The Rudolf Steiner Archive

Rudolf Steiner's Subsequent Oral Report

My dear friends!

[ 1 ] I have just returned from my trip to Breslau-Koberwitz, which, as you know, served a specific purpose this time; but that specific purpose was connected to a very general anthroposophical one. First of all, as you know, a number of farmers who are members of the Anthroposophical Society had requested that a course be held for them focusing on specific agricultural aspects—on matters pertaining to agriculture. Those who are farmers within our Society had indeed traveled from far and wide to gain, in a very serious manner, insights into what anthroposophical research can offer for this sphere of human activity.

[ 2 ] In such practical areas of life, these are, of course, very much practical considerations for work, not just some theories. That is why practical considerations were certainly expected.

[ 3 ] Now, this event was a self-contained occasion and one that proved exceptionally satisfying for the participants, because the attendees of this agricultural course—including those members of the Goetheanum Executive Board who were able to be present—Dr. Steiner, Miss Vreede, and Dr. Wachsmuth—were guests at Koberwitz Castle with our dear friend, Count Keyserlingk.

[ 4 ] And one can certainly say that it was a reception held in a truly extraordinary way, in the anthroposophical sense. After all, it was no small feat to not only have an entire group gather for lectures at a location that is, after all, a three-quarter-hour drive from Breslau by car, but also to provide them with such generous hospitality. The group consisted, after all, of more than a hundred participants who had to be catered for every day.

[ 5 ] The group usually arrived in Koberwitz around the eleventh hour. People couldn’t stay in Koberwitz; they traveled there from Breslau. And then the lecture began, lasting until one o’clock. Soon after, the lecture gave way to breakfast, during which the guests had access to almost the entire castle and all its amenities—which was very interesting. That lasted until about half past one or a quarter to two. Then there was a discussion on agricultural topics until three o’clock. So that was the Koberwitz portion of the entire event. It went on for ten days.

[ 6 ] So you can see just how accommodating they were. Now, I must say, it was still no easy task for Countess and Count Keyserlingk to organize this course, because it had been promised for a long time, and I kept being unable to attend. That is why Count Keyserlingk’s nephew was already here in Dornach for the Christmas conference, and the nephew was told at the time, when he was sent here: Either you bring me a very specific promise that this course will take place within the next six months, or you are not to come to my home at all. Under these circumstances, the nephew—who has, incidentally, brought about many other curious things in the world—appeared here and spoke so forcefully that I told him the course would take place as soon as it was at all possible.

[ 7 ] Well, it couldn’t have been any earlier, so it took place at Pentecost. It was a beautiful Pentecost celebration, a truly anthroposophical one. There is something very distinctive about the Koberwitz estate and its surroundings. The Koberwitz estate includes thirty thousand Morgen of farmland. It is one of the largest estates. So there is a great deal to see there in terms of agriculture. A great deal was seen there, too, because everything was shown with extraordinary hospitality.

[ 8 ] One thing immediately strikes you when you arrive in Koberwitz and go to wash your hands: You notice right away that there is iron in the sink. The soil in Koberwitz is, in fact, iron-rich. And I do indeed think that this soil could still be put to use in a wide variety of ways, for it is extraordinarily rich in iron. Now, I actually found this abundance of iron everywhere. And that is why, right at the first lunch, when greeting the household, I said that what strikes one above all else is that everything in Koberwitz is made of iron: The nephew was already as unyielding as iron in his demands when he arrived here for Christmas; the soil is completely saturated with iron, and there is a sense of determination and energy there, so that I could not help but say: the Iron Countess and the Iron Count. There was, in fact, something thoroughly iron-like about their moral conduct as well.

[ 9 ] The agricultural course was initially focused on determining the conditions necessary for the prosperity of the various branches of agriculture. There are, of course, extraordinarily interesting fields—plant growth, animal husbandry, forestry, horticulture, and so on. Then there is what is among the most interesting of all: the secrets of fertilization, which are truly extraordinary secrets.

