The Fateful Year of 1923

GA 259 — 7 March 1923, Stuttgart

Memorandum for the Committee of the Free Anthroposophical Society for its Orientation

written between March 7-11, 1923

[At a meeting between Rudolf Steiner and the governing body of the Society for Anthroposophical Youth, formed at the delegates' conference in February, which took place on March 7, 1923, Rudolf Steiner (according to Ernst Lehrs, a representative of the young people, in his memoir Gelebte Erwartung, p. 215f.), “that we would have to be an independent society with our own membership admission and use of the same membership cards (which look quite unassuming compared to the certificates he later created), as the old society had. He also stated that he would provide us with a memorandum for our committee's own orientation, in which we would find fundamental information about the internal structure of our society and how to cultivate life in it. This happened not long afterwards, when he handed over his notes to Maikowski.¹ – we others had since left for our various places of work – when he informed him that from now on our society should call itself the Free Anthroposophical Society."]

1. With regard to the external constitution of the Free Anthroposophical Society, the aim should be to ensure that this society corresponds to the “Draft Statutes”². This makes it possible to unite people in a society while allowing them complete individual freedom, without constantly threatening dissolution. Anyone who truly understands the “Draft” in the right sense will have to find all this fulfilled in it.

2. First of all, it is necessary to bring together all those personalities who are already members of the Anthroposophical Society and who, in the opinion of the committee formed, started from the points of view that legitimately had to cause the separation into two groups of the overall society. Mere dissatisfaction with the old leadership cannot suffice, but only a positive orientation towards an anthroposophical goal, which must be assumed to be unattainable by the old leadership.

3. First of all, the Free Anthroposophical Society, formed in this way, is to appoint trusted individuals who are recognized by the committee. Only those who have an interest in giving anthroposophy to contemporary civilization should be appointed as trusted individuals. Then, in addition to the personalities already in the Anthroposophical Society, others will be added who will only be accepted. But it is precisely with these that care must be taken to ensure that they have made the positive of the anthroposophical the basic direction of their own lives. People who have only a general social interest, without an intensive anthroposophical impact, should not be appointed as trusted individuals, even if they are accepted into the Society with the idea that they will grow into real anthroposophists.

4. For admission itself, a certain degree of immersion in the anthroposophical worldview should be decisive. But for the time being, broad-mindedness must prevail for admission to the general Free Anthroposophical Society. Strictness should only come into play when forming the narrower communities.

5. The Free Anthroposophical Society should become an instrument for spreading anthroposophy throughout the world. The lecture and other dissemination work should arise from its bosom, and institutes and other organizations should also be formed from it.

6. Another is the general Free Anthroposophical Society, and another is the communities to be formed within it. In these — whether exoteric or esoteric — people should come together who feel inwardly connected, who want to experience the spirit together. Alongside such communities, it is quite possible that the branch life will develop in the sense of the “draft”. The branches would then be groups of the Free Anthroposophical Society in general. However, it is quite possible that members of the Free Anthroposophical Society will join the branches of the Anthroposophical Society and work together with the members of the latter.

7. The work in the communities will be of such a nature that it is concluded within the community itself. It is directed towards the spiritual perfection of the members of the community. Whatever a member of such a community undertakes externally, he does as a representative of the general Free Anthroposophical Society. Of course such a community can take on a certain external activity; but it remains desirable that then its individual members act precisely as representatives of the general Free Anthroposophical Society. This does not, of course, need to found a bureaucratic administration of an association activity, but can be a completely free fact of consciousness for the individual.

8. A committee of trust should be established for each of the two committees, one for the Anthroposophical Society and one for the Free Anthroposophical Society. These two committees are responsible for handling the common affairs of the entire Anthroposophical Society.

9. All institutions of the overall Anthroposophical Society should fall within the sphere of interest of both the Anthroposophical and the Free Anthroposophical Societies. This can be quite beneficial if a central administrative office is set up to manage the affairs of the overall Society on behalf of the two committees (mediated by their committees of trust). The division into two groups should not lead to a situation in which an anthroposophical institution – especially one that already exists – is regarded as the concern of only one group.

Quotas – to be determined by the committees – of the membership fees should be paid into the central fund so that the affairs of the entire society can be adequately provided for.

1. It should be understood that the two groups have come into being only because there are two sharply distinct groups among the members, who both want the same anthroposophy but want to experience it in different ways. If this is properly understood, the relative separation cannot lead to a split, but to a harmony that would not be possible without the separation.

2. The Free Anthroposophical Society should in no way attempt to destroy the historical developmental forces of the Anthroposophical Society. Those who want freedom for themselves should leave the freedom of others completely untouched. The fact that there are imperfections in the old Anthroposophical Society should not lead to further feuding, but to the formation of a Free Anthroposophical Society, which, in the opinion of the leading personalities, avoids these imperfections.

3. The separation means that all the conditions are in place for young people in particular to feel at home in the Free Anthroposophical Society. This is because the life communities will be free groups of people who understand each other; and this will be able to form the basis for ensuring that no one in the general Free Anthroposophical Society feels restricted in their freedom.