The Rudolf Steiner Archive

Third Lecture

[ 1 ] My dear friends! If we wish to consider such matters from our perspective, as we are doing now, we must never lose sight of the significance of spiritual scientific observation for understanding human development in the fifth post-Atlantean epoch, but also [for gaining insight into] the preparation of what is to take place in the sixth post-Atlantean epoch. For if one is not attentive to what is currently being neglected by humanity—by today’s materialistic humanity—with regard to spiritual-scientific observation of the world, one cannot advance to the causes underlying today’s current events.

[ 2 ] And in order to establish a starting point for further considerations, I would like to mention how, for some individuals, the act of looking up toward the worlds to which our spiritual science refers occurs, so to speak, involuntarily. It is important to realize that this compelled orientation of these individuals toward a certain worldview is still sporadic today, occurring only here and there; yet it is precisely in this sporadic occurrence that something extraordinarily characteristic can be seen. I recently mentioned the fact that a certain Hermann Bahr has published a play, Die Stimme (The Voice), in which—albeit in a Catholicizing manner—an attempt is made to link the physical, sensory world that surrounds us to spiritual events and spiritual processes. Shortly after this play, Hermann Bahr wrote the novel Himmelfahrt (“Ascension”), and Hermann Bahr’s novel Himmelfahrt is truly, in a certain sense, a document of its time. I do not wish to overestimate the artistic and literary value of this historical document, but it is a historical document. And as fate would have it—I have known this very Hermann Bahr for a long, long time, ever since he was a very young student. And in this novel Himmelfahrt, he portrays a protagonist—as they say in aesthetics—whom he calls Franz—who strikes me as a kind of reflection, not a self-portrait, but a kind of reflection of Hermann Bahr himself. Now, all sorts of interesting things happen in this novel. The novel was written during the war. It is evidently an engagement by the Austrian Hermann Bahr with contemporary events.

[ 3 ] We need only consider, in this abstract form, so to speak, the extent to which the novel’s hero, Franz, is a kind of reflection of a person living in the present—someone who is now about fifty-two to fifty-three years old, who has lived through the events of his time, who began early on to engage in a very intense way with all manner of contemporary trends, for even as a student, because of this engagement with various intellectual currents, he was expelled twice—from two different universities—and was always eager to connect spiritually with certain intellectual currents, including artistic ones. It is not an autobiography—one finds nothing biographical about Hermann Bahr in it—but this hero, Franz, is nonetheless something onto which Bahr may have projected himself. Thus, in this hero Franz, we see a portrayal of a person who attempts to grapple with all the intellectual endeavors currently visible in the world in order to gain insight into the interconnections of the world.

[ 4 ] Right at the beginning, we are told about all the places Franz wandered to in order to gain a clear understanding of the state of the world: first as a botanist under Wiesner—a famous botanist who taught at the University of Vienna— then a chemist under Ostwald, who, at Haeckel’s request, became the chairman of the Monist League, then in Schmoller’s seminar, at Richet’s clinic, where he was able to familiarize himself with Richet’s ideas, and with Freud in Vienna—of course, anyone who wants to engage with contemporary intellectual currents must also become acquainted with psychoanalysis. He was also among the Theosophists in London and mingled with painters, engravers, tennis players, and so on. So, he is not one-sided: he spent time in Richet’s laboratory just as much as he did with the Theosophists in London. He sought to find his way in everything. Then, of course, his destiny—his karma—drove him further out into the world, and various stories are told about how, here and there, he became aware that there are indeed certain underlying factors in human evolution and that one ought to be mindful of these underlying factors. Yesterday I introduced you to one such underlying context, and now I want to point out to you how another person was led to acknowledge such underlying contexts. That is why I would now like to read you a passage from this novel.

But what mattered more to him now was whether he should answer her—and what he should say.

[ 5 ] Franz had found a woman who was particularly devout—Klara had her own kind of piety—but I don’t want to talk about that; I’ll just mention that this was an important reason for him.

But what mattered more to him now was whether he should reply to her—and what he should say. Should he thank her politely and then calmly wait until chance brought her his way? Or perhaps he should follow her advice, turn to one of the pious men, and then use that as an opportunity to write to her again?

[ 6 ] In this context, “pious men” refers to Catholic clergy, whom he first turns to in order to determine whether one can make sense of the world based on what they have discovered and what they know. He then goes on to say:

