press 1965, especially lectures 4 & 5 and Appendix II “Jeschu ben Pandira” which cites Mead.

-Leslie Price

Theosophical History Magazine Vol. I, No. 3 (July 1985)

THE WAY OF INITIATION or The Superphysical World and its Gnosis

The readers of this magazine [The Theosophist] cannot have forgotten the very instructive articles that were published some time ago entitled, "The Superphysical World and its Gnosis". They were translated from the German of Dr. Steiner by Mr. Max Gysi, who now issues them in a book form. Our President [Annie Besant] says in her foreword to the book : 

"Dr. Steiner's views, representing a deeply mystical Christian Theosophy, are of very great utility, supplying a side of theosophical thought which might otherwise miss fitting recognition. He is the natural heir of the great German mystics, and adds to their profound spirituality the fine lucidity of a philosophic mind.

"If English readers find herein presentiments of great truths that seem somewhat unfamiliar, let them seek to gain new views of truth by studying it from another standpoint. If they read sympathetically, seeking to understand, rather than in the spirit of antagonism, seeking to criticise, they will find many a gem of value, many a pearl of price, among the thoughts herein presented, and Theosophy's jewelled diadem will be the richer for their insetting."

A good portrait of Dr. Steiner accompanies some biographical notes by Edward Schure. We need not dilate upon the merits of the contents as our readers are familiar with them. We hope the volume will have the warm reception it deserves.

-B.P. Wadia


http://www.iapsop.com/archive/materials/theosophist/theosophist_v30_n5_feb_1909.pdf

Viewing the Dawn

The viewing of the dawn can promote......considerate patience. You cannot hurry the dawn yourself – it is obvious just what you have with an unripe dawn – you have but predawn gloom. If you hurry too much you can miss its occurrence in its most real sense – you can actually miss experiencing the arraignment of this paradise. The tension and anticipation, the melody, the mood, the airs … the expanding forthwith day. 

For the unripe personality they will say “Oh, there will always be another dawn tomorrow I can see” … but for the mature they realise that not one is ever alike unto another. The unripe personality very rarely will catch this daily event. Yet the mature individual will take in many. The unripe individual will probably busy himself or chatter the moments away, whilst the mature nature might be held in great fulfilment within just a moment of a moment of its glory. 

We can actually work over our personalities during this morning episode for the better in this regard. The unripe individual who is determined to curb his immature aspects within his worldly and inner behaviors will benefit fantastically by learning to take in the morning’s awakening with peaceful and solemn consideration.

-B.Hive 

Dedication to Love & Humility - Rudolf Steiner

There is no worse phrase than this: ‘look deep into yourself'. There one finds, however, only the lower self. One must seek lovingly outside oneself, and then one will find what one is seeking. I have known people who said: "what do I need? I don’t need anything at all, because I’m Atma (soul)" – and even though they constantly say “Atma, I’m Atma”, they do not become conscious of Atma, all they know about it is that it is a word with four letters. It leads to closing oneself off when gazing into yourself. 

For we are part of the whole. The finger is only finger because it is part of the body. If we separate it from the organism, then it is no longer a finger. The finger does not separate itself from the organism; but the human being is so “clever” that he believes that he could detach himself from the earth, although if he is just a few kilometers above the surface of the earth, he perishes. 

[…] It is the worst possible mistake to want to find the god within yourself. Losing oneself through entering into all the details of the world, that is the right path. He who dedicates him or herself to love and humility will find godliness, while he who seeks God in himself, hardens.

- Rudolf Steiner – GA 98 – Natur- und Geistwesen – ihr Wirken in unserer sichtbaren Welt – Vienna, November 7, 1907 (page 38-39)

Rudolf Steiner's Birth Date

Rudolfus Josephus Laurentius could not have been born on the Wednesday the 27th and be baptised in the church at Draskovec on the same day, as it was 11:07 pm at night.
[Copy of Baptismal Record, stating the 27th as the date of the Baptism]
The 25th makes more sense, as witnessed in his own handwriting, and the testimony of Eugenie von Bredow (who says "hitherto we celebrated on the 27th"- she knew of both dates). By 1921 he was celebrating his birthday on the 25th.

He was born late Monday night on the 25th. Mother and baby were exhausted, they had the Tuesday to recover and arrange a baptism on the Wednesday. That makes for a sensible timeline- even though the baptism still seems rushed.

How can we be sure if even Dr. Steiner wasn't sure. Here he was at the advanced age of sixty, considering that his birth date was wrong. He wouldn't have done that lightly.

Sergei Prokovieff goes into the reasons why he (Steiner) may have wanted to hide the date. He does cite the avoidance of occult attack: See pages 29 and 30 https://books.google.com.au/books?id=SfZymMqqDJ0C&pg

http://www.astro.com/astro-databank/Steiner,_Rudolf

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=955186131206993&set=p.955186131206993&type=3&theater

“At the beginning we note the following unusual circumstances: Rudolf Steiner was born shortly before midnight on February 25, 1861, in the tiny village of Kraljevec. (see Note 1) Owing to negligence of the midwife the child was bleeding almost to death. It was questionable how long it would survive. If this birth had been normal the child would have been baptized a few days later in the church of Kraljevec, but now an emergency baptism was called for. However, the schedule of the church of Kraljevec could not accommodate this emergency. So the child was carried two miles through wintry February cold and snow to the church of Draskovec, a neighboring village. There it was baptized on February 27, and named:

Rudolfus Josephus Laurentius Steiner

or, as we would say:
Rudolf Joseph Laurence Steiner.

It is significant that the church of Draskovec was dedicated to St. Michael. It was a St. Michael Church! [the church is in fact dedicated to St. Roch, not Michael]. Apparently destiny had arranged circumstances so that St. Michael would stand guard, as it were, like a god-parent, at this human being's entry into the physical life on earth.”

-From: Dr. Ernst Katz, ‘The Mission of Rudolf Steiner’
Guenther Aschoff:

This is Rudolf Steiner’s newly made, baptism certificate from 1879: the first photograph from Max Benzinger (from the 1^st of February, 1914 (above) and the second photo from Max Benzinger (?) from 1918/1920 (underneath), kept in the Rudolf Steiner Archives – (almost completely deciphered): a copy of the newly prepared baptism certificate from 1879, by Guenther Aschoff.

"Newly made" where is the photo of the original which shows the name "Adolf" instead of "Rudolf"?
Guenther Aschoff:

Rudolf Steiner’s certificate of baptism had to be obtained from the parish of Draskovec, which was appropriate for Kraljevec. One can understand how irritating it may have been for his parents having received the document in Neudoerfl, only to discover the incorrect first name written, as well as the incorrect birthplace. There it was written ‘Kraljevec 24’ instead of ‘the railroad station’ as well as the office and the name of ‘Gabriel Mestritz’. The parents then went to the priest Johann Widder in Neudoerfll and pleaded with him to prepare a new copy of the baptism certificate; and that Record of Baptism was received and has remained.

At the birth, those present were the mother and father, also the stationmaster, Laurentius Diem and his wife Frau Josefa Jakl, the godmother, as well as a midwife. The midwife applied bandaging to the navel after the birth. For some reason, perhaps a poorly bound bandage, there was a great loss of blood; so the parents decided to call for an emergency baptism. To carry this out, a baptised Catholic must speak, ‘I baptise you in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.’ It was already midnight or shortly thereafter, and those present didn’t want the newly born infant to die without being baptised.

  On the next day, or the day thereafter, the baptism was repeated at a church in Draskovec.  The priest on duty, Gabriel Mestritz, registered the birth and baptism as taking place on the 27^th of February, 1861, under the name ‘Adolphus Laurentius Josephus Steiner’. As the place of residence he gave ‘Kraljevec 24’. At the end he wrote ‘Gabriel Mestritz’ for the name of the authorised priest attending to the baptism.

Where on the "newly created" baptism does it say "birth". It just states the baptism day of 27th.

Being born a Catholic, it is not hard to imagine that the young Rudolfus celebrated his baptismal day, as it was a Catholic tradition to do so:

"Melkite Catholics encourage families to celebrate the baptismal day rather than the actual birthday." http://www.resourcemelb.catholic.edu.au/object.cfm?o=205&pid=1476&showrm=true&uptam=false

Birthdays were not generally celebrated in the early 17th century. Some people marked the anniversary of their baptism, as the day of their birth as a Christian. It was a day of retrospection, of prayer and meditation, rather than a public celebration. https://www.plimoth.org/sites/default/files/media/pdf/edmaterials_celebrations.pdf

Baptism anniversaries are joyous occasions that can be celebrated by the entire family. If parents, grandparents, and baptismal sponsors pay attention to these “birthdays”, children will come to regard these anniversaries as significant. We help our children value the remembrance of their “birth” into the family of God. http://www.neiasynod.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/Baptismalb-daybrochure.pdf

More important than our real birthday, the anniversary of the moment when our mother gave us our physical life, is the anniversary of the moment when we received the life of our soul as children of God. https://www.catholicculture.org/culture/liturgicalyear/activities/view.cfm?id=407

Jesus & the Archangel

The higher we go we find that Christ is of the Trinity and then condescends through the Seraphim, Cherubim and so on to become an Archangel and then man.

