Current Social and Economic Issues

GA 332b — 21 June 1919, Stuttgart

Address at the Deliberations for the Founding of a Cultural Council

Protocol Record Stuttgart

[Carl Unger welcomes the participants. Emil Leinhas then reads the revised text of the appeal. Wilhelm von Blume talks about the difficulties involved in propaganda and the practical implementation of the independence of intellectual life. He is against the distribution of a third version of the appeal, as it would be ineffective. The new text should be used as an explanatory pamphlet.]

Rudolf Steiner: It seems to me, ladies and gentlemen, that if the questions raised at this conference are to be fruitfully discussed, it is necessary to consider the starting point very carefully. When discussing the future realization of independence in intellectual life, I noticed that certain misunderstandings can easily arise in this regard. The day before yesterday, I explained my views on this subject to younger teachers here in this place and saw that the misunderstanding arises when it is claimed that the relationship between the state and school, as it has been practiced until now, should be thoroughly criticized and dismissed, and as if it should be asserted that this relationship between school and state has only produced something fundamentally evil, and that something new must take its place. This is actually how what is meant by the threefold social order in this particular case cannot be grasped. Today, it is not so much a matter of focusing on how the school has got along with the state so far, but rather, it is above all a matter of us really showing ourselves capable of adapting to the great moment of world-historical development today. The idea of the threefold social order can only be grasped by realizing that we are in a time in which, firstly, many things are changing of their own accord and, secondly, new formations must necessarily arise. The question cannot be: Do we or do we not like this or that about the school or the state today? but certain things are happening, want to happen, want to be realized, and we have to seize the world-historical moment. And it is precisely by propagating this threefold social organism that those who profess the idea of threefold social order believe they can grasp this world-historical moment.

Now I do not want to go into economic life in any further detail – I have already done so on numerous occasions – but I would like to focus specifically on what is happening in relation to intellectual life in general and to the school system in particular. It is not news that economic life is being placed on a new footing, that economic life is heading towards a certain socialization. This is not something that can be decided or not decided today; it is already happening of its own accord. We only have to ask ourselves the question: how do we shape what wants to be shaped in the most reasonable way? In such a way that in the future, state life democratizes itself, must democratize itself down to the last detail; that too happens by itself; one only has to consider how to do it most reasonably.

Now comes intellectual life. I do not consider this to be something that runs alongside the current task, but rather, I consider it to be the most important thing of all. For the school system may have been good or bad – we are not concerned with criticism today – but if we have a community that is economically socialized and legally democratized, then we need a different education for the people who want to live within democracy and within the social economic order. So, it is not a matter of asking: How do we get the school away from the present state? but rather: How do we educate people through school who can grow into a new social order that more or less arises by itself? It is of little importance to us whether school thrived under the old state or not, because this old state will simply transition into the new one, and we have to consider how to shape school for the new state.

It will not leave us much time for reflection. There are things that demand that we act quickly, that we rise to the challenges posed by human development itself. And one can often tell from the socialist program what needs to be done. You see, there are socialist economic programs, and there are socialist political programs; both have a number of things to be criticized. But from the same side from which socialist economic and political programs come, also come socialist school and pedagogical programs. People demand that this or that be realized in the pedagogical-didactic field. And anyone who is truly serious about the development of humanity, who has a heart and mind for what should and must happen, will find the pedagogical didactics that emerge from this socialist program to be something terribly horrific. One cannot imagine anything worse than what is depicted in this socialist pedagogical and didactic program coming upon humanity. It demands, for example, that socialization and democracy be forced as deeply as possible into the school. The children are to be socialized and democratized from an early age. The directorates are to be abolished. The teacher is to be forced into a school community with the children in a comradely way, based on democratic and socialist principles. Yes, my dear friends, if you educate in this way for what wants to emerge as the most radical democracy and socialism, then you will not get people into this democracy and socialism, but you will get beings with the most terrible, most elementary instincts, who will truly develop little socialism and little democracy.

That is why we must first make it clear to ourselves: when, on the one hand, socialization and democratization take place, that we then have all the more need to get people used to it at school – as I explained the day before yesterday – firstly, to a dignified imitation of what the child always wants to imitate after the parents in the first years of development , and that we have to accustom the child, above all from the age of seven to fourteen, which is precisely the school years, above all to a sense of authority – to an absolute sense of authority that is cultivated much, much more and much more energetically than it has been cultivated so far. We must not banish the belief in authority from school if we want to socialize and democratize. From the age of six or seven until the age of fourteen or fifteen, we have to get the child to look up to the teacher as if he were a “demigod” or, I would say, so that through the feelings that they develop within themselves during this time, what must be a state in democracy and socialism becomes strong in the soul, if all is not to fall apart into bestiality.