First of all, however, he had to figure out for himself what he actually wanted. Was he simply in love, and was his desire to become devout merely a disguised wish to please her? He certainly hadn’t lied intentionally, but it was possible that his feelings for her—which made everything seem more beautiful—caused every one of her traits and habits to appear desirable to him. One instinctively wants to be like the one one loves, and what is dear and valuable to that person becomes so to the lover as well. But that wasn’t true at all in this case! He had already been on the path to faith before he even knew her. He would hardly ever have met her without that strange inner urge—utterly inexplicable even to himself—that suddenly drew him gently into the churches and led him to find her before the saint, herself almost like a saint. Otherwise, he would not have noticed her at all; perhaps he did not even love her, but merely the manifestation of his own longing in her. And it was not love at all—not what he had hitherto called love—but the bliss of being devout that he felt! But was he pious, then? He knew only that he wished to be, but still did not dare, as it were—perhaps out of fear of deceiving himself again, just as every desire had deceived him time and again—and if he were to be disappointed once more now, then he would have none left! He would have liked to be pious, but the question, of course, was whether he could be. Pious like those beggars whom he so envied for the unadulterated bliss of their simple devotion? Hardly. After all, he had already tasted too much from the tree of knowledge. Pious like Klara? He was no longer capable of spiritual innocence. But was there not perhaps a kind of second innocence, a regained innocence? Was there not a piety of the mind that recognizes its limits, of the humbled intellect—a faith of the knowledgeable, a hope born of despair? Have there not always been solitary, hidden, wise men, turned away from the world, connected to one another through secret signs, working wonders in silence with an almost magical power, in a higher realm above the peoples, above the creeds, in the boundless, in the realm of a purer humanity closer to God? Is there not even today, scattered and hidden throughout the world, a knighthood of the Holy Grail? Are there not disciples of a perhaps invisible, inaccessible, merely sensed, yet omnipresent, all-governing, fate-determining White Lodge? Was there not always on earth, so to speak, an “anonymous” community of saints who do not know one another, know nothing of one another, and yet influence one another—indeed, work together—merely through the rays of their prayers? Even during his theosophical period, such thoughts had occupied him greatly, but he had apparently only ever encountered false theosophists; perhaps the true ones could not be known. And suddenly it occurred to him: might the canon [...]

[ 7 ] He had, in fact, met a canon who, strangely enough, had struck him as a person free of prejudice in many respects.

And suddenly it occurred to him: Could the canon perhaps be one of those true masters, one of the hidden spiritual rulers of the world, one of the secret guardians of the Grail? Only now did he realize that he had always been drawn to the canon, as it were, by a promise of great revelations, as if the words of life were to be preserved there. The esteem in which this priest was held, the reverence—even fear—with which people spoke of him, the obedience even those who were reluctant to do so showed him, the deep solitude that surrounded him, the enigmatic power to help friends and harm enemies that was attributed to him—even though he smiled and lamented that he deserved neither the gratitude of his friends nor the resentment of his enemies — all of this went far beyond the significance, the power, and the dignity of his office and his outward position, and while some attributed it to the “good connections he happens to have,” [...]

[ 8 ] — as they say in Austria: “the ones he just has” —

[...] While others even attributed it to the rumor that he was descended from a nobleman, the magical power of his gaze, his presence, and indeed his very name remained unexplained. There were a dozen canons in the city; but he was the Canon. When anyone spoke of the Canon, they meant him. When someone asked after His Excellency, they weren’t even understood at first. They still couldn’t get used to calling him that; to them, he remained the Canon. He walked modestly in the procession behind the cardinal in his resplendent red robes, but everyone’s eyes were fixed only on him.

[ 9 ] — the canon, not the cardinal! —

Whenever he failed to take his usual walk at the usual time, word immediately spread throughout the city: “The canon has gone away!” — And when word then spread again that “The canon is back,” it seemed to be of the utmost importance to the entire city. Franz recalled a conversation he’d had years ago in Rome,

[ 10 ] — Please forgive me for reading this aloud now, but Hermann Bahr wrote this, and I apologize

[.—.] with an Englishman who, after traveling the entire world, had settled in the Holy City because he claimed to have found nothing more mysterious than the Monsignori. Whoever could understand them would hold the key to the fate of humanity. He was a clever man of mature years, from a good family, wealthy, independent, a bachelor, and a true Englishman—sober, practical, unsentimental, completely unmusical, unartistic, a coarse, cheerful hedonist, an angler, rower, sailor, a hearty eater, a heavy drinker, a bon vivant whose contentment was disturbed by only a single passion: the curiosity to see everything, to get to know everything, to have been everywhere at least once—really with no other purpose than to be able to say, with satisfaction, whenever any place was mentioned: “Oh yes! —, to know the hotel where Cook had put him up there, and the sights he had visited, and the people of rank or fame with whom he had associated. To travel more comfortably and gain access everywhere, he had been advised to become a Freemason. He praised the usefulness of this organization until he believed he had discovered that there must be another similar, yet better-led, more powerful organization of a higher order, which he now absolutely wanted to join—just as, if there had been another, better Cook to be found anywhere, he would naturally have turned to him. He would not be dissuaded: the world was ruled by a very small group of secret leaders; so-called history was made by these hidden men, who were unknown even to their closest servants, just as those servants were unknown to theirs, and he claimed that, following the trail of this secret world government—this true Freemasonry, of which the other was merely a highly foolish copy with inadequate means—he had found its seat in Rome, specifically among the Monsignori, though of course most of them, too, were unsuspecting extras whose throng served merely to conceal the four or five true masters of the world. And Franz still had to laugh today at the comical desperation of his Englishman, who now had the misfortune of never encountering the right person, but instead always coming across mere extras—yet he did not let this mislead him, but instead gained even more respect for such a well-protected, impenetrable society, into which he ultimately bet he would still be admitted, even if he had to remain in Rome until the end of his life, and even if he had to take the habit or perhaps even undergo circumcision; for having traced the invisible threads of a power spun across the entire world everywhere, he was not averse to holding the Jews in high regard as well, and he occasionally voiced, in all seriousness, the suspicion that perhaps, within the innermost circle of this hidden world web, rabbis and monsignors sat together in perfect harmony—which, incidentally, would have been of no consequence to him, provided they would only let him share in their magic.