Now, my reading of Rudolf Steiner says that Michael is that Archangel.

From The Pre Earthly Deeds of Christ:"He who was later the Nathan-Jesus had been present in the three earlier events, but not incarnated as physical man; he lived in the spiritual worlds as a spiritual Being of the nature of the Archangels; and in the spiritual worlds, in the preparatory stages of the Mystery of Golgotha, in the Lemurian age and twice in Atlantis, he was permeated by the Christ-Being."

Notice he lived as one who had "the nature of the Archangels", but he was of an Angelic nature:

"It may be said, therefore, that there were three Archangel-lives in the spiritual world, and that the Being who lived those lives was the same as he who was later incarnated as man and is described in the Gospel of St. Luke as the Jesus-child. Three times had this Angelic being, who later sacrificed himself as Man, offered himself for permeation by the Christ-Impulse. As in Christ Jesus we have a Man permeated with the Christ-Impulse, so it may be said that three times previously we have an Angel permeated with that Impulse. "​

Dr. Steiner's teaching is that the Nathan child was a pure soul who was not involved in the Fall. He had also been Krishna. I hadn't consider him as an Archangel nature. This is a new thought- and quite convoluted too.

The fact that the "Christ Impulse" incarnated in an Angelic being as stated above, is contradicted by Steiner here:

"I admit that it may seem strange when I say that this great Being was ensouled three times in an archangelic form, and then incarnated in a human being. It would seem a more orderly progression if between His ensoulment as an archangel and His human incarnation He had taken an angelic form. So it may seem to us. Yet, even though it is claimed that the statements of spiritual science are fictitious, truly it is not so. You may gather this from corroborative evidence. If you ask me how it happens that Christ did not descend from hierarchy to hierarchy and only afterward to man - if you were to ask me that, I could only answer that I do not know, for I never make theoretical combinations. The facts adduced by spiritual research are that Christ chose three times an archangelic form, leaving out the angelic form, and then made use of a human body. I leave it to future research to determine the reason, which I do not yet know, though I do know that it is true. "

Was he making a correction, because the Pre Earthly Deeds of Christ lecture was given in March and the Four Sacrifices in June 1914?

From the Four Sacrifices of Christ:

"This danger to humanity was averted in the Lemurian age by a Being Who later, through the Mystery of Golgotha, incarnated in the body of Jesus of Nazareth. In this earlier age, however, He ensouled Himself - I cannot say incarnated - in one of the archangels.

"While the earth was working through the Lemurian age, a Being living in spiritual heights became manifest - one might say, as a sort of prophecy of John's baptism - in an archangel who offered up his soul powers, and was thus permeated by the Christ."

So in this lecture we are again talking about the Nathan Jesus (though he is not mentioned by name).

Then we find the Nathan Jesus being talked about as though he had been ensouled with the Archangel Michael:

"Once more the Christ Being ensouled Himself in an archangel, and the power thus generated in the spiritual world made possible the harmonization of thinking, feeling and willing........

"Mankind has preserved some memory of how human passion and human thinking were harmonized at this period by forces that descended from supramundane worlds, but the sign of this memory is not rightly understood. St. George who conquers the dragon, or Michael who conquers the dragon, are symbols of the third Christ event, when Christ ensouled Himself in an archangel. It is the dragon, trodden under foot, that has brought thinking, feeling and willing into disorder. All who turn their gaze upon St. George or Michael with the dragon, or some similar episode, perceive, in reality, the third Christ event. The Greeks who in their wonderful mythology made copies of what happened in the spiritual world at the end of the Atlantean age, revered the Sun Spirit as the harmonizer of man's thinking, feeling and willing."

Now the Nathan Jesus is forgotten:

"Then came the fourth, the earthly mystery, that of Golgotha. The same Christ Being Who had ensouled Himself three times in archangelic form incarnated through what we call the Baptism by John in the Jordan in the body of Jesus of Nazareth."

I'm not too clear on all this. Just what is the connection of the Archangel Michael to the Nathan Jesus?

Seven Occult Seals

The first modern appearance of Seven Seals in occult form was in Eliphas Levi's "Rituel De La Haute Magie", 1860. Rudolf Steiner's versions are similar to Levi's.

Copy by Stephen Hawks 

Albrecht Durer's woodcuts of the seven seals were published in 1498.

The Second Seal of Durer:

And, behold, a Throne was set in Heaven, and One sat on the Throne. And He that sat was to look upon like a Jasper and a Sardine-stone: and there was a rainbow round about the Throne, in sight like unto an Emerald. And round about the Throne were four and twenty seats: and upon the seats I saw four and twenty Elders sitting, clothed in white raiment; and they had on the their heads crowns of Gold ... And round about the Throne were four Beasts full of eyes before and behind. And the first Beast was like a Lion, and the second Beast like a Calf, and the third Beast had a face as a Man, and the fourth Beast was life a flying Eagle.

On His knees lies the Book with seven seals; the Lamb, who alone is worthy to open the seals thereof, standing upon it.

It's hard to see the beasts here, so prominent in the Arild Rosenkrantz version.

"Four of the trumpets have already sounded, and the plagues that follow their sounding have stricken the earth. The rain of fire, mingled with blood, falls on the grass and the trees; the mountain of fire is cast into the sea ; the star named Wormwood is about to fall into a well of water; and the third part of everything is smitten and destroyed.

"In Dürer's representation of this vision, God the Father sits on a throne at the top of the cut, dealing out the trumpets to the angels, who have received all but two, which He is in the act of handing to the two angels nearest the throne. The angel with the censer, containing the prayers of the saints, stands at the altar immediately in front of the Father. The two principal angels, with their long trumpets at their mouths, occupy the central space of the picture, together with the darkened visages of sun and moon.

"The landscape on earth is partly river or sea, and partly shore. Two great cities doomed to destruction lie on either side of the broad water, in which numerous vessels of all descriptions are suffering shipwreck. An eagle flying over the earth utters the cry of ' Woe, woe, woe to the inhabiters of the earth by reason of the other voices of the trumpets of the three angels which are yet to sound !'

- Mrs Charles W Heaton (The History of the Life of Albrecht Durer of Nurenberg with a Translation of His Letters and Journal and Some Accounts of His Work: Seeley, Jackson and Halliday, London; 1881)

A keen observer has noted:

"But the clearest clue hidden in plain sight is the eagle-which is NOT an eagle. First of all, the eagle, according to the storyline, is supposed to be swooping upwards in the sky, Dürer has the bird swoop down.

"Secondly, it’s not an eagle, and we know this by the shape of the tail feathers. Bird tail feathers are used for giving signals or messages to other birds and Dürer ’s bird gives us a message. An eagle’s tail is not forked like the bird Dürer depicts as we can see in this picture.

http://img.ehowcdn.com/article-new/ehow/images/a05/k9/3h/purpose-bird_s-tail-feathers-800×800.jpg

"So what kind of bird is this with a forked tail? It’s what’s known as a European kite or goshawk. And in Hungary, the land of Dürer ’s ancestry, the goshawk was known as the Turul, a very important mythic image. It was the great bird resembling a falcon that was sent forth by Isten to guide the creation and destiny of the Magyar people. The first Hungarian kings after St Stephen I were the hereditary of the Turul (“Turul nemzetség”)

For more on the Hungarian Turul, please see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turul


You can read more about the fourth seal (and the others)
here:

http://wn.elib.com/Steiner/Lectures/OccSigns/19070916p01.html

The above is Rudolf Steiner's lecture Occult Signs & Symbols.

The following are versions by Clara Rettich (1911):

The mystery of the holy grail. It is that astral experience which renders the universal meaning of human evolution. The cube represents the world of space, not yet mingled with any physical being or event. Out of the three space dimensions grow first of all the lower human powers, illustrated by the two serpents; these again bring out of themselves the purified higher spiritual nature, represented in the world spirals. The upward growth of these higher powers makes it possible for mankind to become the recipient, or chalice, of purely spiritual cosmic being, expressed in the dove. The motto and truth of spiritual science is inscribed here: I am born out of the Godhead; I die in Christ; I am born again through the holy Spirit.