[ 10 ] For all of this, the principles and interrelationships were first developed; these appear particularly significant in the present day precisely because—believe it or not—it is agriculture, more than any other sector, that has strayed the farthest from rational principles under the influence of a materialistic worldview. And very few people realize that, over the course of the last few decades, a trend has emerged within agriculture whereby all the products on which human beings actually depend are degenerating—and degenerating at an extraordinarily rapid pace.

[ 11 ] It is indeed true that it is not merely the moral development of humanity in the present—in this time of transition from the Kali Yuga to the Age of Light— is in a state of degeneration, but rather what human beings have done to the Earth and to what lies immediately above it through their actions is undergoing rapid degeneration—a fact that has been statistically established today and is discussed in agricultural associations, for example—and against which human beings are simply powerless.

[ 12 ] And so even today, a materialistic farmer—if he isn’t just going through life in a complete daze but actually gives some thought to the issues that arise daily, or at least annually—can roughly calculate how many decades it will take for agricultural products to degenerate to the point where they will no longer be fit for human consumption even within this century.

[ 13 ] So this is indeed a question that, in the most eminent sense, is—I would say—a cosmic-earthly question. In agriculture in particular, it becomes clear that forces must be drawn from the spirit that are completely unknown today—forces that are significant not merely in terms of, say, slightly improving agriculture, but in terms of ensuring that human life itself—for humans must, after all, live off what the earth provides—can indeed continue on earth, even in the physical sense.

[ 14 ] So this was already a very significant topic. And the principles that were then outlined—to show the conditions under which plants of all kinds develop, the conditions under which animals develop—the principles governing how to fertilize, how to remove weeds, how to eradicate agricultural pests and parasites, and how to combat plant diseases— all of these are, after all, extraordinarily pressing issues in the field of agriculture today.

[ 15 ] After these principles had been discussed, the conversation then turned to what needs to be done first to bring about a reform in the use of fertilizers, a reform in the control of weeds and animal plant pests—the parasites—and in the control of plant diseases. And following the course and the daily discussions that followed it, a “circle”—as Count Keyserlingk called it—of the anthroposophical farmers gathered there has now formed, which intends to work here in close collaboration with the Scientific Section at the Goetheanum. Thus, the Scientific Section must work out principles based on the fundamentals—initially concerning geological soil conditions, other soil characteristics, forage possibilities, manure applications, and all relevant factors such as proximity to the forest, climatic conditions, and so on. Once this information has been provided in the appropriate manner by the agricultural experts, the principles will then be worked out here, according to which the further experiments are to be designed, in order to actually test what has been given as practical guidance in the course or mentioned in the discussions, so that everyone can then say—even if some things still seem strange today—‘We have tried it; it works.’

[ 16 ] To this end, there is to be this group of farmers, which will work in close collaboration with the Scientific Section and also with Dr. Vreede, since astronomical data is necessary for this purpose.

[ 17 ] Of course, the entire School of Spiritual Science—and the Medical Section in particular—will be involved in this in the most diverse ways possible. Thus, in accordance with the intentions formulated by our friends—namely Count Keyserlingk and Mr. Stegemann—during the course, the matter will hopefully now take a more favorable course in practical terms than many of the initiatives undertaken recently by others under different auspices, under auspices that were not quite so appropriate.

[ 18 ] The condition for success, however, lies in the following—and this was strongly emphasized, repeated over and over again—that the content of this course remains, for the time being, the intellectual property of the Farmers’ Circle, that is, of practicing farmers. There were, after all, people interested in agriculture who were unable to join the Association; it was expressly stipulated to them that—contrary to the customary anthroposophical practice—not everything should be blabbed out to everyone right away, for these ideas can only attain their practical significance if, to begin with, the content of the course remains within expert circles and is tested by farmers. Some things will take four years to test. During this time, the practical guidance that has been given will not go beyond the circle of the agricultural community, because there is absolutely no point in merely talking about these things; rather, they are meant to actually be incorporated into everyday practice. And anyone who has heard these things there and then goes and blabs them around is doing wrong.

[ 19 ] These are the things that relate, first and foremost, to what I believe is a fruitful agricultural course. There was also an eurythmy performance in Breslau on the morning of Pentecost Sunday, which was exceptionally well attended and received an exceptionally favorable reception.