[ 11 ] You see, someone is searching there! It refers to a person who is searching there. And you can be absolutely certain—even though it’s not an autobiography—that this Hermann Bahr had already met that Englishman. It’s all taken from real life.

Even back then, Franz had sometimes wondered whether there might not be some truth hidden in the Englishman’s folly after all. Life—whether that of individuals or of nations—which at first glance seems so meaningless, and up close appears to be nothing but a jumble of coincidences, nevertheless reveals itself, when viewed from a distance and from on high, to be consistently well-planned and firmly guided. Unless we are willing to assume that God Himself intervenes directly to adapt, with His own hand, the nonsense, the folly of human caprice to his purposes, we are compelled to conceive, to a certain extent, an intermediate realm through which his will is mediated—a circle of silently ruling human beings through whom he acts upon the world, so to speak, stations of divine power and wisdom, from which their rays shine into dark humanity and ultimately, time and again, bring everything back into order. These lenses of God, gathering the creative spirit and scattering it into the world; these secret organizers, these hidden kings—it is through them that, in the end, all madness is repeatedly brought back to reason, passion is silenced, chance becomes necessity, chaos takes shape, darkness into light—and who has not encountered people in their life who truly possess a strange dignity and aloofness, who are reputed to be able to curse or bless with a mere glance, and who, however quiet they may be, seem to exert a far-reaching influence? They are mostly people who live very simple lives—shepherds, country doctors, village pastors, often old women or precocious children who die young—and they all possess something that makes them seem eerie to others and grants them great power over people and animals, indeed, as one hears repeatedly asserted, over all of nature—over springs, ores, weather, sunshine and rain, hailstorms and drought. When we cross their path, we have—often at that very moment, sometimes only years later—the distinct feeling that a decision about our lives has been made as a result. They themselves, it seems, perceive their power more as a burden, perhaps almost as a curse, but in any case as a duty. They live in seclusion and are glad when they are spared. One might well imagine that they are all connected with one another across the vast world, sending signals to one another or perhaps even passing on the signals of even more powerful secret rulers, all of this perhaps entirely unconsciously, or at least only half-consciously, more, so to speak, yielding to inner imperatives, obeying instinctively than deciding for themselves—since they do not seem to be in control of their own power at all, but rather appear to be overwhelmed by it; all these abilities are found almost exclusively in cases of clouded or perhaps faltering consciousness. Franz had known such people even in his youth; after all, they are not uncommon in the mountains. He recalled them again upon hearing the Englishman’s rapturous ramblings. And it was not until much later that the thought occurred to him: might it not be possible for someone who was not born with such abilities to acquire them—could one cultivate such powers, or learn them through training? But the theosophical exercises had soon disappointed him, and it was only the sight of the ecstatic worshippers in the dark churches that had reminded him of this again. Through practice, these people had managed to put themselves into a state where suffering, hardship, and envy fell silent; they returned from prayer soothed, comforted, and strengthened.

[ 12 ] So, as you can see, Franz wasn’t interested in the theosophical exercises; he didn’t want to use them to find his way to an understanding of the spiritual worlds. But you see, something is dawning—something is dawning regarding those things we had to talk about yesterday. So you see: People today are gradually being led to recognize, so to speak, how the strings are pulled; people are beginning to take notice that certain individuals make use of such strings. One can only hope that people like this Hermann Bahr would approach the matter with even greater seriousness than they currently do. Even the canon whom he actually met took it more seriously; Hermann Bahr was in fact once invited to this canon’s home, into a peculiar circle of people that he now describes in his novel. From this description, one can see that the canon associated with all kinds of people—the pious monks just as much as the worldly cynics and the frivolous—and invited them all to his table. But Franz did notice all sorts of things. The canon led him into his study while the others entertained themselves in various ways—after all, once the meal is over, there’s always something else to do. So the canon led him into his study:

The niece had left, but the guest of honor, Uncle Erhard, and His Excellency, settled comfortably in their chairs and devotedly giving themselves over to digestion, had still not finished telling their stories; the tales were growing more troubling, the mockery bolder, the allusions clearer, and our entire world—the court, the nobility, and the General Staff—was portrayed in anecdotes; nothing was spared, it seemed as if everything consisted solely of anecdotes. Franz stepped away in disgust, heading for the library. It was not large, but well-curated. As for theology, only the bare essentials, [...]