***********

Arild Rosenkrantz painted the Apocalyptic Seals for the first time in 1923 under the personal guidance of Rudolf Steiner. They were published in 1924 in black and white in an English portfolio edition: “Occult Seals and Columns”.





The mystery of the creative word represents comprehensively the entire earthly evolution of man. The images in this and the other seals can be found in “The Revelation of St. John” or the Apocalypse. “And I turned to hear the sounds which reached me; then I saw seven golden lamps, and in the midst of the lamps one like unto the Son of Man, in a long garment… with eyes as a flame…and feet of living fire… and a voice like the sound of many waters. And in his right hand were seven stars, and out of his mouth came a sharp two-edged sword, and his countenance was as the sun shineth in his strength.”

“Here,” Steiner writes, “in general images, most far-reaching mysteries of human evolution are indicated… Every sign and form in the seals is significant… This continous development from the beginning to the end of the earth reveals itself to the seer, when he sees on the astral plane the archetype of evolving man, as it is reproduced in the first seal.”

"The group soul represents one of the first evolutionary states of earthly humanity, with all that belongs to it. In the remote past humans had no individual soul but were part of a group-soul. On the astral plane this may be reduced to four fundamental types: the lion, ox, eagle and that form, which as a group soul comes closest to the individual soul of human beings today. But as yet, as Emil Bock writes in his “Apocalypse of St. John”, everything is filled with divine calm and solemnity. Creation still rests in the sphere of perpetuity; the wheel of time is not yet revolving. The hierarchical realm which contains the creatures is full of wonder and worship, absorbed in contemplation of the creative cosmic centre. In the centre Rosenkrantz has placed the lamb – the only one worthy of opening the seals."

"The four riders represent the mysteries of the so-called harmony of the spheres. You experience these mysteries, Steiner says, in the interval between death and a new birth. The angel blowing the horns represents the spiritual primordial essences of world-phenomena.The apocalyptic riders represent the main points of development, through which a human individuality passes in the course of many incarnations and which are represented on the astral plane in the four riders on horses: a shining white horse expressing a very early stage of soul development; a flamecoloured horse indicating the warrior stage of the soul's development; a black (or blue) horse corresponding to the stage when only the soul's outer physical perception is developed, and a gleaming green horse, the picture of the ripe soul, which has gained mastery over the body."

Steiner & Society

Dr. Ita Wegman who, together with Dr. Noll, gave Steiner medical care until the very end, reports as follows: “In full consciousness, but without saying anything about the future, without leaving behind any instruction or message for this or that personality, the Master has left us. And a direct question put to him on these matters was consciously answered in the negative. Why was this?” Somewhat later, Dr. Noll told Johanna Mücke: “Shortly before his passing, Frau Wegman asked Dr. Steiner whether there was any arrangement he wished to make in connection with the Society – he looked very intently at her and then turned away!

  ""All that is represented on the Earth as something of a personal nature is, when it mixes itself into what has to happen for the cause of Anthroposophy, an element which, if it remains personal, cannot be justified before the spiritual world. And what difficulties arise for the one who has to represent something or other before the Spiritual world in a responsible way, if at times he has to bring, together with that for which he must stand responsible, all that comes out of the personal aspirations of the people involved. What consequences this has, of this you ought to be a little more aware. It results in the most terrible setbacks from the side of the spiritual world… Here is someone working with others in the Anthroposophical movement…. but he weaves into what he is actively contributing, personal ambitions, personal intentions, personal qualities. And so, there they are, these personal ambitions, these personal tendencies. Most people don’t realize that they are personal; most people regard what they do as impersonal, because they deceive themselves as to the personal and impersonal. This must then be brought along. And it results in the most appalling setbacks from the spiritual world for the one who has to carry with him into the spiritual world these things that have their source in the personalities.

"These are inner difficulties, my dear friends, which arise particularly for such a movement as Anthroposophy within the Anthroposophical Society. Certainly it is terrible that we have such terrible opponents, but with respect to the inner question of how Anthroposophy has to be represented, it is far more terrible when it is necessary to carry the fruits of work that is done within the Anthroposophical movement, to carry them into the spiritual world with the encumbrance of the personal interests of this or that individual. And, actually, very little thought is given to this fact”.


After the esoteric vessel had broken, the Council found itself in a state of bewilderment and helplessness. A general meeting of all the members ought to have been called. The perplexing situation should have been declared openly. One should have discussed with the members what further steps might be taken. Instead there began the “playing with esotericism”, which Rudolf Steiner in the 3rd letter to members had expressly characterized as a form of untrue behaviour and thus as the opposite of Anthroposophy. There he describes the two fundamental evils of pseudo-Anthroposophical behaviour: “playing with esotericism” on the one hand, and on the other the cold impulse to teach others. So now there was the wish to appear to be more than they really were. They felt themselves to be still the esoteric Council, and let the members continue to look up to them as such. Marie Steiner was the only one who was clear about the whole situation. There is a letter from her to Eugen Kolisko, in which she writes: “I have clearly recognized that our Council, as it now is, has been orphaned in the stage of infancy, and is a complete nothingness”.

She stresses that this has been written after the most painstaking reflection and that she has weighed everything up in the fullest sense of responsibility”. It is in the ideological usurpation of the Christmas Conference for reasons of vanity and the retention of power that the true motives lie for the inclination shown very soon by Marie Steiner, to withdraw from the Council after Steiner’s death. In various letters she later expresses herself very clearly regarding the spiritual decline in the heads of the Council members. By way of characterization she chooses typical concepts, well-known from the Catholic Church. She speaks, for instance, of the “dogmatizing of the Christmas Conference”, of the “Papism” of Steffen, Wachsmuth and others, of the “authority principle” basing itself on “installation” and the Petrine succession emanating from this. She tells how people who wish to live according to free spirituality are “branded heretics” in true ecclesiastical fashion. How the “infallibility dogma” of the “Steffen party” dominates the Society and how the wisdom of Rudolf Steiner, withheld in secrecy, and the First Class of the Free High School for Spiritual Science are misused as “instruments of power”, causing Marie Steiner to feel in the end that the “endless talk about the Christmas Conference” is no more than “empty chatter”.

A further example of “playing at esotericism” on the part of the remaining Council was their failure to inform the members of the Christmas Conference Society that on the 8th February 1925, in the absence of Rudolf Steiner owing to his illness, the Christmas Conference Statutes had been replaced by those of the Building Association in order, so it was claimed, to make possible, after constant postponement, the entry of the Christmas Conference Society in the Swiss trade register. At any rate, this was how Gunther Wachsmuth, who held responsibility for the decision, justified the action retrospectively in 1950. It emerged, however, from later inquiries addressed to the Confederate trade register office, that in 1924 the statutes of the Christmas Conference Society could have been entered in principle, as there were no prescriptions attached to the formulation of association statutes. From then onwards, the Christmas Conference Statutes were known as “Principles”, and no-one really knew what he had committed himself to. This is also the reason why it was possible later to bring about expulsions by means of majority voting. The Statutes of the Christmas Conference would not have allowed for this at all.

Now the Christmas Conference members, without being informed of the fact, had become members of a Building Association with exoteric administrative Statues. The fact that Rudolf Steiner had agreed, through his own signature given on his sick bed, to the transformation of the Christmas Conference Society into an exoteric administrative association with the Statutes of a Building Association is, within the whole context of events, further proof that Rudolf Steiner had abandoned the Christmas Conference of 1923 and thereby again separated the Society from the movement. Especially considering with what meticulous care he had discussed the Statutes during the Christmas Conference. Now he simply puts his signature to the statutes of the Building Association. Illusionistic wishful thinking has, to this day, obscured people’s perception of the fact of the failed Christmas Conference; and it is this, and this alone that made possible the entire constitution debate, including the pseudo-Christmas Conference of 2002 and its pointless legal processes. The pro and contra of the many painstaking and commendable investigations, and the courageous opposition of the “Gelebte Weihnachtstagung” group to the ‘two Societies’ theory, which the Goetheanum Vorstand quickly took over from the researchers into the constitution, thereby triggering the avalanche of legal battles from 2002 onwards, - all this dissolves into nothing if one learns how to think the thought that Rudolf Steiner himself, on the 8th February 1925, confirmed with his own signature the final separation of movement and Society, shortly before his death on 30th March 1925. For Building Association statutes are simply not the statutes of the Christmas Conference (Principles). And the Administration” (08.02.1925) is simply not the “Anthroposophical Society in the narrower sense” (29.06.1924), meaning the esoteric stream within the Society, in so far as it is cultivated by members, hence the movement.