Therefore, we must develop these things all the more through a very thorough immersion in the very, very earliest impulses of human nature, if we want to somehow lead people into the so-called state of the future - and we do want that. So, my dear friends, what must be considered for spiritual life when we speak of the threefold social organism is based on the development of the times. Of course, those who today only want to turn their attention to economic life could not truly consider this; it is precisely those who have already stood on the ground of didactics, of pedagogy, who already have experience in it, who should consider this. It is only right that we talk about things based on the foundations of experience. It hurts so much today: when you come to proletarian assemblies, the proletarians speak their language, and when you talk to the bourgeoisie about the proletarians, you realize that they have no idea what has been going on in proletarian circles in recent decades. The people from different classes do not understand each other at all. And so it is now really a matter of our finally learning to talk in a way that is appropriate, not just in terms of our station and class – then people will understand each other. That is what I ask you to consider; then we will also come to a proper assessment of these three demands.

You see, I have now disregarded the first years of childhood, which are part of the education in the home, because I wanted to address the first stage of primary school. Yes, I think that in the future it is necessary that between the sixth or seventh year and the fourteenth or fifteenth year, education is built entirely on a truly more intimate and better psychological anthropology than we have done so far in our pedagogy. This must become something that really takes place between the teacher, who has his authority, and the child, who allows himself to be guided by this authority, and receives everything he receives in such a way that the source of truth passes through another human soul, so that he learns to have trust by looking up to the other person. And the teacher, in turn, must take into account from year to year the way in which the young person develops between the sixth, seventh and fourteenth, fifteenth years. We have to teach the school subjects in such a way that we take into account how the child's development is internally determined. We have to, so to speak, see the possibility – yes, don't misunderstand me, I mean, we sometimes have expressions that don't quite cover the matter, but we can communicate – we have to be aware of the possibility of seeing a religious act in teaching. We actually have to come to terms with the fact that we are gradually educating the child to free the mysterious spirit and soul from the physical body. This sense of devotion, freeing the spirit and soul from the physical, is what really needs to take hold. And here I think it is really a matter of not thinking that it should only be built piece by piece. I have full enthusiasm for the school that is to be founded here as a Waldorf school, so that we can once give an example of how we imagine anthropological education, through which the human being is truly made human.

But all this remains a mere surrogate. And the point is that everything that is conceived as the threefold social organism is really not so, that one can say: This must be realized slowly and gradually, these are far-reaching developmental ideals, but that one can actually do it right away, if one really wants to. All the explanations that I have given in the book 'The Core of the Social Question' are actually based on the fact that they can be immediately implemented in reality. My main concern is that once we have fully realized what independence of intellectual life means in relation to the tripartite social organism, we can replace everything that is state-run in schools today with objective pedagogy in schools. Why should this not be possible? It is something that only requires a decision and the courage to implement it. External conditions will not improve, but the foundations will be laid for such improvement. We should start at the top.

It would start with placing the administration of the school system on its own feet, on its own ground, that is, wanting the university or college as an autonomous body, and that within the autonomous university, those teachers who sit in the ministry and who are not bureaucrats, but who are themselves part of the living spiritual life, are not concerned with laws that are made in parliaments, but with human advice that goes from person to person, that they are concerned with what has to happen in the school system, they are to be placed on their own two feet, on their own legs, on their own ground, that they are to have their own university or college as an autonomous body, and that within the autonomous university, those teachers who are not bureaucrats but who Thus, a real, human detachment of the school system from the state system. If the question of how schools are paid for cannot be resolved today, transitional arrangements can be created in this regard. If the people who have to teach have no confidence that the nourishing goddess or cow, I don't know what, will come from the economic life, then let the state pay for the school for the time being. What matters is not that much, but that what is spiritual in the spiritual life really becomes independent, that the whole spirit of the pedagogical-didactic also passes through the administration and the structure of the spiritual organism. If one only attacks this, I would say, initially on one point and then works in this direction, then I would say, I have nothing against the “gradually”. But just don't think that it somehow depends on the fact that it is difficult. It is not difficult at all; once you have thoroughly grasped the idea, you will come to it. I once expressed it in the following way.