[ 13 ] — after all, we were visiting a canon, who needs theology the least of all —

[...] the Bollandists, a great deal of Franciscan literature, Meister Eckhart, the Spiritual Exercises, Catherine of Genoa, the mysticism of Görres, and Möhler’s Symbolik. As for philosophy, even more: the complete works of Kant, including the writings of the “Kant Society”; Deussen’s Upanishads and his History of Philosophy; Vaihinger’s Philosophy of the As If; and a great deal of critical philosophy of knowledge. Then the Greek and Roman classics, Shakespeare, Calderón, Cervantes, Dante, Machiavelli, and Balzac in the original, but of German authors only Novalis and Goethe—the latter in various editions, his scientific writings in the Weimar edition. Franz took one volume of these and found many marginal notes in the canon’s hand; at that very moment, the canon left the young monk and the Jesuit and approached him. He said: “Yes, nobody knows Goethe’s scientific writings. What a pity! There, the old pagan—which he is said to have been, after all—suddenly looks quite different, and then one finally understands the ending of Faust. I could never have imagined that Goethe was just suddenly pretending to be Catholic there, [...]

[ 14 ] — don’t you think we should forgive the canon, who wants everything to be “Catholic”? For us, the most important thing is that he has turned to scientific writings

[...] Goethe is just pretending to be Catholic here, purely for dramatic effect. My respect for the poet—for any poet, for that matter—is far too great to believe that someone should don a costume just as they’re about to speak their final words. But in his Natural Science Writings, every page attests to just how Catholic Goethe was, [...]

[ 15 ] — one must forgive the canon for that —

[...] perhaps unwittingly, and in any case without the necessary courage. It reads as if someone, unfamiliar with Catholic truths, discovered them, so to speak, unexpectedly on his own, though of course not without a fair share of forced interpretations and oddities; yet on the whole, nothing decisive, necessary, or essential is missing—not even that touch of superstition, magic, or whatever one might call it, which always remains so suspect to the true, born-again Protestant regarding our holy doctrine—not even that! I have often scarcely believed my own eyes! But once you’re on the trail of Goethe, the cryptic Catholic, you soon see him everywhere. His trust in the Holy Spirit—whom he, of course, prefers to call “Genius,” [...]

[ 16 ] — Goethe, of course, and with good reason! —

[...] his deep sense of the sacraments, of which there are still too few for him; his sense of the “mystical”; his gift for reverence; and, above all, the fact that he, in a thoroughly un-Protestant way, never content with mere faith, but everywhere striving for the acknowledgment of God through living action, through pious works—and even that rare, supreme, and most difficult understanding that man cannot be brought to God unless he brings himself to God—the understanding of this terrible human freedom to have to choose for oneself and to accept the grace offered, but also to be able to reject it—through which freedom alone does God’s grace become a personal merit for the person who chooses it, who takes it for himself—all of this remains, even in his exaggerations and distortions, so staunchly Catholic that, as you can see, [...]

[ 17 ] — they were already on a first-name basis, so the canon said to Franz

[...] was often able to jot down in the margins passages from the Tridentine Council where the same idea is expressed, at times in almost the same words. And when Zacharias Werner said that a single sentence in Elective Affinities had converted him to Catholicism, I take him at his word. By this I certainly do not mean to deny that there is also a pagan, a Protestant, and even an almost Jewish Goethe, nor do I wish to claim him as the paragon of a Catholic—which, incidentally, he was still more than the shallow, pleasure-seeking, run-of-the-mill monist that the New German schoolmasters parade under his name.”

[ 18 ] As you can see, even within these circles there is already a search underway for a different Goethe—one who can find his way into the spiritual world—though certainly a different Goethe than the “shallowly cheerful, forest-and-meadow monist” described by Goethe’s biographers and as whom he is peddled to the world today. You see, the paths that this Franz takes—I’m not talking about the canon, but about Franz—these paths are not all that different from those you’ll find interwoven in what we call anthroposophically oriented spiritual science—you see, there may well be a necessity here.

[ 19 ] Now I ask you to recall—most of you will remember this, though I don’t know if I’ve mentioned it here before—but I have mentioned it often—do you recall how I said that among the hidden events of our present time, the concrete hidden events of our present time, quite apart from all external physical occurrences, is the death of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria? And at that time, I placed particular emphasis on the fact that something new truly came into being for the world as a whole—if we consider the physical and spiritual worlds together—that things were very different before the assassination of Franz Ferdinand than they were afterward. My dear friends, what does it matter to us how such things appear on the outside, in the Maya—what matters to us is how things unfold inwardly. And so I said: What ascended into the spiritual worlds as the soul of Franz Ferdinand became a center for very strong, powerful effects, and much of what is happening at present is connected precisely to the fact that a unique transition took place between life and so-called death, that this soul became something entirely different from what other souls become.

[ 20 ] I said that for anyone who has consciously participated in the events of the past decades, a major reason for the current painful events lies in the fear permeating the entire world—the fear that individual people had of one another, even if they were not aware of it, but above all the fear that individual nations had of one another. And if one had clearly traced the source of this fear, one would not be talking so much nonsense about the causes of war as one does today. This fear could be so significant because, as an emotional state, it is interwoven with what I told you yesterday, illustrating it with examples. Consider this, so to speak, as a kind of sketch. But now the aura of fear pervades all of this. Franz Ferdinand’s soul was connected in a very specific way to this aura of fear. Therefore, his violent death is by no means merely an external event. I said this because it was an observation on my part, because it was truly a special, significant event connected to many things happening in the present.

