Introductions for Traditional Christmas Plays

GA 274 — 6 January 1918, Dornach

Introduction

On behalf of all those who are involved in the construction and the work on the building, and on behalf of all those who work in our Anthroposophical Society, I would like to warmly welcome you as our dear guests and express our great joy that you want to take a look at these unpretentious plays of ours – Christmas plays. I will take the liberty of saying a few words about these plays and will start by describing how we actually came up with these plays, the performance of which is somewhat loosely connected to our endeavors, but which, as you will see, are in fact properly integrated into our endeavors.

The plays that we will present to you come from the former German region of Upper Hungary, from western Upper Hungary, from Oberufer. They came to Oberufer through immigrants who migrated from more western areas to this eastern part of Central Europe, probably as early as the 16th century, or at least at the beginning of the 17th century. It is precisely because they were found in this German colony that they are particularly interesting; more interesting than similar other Christmas and Easter plays, of which there are many, especially now that they are performed here and there. The ones we are presenting were collected by my dear old friend, the late Karl Julius Schröer, in the 1850s and 1860s in Oberufer near Pressburg among the local farmers. That is to say, he learned from his residence in Pressburg that the so-called German Haidbauern, who had immigrated centuries ago, would perform certain plays in the manner that I will describe in a moment when the Christmas season approached. He then often participated in such plays. He liked them very much and was then able to write down what the individual farmers, who were fellow players, copied down as roles for such plays. And then he was able to put the pieces together.

Karl Julius Schröer's intention was to preserve the spiritual heritage that had been preserved in such regions from ancient times – for such things are indeed ancient times. Because the times when Karl Julius Schröer found these plays there were also the times when this old culture was already dying out, replaced by the newer form. And all those similar plays that are performed more in the west of Europe and that, if one has only a rough sense of them, can indeed remind one of the older Christmas plays, as we will hear and see them today, are less interesting because in the areas where they were performed, they were later changed from decade to decade and, one might say, increasingly modernized, so that they no longer have the genuine, exemplary form. On the other hand, we have preserved the genuine form of these plays in the 16th century in the plays of the farmers in the Zipser and other areas of Hungary, where German farmers settled and preserved German culture as a kind of cultural ferment. It was the case that these people continued to play these plays in the exact same way from decade to decade, and that is why they could still be found in the 19th century in the same form in which they had been introduced in the 16th century. That is why these plays, which we are trying to present to you in this weak attempt, are particularly interesting.

The institutions that Karl Julius Schröer found at the time were that some family in the village of Oberufer – Oberufer is on an island off the island of Schütt, which is formed by the Danube just below Bratislava and is from Bratislava, so that it can be reached by cab in just half an hour. In this village of Oberufer, which was a rich farming village in those days, a respectable farming family would generally own these plays. And when the harvest work was over in the fall, the farmer would gather the people, older and younger boys from the village, who were to play. Women were not allowed to play, I must explicitly note that, which of course must be different for easily understandable reasons in our performance today. The older and younger boys who were to play had to learn their roles in October and November until Advent. That these plays were performed with great seriousness, but without any sentimentality, can be seen in particular from the following. It was by no means a matter of playing a mere comedy, but those boys who were to play had to fulfill conditions that were perhaps not so easy for some of them. They had to commit themselves to leading a completely honorable life during the weeks in which they had to prepare for the plays; not to sing any rogue songs during that time, and so on. Furthermore, during all this time, they had to follow the instructions given to them by the master of the play to the letter. Under these conditions, the roles were then assigned and learned. The roles of Mary and Eve were also always performed by a younger boy.

When Christmas time approached, when everyone had learned everything, it was arranged that the angel, whom you will also see here, who led the whole group with a star, dressed up and that the procession of players set off from the teacher's house. The angel was already dressed, but the other actors had not yet dressed at the teacher's house; the actors then carried a large, as it was said, Kranawittbaum, which is a juniper tree that served as a Christmas tree. So they went, singing all kinds of Christmas carols, from the master's house to the inn, where the things were to be performed.