There is a contemporary philosopher. I value his acumen very highly – I distinguish between acumen and genius, as well as between depth of mind and expertise. So there is an astute man who wrote a book in the 1980s called “The Whole of Philosophy and its End”. In this book, he seeks to prove that, as a result of our scientific way of thinking, which has taken hold of everything, we have come to the point where all philosophical worldviews must cease, and the things that philosophy has done so far must be handed over to politics, science, jurisprudence and also state pedagogy. This is something very significant. This man has thought through to its logical conclusion what actually lies in the habits of thought. He has therefore come to the right conclusion: if we continue to muddle through – and he is in favor of our continuing to muddle through – he is enthusiastic about the dissolution of all philosophical thinking. He proves this very astutely and has therefore also become a professor of philosophy at a university. He talks about state pedagogy. For those who understand how to see the issue as a symptom, this also means a great deal. It means that there is no longer any kind of autonomous pedagogy, that there is nothing that takes the human being as such into account. Rather, the state has become something over the centuries; it demands this and that preparation of the human being for what it has become; the human being who is within the state must look a certain way. Now, if you are a teacher, you have to study: well, so the human being must look like this, we have to turn people into this, so that they look like this. - This is something that must be overcome. And if we want to face up to the historical moment, then we must overcome this. It is not the spiritual life that should receive its directive from the state, but the state that should receive its directive from the spiritual life. The trainee lawyer and the assessor - I am already of the opinion - take it as grotesque, but this opinion will not be long in coming: it is for the university to determine what a trainee lawyer and an assessor should look like in the world, and not the state. It is not the state's place to make laws about how this or that should be, but intellectual life should be the guiding force. It should tell the state: if you are a proper state, your assessor and your trainee lawyer should look a certain way. So, I think to myself: a truly inner autonomy of the whole intellectual life, that is what is most important.

I also think of the authorization system in this way. Isn't it true that anyone who has studied this authorization system in recent times – I don't even want to go into aptitude tests so much – will have seen that time and again, authorizations that arise from the matter itself have been transformed into state examination systems. The state has set its state examinations in place of the earlier diploma examinations at universities and

colleges. This was a move of the times; in many respects it was a justified move of the times, but it must be reversed again, not in the bad sense; we do not want to fall back into the Middle Ages, but we must come to a point where intellectual life is completely autonomous and , because if we are to enter into the material world as much as socialism wants, then we can only do so if we have a strong counterweight, if we have a very strong spiritual life.

Look, let's take things as they are. There's no denying that social democracy, as it has developed over the course of half a century, thinks in a more or less Marxist way. And anyone who does not adhere to Marxism today – that is, to the Marx whom today's party popes consider the real Pope – is considered worthless within the social-democratic party. This is how social democracy has developed over the last half-century. Through so-called revisionism, attempts have been made to blunt all sorts of things, but now they are being emphasized more and more sharply again. But there are also those who draw the ultimate consequences of Marxism. There is no denying it: who drew the ultimate, real conclusion of Marxism, first in theory and then tried to implement it in practice? That is Lenin – Lenin, who actually considers the Scheidemanns or Bindemänner, the Kautskys and whatever their names are – it is said of him – the German socialists, all of them to be scoundrels, Lenin, who with great logical acumen draws the final consequences of Marxism in all areas.

The realization of this is today's Bolshevik Russia. There is an inner necessity in this: Marxism leads to this and, when it is put on its own feet, can lead to nothing else. Now Lenin had written a book, “Revolution and State”. In it, Lenin says: the old state is bad, bad in every respect; there is nothing to be done, absolutely nothing to be done with the state. The state must be overcome, only we cannot overcome it immediately. - So he says: so we will just make a state in which the proletarian dictatorship will rule. We will set that up; there should be equal rights and equal pay for all. That is already the case in Russia today, where sometimes one person is paid six times as much as another. There are people who earn 200,000 rubles as intellectual workers, but still: equal pay and equal rights for all! In reality, things sometimes turn out quite differently, but then people like Lenin – who is very astute, who has really drawn the final consequences of Marxism – says: Let's continue with the old state a little longer, let's continue with the structures that we see in the old state. But if we do it this way, this state, this new state, has a certain task. Lenin actually defined this very strictly and logically in 'The State and Revolution'. He says: This state, which he has now established, has the task of gradually leading itself to its own death. The state has no other task than to lead itself to its own death. That is actually Lenin's definition of the state he established. Because first, he says, and by the way, he starts with things that can be found in Marx himself, because he says: So the present state, in which it is not particularly comfortable - it has not turned out as we wanted it to - the state will revolutionize itself to death, and only then will the new come, where everyone will be treated according to their ability and need.