[ 21 ] Well, I don’t know—I don’t want to assume that such matters, which are of course kept confidential within our circles, are being discussed everywhere outside our circle; but the fact is that I have been presenting this matter in a wide variety of contexts right from the start of the war—and there are witnesses to the fact that it has been presented. Hermann Bahr’s book came much later; in fact, it was published only recently. Nevertheless, I find the following passage in it—and I ask you to consider the fact that, within our anthroposophically oriented spiritual science, reference is made to such a significant, spiritually significant event, and that one then subsequently finds the following in a book—which was written after the fact: This novel is about a man who always appears to be quite foolish. He is, in fact, a sort of prince in disguise, but he presents himself as a completely foolish man and takes on menial jobs. But when he hears the announcement via a public notice—he is in the countryside: an assassination has been carried out against Archduke Franz Ferdinand—he makes a remark that not only nearly gets him lynched but also lands him in jail, for how could any police force not be convinced, as a matter of course, that someone who makes such a remark immediately after the assassination is part of the conspiracy? That goes without saying, even if many, many miles lie between the two places, even if one event took place in Sarajevo and the other in Salzburg. Nevertheless, to the police, it is self-evident that the man is part of the conspiracy.

[ 22 ] But this reveals that this foolish man is, in essence, a prince in disguise who keeps a deeply meaningful, mystical diary. It also reveals why he actually made that remark. And the following is written about this:

The enchanted—and now disenchanted—prince, [...]

[ 23 ] So he was actually a prince, but the whole business of being a prince had grown tiresome to him, and he became the disguised old Blasl, who took on menial jobs, acted quite foolishly, even let his masters beat him, and usually said nothing at all; only on certain occasions did he become talkative, but otherwise he said nothing at all. When they investigated the matter—as was only natural—they found a mysterious manuscript that he himself had written—this is recounted here in the book:

The enchanted—and now disenchanted—prince, still in his old clothes and otherwise exactly the same as before, yet somehow different ever since Franz had learned it was a disguise, said with a smile: “Please forgive me for the deception—though, as far as I’m concerned, it wasn’t really one at all. I haven’t been the Infante Don Tadeo for a long time now. If circumstances compel me to portray him again for a while, this role is much harder for me. To myself, I really was the old Blasl, and if I lied at all, I would have been lying to myself, not to you. I had no way of knowing that I would cause you any inconvenience. I’m truly sorry. Of course, it was the silliest misunderstanding. I knew the heir to the throne very well—though I’d never actually met him—and he was very dear to me; we were in contact, even if not in the way people do here.”

[ 24 ] “Local” species — meaning the physical species: We were in contact, though not in the physical sense.

“He had long since crossed the boundaries of earthly activity and already had one foot in the other realm of purely spiritual action. He now had to cross over completely—I knew that; he could no longer remain here for his mission to be fulfilled. Only from there will his deed take place. I was only surprised that fate had hesitated so long with him. And when, stepping out of church that Sunday—where I had just been reassured anew through prayer—I found the anxious crowd, I knew at once that he was finally set free. What is to be accomplished through him can only be carried out from the other side. Here, he could only promise it; his life was merely a foretaste. Only now can it come to pass. I could never have imagined him as a constitutional monarch, with parliamentarianism and all that nonsense; his stature was too great for that. But now, in one fell swoop, he has seized the initiative. This dead man will now truly live—and from the ground up. That is what I felt upon hearing the news; that is what my words meant. But you will understand that I had little hope of making myself understood to those peasants. I preferred to remain silent and am only surprised that they didn’t finish me off. I was prepared for that, and it would be over by now. So I still have a little work left to do. So be it!” He had said all this in the same tone, which, in a sense, lacked punctuation, and only rarely

[ 25 ] Franz stared at him once with his lifeless eyes. Then he asked him not to say anything about his notebooks and to forget about them himself. “The truth is in them, but only for me; to understand it, one must understand my sign language. What is written there is true, but the words are meaningless.” Franz couldn’t help but describe to him the impression the notebooks had made on him. Franz was, in fact, the only person in that city who understood Spanish, and since these notebooks were written in Spanish, he was called in—though I should point out that there’s a bit of irony here, since in Austria people call everything “Spanish” that they don’t immediately understand—but in any case, they were Spanish notebooks. However, since Blasl—or rather, the Infante—was suspected of being involved in the conspiracy, these notebooks had to be read; and because Franz had once been to Spain and could therefore read Spanish, he had to read them—Hermann Bahr, after all, had actually been to Spain as well.