To this day neither a report nor minutes have appeared of the preliminary meeting for the members of the A.S., which took place one hour before the 4th extraordinary general meeting of the Goetheanum Association on the 8th February 1925. In the meeting itself Rudolf Steiner was represented by Emil Grosheintz, who in 1912 had placed his land in Dornach at Steiner’s disposal for the building of the Goetheanum. He held several leading positions within the Society and can be regarded as a close associate of Rudolf Steiner. No message of greeting from Rudolf Steiner was read out to those assembled!

Darkening of consciousnesses appears to have occurred; confusion in a number of matters seems to have arisen. On the evening of Sunday 8th February, from 9 – 11 p.m. to 0-11 a.m. an astronomical partial eclipse of the moon occurred. [Footnote: Marie Steiner also had no precise memory of what happened at the meeting.] Although because of illness, Rudolf Steiner was not present at the meeting on the 8th February 1925 and he only received the document for signing afterwards, there is no doubt whatever that he knew what he was doing. On the contrary, the following is an account of all his activities right up to three days before his death: “Rudolf Steiner was weakened physically, but fully awake and alert and still full of amazing energy for work. Every week until his death excerpts from his “Autobiography” appeared in the “Wochenschrift”, and the essays for members, with the “Leading Thoughts”, in the newssheet. Everything was written by hand and then the proofs were corrected. Until three days before his death the applications for membership of the class were read by him and responded to with written comments… At the same time, until close to the end of March, Rudolf Steiner was correcting the proofs of the book “Extension of the Art of Healing”. In addition to this there were letters, the signing of residence permits, visits from Council members. A photocopy of the last letter to members, “From Nature to Sub-Nature”, shows the clear, conscious and steady handwriting of Rudolf Steiner… It is also quite unthinkable that anyone should have tried to hide something from him, because everyone, Rudolf Steiner included, was hoping for a speedy recovery.” (Manfred Schmidt-Brabant, Newssheet 04.05.1997).

As to the possibility that on 8th February 1925 a conscious act of deception was carried out behind the back of Rudolf Steiner, extending as far as manipulations with Steiner’s signature, I would stress quite clearly that according to my research into the ways in which the Councils from then until now have acted, there is no evidence of any deliberately corrupt behaviour. What we are dealing with is “only” the result of an unconscious calculation related to vanity and power, flattering itself that it stands in the centre of world-evolution and has the very best at heart. Again, the error lies “only” in a lack of truthfulness with regard to oneself and the facts.

Rudolf Steiner could have intervened, himself, when he saw the decisions of the 8th February published in the Newssheet, if he had not been in agreement with the content. It seems to have dawned on Albert Steffen when, in his diary on 9th February, he noted with regard to the curtailment of the powers of the existing Council: “Now every member has a vote. The Society can now say: No building! No clinic! A different Council etc.” Instead, Rudolf Steiner now tried bypassing the restricted Council to rescue the movement by writing a letter on 19th March (eleven days before his death) to seven personalities of the Free High School for Spiritual Science, appointing them as leaders of the “Administration of the Goetheanum Building”. At the head of this group of seven new administrators we again find Emil Grosheintz, appointed by Rudolf Steiner as Chairman of the group. The letter bears the official stamp of the Free High School for Spiritual Science, and the signatures of Rudolf Steiner as President and Ita Wegman as Recorder. It is an appointment and not an open request, as the dethroned Council later declared it to have been. As the appointment was made by the esoteric High School, it has to do with the continuation of the Goetheanum building in the spirit of the Christmas Conference as a permanent spiritual “construction project”.

However, after Rudolf Steiner’s death on 30th March 1925, the Council that Steiner had himself curtailed, rejected the collaboration, as equals, of the seven administrators appointed by Steiner on 19th March 1925. Through this action the dethroned Council of the Christmas Conference of 1923 demonstrated that it had understood nothing of the things in which it was involved and which were of concern to Rudolf Steiner. To this day, all the Councils at the Goetheanum have been similarly unaware of their situation. That is to say: there is no consciousness of the fact that movement and Society were condemned, from that point onwards, through a decision of the spiritual initiators, to go their separate ways again. In this connection, the situation of the “Gelebte Weihnachtstagung” group must be viewed as a tragedy: On the one hand it has prompted, thanks to its grandiose stubbornness, the present Goetheanum Council and the dreaming Society members to take a new look at themselves and try to understand their position. This is highly commendable! On the other hand, they have also succumbed to the illusion that the Christmas Conference Society of 1923, after all that has happened, still has some meaning today.

Immediately after Steiner’s cremation, the karmic streams come into irreconcilable collision with one another. The crowning points of this unworthy culture of conflict in the history of Council and Society, which has gone on for years and continues into the present, can be quickly enumerated. Those wishing to know the details should read the “Rückblick” of Fred Poepping, in which he describes from his own experience the events in the Anthroposophical Society from 1923 to 1963.

The events described are a complete mockery of the heart culture striven for by Steiner. The first to happen, directly after Steiner’s cremation, was the conflict over the urn between the women on the Council, who could not agree on where the urn should be placed for the members to pay their final respects. If you read Fred Poepping’s description you can see how a relatively trivial misunderstanding causes the various emotions to flare up with explosive force. Here, as in all subsequent cases of conflict, what was lacking were the subsidiary exercises of the path of inner development, which control and transform the astral body. The distressing thing about this and all the conflicts that followed is that they had to do with shortcomings of the representatives of the cause of Anthroposophy, who upheld at the same time their lofty claim to be leaders, vis-à-vis the Society and humanity as a whole.

Through this fundamentally untruthful and sectarian mode of behaviour of individual Council members, the disintegration of the Council was only a matter of time. In 1935 Ita Wegman and Elisabeth Vreede were expelled from the Council. Together with the expulsion of other leading personalities, the English and Dutch Societies seceded from the control of Dornach. Following closely upon the first conflict over the literary estate came the second, in which Herr Steffen and Herr Wachsmuth wished to challenge the testamentary rights of the widow of Rudolf Steiner. Interestingly enough, they tried to justify their legal position on the grounds that after the Christmas Conference everything was different and even earlier testaments should no longer be regarded as valid. The conflict came to an end when in 1952 a Swiss court declared Marie Steiner, who had died in 1948, to be in the right.

As a result of this conflict the books of the complete edition (Gesamtausgabe – GA) of Steiner’s lectures and written works, published by the Nachlassverein (Literary Estate Association) which had been founded in Marie Steiner’s lifetime, were no longer sold in the bookshop of the Goetheanum. The whole atmosphere within the Anthroposophical Society was marked by dogmatic disenfranchisement of the members by the residual Council, servility of the members, and by conflict between the most varied interest groups, which gathered in party-political style around the most varied personalities. It should be realized that all this was going on while, all around, the Second World War, the Holocaust, the dropping of atomic bombs was throwing the world into chaos. What was meant to bring healing to the world had itself become a prey of the counter-forces.

In the post-war period from the sixties onward, voices were raised for the first time, pointing to a discrepancy between the statutes of the Building Association and those of the Christmas Conference. In full consistency with the Dornach policy of retention of power, these critical inquirers were branded immediately as opponents. Fred Poepping, as a witness over a long period, cites the Parable of the Ring from Lessing’s drama “Nathan the Wise” as proof and as a touchstone for the failure or success of the Christmas Conference. According to this parable, only he has the true ring, who also manifests the virtues of the true ring. If we sum up all the impressions from 1923 up to and including the events connected with the so-called new constitution of 2002, we must regretfully conclude that the Council of this Society, at any rate, despite widespread illusions to the contrary, was no longer in possession of the ring after 1925.

III The Meaninglessness of the New Constitution

We will now discuss an aspect of the Christmas Conference which has so far not been taken account of in the entire constitution debate and which will show up this debate in whatever shape or form as a complete waste of time. It proves those members to have been right all along, who felt that this debate was unnecessary. But what follows we will be dealing, not merely with vague intimations, but with facts. And it is also to be hoped that this will remove, for all time, the basis of the Christmas Conference ideology which is so widespread in the Anthroposophical Society today.