But now Lenin adds, and I ask you to consider this as decisive: what then emerges from the state that has now killed itself cannot be done with today's people, but for that we need a new kind of people. In other words, we need to look to the future state, for which we first need a new kind of human being. Yes, my esteemed audience, the threefold social organism wants to prevent this world-historical madness, which is extraordinarily logical and methodical, from realizing what can be realized, what can be based on real ground. But above all, one must not be a supporter of the madness, of the idea that, even after everything has committed suicide, in some way or other – yes, I don't know how – the new human race will come into being. But if one does not subscribe to this idea, then one needs a heart and mind for the growing human being. Then one must understand that one needs a reorganization of the spiritual life, then one must above all have a heart and mind for the training of the spiritual life, for the development of an appropriate spiritual life. Then these insane thoughts that a new human race must first be created will disappear from people's minds, and one will take the courage to make people suitable for what they are to develop in democracy and socialism. This is a real thought, that is at issue here. But things are not so – truly not! – that one can prepare to discuss things leisurely and calmly over the next three years. The issues are too urgent and pressing; things must happen. What matters is that we have the good will to grasp things quickly and to do what can really be done. To do this, however, one must have heart and mind for these things, and realize that today's human race does not need to be wiped out for something to happen in the Lenin sense, but that the whole of today's human race is good.

But people need to be educated. Let us look at the present and say to ourselves: the people who are now to grow into what wants to be realized in history must be educated differently. It is now time to tackle the questions on a large scale. That is why I have often said: Above all, the real idea of threefolding must be understood. In relation to intellectual life, this consists of truly placing it on its own ground. For this, nothing is needed but the abolition of the usual school supervision, which is exercised by officials in such a semi-official capacity, as it is called in the new Württemberg constitution, where a contradiction that exists in life is immediately expressed by such a stylization: “officials who work on a semi-official basis”. One can fish where in reality that occurs which should not occur, but the point is to really grasp that only people of intellectual life come into the school, since the minds of people should not be filled with the spirit that speaks out of decrees. What more is needed than for the state to declare: You spiritual life, you shall govern yourselves; we are abolishing the Ministry of Culture and Education and giving spiritual life itself the opportunity to govern itself. I cannot see why it should be better for state officials to govern things than for people who are part of the spiritual life. This is something that can really happen overnight if only there is the strong will to do so. That is what I mean, and what I meant is that today it really depends on winning the masses over to the idea of the times in another area, that today it also depends on having as many people as possible who can understand that spiritual life must be placed on its own ground and who work together in their own way to make this happen.

You can see how we started our work here, initially in the economic sphere. Within three weeks, thousands upon thousands of proletarians from all walks of life had understood what was meant by the threefold social order. They understood it in their own way, of course, but there is nothing wrong with an emotional, intuitive understanding among the masses. On the contrary, it is something natural. Then the selfish leaders came along who thought: “Ah, Mr. Kohl, he speaks for Kohl, he won't make any impression on the people, he has no authority.” Then they saw that Kohl won over thousands of people. Then they became afraid that the reins would be wrested from their hands, and now we are faced with the possibility that the broad proletarian masses, who were already on the path to reason, will swing back because they cannot be disloyal to their leaders, because they are wedded to them. And now the party templates and party slogans want to triumph over reason once again. If you ask: Does it have to be that way? the answer is: the masses are, after all, just voting cattle. But the masses could also be something other than voting cattle, something that really comes from a rational organization of reality. You see, what was striven for there should be striven for to a greater extent in our own time, which can be said to bring terror every week. It should be striven for in the life of the spirit, it should be striven for by the spirit life, which has become independent, that education should be organized in such a way that the human being comes into his own, so that he can also stand in democracy and socialism. But people are so afraid when they see how little feeling there is for what is pulsating through human development today, they are so afraid that what I have so often said at the end of my lectures: What has to happen should actually be understood before it becomes too late. One fears so much that it could become too late; I really fear that if one says: We cannot simply destroy our state – then I fear it.