[ 26 ] So you see—since one must assume that Hermann Bahr was not prompted to do this—a remarkable way of bringing a person to terms with these matters, a necessity in the present to grapple with them, to engage with them. And I believe it is justified to be a little surprised that such things are appearing in novels at present, for this is connected to the inner fabric of our time. Admittedly, at first it is only people who lead a life similar to Hermann Bahr’s who are moved by this—a man who has gradually gone through all sorts of experiences and who now, in his old age, after having long professed his allegiance to Impressionism, is still trying to understand Expressionism and everything else that arises from it. He is a person who was truly able to connect, both outwardly and inwardly, with the most diverse movements through his soul; who was actually among the Ostwaldians, Richet, and the Theosophists in London and tried his hand at those circles; and finally, since he lacked sufficient perseverance, came to Canon Zinger, whom he now regards as a master. Yes, he has gone through inner and outer currents.

[ 27 ] When I first met him, he had just [as a student in Berlin] written his play Die neuen Menschen (The New People), of which he is now deeply ashamed; it was written in a strictly social-democratic vein, and at that time there was no more ardent social democrat than Hermann Bahr. [Previously, as a student in Austria], he had joined the German nationalist movement. Again, no one had been a more radical German nationalist than Hermann Bahr. Then, [in Berlin, after completing his studies]—he was now twenty-four years old and finally had to enlist as a soldier—he became a one-year volunteer. No one became as radically militaristic as Hermann Bahr—he was now completely imbued with a soldier’s mindset. During this time, he wrote a short one-act play of minor significance. Then he wrote Die große Sünde [in which he made no secret of his disappointment with the socialist movement and politics in general].

[ 28 ] As you can see, he knew how to connect his soul with external trends, yet he never failed to familiarize himself quite seriously with internal trends as well. Then, after his military service [and his subsequent stay in Paris] were behind him, he returned to Berlin for a short time and edited a modern weekly magazine there called Freie Bühne für modernes Leben (Free Stage for Modern Life). He could transform himself into anything—except a Berliner! He had barely arrived [in Paris]; he couldn’t even conjugate a reflexive verb with “être,” only with “avoir”—yet he was already writing enthusiastic letters about the “sun-man” Boulanger, who would show Europe what true, genuine culture is. Then he went to Spain, became a fervent opponent of the Sultan of Morocco, against whom he wrote articles—but in Spanish. Then he returned, not as a copy of Daudet—not a copy, for as a person he was a mixture of races—but outwardly he did look quite similar.

[ 29 ] He told us back then at the famous old Café Griensteidl, which since 1848 had seen all sorts of people pass through its doors—people who were of some importance in Austria—and where Lenau, Anastasius Grün, and all sorts of other people used to frequent—a place where even the waiters had achieved a special kind of fame, for who in Vienna didn’t know the famous Franz and, later, Heinrich from the Griensteidl? Now it has been torn down, but precisely because Hermann Bahr spoke so much there about the way his soul had immersed itself in French culture, spoke of the “sun-man” Boulanger, someone else took offense, and when Café Griensteidl was demolished, Karl Kraus wrote the pamphlet “The Demolished Literature.” I still vividly remember how Hermann Bahr told us about the profound impressions he’d had and how he—a native of Linz—had the most beautiful artist’s face in all of Paris; I still remember very vividly how he raved about Maurice Barré, how he inspired people with Maurice Barré’s ideas, how he passionately championed everything that was then beginning to take shape as “Young French-ism,” and how, truly from an enthusiastic heart that had witnessed an entire literary movement with all its aspirations, one came to know everything that was happening there. Then, together with a few others, he founded a weekly journal in Vienna, in which he wrote truly significant articles—he delved deeper and deeper, though in his case, trivialization and depth always went hand in hand. And so he has now undergone a further transformation, just as he once did—from a German nationalist to a social democrat, from a militarist to an ardent Boulangist and follower of Maurice Barrès and others; finally, he has become an admirer of Impressionist art.

[ 30 ] Every now and then he would return to Berlin, but he always left again very quickly; it was the only place he couldn’t stand. In contrast, he loved Vienna terribly and expressed this in many, many ways. In recent years, the people of Danzig—his beloved Danzigers—have often invited him to give lectures on Expressionism, which they are said to have understood very well and which, of course, also appeared in his book on Expressionism. There he also raves about Goethe’s scientific writings, showing that he has come a little closer to what we know as anthroposophy, but for him it is really only a beginning. Just as an aside, I’d like to mention that in his latest book on Expressionism, he says all sorts of nice things about the people of Danzig—naturally, to highlight their great merits in contrast to those of the Berliners. It has been widely reported lately that Hermann Bahr has become a Catholic. Well, he probably hasn’t become a full-fledged Catholic; he’s become one to the same extent that he was a Boulangist. But he is a person—as you have now seen in his latest novel—who, precisely because of the cosmopolitanism he possesses due to his longing to know everything in his own way, has been moved by the necessity of understanding, in the present, things such as humanity’s ascent into the spiritual world or the connections between people — connections of a different kind than those that arise merely through ordinary physical means; in other words: connections such as we characterized yesterday.