While they were parading with their big tree, the devil, who had also already dressed and whom you will also get to know in the plays, was meanwhile busy doing all sorts of stupid things. He ran through the whole village with a cow horn, through which he blew terribly, and shouted into all the windows that people had to come to the play. When a wagon passed by, the devil jumped up on the wagon and shouted and tooted from above down, and so on. Then this procession moved little by little towards the inn. There it was arranged that the guests were seated on a number of chairs arranged in horseshoe rows. In the middle was the playground, the stage. And then these plays were performed, which we will see and hear here. Usually the shepherds' play was performed first, which you will see here as the second play. In reality, it was performed first in Oberufer; we are performing it second here. Then came the Paradeis play, which we are performing first. And then came a carnival play, which we have not been able to perform so far because we have not learned it yet, but we may perform it again. Just as in ancient Greece, a so-called satyr play, a comic play, followed the serious performances, a carnival play followed there as well. It is interesting that those people who performed the holy characters had a certain prestige from playing Mary and Joseph and the others, and that they were not allowed to play in the carnival play. So the matter was already held sacred. The plays were very well received by the farmers of Oberufer at the time. Only: the entire intelligentsia – as is sometimes the case with such things – was hostile to the performance of these plays. This intelligentsia believed that there was nothing cultured about the plays. So the whole intelligentsia was against it. It was only good for the village that this whole “intelligentsia” consisted only of the schoolmaster, the notary and the municipal council official. But they were all gathered in a single person. So this intelligentsia was indeed unanimous, but it consisted of only one person.

These plays were performed. They are basically the real continuation of the way such things have been performed throughout Europe for centuries, but which had been lost by then. We can prove that as early as the 12th century an Adam and Eve play was performed throughout Europe. At the Council of Constance in 1417, such a Christmas play was performed before the emperor in Constance. At one point in the play, you will see that when the Rhine is mentioned, it is clear that the plays really come from a more western region and were introduced in Hungary. In Hungary, the farmers kept the plays pure and true. As a result, I would say that the plays bear their origin on their foreheads, from centuries past to the present. Some things have changed a bit over time since the 16th century. For example, the three shepherds that you will see already exist in the oldest play, but the three innkeepers in the play, as it is no longer performed in Oberufer, were not three innkeepers, but rather an innkeeper, his wife, the innkeeper's wife, and a maid.

Now you will see two of our innkeepers here, who are quite cruel and reject Mary and Joseph; the third will then be kind. In the very first play, it was the innkeeper who did not accept Joseph and Mary but threw them out; the innkeeper's wife also did not accept them; only the maid showed Joseph and Mary the stable. For example, when things started in Oberufer, they didn't have the necessary material; of course, you always had to have very young boys to play the roles of Mary or the landlady. Often there weren't enough of them, and the roles had to be taken on by older boys. That's obviously where the innkeeper, landlady, and maid were transformed into one innkeeper and two more innkeepers. These plays have undergone many transformations over the centuries. The spectators, who were then to come to the plays – they were always performed on Wednesdays and Sundays between three and five o'clock in the afternoon – had to pay two kreutzers, or four rappen; children paid half. And the performances were, as I said, understood without sentimentality, but with a certain real moral seriousness. This can be seen from the fact – as Schröer himself once experienced, for example – that the actors once refused to play in a village – they then went around the neighborhood to perform the plays there – where they were met by a gang of musicians. They said: “Do you perhaps think that we are comedians? We won't put up with that!” – And they didn't perform the plays. They wanted the matter treated as a very serious one.

And when the plays had made their impression on the people, then it can be said that in these areas the memory of what these plays had to say as a simple, unadorned retelling of the biblical stories really did endure for a very, very long time and was very beautiful. It was truly a celebration of Christmas for these villages, which had an extremely significant moral and social influence, deeply affecting the minds of the people.

Karl Julius Schröer collected these plays; they have now been printed. But it is very significant that Schröer no longer found the manuscripts, which were rewritten, with the German people, but with a farmer named Malatitsch, that is, with a Slavic farmer. In more recent times, what the entire configuration of the Austrian state had actually brought about over the centuries had flooded in. The heads of state of Hungary and Austria themselves had always issued calls because they needed the influence of Western German culture. As a result, farmers moved there, and these colonies, these German colonies, emerged in the Spiš and Banat regions. These people also moved to other areas, to the Bohemian areas, to Transylvania. They formed a cultural impact everywhere, which is inside the other, but in more recent times it has been flooded by what has passed over it. Schröer is one of those people who studied German folklore in the Austro-Hungarian areas. Decades ago, I got to know in his company how he followed the traces of this old culture in the middle of Austria, and it is a very significant memory for me, what I was able to learn at his side about this culture and its development back then. Schröer not only collected these Christmas plays, but he also compiled grammars and dictionaries from the dialects and accents of the various regions of Austria, in western Hungary, in the Gottschee region, in Transylvania, and in the so-called Heanzen area. This man was one of the last people in the world to compile all of this material from living history. He did so with love, and it was love that preserved these pieces, which we are trying to reproduce here.