Ladies and gentlemen, we do not want to destroy it either, because after all, if we were to decide by tomorrow to leave the school system to its own devices until tomorrow, I believe that things would hardly look much different. You would only be making a start on what would gradually make intellectual life more intense. It would not be a matter of destruction at all; it would not look any different in the schools in the next few weeks; but rather so that not people rule over the school who rule from the bureaucracy, but rather those from education. If you didn't look too closely, you wouldn't notice any particular difference when the most important thing happened. And a revolutionary who was expecting that when the revolution came, no stone would be left unturned, would perhaps say: Nice revolution! It doesn't look any different than it did a fortnight ago!

So it can't be about destruction. But it is a different matter if you are too afraid of destruction, because then it could be that we avoid destruction, but that other, elemental forces, which are spreading through Europe with enormous power today, could take care of this destruction quite thoroughly. Therefore, I believe that we do not have the choice to rely too much on slowness, but we must take action. We must actually see what is at stake, and it is important that this threefold structure emerges from the reorganization.

After a lecture, a man once said to me: So the state is to be divided into three parts; whether the Entente quarters us or Dr. Steiner thirds us is completely irrelevant. But that is not the point at all. It is something quite different. For example, there is a man who always follows the lectures I give like a loyal Eckart (I don't know if he is here again today) and who usually says something very apt after the lectures. After some have objected to this and others to that, he says: “But children, just take what has been said quite simply; you just have to take it quite simply as it really is.” He is truly a faithful follower of Eckart, who always follows from lecture to lecture and at the end uses the apt words: “Just take things as they are!” What one sees in this threefold structure is simpler than one might think, and what one considers difficult is often only a difficulty that has been introduced. What I am about to say now, I say so that I am not misunderstood, so that people do not think that I want to belittle the state, the existing state, or that I believe that if the existing state remains, schools will change much. No, I don't think so, but we should recognize that we are in a great moment in world history, that we are grasping what can be grasped with regard to the liberation of intellectual life and especially to the reorganization of the school and teaching system in this moment in world history. We can talk about the rest later.

[The discussion is about the text of the appeal. At the request of Emil Molt, a commission will be appointed to prepare the final version. However, the debate will continue. One participant, Karl Bittel, criticizes Rudolf Steiner's account of the situation in Russia.

Rudolf Steiner, interjection: I did not speak about Russia, I spoke about Lenin's book 'The State and Revolution' and [about] what is directly related to it. This is not a derogatory criticism, it is meant quite objectively.

[Karl Bittel mentions the Württemberg 'Council of Intellectual Workers' towards the end of his remarks.]

Concluding words of Rudolf Steiner: Dr. Bittel has indeed misunderstood many things thoroughly. I myself, however, do not wish to be misunderstood, but would like to make it clear from the outset that I am firmly of the opinion that such objections as those made by Dr. Bittel must be accepted with all gratitude, even if they miss the point in such a way that we actually lose sight of the matter at hand. For example, what was most emphasized in my remarks was completely overlooked, namely that teaching should be based on a healthy psychological anthropology, and that we cannot have any hope that anything will come of an education system precisely because we do not have such a healthy anthropology. I did not make a demand – anyone who has heard me speak often should know that I am not a programmatic person and do not make demands out of the blue – but I simply characterized what must be the case according to the natural laws of human development. I said: If we want to prepare people to really grow into democracy and socialism, then it is simply necessary from the point of view of human nature that between the change of teeth, that is, between the ages of 6, 7 and 14 , 15 years of age, feelings of authority develop in the human being, so that he then has the inner strength that enables him to stand within a democratic state later on, in order to allow democracy and socialism to be expressed in the fullest sense. This view of the matter is conceived from the point of view of a truly real psychology. I ask you to understand this as the difference between what is happening here on the basis of the threefold social order and other programs that are based on demands. Everything that arises in this idea of threefold social order should simply be based on reality.

Another misunderstanding is the following. We would not continually run into dead ends and impossibilities in the whole discussion if we did not counter what is wanted here with all kinds of other program points. Please look at it this way: One may have many concerns about such programs as those of the youth organization, for and against – I do not want to get involved in that. I myself find this program, which has been read here, to be too senile; I do not feel old enough to take this path. But what really has inner youthful power is what I miss in today's youth movements: that they are already so old and cannot relate to the ground of a real youth. I once said to a younger representative who appeared with great emphasis in Bern, I think, “You are 35 years old, I will soon be 60, but from what you have said, I feel much younger than you are.” It depends on whether you can take things as they are meant. The pros and cons should not be considered at all.