[ 20 ] In addition to these events, numerous others took place. Above all, the agricultural debates in the mornings lasted from about a quarter past eleven until three in the afternoon. That was out in Koberwitz, as I said. The other events took place indoors in Breslau—I will explain what happened in between later—and each day concluded with an anthroposophical lecture for members of the Anthroposophical Society, which also dealt primarily with questions of karma, which had, after all, been the subject of discussion here for weeks. These were summarized there in nine lectures. I have already provided a brief report on the whole matter in the newsletter that accompanies the Goetheanum, which was just published today. It already covers the entire Breslau event. I would also like to emphasize once again: Based on what has now been tested in various places—in Prague, in Bern, in Paris, and now again in Breslau—I can say that what emerged from the Christmas Conference—this esoteric current that is now flowing through the entire Anthroposophical Society, which is the new, one might say is actually what is present now following the true reestablishment of the Anthroposophical Society—something that was not there before—is now being received from the heart everywhere in a truly, in a distinctly satisfying, not merely but extraordinarily soulful way; so that there is truly well-founded hope that now, after the Anthroposophical Society has gained its spirituality through the Christmas Conference, and the esoteric executive committee in Dornach is already working consciously and spiritually, it can now actually be observed everywhere that not only is the current flowing outward, but that the hearts of the participants are truly responding to this current.

[ 21 ] This was very, very evident during the evening lectures and the members’ presentations in the evening. And the warmth with which Breslau and Koberwitz welcomed these lectures, too, truly took shape in a spiritual and organizational way, for it was a deep anthroposophical understanding, and it had also been put into practice, realized in the material world. I need only mention that on the last evening—Monday evening in Breslau—instead of a lecture, everything concluded with a convivial get-together. Many members had indeed traveled from far away; for a long time, members from the German regions had not had an event like this. Members had come from far away—from southern Germany, from western Germany, and of course from the nearby regions as well—so that the large halls were overflowing with members. On the last evening, during the social gathering—after many, or most, had had to leave on Sunday—there were still some three hundred and seventy members present, all of whom were treated to dinner in Wrocław at the Keyserlingk residence.

[ 22 ] So just create a mental image of a restaurant in Breslau, brought in by trucks, where everything needed to cater to three hundred and seventy anthroposophists who, as I noticed while walking around, had an exceptionally hearty appetite that evening was present. – Yes, that’s how it is when looking at pictures; you’re never as hungry as when you’ve walked through art galleries, and apparently the same thing happens at anthroposophical lectures. It had all built up over the past few days. But the best part was that the anthroposophists had a hearty appetite—there were three hundred and seventy of them—and that quite a lot was left over.

[ 23 ] These lectures thus brought the day to a close, so that the entire event was framed by the agricultural course and the anthroposophical members’ meetings. In between, there was a course on artistic speech formation led by Dr. Steiner; there were two meetings for the Breslau youth group; there were two class sessions [—and all of that right in between.] And last Sunday, something else was added. Mr. Kugelmann arrived with his theater troupe, who had founded new artistic stage plays inspired by the speech course held here at the Goetheanum two years ago, and who wanted to perform “Iphigenia” for us—which, in light of everything that had emerged from the speech course, was indeed a very promising—at least initially promising—undertaking.

[ 24 ] The time was filled to the brim—truly to the brim—but it was also possible to offer a variety of things to members who had long been unable to attend an anthroposophical event at all. [And so the entire event in Breslau-Koberwitz came to a close.]

[ 25 ] In between these matters, there were the inspections of the estates. We looked at whatever there was to see on the estate, although, of course, all these matters in Central Europe are inevitably influenced today by what is so clearly evident in the economy, which is in a state of absolute collapse. I am referring to economic life in general. The Koberwitz estate is, of course, managed exceptionally well—farming must naturally continue—but economic life in Germany is already in a terrible state. Well, on Monday, I believe around eleven o’clock in the evening, the events came to an end.

[ 26 ] Then, on Tuesday, I was able to drive over to Jena-Lauenstein, where a number of our younger friends, together with Dr. Ilse Knauer, are establishing a therapeutic and educational facility not only for children with learning disabilities, but also for those who are truly physically ill—children who are to be educated and helped to reach their full potential. As I said, this institute is currently being established. I was able to help inaugurate the project and see the first children admitted. So we have, so to speak, gotten the project off the ground in Lauenstein, near Jena.