In the above-quoted address of Steiner to open the Christmas Conference 1923, words are spoken which one can pay insufficient attention to in reading: and it is …. “ not out of the arbitrariness of earthly will, but in response to the call that has sounded from out of the spiritual world….” that the Christmas Conference is taking place. Now there exists a hitherto unpublished report written down by the stenographer Helene Finkh (who was employed at the Goetheanum at that time). Copies of this report are in circulation among many members of the Society. It is said not to be traceable in the archives, where the claim is made that no such document has ever existed. It contains notes of a discussion held by Rudolf Steiner with the esoteric Council which was about to be formed, on Sunday 23rd December 1923 at 6.00 p.m., that is, on the evening before the beginning of the Christmas Conference. In it, words are recorded that were spoken by Rudolf Steiner to the future Council. I quote: “Thus, with this third and final attempt, the question is again asked of human beings, whether there is a group willing to come together to form a new spiritual leadership, where the impulse proceeds not from an earthly community, with the wish to “found” something, but where from out of the spiritual world a ‘Stiftung’ (Foundation) is inaugurated, which one may propose to join in full responsibility.

This act of joining a ‘Stiftung’ inaugurated from out of the spiritual world can be something of great significance for humanity as a whole, but it will bring calamity if later those who make such a resolve for earthly evolution break faith with their decision”. So here the reference is to a “third and final attempt” to form a “Stiftung from out of the spiritual world”. In order to grasp what this means, we must cite the explanatory words spoken by Rudolf Steiner, as they have been passed down to us by Marie Steiner in connection with the “second Stiftung”, Berlin 15.12.1911. Marie Steiner describes the phenomenon of the ’Stiftung’ as follows: “It has to do, as it were, with a direct communication from the spiritual world. It is said (by R.St. – Trans) to be like a call that goes out to humanity; and then (the spiritual world) wants to see what echo it receives. Such a call generally sounds three times. If the call goes unheard for a third time, it is taken back again into the spiritual world for a long time. This call has already gone out to humanity once.

Unfortunately, it found no echo. This is the second time. It is purely spiritual things that are involved here. Each time a call goes out in vain, the conditions and circumstances to be confronted grow more difficult”. It becomes clear from the report of 1911 that the three calls are identified with three ‘Stiftungen’, whereby a ‘Stiftung’ is not a human creation, but an initiative from the spiritual world which is hoping that human beings will decide to adopt a certain way of working. Rudolf Steiner said in 1911: “It is therefore to be announced to you that, among those human beings who will come together for this purpose in a corresponding manner, a way of working is to be inaugurated (gestiftet) which, through the way in which the ‘Stiftung’ comes about, has as its direct starting-point that individuality whom for ages past in the Western World we have called by the name Christian Rosenkreutz”. Just as this second ‘Stiftung’ impulse, inaugurating a ‘Stiftung of a Society for Theosophical Style and Art (Art und Kunst)” in 1911 failed owing to human inadequacy, so the first ‘Stiftung’ impulse in 1905 had also failed. What was intended with the first ‘Stiftung’ impulse becomes apparent from a lecture held by Rudolf Steiner on the occasion of the general meeting of what was still the Theosophical Society, in Berlin on the 22nd October 1905. He said: “If, however, the Theosophical Society were to forget that there is the pulsing of this blood within it [Steiner had previously admonished his listeners to cultivate “occult teachings and occult living”], then it may well be an interesting Society, but that which is intended with it by the exalted powers who presided over its beginnings, it will not succeed in accomplishing”.

One should also quote here the conversation with Rudolf Steiner reported by Alexander Strakosch, the handicrafts teacher at the first Waldorf School: “In a personal conversation while we were walking together Rudolf Steiner pointed out in the most earnest way how much depends quite directly upon the way human beings respond to a call that has gone out from higher worlds. This was in 1923, when events in the Anthroposophical Society were a source of great concern for him. He asked me, ‘Do you know where the difficulties in the Society come from?’ ‘They come from the fact that there is not a sufficient number of people who have reached the levels of higher knowledge described in the book ‘How to Attain Knowledge of Higher Worlds’. When the spiritual world had assigned me the task of writing this work, it had expected that many people would progress so far. Thus I was instructed to write a second volume’. After an interval of most solemn silence he continued by saying: ‘The expectations have not been fulfilled. Every so often, the spiritual world casts out a line. This time nothing was caught on it. But because there had been talk of a continuation I had at least to bring out the short work ‘Stages of Higher Knowledge’.” So Part II of Knowledge of Higher Worlds…. was never written.

But now, back to the Christmas Conference: If, therefore, we seriously consider the Christmas Conference of 1923 as the third attempt at a ‘Stiftung’ from the spiritual world, it should be evident from this, that the so-called “New Constitution” of the A.S. in 2002, and all activities connected with it, have nothing whatever to do with the Christmas Conference of 1923, as this “New Constitution” rests only upon human activities and wishes. In the report quoted above, the following is also said about the esoteric Council: “But we will always need to place before our souls the fact that a centre of this kind will only be able to work in the right way if each individual who is here entrusted with a task of leadership, should really feel and take on in practice the commitment towards the spiritual powers. This solemn commitment will not only place demands upon the individual, which he may be quite unable to meet, it will place them above all upon the whole Council in its entirely. If this harmony and solidarity is not renewed ever and ever again, the central Council will soon disintegrate and it would really be better if its members had never come together to undertake a solemn commitment of this kind”.

And the following is also said: “If this attempt to connect to a ‘Stiftung’, and thus to begin a new spiritual leadership on Earth, were again to fail, then no-one in our circle will find the strength again during this earthly life to connect once more in this way to a 'Stiftung’ from the spiritual world”.

It should also be clear from these words that with Rudolf Steiner’s death, at the very latest, the Christmas Conference had finally come to an end, because from then onwards the united character of the Council as emphasized by Steiner disintegrated, not to mention the withdrawal of Marie Steiner already in 1925 and the expulsions in 1935. In the report quoted we see also how the individual Council members were placed in a relation to one another, what meditations they would need to work with in order to overcome their own weaknesses, and in what way they would stand in a special relation to the truth.

This unity or totality (Gesantheit), drawn together in a bond with Rudolf Steiner, would have been able to fulfil the function of an organ of spiritual receptivity. As to what has happened in Dornach since Steiner’s death and right up to our own time, the situation is entirely different. Here, according to a quote from Steiner, the following law applies: “Where the dissemination of the occult life is concerned, the Masters speak. Where one is only concerned with the organization of the Society…. Then error is possible, because the Masters are silent”. (GA93 22.10.1905. Berlin)

Seen against the background of the fact that the Christmas Conference was a ‘Stiftung’ out of the spiritual world, it is evident that the present Council and broad sections of the membership of the Anthroposophical Society have a connection to reality that is insufficient. In the entire “New Constitution” debate it is either not known or the fact is simply ignored, that the third call also, like all calls from the spiritual world, are limited to a certain ‘window of opportunity’. The “way of working” demanded by a ‘Stiftung’ could not be continued beyond Steiner’s death. Instead, the idea was already propagated by the First Council and all too readily believed by the Society members, that Rudolf Steiner would now lead the Goetheanum from the other side. But if we renounce all illusionistic glossing over of the facts, then the symptoms of the failure of the Christmas Conference are unmistakable:

1. The character of the Christmas Conference as a ‘Stiftung’ (third and final attempt).
2. Steiner’s words in 1924 about the failure of the Christmas Conference.
3. His signature put to the Building Association statutes, out of resignation.
4. His turning away despite explicit requests for instructions in the event of his death and concerning a successor.
5. His early death, brought about by the Karma of those involved.
6. The entire history of Council and Society right up to the present time.
7. The absence of Anthroposophy in contemporary cultural life, although Steiner had anticipated a culmination of Anthroposophy in cultural life at the turn of the millennium.

IV The Consequences for the Anthroposophical Movement Today

The result of our inquiry is, unfortunately, clear and beyond question. The new spiritual leadership of humanity intended with the Christmas Conference failed to materialise. The Anthroposophical movement, with the death of Rudolf Steiner, separated again from the Society. Since that time the Council of the Anthroposophical Society has tried to create the impression that it has the blessing of Rudolf Steiner. We of later generations, who belong to the Anthroposophical movement and who, as “homeless souls”, sought Anthroposophy on the Earth, can be overcome by sorrow, when we consider the ideals of truthfulness and tolerance cherished by us, which have clearly led us, out of ignorance and naïve trust, into a Society which, in Steiner’s words, may well be “an interesting Society”, but “which will not accomplish what was intended with it by the exalted Powers, which stood at its beginning”.