[ 31 ] Well, you can at least understand that I attach a certain significance to the fact that such a novel contains not only general allusions, but that events reach a point as concrete as the death of Archduke Franz Ferdinand. This shows you that things must be taken much more concretely than is usually assumed. Well, it is precisely such things, however, that must point out to us that what happens on the physical plane is often merely a symptom—a symptom of what is actually happening in reality, of what is going on, so to speak, behind the scenes of existence. For you cannot possibly form a [proper] understanding if you read in the newspapers only what has taken place in connection with these events—I mean, for now, only this assassination. And if you do not appeal to the spiritual realm, you cannot possibly grasp that one is led to the true significance of the matter at all. But it is not yet possible today to speak about these things entirely impartially and to express everything that is connected with them. However, it is surely permissible to allude to certain aspects, initially more superficial ones.

[ 32 ] Let us recall what was said yesterday about the Slavic world and the Slavic spirit. Let us bear in mind that the so-called “Testament of Peter the Great,” which appeared around 1813, or perhaps even a little earlier—and was circulated, quite justifiably, as if it had originated from Peter the Great himself—is intended to have a suggestive effect on what a natural current such as the Slavic spirit is, in a sense, supposed to take on, in order to steer and guide it. Where to guide it? To steer it into the channels of Russism, so that ancient Slavic culture appears, as it were, as the bearer of the Russian state ideal. Because this is the case, a precise distinction must also be made between the spiritual essence of Slavic culture—that which exists as a current of ancient Slavic culture—and that which, I might say, seeks to set itself up as an external vessel to contain this entire Slavic culture: Russism, the Russian spirit.

[ 33 ] Now, one must not forget that a large number of Slavic tribes—or at least parts of them—live within the borders of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy. The Austro-Hungarian Monarchy—let me use my fingers to count—has Germans, Czechs, Slovenes, Slovaks, Serbs, Croats, Slavonians, Poles, Romanians, Ruthenians, Magyars, and Italians living within its borders. As you can see, that’s far more ethnic groups than Switzerland! Now we have [twelve ethnic groups], and what exists within these groups can only be understood by someone who has actually lived among them for an extended period of time, experiencing the events firsthand and grasping the various currents at play within Austria-Hungary. As far as the Slavic peoples are concerned, it must be said that in the last decades of the 19th century, a fundamental aspiration—permeating everything—was to find a way for these various peoples to live together in peace and freedom. And the entire history of Austria-Hungary in those final decades, with all its fierce struggles, can only be understood if one views it through the lens of the individualization of the various tribes—which is, of course, difficult, since the people do not simply live side by side but are often intertwined. Among the Germans of Austria, there are very, very many who see the salvation of the Germans precisely in individualizing the various Slavic tribes in Austria as much as possible—that is, in seeking a way for them to develop independently and freely as distinct entities. It goes without saying that such solutions cannot be found quickly; it takes time, but such a movement certainly exists.

[ 34 ] In addition to these Slavic tribes united within the framework of Austria-Hungary, we have the Balkan Slavs, who were under Turkish rule for a long time but have, in recent decades, shaken off that Turkish rule and established individual Balkan Slavic states: Bulgaria, Serbia, and Montenegro. In addition to what I have just mentioned, there is also the Polish-Slavic people, who are the most advanced in terms of intellectual life—a point I already touched upon yesterday. I would now like to draw your attention only to the most important aspects, for I can, after all, only develop these ideas step by step. Yet it is precisely within all these Slavic peoples and tribes that, to a certain degree, what I described yesterday as the unified, elemental national element—which is, in fact, a preparation for the future—remains alive within them.

[ 35 ] Let us first consider the matter from an external perspective. Why, viewed from the outside, was Franz Ferdinand of some significance? He was of a certain significance because, through his very nature and all his inclinations—you must understand the outward aspects symbolically as representing something that lived within him—he was, so to speak, the outward expression of certain currents; because there lived within him something that—had it only been able to free itself completely—would have responded with extraordinary understanding to the individual development of Slavic culture. One can [despite certain limitations] call him nothing less than an ardent friend of Slavic culture, and he had an understanding—perhaps I should say: that which lived within him, of which he himself was not fully aware, had an understanding—of the forms that the coexistence of the Slavs must take if they are to develop individually.

[ 36 ] One must now recognize that [in this case] the course of karma was a most peculiar one. One must not forget that there was once an heir to the throne in whom great hopes were placed, particularly in the direction in which many liberal and free-thinking people of the present day think—the heir to the throne, Archduke Rudolf. It was clear to those who knew the circumstances and the man himself—Archduke Rudolf—that something was at work within his soul that I referred to yesterday as English political thought—thought forms concerning the way states are governed. And people expected him to apply this way of thinking to the Austrian situation; his own inclinations were also aligned with this. But you know how karma worked and in what way what should have happened was made impossible. Now the opposite became possible: that a man moving in a completely different direction could become significant. And it is truly not without significance when attention is drawn to this:

Here, he could only make a promise; his life was merely a preview. Only now can it come to pass. I could never have imagined him as a constitutional monarch, with parliamentarism and all that nonsense.