[ 27 ] So I came here via Stuttgart. Isn’t it true that what is particularly distressing in Stuttgart today—aside from everything else—is that at the Waldorf School, which is making such extraordinary progress in terms of pedagogy, didactics, and spiritual development, the financial situation is downright bleak. Just consider this: this morning, for example, I had to reorganize the fifth grade again so that two classes became three; so now we have fifth grade A, fifth grade B, and fifth grade C. We also have the sixth grade divided into three sections. Most of the classes are divided into two sections, even up into the higher grades. We have over eight hundred students at the Waldorf School. Things are going exceptionally well from a pedagogical and didactic standpoint, as well as from a spiritual standpoint, but the financial situation of the Waldorf School is downright bleak—truly bleak in the deepest sense!

[ 28 ] You just have to consider that, let’s say, in the weeks leading up to Christmas, we still had a monthly budget at the Waldorf School of about 6,000 to 8,000 marks, which now corresponds to a monthly budget of 25,000 to 27,000 marks as a result of the tremendous surge in food prices in Germany. These are, of course, terrible circumstances. And some time ago, we faced a financial situation in which we were short by about 15,000 to 17,000 marks out of this monthly budget of 25,000 to 27,000 marks, meaning that we will have to reckon with a monthly deficit of 15,000 to 17,000 gold marks in the near future.

[ 29 ] This is indeed a distressing situation that weighs heavily on the soul, for everything is already in place: there is a faculty of over forty teachers, and there are over eight hundred students. Of course, it is extremely difficult to keep all of this going under such economic conditions, and especially given the economic outlook that currently exists in Germany.

[ 30 ] Thanks to the willingness of anthroposophical friends to make sacrifices, it has now been possible to cover 10,000 marks of this monthly shortfall for the next three, four, or five months, so that only about 6,000 to 7,000 marks per month will need to be covered in the final months. That amount could certainly be covered as well, but it is true, my dear friends, that in the Anthroposophical Society, when it comes to matters that need to be handled in a practical way, there are some who behave in an impractical manner.

[ 31 ] One need only consider, as I said recently at a meeting of the Waldorf School Association—and I hope this message will be spread far and wide, for spreading these ideas is far more important than what is sometimes put out by anthroposophists today—I said: We have, by a very conservative estimate, 10,000 anthroposophists in Germany. If collections were taken everywhere every week, and if everyone gave just 50 pfennigs each week, that would amount to 5,000 marks per week from 10,000 anthroposophists—and it is something that could easily be managed, if only people would do it. So I said: In the Anthroposophical Society, it is often the case that our institutions are so poorly funded that people who would gladly give their money—and this is based on experience—have absolutely no idea how they can contribute it.

[ 32 ] Yes, but the situation at the Waldorf School remains, after all, a very difficult one to bear, and I would like to take this opportunity to mention that, thanks precisely to the willingness of our Swiss friends to make sacrifices in recent times, a monthly budget—not at all insignificant, but quite substantial—has been partially covered, partly through direct financial aid, but primarily through the sponsorship of children —a sponsor is someone who pays the monthly budget of 25 to 27 marks for a child at the Waldorf School—has been made available. [And by taking on such sponsorships, the Swiss have indeed made a considerable contribution.]

[ 33 ] But of course, the outlook remains very bleak, and the conditions at the Waldorf School are something very, very depressing.

[ 34 ] If we could find another 250 to 300 sponsors, and if membership dues were collected more reliably and fundraisers were held, it wouldn’t be all that difficult. Of course, it must be said that there is currently an indescribable shortage of money in Germany. It’s not that there are no assets, but the shortage of money is so severe that circulation is virtually impossible. So economic life is already in a pretty dire state in Central Europe.

[ 35 ] That is the report I wanted to give you. All these things show that everything done in the field of anthroposophy by the anthroposophical movement itself possesses a very strong force in the present. The very form that the Waldorf school has taken already demonstrates a very, very strong force inherent in anthroposophy. And this is evident in other ways as well.