That it has not accomplished this for 80 years also comes to expression in the fact that Council member Manfred Schmidt-Brabant, shortly before his death, in the opening lecture of the Michaelmas Conference in 2000, spoke of the “occult imprisonment” of Anthroposophy, in view of its lack of influence in the world. The constitution activists in the Society and the modernized Council now thought that they could rescue the Anthroposophical Society, in the spirit of the Christmas Conference and of Rudolf Steiner, from its state of ineffectiveness by freeing it from the Building Association statutes and consciously reuniting it at last with the Christmas Conference statutes. Here, the Council, modern and self-sufficient as it was, also allowed itself to make a number of changes to the Christmas Conference statues of 1923, though this was brought to a standstill by the four plaintiff groups, who challenged the entire New Constitution process in a court of law. After its defeat, the Council avoided taking the case to the highest possible court of appeal. I will not go further into the disaster of the New Constitution, and instead refer the reader to “Die verordnete Denkpause” by Detlef Olaf Boehm, which summarizes it all in a concise and readable form.

Underlying the idea of the New Constitution are a number of illusions which anyone who cares deeply for true Anthroposophy should firmly resist. Here the illusions are listed briefly, and the reader can try to identify the points that apply to him:

1. The illusion that, by altering its statutes, one can help an association which regards itself as esoteric to achieve greater effectiveness in the wider world.
2. The illusion that the administrative association which continued to exist after Steiner’s death, is in reality the esoteric association intended by Rudolf Steiner at Christmas 1923.
3. The illusion that a ‘Stiftung’ from the spiritual world, bound to a limited timeframe and to a particular circle of people, can be brought to life again through an arbitrary human act that is the product of human wishful thinking.
4. The illusion that in staging the Christmas Conference anew one is standing in a direct line from Rudolf Steiner who, from the spiritual side, is continuing to lead the earthly Goetheanum; and that this New Constitution is something we owe to him, or alternatively that we have this “high obligation” towards the so-called spiritual world, which we conceive in a way that suits our own purposes.
5. The illusion that, with the Christmas Conference, Steiner created an entirely new esotericism, which must be distinguished from the esotericism before the Christmas Conference.

An educational drive is needed to counter these absurd pseudo- Anthroposophical ideas, which live not only in the Council, but also in the Society. There may well be people who feel quite comfortable in this undoubtedly “interesting Society”. But for anyone who feels a deeper commitment to the cause of Anthroposophy than to the eighty-year-old spectre of an administrative association with false pretentions, and who has recognized the appalling situation in which the “Living Being of Anthroposophy” finds itself; three fields of work promptly arise which in the present context can only be given in outline:-

a) Bringing clarity regarding the illusionistic Christmas Conference ideology (Free Spiritual Life in thinking).
b) A re-ordering of the relation between Anthroposophical Society and Anthroposophical movement (the Life of Rights in Responsibility, concerns the Feeling)
c) Taking initiative action on one’s own responsibility in the spirit of the ethical individualism of the Philosophy of Spiritual Activity. (The meditative deed inwards, in balance with working upon the world, outwards. Both involve the will).

The Consequences

A. Bringing Clarity regarding the Illusionistic Christmas Conference Ideology

The Christmas Conference Ideology is based upon the assertion that only those are true Anthroposophists who subscribe to the following dogma, which is adhered to like an article of faith: the work of Rudolf Steiner continues, but only through the Society directed from Dornach, because the Christmas Conference succeeded in accordance with Steiner’s intentions and the Council stands in spiritual succession to Steiner. The fact is suppressed and passed over in silence, that already in Rudolf Steiner’s lifetime the Council failed in its task and thus played a decisive part in the failure of the Christmas Conference. It ought to be clear to the Council members at the very least, that with Steiner’s death the third attempt at a ‘Stiftung’ had to come to an end. Instead, the first generation of Council members (Steffen, Wachsmuth) contributed substantially to the obscuring of the facts. Thus the revealing but embarrassing fact that from the 8th February 1925 onwards the members had, with Steiner’s agreement, belonged to a Building Association with exoteric statutes, was not divulged to the members, as this would have made apparent the dethronement of the once esoteric Council. Only through the persistent archival research of individuals into constitutional questions did it become clear decades later that there is an irregularity here, which remains puzzling only so long as the character of the Christmas Conference as a ‘Stiftung’ is left out of account, or kept secret. (see Ch.III)

However, this veiling of the truth did not happen through evil intent, but through weakness of character. The deeper, unconscious reason for unwillingness to admit the failure of the Christmas Conference lies in the inability to face up to one’s own failure, working hand-in-hand with the flattering sense of having been elected to play a role of the highest importance. The two things in combination give rise to a vain belief which strives to maintain the situation unchanged for oneself and one’s close associates, ostensibly for the good of humanity. The un-purified, illusionistic life of feeling (Luciferic) opens the door to Ahrimanic intelligence, which calculates as follows: If we succeed in keeping the Anthroposophical Society after the Christmas Conference free from the stigma of failure and, instead, sanctify it still further by distinguishing it as clearly as possible from the Anthroposophical Society before the Christmas Conference, we can avoid facing up to the painful fact that with the failure of the Christmas Conference the Anthroposophical Society fell back again into the unsatisfactory state it was in, in 1923. We can thereby avoid having to apply to ourselves the sharp and unsparing criticism directed to the Anthroposophical Society by Steiner in many lectures during 1923. In reality this criticism of the Anthroposophical Society by Steiner has remained, to this day, of the utmost relevance.

Esoterically speaking, it is the unredeemed ‘double’ of the Society which places itself as a shield before the Council and many members. In the slumber in which they are plunged to this day, the Sleeping Beauty, in order to save them from the terrible and sobering experience of waking up to the reason for the “occult imprisonment” and their ineffectiveness in the world. The reason is the unconscious self-deception underlying the Christmas Conference ideology. This self-deception is incompatible with the fundamental principle of truthfulness, with which Anthroposophy stands or falls. Rudolf Steiner’s own words: ”Actually, nothing has greater power to tempt and mislead as than when we say that an action was done “in good faith”. For this “good faith” is the snug couch of idleness for a humanity who, in its extreme lethargy, does not feel the responsibility to first find out, before it makes a statement, whether it is true or not, whether or not it corresponds to the facts…. There needs to be a correspondence with facts in the world as a whole, not just with ourselves; otherwise what comes about in the external world as a result is forsaken by Angels, and handed over to Ahriman. And everything of an untruthful nature that is asserted “in good faith”, is what drives human beings most strongly into the Ahrimanic, is the strong rope that draws them inexorably into the Ahrimanic. And to appeal to good faith in the case of untruths is the best way, today, of delivering world civilization over to the being of Ahriman…. For it is really so, that human beings lose the assistance of the world of the Angel or when they lie down on the snug couch of good faith in the case of statements which they have not verified. And elsewhere Steiner says the following: “One must break the habit of a certain – there is no other way of putting it – dream-like longing, a certain sleepy-headedness, which so easily overcomes the person who approaches our spiritual-scientific movement and wants something soft and comforting for his soul, something that carries him through lifeenveloped in a nice warm feeling, something that you listen to and let work upon you in such a way that it warms you through and through, that you can believe in the higher calling of the human soul, all of which is quite right, but which can also be bound up with a certain lulling of the soul-life into complacency. This can be observed all too often, especially in those who let spiritual science work upon their soul and who do not strive at the same time to find, through what spiritual science can be, a clear and certain judgement regarding the events of life, regarding the complex interconnection of the facts within which each individual human being stands”.

A particularly disastrous role in the creation of the Christmas Conference ideology was played by Council member Rudolf Grosse with his book “The Christmas Conference as a Turning-Point of Time”, which first appeared in 1976 and in a short period was printed in three editions, because it was devoured uncritically by the members. But if one wishes to characterize the book and the reaction of the Society members as seen at this much later point in time, there is again no conscious bad intention, but the subtle working of the Luciferic-Ahrimanic forces which we spoke of earlier. The book came as a gift to the uninformed minds, the complacency, the lack of spiritual independence and the wishful thinking of many people. I myself recall that it provided substantial arguments – which today I can no longer accept – leading to my joining the Anthroposophical Society. Rudolf Grosse, as representative of the Society, skilfully exploited a number of publications of Steiner’s Complete Works (Gesamtausgabe – FA) which the Literary Estate Association (Nachlassverein) of Marie Steiner – formerly opposed by Grosse – had meanwhile published, and made us aware of the ideas that were now made available to all in an unprotected form, for the benefit of the then vegetating Anthroposophical Society.

