The Constitution of the General Anthroposophical Society

GA 260a — 10 February 1924

The School of Spiritual Science IV

Those who join this school as members are in a completely different position from those who join the Anthroposophical Society. One becomes a member of this school after having been a member of the Society for a sufficiently long time. One has learned what anthroposophy aims to achieve and what it truly is. One has been able to form an opinion about what it can mean to oneself. But this means that the intention to join the school may be connected with the assumption of a set of duties and the awareness that one wants to be a representative of anthroposophical work.

Given the way anthroposophy is presented within the Anthroposophical Society, it is not only absurd but also completely tasteless when opponents repeatedly slander anthroposophy by claiming that it seeks to exert a suggestive influence on anyone. Everyone who is involved in anthroposophy knows this very well, or at least can know it. When members who have left the Society make such claims, they usually know themselves that what they are saying is objectively untrue. No one in the Society is led blindfolded into anthroposophy. Therefore, no one can become a member of the school without having a full understanding of what anthroposophy sees as its task.

Everyone should judge for themselves whether they want to become a member of the School based on what they have learned as a member of the Anthroposophical Society. When the School's management speaks of duties that its members take on, they can be completely clear about what this means. It simply means that the School's management cannot fulfill its tasks if such duties are not taken on. The relationship of each member of the school to the management remains completely free, even if such duties are assumed. For the school management must also enjoy the freedom to act in accordance with the natural conditions of its work. It would not have this freedom if it were not allowed to say to those who are free to join the school or not: If I am to work with you, then you must accept the obligation to fulfill this or that condition.

This should actually be self-evident and not need to be said. But it must be said, because all too often one hears that those who join the school must give up some of their “human freedoms.” When this is said by members of society, it is not surprising that malicious opponents spread the slander that anthroposophy gradually turns its adherents into mindless tools of those who have bad intentions. Anyone who has been involved in the society for a sufficiently long time knows that anthroposophy would lose all meaning the moment it took any action against the independent, prudent, and discerning will of its members. Anthroposophy truly cannot achieve its goals with mindless tools. For in order to truly come to it, the free will of those involved is precisely what is needed.