[ 36 ] There is a need for what anthroposophy has to offer. A language course—that is, a course on the artistic use of language—had been scheduled, which had to be completed in just a few hours because there really wasn’t enough time for so many things. But I believe about 160 people signed up. You can’t teach 160 people a language in five hours, so the arrangement had to be such that about 30 people sat in the front and received actual language instruction; the others could only listen. So the need is definitely there—a deep, intense, and far-reaching need. We just need to be able to really mobilize the available resources, and we need to make real progress in our anthroposophical work.

[ 37 ] It is indeed a fact that something like what happened in Breslau could have come about precisely because of the influence—as I have already said—of the “Iron Count” and the “Iron Countess” Keyserlingk, and of our old friend, Rector Bartsch, who has been active for almost as long as the anthroposophical movement itself has existed; he began as a young man an anthroposophist, has now retired as a school principal, but still feels so youthful in the company of others that, in his welcoming remarks to me on the first evening of the members’ meeting and the lectures, he called me “Father”—a remark for which he had to atone quite severely throughout the entire ten days!

[ 38 ] This is the report I wanted to give you, my dear friends, about that event, which must undoubtedly interest you simply because it may now, after all, be possible to bring something from anthroposophy into everyday life in a specific area. For it is clear that in the field of anthroposophy, contributions can be made from both sides—from the most spiritual and from the most practical—and it is only when these two sides are interwoven and brought into complete harmony with one another that true work is accomplished.

[ 39 ] The errors that can very easily arise in anthroposophical work arise precisely because, on the one hand, what is spiritual does not translate into real life—it remains a kind of theory, or a kind of, I would say, a belief in words—not even in thoughts, but a belief in words—and, on the other hand, that the insight into how the spiritual can truly intervene in immediate practical action is not properly conveyed.

[ 40 ] You need only keep one thing in mind, my dear friends: today, virtually no one understands the essence of fertilization. Certainly, it is done instinctively, out of tradition from ancient times. But to understand the essence of fertilization—that is something virtually no one does today. Fundamentally, no one knows—except those who can know this through spiritual insight—what fertilizer actually means for the field, why it is indispensable and necessary in certain regions, and how it should be handled. For example, no one today knows that all these mineral fertilizers are precisely the ones that contribute most significantly to the degeneration I have spoken of—to this deterioration in the quality of agricultural products. For today, everyone simply thinks: Well, plant growth requires a certain amount of nitrogen, and people are simply indifferent to how this nitrogen is produced or where it comes from. But it is not a matter of indifference where it comes from; rather, the point is that there is a great difference between nitrogen and nitrogen—between the nitrogen as it exists in the air combined with oxygen [between this dead nitrogen and the living nitrogen in the soil]. You will not deny, my dear friends, that there is a difference between a person who walks around alive and a corpse, a human corpse. One is dead; the other is alive and animated.

[ 41 ] The same is true, for example, of nitrogen and other substances. There is “dead” nitrogen. This is the nitrogen found in the air around us, mixed with oxygen, which plays a role in our entire breathing process and in our interaction with the air. It must not be “alive,” for the simple reason that if we were to live in “living” air, we would constantly be fainting. The fact that the air is “dead,” that the oxygen is “dead,” and that the nitrogen is “dead”—this is the condition of an atmosphere in which many people are to breathe so that they can think consciously and calmly.

[ 42 ] The nitrogen that is in the soil—which must be introduced through manure and which must form under the influence of the entire sky—must be a living nitrogen.

[ 43 ] And these are two different kinds of nitrogen: the nitrogen that is above ground level and the nitrogen that is below ground level; one is dead nitrogen; the other is living nitrogen.

[ 44 ] And so it is with everything. That which is necessary for the continued preservation of nature has, after all, been completely lost to ignorance in the course of the materialistic age. People simply do not know the most important things. And so things are carried on—certainly out of a very good instinct—but that instinct is gradually disappearing. Traditions are disappearing. People will fertilize the fields with science. Potatoes, grain—everything is getting worse and worse.