In Grosse’s book the failure of the Christmas Conference is kept hidden behind a glorification of Rudolf Steiner’s death through its transformation into a sacrificial death for the sake of the continued existence of the Society. The fact that Rudolf Steiner did not appoint a successor but turned away in silence when asked about this, is interpreted to mean, entirely in the tradition of Steffen, that from then on he would lead the Goetheanum from the spiritual world. The Christmas Conference is celebrated as a triumphant victory, as a “new beginning at a world-turning-point of time”. Actually this concept comes to us from Steiner, just as does the concept of the “spiritual Goetheanum”, but the clever mixture of Steiner quotes, wishful thinking and unmentioned facts would require a more exact analysis than is possible in the present context. The people who belong to the Anthroposophical Society and are drawn to Grosse’s book imagine that they are joining the Christmas Conference Society, oblivious of the fact that the Association they are in may well be an interesting one, but is actually no more than a “Bau-verein”, whose Council also has no knowledge of this fact, as it has been since 1925 in a line of succession of “playing at esotericism”.

The book resulted in a growth in membership, because it invites anyone to receive, with no effort required, the consecration of the Christmas Conference. In the Christmas Conference ideology the element is decisive, according to which simply to be a member of the Society is a guarantee of the fact that one stands within the sacred stream of true Anthroposophy. That this basically conservative-Catholic conception of an “Institution that alone can bring salvation” is shared and defended with inner satisfaction by most members of the Anthroposophical Society, sheds light upon the “snug couch of good faith” on which many Society members are reposing. In contrast to the message of victory of the Christmas Conference as proclaimed by Rudolf Grosse, which so many Anthroposophists – myself included – fell for, it is salutary to take stock of the true situation of the Anthroposophical cause.

- The Goetheanism further developed by Steiner has not been recognized by official Goethe research.
- The ‘Philosophie der Freiheit’ has not been taken up by universities.
- The first ‘Stiftung’ out of the spiritual world was not taken up between 1905 and 1909
- The second attempt at a ‘Stiftung’, The Society for Theosophical Style and Art, 1911, was declared a failure by Steiner in autumn 1912.
- The new Freemasonry for men and women had to be discontinued by Steiner in 1914.
- The Social Threefolding movement was withdrawn by Steiner on the grounds that it had failed for the present.
- The burning down of the Goetheanum on New Year’s Eve 1922/23 was a consequence of the disintegration of the Anthroposophical Society.
- The third attempt at a ‘Stiftung’, the Christmas Conference 1923, resulted in the death of Steiner.

Anyone who would ignore all this or recast it into a victory has lost touch with reality. In the Council of the Anthroposophical Society at the beginning of the 21st century it is above all Sergei O. Prokofieff who promotes the Christmas Conference ideology in his writings, and in thick volumes transports the feeling of his readers into an illusory heaven through numerous Steiner quotations, many of which are applied in a questionable way. In addition Prokofieff, standing entirely in the Albert Steffen tradition, treats the “Foundation Stone”, given by Rudolf Steiner during the Christmas Conference, as a finished product. This is clearly in contradiction with Steiner’s intention to open up a field for individual meditative work.

As an inducement to sober reflection I would quote here a statement of Rudolf Steiner’s which is attested by Herbert Witzenmann to have been made to Guenther Wachsmuth: “It could well be that when I return I will have to fight against the Anthroposophical Society”.

If one wishes, in a constructive way, to oppose the presentation of the Christmas Conference in false colours, it must be made quite clear that the new attempt at a ‘Stiftung’ from the spiritual world in connection with Rudolf Steiner, wanted to descend from heaven to earth in order to inaugurate a new Mystery Centre on the Earth. Steiner was prevented from doing this by the Karma of those involved. And now the death of Steiner which resulted from the hindrance to his work is used in order to disseminate the legend of his continued “spiritual leadership of the Goetheanum”. To this, one must say first of all, that in this way of treating Steiner’s death a mode of thinking becomes visible for which the Council’s “playing at esotericism”, is more important than consideration of the tragic situation in which Steiner stood to the very end. And, secondly, the question arises why Steiner made such great efforts on Earth when “spiritual leadership from beyond the Threshold” would have been just as effective. Regarding the claim that an entirely new esotericism arose after the Christmas Conference, it can be shown right down to single details that Steiner’s body of Christian- Rosicrucian teaching forms a hermetic unity.

B. Re-Ordering the Relation between Anthroposophical Society and Movement

Here too we can give only a few indications. The Anthroposophical Society would not exist at all without the Anthroposophical movement. The movement is of primary importance. The only reason why Rudolf Steiner united himself with the Society at the Christmas Conference was that he hoped to provide a protective sheath for the movement which he represented. From Steiner’s death onwards, at the latest, the Council of the Anthroposophical Society instead used the movement for its own purposes. For the sake of the retention of power, the movement was, from 1925 onwards, harnessed to the wagon of the Society. Since then it has had to serve under a false guise, held fast in the grip of the dogma of the “eternal Christmas Conference” and thus turned into its opposite. It is hardly possible to imagine a more sinister and subtle way of separating Steiner from his work. During his lifetime Steiner had warned of the possibility of the separation of his name from his work.

In the light of this knowledge, the movement now has the task of freeing itself from the grip of an element that is foreign to its true nature. The Anthroposophical movement can only exist in the free atmosphere of truthfulness and tolerance. Thus the Anthroposophical Society since 1925 may well be an interesting Society that provides satisfaction to many people because it gives them what they want. The movement will always tolerate this, but has, itself, nothing to do with such a situation, because it feels committed to the cause of Anthroposophy. The Anthroposophical movement is committed to the work of Rudolf Steiner, which is published by the Association of Rudolf Steiner’s Literary Estate (R.St. Nachlassverwaltung). It is in no way my intention to open up the old battlefront between the Council of the Society and the ‘Nachlassverein’. It is a matter of looking as soberly as possible at the way things have developed.

Everyone in the Anthroposophical Society today was, to begin with, interested in the heart’s concern of the Anthroposophical cause, and thus in the movement. If Rudolf Grosse’s seductive and misleading book had not appeared, hearts would have turned, in their movement, not to the Anthroposophical Society but to the Nachlassverein, for it is there and there only that, to this day, the wellspring is to be found, of Rudolf Steiner’s spiritual bequest.

As a result of the obscuring of the facts, people who were actually seeking the movement unwittingly entered a Building Association with exoteric statutes, whose Council went so far, between 1943 and 1952, as to take legal action against the source of the movement in order to obtain possession of all the documents. It would then have been possible, through selective and incomplete publication of the Steiner texts, to further perfect the “game with esotericism”. The Council of the Anthroposophical Society has always viewed with suspicion the Complete Edition, which has meanwhile become available on CD, DVD and HDD, because on the one hand it fears that revealing and therefore unwelcome facts might come to light, and on the other hand there is reflected in this suspicion the tendency of the sectarian “game of esotericism” to keep things secret.

But now also the Internet brings with it, depending on one’s point of view, the risk or the opportunity of a free Anthroposophical movement independent of Dornach. If in this connection one leaves out of account the Ahrimanic counter-school which uses for itself and distorts the original Michaelic intelligence, then one will not estimate rightly the danger to which the Anthroposophical cause is exposed. Not even full pages of quotations from Steiner can mislead one as to the danger of distortion of the facts. Steiner explains this as follows: “For it is a normal occurrence in occultism that powers wishing to pursue their own special interests assume the form of those which previously gave the actual impulses”. (GA 158 11.04.1912).

That it belongs to the essential nature of the Anthroposophical movement that a battle, such as is suggested here, could be fought over the future of the cause of Anthroposophy, of this Rudolf Steiner spoke as early as 1912: “Only those who adopt an attitude of testing, towards what is given from out of the spiritual world, can remain loyal to Christian Rosenkreutz….. In your closest circles, too, many a trial will beset you”. (GA 130 17.06.1912 Hamburg)

Steiner’s words on 19.07.1924: “What is essential now is that the Anthroposophical Society should take hold of this, its inner task; the task which consists in not allowing Michael’s right to human thinking to be challenged. Here, there is no room for fatalism. One can only say that human beings must work in collaboration with the gods. Michael fills human beings with enthusiasm for Michael himself, so that on the earth there may appear a spirituality that is equal to the individual intelligence of human beings, so that one can think and be at the same time a spiritual human being; for this is what is implied in the rulership of Michael. This must be fought for within the Anthroposophical movement….”

Thus it is a struggle that must take place within Anthroposophical circles. If now we look with undistorted vision at the situation of Anthroposophy today, we see a joining together of two unhealthy attitudes of soul in the Society: Luciferic Christmas Conference mystification and Ahrimanic dogmatism. The one makes a person flee reality and remain inactive, but be filled with conceit in an elitist sense; and the other paralyzes free activities through dogmatic adherence to principles, and makes one servile in one’s acceptance of the authority of Dornach. It is a puzzling fact that within the Society people are unaware that through acting in this way they provide direct evidence of the failure of the Christmas Conference although, amusingly enough, they believe themselves to be in possession of the Christmas Conference.