So, dear attendees, we have come to these pieces and incorporated them into our work here at the Goetheanum, because we are striving to truly cultivate everything that emerges in the spiritual life of humanity. What is usually said about us is mostly nonsense. What we are really doing here is based on an interest in everything that lives spiritually in humanity. These plays have really emerged from a general human interest. When they were performed, Catholics and Protestants sat together in the audience, because that is who was in the area at the time. And among the actors there were both Catholics and Protestants. From this you can see that everything that was alive in these plays had a moral and religious thread, but nothing that was somehow denominational. This is what should be particularly emphasized.

Now I will explain a few more expressions from the Paradeis play, that is, the expulsion of Adam and Eve from Paradise, and from the Shepherds play, so that they are not incomprehensible. The star-scissors are the device with which one can push the star far away from oneself and then bring it close again. And these star-scissors are carried by the leader of the whole, with the star. Here we have arranged things so that, in addition to the bearer of the star, the angel also carries a star, but the star-scissors are what can be used to push the star back and forth.

A scream, as you will hear it here in the play, is the same as a rumor. That which is told about someone. All sorts of things are told. A scream, a gossip has arisen. Then you hear the expression gespirrt = closed, locked.

Then in the shepherd's play, when the innkeeper wants to boast:

I åls a wirt von meiner gstålt,
Håb in mein haus und loplaynt gwålt —

does not mean, as one might easily believe, that he means that the innkeeper has a particularly beautiful stature and therefore has special power in his house. Rather, it means: an innkeeper of my reputation, of my standing, an innkeeper who is as well-positioned as I am, has power in his house, that is, to allow people to move into his house.

Then one of the shepherds says to the other that he has lent his gloves to him again and again, that is, repeatedly. Then you will hear the word: Es hat sich etwas verkehrt. That means in those areas, something has happened, something has occurred, something has taken place. Then spiegelkartenhal. That means there was black ice, so you can easily fall over. The forest birds are singing. That means the birds are already chirping. The coachman cracks his whip.

Then I would like to draw your attention to the beginning of the play, where God speaks to Adam, whom he made out of clay, out of earth, which apparently does not rhyme, but in the local dialect it is:

Adam, take the living breath = clay.

You don't have to imagine Rieben, as if it were badly pronounced, but that's what the farmer says instead of ribs. Rieben. So Eve is not made from a turnip, but from a rib = Rieben, and it rhymes correctly with love.

She is made from your ribs at the same time,
so you must love her a little.

Råtzen is something you talk about. The devil has a råtzen, that is, he takes pleasure in something. Frozzelei, that is: to make a fool of, to lead around by the nose. This is also an expression that the devil will use. — Loplaynt. The farmer usually says it when he speaks of his inn or his house; he pronounces it in a very educated way, at least he thinks he does: in my loplaynt — so that one does not notice that he is using a foreign expression. Then:

Had Adam and Eve eaten Kletzen.

Kletzen are dried pears and plums that people prepare, especially at Christmas.

These are some things that I wanted to mention in advance so that the expressions are not left unintelligible. Otherwise, I would just like to say that, of course, the plays must speak for themselves by expressing in a simple and unadorned way what people could take from the stories of the Old and New Testaments, what should pass into their minds and hearts.

I ask you to receive them as they are meant. The plays should be accepted without pretension. Of course, we cannot reproduce them exactly in the same form as the farmers performed them; but as far as we can, we should try. Our friend, Mr. Leopold van der Pals, has once again tried to renew the music. You will find it as an accompanying piece. There will be a short break between the plays. In between, we will play some Christmas music by Corelli and an Adagio from the first Bach sonata. I have taken the liberty of saying the most important thing about the Christmas plays at the beginning.