The Fateful Year of 1923

GA 259 — 1 March 1923, Stuttgart

Address at a Meeting of the “Federation for Free Intellectual Life”

On the day following the delegates' conference, Rudolf Steiner was still in Stuttgart and took part in a meeting of the “Bund für Freies Geistesleben” (Federation for an Independent Spiritual Life). The following wording of his vote has been handed down by Dr. Karl Heyer, to whom “Dr. Carl Unger gave a document in March 1923 with the remark that it was a free reproduction of remarks made by Rudolf Steiner (shortly before) about the Bund für Freies Geistesleben in a meeting in Stuttgart, written down by Dr. Unger. (That meeting may have been one held on March 1, 1923).

If the “Association for Free Intellectual Life” is to be given tasks, it can only be with due regard to reality. As early as the¹ constitution, I pointed out what was important. Until the last third of the 19th century, this bond actually existed and consisted of people who, as free spirits, stood out from the philistine intellectual life. The difference between old and young, as it stands out today, is superficial. In the past, there was a natural authority stemming from the fourth post-Atlantic culture, but even in Goethe's time, people entered into philistinism in their old age. Goethe himself, in his old age, was of course always the man of genius, but he was also the corpulent privy councillor with the double chin. Now we have entered the epoch of freedom, and this finds expression in youth. For example, in his “Conversations of the German Emigrants,” Goethe describes such a circle, which existed instinctively. People from the most diverse spheres discuss matters on completely free, neutral ground; a spiritualist is also present. Such people have always distinguished themselves from the philistine intellectual circles, such as theologians, lawyers, physicians and whatever emerged from the fourth faculty. Such a federation must be consciously developed. At the time of the Congress of Vienna [meaning the international congress of the anthroposophical movement in June 1922 in Vienna] a so-called cultural alliance was founded by seven people, of course in the wrong way, there was also a Jesuit among them. But it is a matter of a worldly concern. This cultural association described the idea of threefolding in the first issue of its journal, albeit in a hidden way, but quite appropriately. There is talk of the philistine industrialists on the one hand, and the Bolsheviks on the other. Between them there is a certain social class that knows it belongs to them: the declassed nobility, people who are otherwise educated but who have fallen by the wayside, will constitute themselves internationally and recognize each other everywhere. The “Bund für Freies Geistesleben” must found itself on such a real basis, but with full consciousness. Then spiritual people will also have their place. The people are certainly there. I do not think much of existing connections. Things must happen naturally. Lectures are useful if one can make use of latent success. You find people if you let them approach you and do not push them away. These are people of a special spiritual nature, people who actually have the need to get in touch with something spiritual outside the mould into which they have been placed by their education. In the disintegrating society of Europe, these people can be found everywhere. They have the need to be with like-minded people in a community on spiritual ground. Those who are interested in a free college grow out of this. It will be easiest in the artistic field. The idea of a free college within Central Europe could arouse the greatest interest in America, especially financially, but we also need the lecturers for this, because we cannot always burden the same people with everything.