[ 37 ] But above all, one would have had to imagine the other man! You see, karma is at work, and we must perceive this karma at work in order to ascend to even greater heights of understanding. That which should and could have been established—not according to the will of this or that person, but according to the intentions of world evolution—that which could have been initiated by this soul observing Slavic culture with understanding—I will for now characterize only in abstract terms—that, my dear friends, would truly have had a liberating effect, especially for Slavic culture. But at the same time, it would have been devastating for what Russism seeks to do with Slavic culture, for Russism seeks to bring Slavic culture within the framework it has prepared through the “Testament of Peter the Great” and to use it as its instrument. It seeks to bring it under its control. How quickly such things can come to pass naturally depends on various secondary currents and circumstances. But it is important to have a clear understanding of what is developing in a certain direction. It goes without saying, therefore, that only those who viewed Slavdom with some depth could truly grasp what was actually taking shape there, and that this had to be counteracted by those who actually seek to destroy Slavism through Russism.

[ 38 ] Well, things become particularly delicate, particularly sensitive, when individuals intervene in these movements and rely on methods that are connected to occult movements, and there are [some] such societies scattered far and wide across the globe. Some of these are more deeply rooted societies, such as those we will learn about tomorrow. Some are only marginally involved, but even though they are only marginally involved, they must—precisely because they are involved—still be regarded as vessels through which the occult currents flow. And that society—the “Narodna odbrana”—which was ordered to be dissolved in Serbia following the death of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, was a society that was, after all, the direct continuation of an earlier society that operated entirely within the occult and had merely altered its methods slightly—I am simply stating the facts. You see, here you have an example of how an occult society operates politically—an occult society that, while having its center of operations in Serbia, extended its influence everywhere there were Slavs, was connected to a wide variety of other societies, and, above all, had an inner connection with Western societies. That is why, in such a society, one can teach things that are already connected to the occult forces at work throughout the world.

[ 39 ] Why, my dear friends, must we take so many detours just to gain even a modicum of understanding of what we actually need to understand? Do not be surprised that we must take so many detours, for it is all too easy to form superficial judgments when one tries to apply one’s insights to immediate events in which one is caught up in likes and dislikes; false impressions and misunderstandings arise all too easily in such situations. For how often does this happen to us? We have our sympathies and antipathies in our souls—to which, of course, everyone is fully entitled—but we often have reason not to admit them to ourselves; rather than—I won’t say deceiving ourselves—we put ourselves under autosuggestion, convincing ourselves that we are judging objectively. If one were to calmly admit, “I have these or those sympathies,” one would be admitting the truth; but while one wants to judge “objectively,” one does not admit the truth to oneself, but rather, in a sense, numbs oneself to the truth. Well then, why can human beings have such tendencies? Simply because, when people strive to understand reality, they very easily encounter strange contradictions, and when they encounter contradictions, they seek to overcome them by accepting one of two contradictory things and rejecting the other. But very often, this means not wanting to understand reality at all.

[ 40 ] I would like to give you an example of how one can become entangled in a contradiction—a serious contradiction—if one does not understand the vital connection between what is contradictory and the whole, full reality. Within our anthroposophically oriented spiritual science, we call “Christianity” that which is gripped by the significance of the Mystery of Golgotha—that which is gripped by the fact that Christ was condemned, died, was buried, but also rose again in a genuine, true sense and lives on as the Risen One; We call this the Mystery of Golgotha, and we cannot grant anyone the right to call themselves a Christian who does not acknowledge this. But what was necessary for Christ to undergo, for the sake of human development, what I have just described? For this to happen, it was necessary for Judas to betray him; it was necessary for him to be crucified. And if those who crucified him had not crucified him, then the Mystery of Golgotha would not have taken place for the salvation of humanity. If Christ had not been betrayed by Judas, then the Mystery of Golgotha would not have happened. Here you have a terrible, real—I would say—a contradiction driven to the extreme, to the gigantic.

[ 41 ] Is it even conceivable that someone might say: “You Christians owe it to Judas that your Mystery of Golgotha came about at all; you Christians owe it to the executioners who nailed Christ to the cross that your Mystery of Golgotha took place”? — Does that mean anyone is justified in defending Judas and the executioners, even though it is true that the meaning of earthly history is owed to them? Can such a question be answered so simply? Do we not encounter contradictions, my dear friends, that stand before us and spell a terrible fate?

[ 42 ] Think for a moment about what I have just presented to you. We will continue these reflections tomorrow. I mentioned that last point only so that you might reflect on the fact that it is not so simple to say: “Of two things that contradict each other, I accept one and reject the other.” — Reality is deeper than what humans often try to grasp with their minds, and it is not without reason that Nietzsche, from a mind that had nearly gone mad, coined the phrase: “The world is deep, and deeper than the day has thought.”

[ 43 ] Now that I have attempted to draw your attention, in a formal manner, to the nature of the real contradiction, we will try tomorrow to delve even deeper into the subject we have now begun to explore. I’d like to take just a very short break now; you may stay in here. And then, to help you understand, I’ll speak very briefly about Goethe’s “Walpurgis Night” and “Faust,” since that might also be useful to some of you. So let’s take just a few minutes’ break so that we don’t let the topics run into one another.