[ 45 ] People know this, too—that things are getting worse—and they can back it up with statistics. The only thing that exists today is resistance to practical measures based on what can be gained through spiritual insight.

[ 46 ] It is of immense importance to take a close look at these matters and see them clearly. I’ve said this here before: if someone has a compass needle that always points in a very specific direction—one end toward the magnetic North Pole, the other toward the magnetic South Pole—you’d think they were being childish if they said that the reasons why one end always points north and the other always points south lie inside the compass needle itself. We say: here is the Earth, there is the magnetic needle; why does the magnetic needle point with one end toward the north and the other toward the south? Because here is the magnetic north pole, and here is the magnetic south pole; they determine the direction of the magnetic needle toward one side and the other. We draw on the entire Earth to explain the direction of the magnetic needle. We start from the magnetic needle itself. Anyone who thought the cause lay within the magnetic needle would be considered childish.

[ 47 ] But it is childish to believe that what modern science observes in the immediate vicinity of plants or in their immediate surroundings depends on what one is looking at. The entire sky, with all its stars, plays a part in plant growth! You have to know that. It really must sink into people’s minds. You have to be able to tell yourself that it is just as childish to practice botany in today’s way as it would be childish to talk about the magnetic needle the way I have suggested today.

[ 48 ] And any educated person today can acquire certain things, provided they have a sense of the very simplest conditions of anthroposophical life.

[ 49 ] What I first hinted at in Penmaenmawr last year is extremely important. People today don’t even know how humans and animals feed themselves, let alone plants. People believe that nutrition consists of humans eating the substances in their environment. They put them in their mouths; they then enter the stomach. There, some is stored, and some is excreted. Then what has been stored is used up. Then that, too, is excreted. Then it is replaced again. Today, people have a purely superficial mental image of nutrition. But that is not how it is—namely, that the food a person takes in through the stomach is used to build bones, muscles, and other tissue mass—this applies explicitly only to the human head. And everything that, via a roundabout route through the digestive organs, spreads throughout the human body for further processing—that merely forms the material substance for the head and for everything that is deposited in the nervous-sensory system and its associated structures, whereas, for example, for the limb system or for the organs of metabolism themselves, the substances required —that is, to form tubular bones for the legs or arms, or to form intestines for metabolism and digestion—are not formed at all from the food taken in through the mouth and stomach, but are absorbed from the entire environment through respiration and even through the sense organs. A continuous process takes place within the human being whereby what is taken in through the stomach flows upward and is utilized in the head, while what is taken in by the head—or rather, by the nervous and sensory system—from the air and the surrounding environment flows downward again, and from this, the organs of the digestive system or the limbs are formed. So if you want to know what the substance of your big toe consists of, you don’t need to look at the food you eat. If you ask your brain, “Where does this substance come from?” then you must look to the food. But if you want to know the substance of your big toe—insofar as it is not sensory substance, that is, lined with warmth and so on (in which case it is also nourished by the stomach), but rather what constitutes its structural substance and so on—this is absorbed through breathing, through the sense organs, and in part even through the eyes. And all of this, as I have often explained here, enters the organs through a seven-year cycle, so that the human being is, in terms of the metabolism of the limbs—that is, the organs—substantially composed of cosmic substance. Only the nervous-sensory system is composed of telluric, earthly substance. Now, you see, this is such a fundamentally significant fact that [life itself—] the physical life of humans and animals—can only be understood at all if this is known. And nothing—not even the means and methods to know such a thing—is provided by modern science. It is simply impossible to know this with modern science. It is simply not possible because, when modern science works with its current methods, it cannot arrive at such an understanding at all. It is impossible; it is a lost cause. These are the things that must certainly be taken into consideration. That is why we have this separation between theory and practice today. [Today’s theory is theoretical and impractical.] Today’s practice is spiritless; it is mere routine.

[ 50 ] But what comes from the spirit ceases to be impractical when it actually comes from the spirit. It then becomes practical in the most eminent sense.

[ 51 ] [The class session will be tomorrow at 8:30 p.m., and my lecture will be on Sunday at 8:00 p.m., during which I will continue my reflections on karma. There will be a eurythmy performance here on Sunday at 5:00 p.m.]