If one wishes, from the standpoint of the Anthroposophical movement, to resist these tendencies, one must find the courage to re-examine, without prejudice, the relations between Society and movement: The movement has shown, through all the years since it became manifest through Rudolf Steiner, that it can exist despite hindrances stemming from the Anthroposophical Society. Why, then, should it not be freer and more capable of action without the present ideological imprisonment, than if it is bound hand and foot by a superfluous so-called new constitution created at Christmas 2002?

Rudolf Steiner made the following observation: “On the ground provided by spiritual science people unite through differentiation, individualisation and not centralisation”. (GA 259 28.02.1923. Stuttgart)

All the many initiatives carried by individuals working together – from kindergartens to schools, agriculture, medicine, the Christian Community, the Jugendkreis, the High School, the publishing houses, banks, buildings and organizations such as national societies, working centres, branches etc. – all arose, so far as their essential nature is concerned, from out of the movement or with its help, because people became active where needed, with their intelligence, their heart-forces and their initiative. The Council in Dornach and the Society structures were not necessary for this and, seen in relation to the initiatives, resemble a superfluous hydrocephalus. All of them can carry on working as before – but now more conscious of their independence, no longer needing to keep one eye trained on Dornach, working in free responsibility towards the spiritual world and their fellow human beings.

There will be in the future many decentralized centres, held together in friendship because they feel committed to the same idea. The flow of gifts and subscriptions must be reconsidered. Maybe in future more funds will be available locally than before – I can imagine the present Council functioning as the administrative Council of a conference centre, which is what the Goetheanum building is. Whoever feels a relation to the building should be free to connect on to it.

C. The Specific Inner Work of Those Who Feel They Belong To the Anthroposophical Movement

Here we must reflect upon the ethical individualism as described in the “Philosophie der Freiheit”. Only in this way will it be possible in future for work to proceed “on the basis of geographical location and subject matter”. Words from the “Philosophie der Freiheit” are relevant here: “To live out of love for the deed, and let live out of an understanding of the will of others, is the fundamental maxim of free human beings”. (GA4)

Following the law of the attraction of like by like, the people who wish to work together will find each other. As a result of the failed attempt at a ‘Stiftung’ in 1923, the Anthroposophical movement is now returning, one hundred years later, consciously to it germinal state of 1905. Standing at the centre of individual strivings will be the first call from the spiritual world – the manual for inner training, How to Attain Knowledge of Higher Worlds. This concerns the development of the individual’s vertical connection to the heavenly realms. It is quite obvious that neither a Pope nor any kind of Council is necessary, nor is it able to take away from me my own responsibility or make prescriptions for me in this matter. Only in this way will it be possible to retrieve the “living being of Anthroposophy” from the “condition of latency” * in which it has predominantly been since Rudolf Steiner’s death. Outwardly nothing changes at all, apart from the flow of money – inwardly, a turn of 180° takes place – either one holds fast to the Society-illusion, maintaining the situation as it has always been, or thinking is renewed in the spirit of the Anthroposophical movement – in other words: general reform. We are living today nearly 600 years after 1413. The entire consciousness-soul epoch has a duration of 2500 years. Today, therefore, one quarter of this period has passed, and all is not lost.

“Anthroposophy will certainly not be made to disappear from the world. But it could, for decades or longer, sink back into what one might call a condition of latency and then be taken up again. But this would entail a tremendous loss for the development of humanity….” (Dornach 17.06.1923.)

V A remark concerning the “Free High School for Spiritual Science in Dornach”

According to a statement of Rudolf Steiner the High School is to be regarded…. “as an institution of the spiritual world for the present time”. (GA 270. 18.04.1924) But, like the Christmas Conference Society, it too is subject to the condition that it must develop. In Steiner’s words: “this school must develop into what can be a real Mystery School in our time. It is through this, that it becomes the soul of the Anthroposophical movement”. (GA 260a. 07.07.1924. Dornach. GA240. 06.02.1924. Stuttgart) Maybe it is interesting to note that Rudolf Steiner continues, after the Christmas Conference, to make a clear distinction between movement and Society. The union of the two is conditional upon their development. This applies both to the Council which understands itself to be esoteric, and to the High School, and also to the individual members of the Society. Steiner emphasizes that it is only on the precondition that everything “becomes different” that there is any meaning for him to bring movement and Society together.

Rudolf Steiner’s aim was to let the “primal source” of the movement, the supersensible Michael School, flow into an earthly institution, the High School, in order from thence, in connection with Council and Society, to further human beings. We have already explained that the striven-for goal was not achieved or, if so, only to a very limited extent. Today, the Society together with its Council clings to the High School as its one source of hope.

However, the High School itself, owing to Steiner’s premature death, remained a fragment. And, what is more, this fragment has rigidified into a questionable tradition. However, the Christmas Conference impulse is bound up in the closest possible way with the High School, since it comes directly from the super sensible school of Michael. And we have to face up to the bitter truth: according to a number of statements of Rudolf Steiner, the Christmas Conference will evaporate if the conditions are not met. That they were not met is amply demonstrated by the conflicts, expulsions and lawsuits.

Thus the same applies to the High School as to the Society: “It will be an interesting Society, but it will not accomplish what was intended with it by the spiritual powers which stood at its very beginning”.

The First Class of the High School, which was usurped by the Council of the Society through the excommunication of Ita Wegman became, in Bondarev’s words, a “Flying Dutchman”, suggesting a phenomenon that is more appearance than substance – a ghost-ship, in other words. How far this applies also to the esoteric Jugendkreis is for those who belong to it to decide for themselves. Rudolf Steiner, at any rate, wanted to see the Jugendkreis integrated into the High School. These unpleasant facts raise the question for anyone seriously concerned about the cause of Anthroposophy: How can one find, today, the living school of Michael, which Steiner called the ‘Fundamental source’?

The answer is simple: The laws that applied then are still valid one hundred years later. The method that is of central importance was made known by Rudolf Steiner in his basic work “Die Philosophie der Freiheit”, and esoterically deepened in “How to Attain Knowledge of Higher Worlds”. He himself makes no distinction between the book “How to Attain….” and the High School which he tried, but without success, to bring into being: “It is really so, that the esoteric deepening of which you can read so much in my book ‘How to Attain Knowledge of Higher Worlds’ and of which so much is spoken, is now to take place through the three classes.” (GA 260a. 07.07.1924. Dornach)

As, however, the three classes did not materialize and the one class was used more for “playing at esotericism”, mystery-mongering and “sailing in cloud-cuckoo-land” (all in lecture 30.01.1924 Dornach) than for a High School activity worthy of the name, there is only one remaining option – serious individual work in esoteric striving. Plenty of material providing stimulus is available. We who feel connected with the Anthroposophical movement owe a debt of gratitude to the Rudolf Steiner Nachlassverwaltung, to the extent that, in the spirit of the later Marie Steiner von Sievers, they made their editorial work subject to the test of truth, although doubts about this have been raised recently. Let us hope that the Nachlassverein is not overtaken by the “Karma of Untruthfulness”.

It cannot be, that later generations, who also belong to the School of Michael, must suffer the consequences of the failure of the first generation and that the tradition of inefficacy and untruthfulness resulting from this should hinder real development. Do we not see a clear message in a declining membership and in young people’s lack of interest in joining the Anthroposophical Society? Of crucial importance from now on is the direct, vertical connection with the spiritual, which can be achieved by any individual. And working out from this basis, likeminded people can join together to carry out their various tasks. The rest is history.
http://www.fhab.org/willi-seiss

http://ipwebdev.com/hermit/giersch.html
General Renewal– or Illusion – of the Anthroposophical Society

by Harald Giersch

A lecture held in the Rudolf Steiner School, Villingen – Schwenningen on 19.01.2005
giving “the reasons why I left the Anthroposophical Society”.
© Achamoth Verlag
Willi Seiss
E: info@achamoth.de
Reproduced with the kind permission* of Harald Giersch and Willi Seiss
Translated by Graham Rickett

*This was sent to me (Joel Wendt) by a third party (Martin Wacey), and given the nature of the material, I have set this within my website
without gaining any more direct permission than its presence in my e-mail box in January of 2010.
Translator’s Note:
In this English version most of the 173 references (to Steiner lectures and works of other German authors) are omitted; also H. Giersch’s frequent underlining’s of words and sentences. Harald Giersch shares G. Bondarev’s conviction that nothing underhand can have taken place at the meeting of 8th Feb. 1925, which Rudolf Steiner was unable to attend owing to his illness

Commentary by Joel A. Wendt on this lecture

http://ipwebdev.com/hermit/giersch.html

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