The matter itself should simply be discussed – and I would be very happy if I could attend discussions on these questions for days rather than just hours. They are just not on the agenda today because we can only hold fruitful discussions when a real basis for them has been created. Only when the spiritual life is liberated do we have any prospect of penetrating these things and preparing the ground for them. Whether one is more for or against: the idea of threefolding creates a healthy foundation for all these movements, on which they can develop. I can honestly confess to you that I would be overjoyed if not only those movements that I tend to sympathize with would come to life on the basis of the new spiritual life, but also the opposing ones would live freely, because it is not important to me to implement any particular worldview, but to create a basis of freedom in which the individual spiritual impulses can compete. Then, on the basis of this free intellectual life, whatever is able to assert itself will come to pass.

So I ask not to misunderstand the matter of authority. It is meant to be perceived by the student as something selfless above all else. The fact that authority does not exist today is evidenced, on the one hand, by the beer newspaper and, on the other, by the pursuit of the school community. If authority really existed as I imagine it, we would have had school communities long ago. The fact that we have to strive for it today and don't even know where we have to get the teachers from to achieve a reorganization of the school is all the more proof that we long for the liberation of education. It is not enough to say: Those who want something must profess a spiritual revolution, must profess this call and so on. My dear audience, we will get nowhere by constantly emphasizing “radical revolution, revolution, revolution!” I am aware that if what is meant here is realized, namely a free spiritual life, then this is a much more radical revolution than what the gentlemen mean who only ever use the word “revolution” in the sense that the previous speaker used it. Just wait and see how radically different this will be from the liberation of intellectual life as envisaged by the Federation for Threefolding, and what will come out of a free intellectual life. I also agree entirely with what the previous speaker said about the press. But it is only possible to intervene there if we have a free spiritual life. I can see no hope in intervention on a legitimate basis or through some kind of press court. It seems obvious to me that history teaching will not look the same as it has always done.

Then there is the question of adult education. Yes, of course I am very much in favor of it, but we have no science and no art for this adult education. Above all, we need what grows out of a free spiritual life. The popularization of class science and class art that today's universities are tapping into does not produce adult education. For a folk high school, we first need a free intellectual life. I have emphasized this before: I know the difference between what is true, real intellectual property and what is taught by professors today as the thoughts of the folk high schools. Because, you see, I felt this dichotomy when I was a teacher at the Workers' Education School founded by Wilhelm Liebknecht. Few could speak to my students, who were all socialists, in the same way – I could speak in such a way that what I said to them was drawn from the universal human: everyone understood and everyone was included. But when I had to follow the customs and beliefs that prevail, so that I had to look at what was hung in the museums of class art – people often made requests to do so – then I had my anxieties, because there was class art, not what I tried to give to the people from the heart, but what the proletarian could not understand because he was not on the same level – so when you explained things to the people, you had to speak a different language. And I was always glad when I could say: This is what must be replaced by something else if something is to emerge that can actually be the art of the future or the like. Because then you can go right to the heart of the artistic feeling and see how impossible it is to get to the real folk art. Just consider how today's artist has grown out of the bourgeois class; he will paint very beautiful landscapes, but anyone who has not grown out of that same class will never be able to understand them at all, because he cannot make the transition between the much more beautiful nature that the professor can see for himself every Sunday afternoon and what has been daubed on the ham, even if it has been done with great artistic skill.

It is much more radical when it comes to adult education and folk art, when we talk about what is meant by the aspiration of the tripartite social organism. It is about something that those who always talk about it, the “radical revolution”, have not yet even dreamt of. It is about something that goes to the very root of what has been creating the gulf between people for centuries, something that goes to the very core of spiritual life. And here it is really necessary to seek out what is meant by the idea of the threefold social organism before opposing other programs to these ideas, because truly – you can at least take it from me – I have become very familiar with these programs. And the idea of threefolding is not there because I have not become acquainted with these programs, but because I have become acquainted with them. The objections that are raised from these points of view have long since been raised by me; and because I have raised them myself, that is why the idea of threefolding exists. I am quite indifferent to the “programme” of threefolding; for me, the important thing is that today the spirit really comes into humanity, which from the spiritual side can see the great historical moment in the eye. Then, for my part, I leave it to others to understand this or that differently. What matters to me is that there are as many people as possible who carry this new spirit within them. Then those who can do something to help this great historical spirit get on its feet will also be able to promote this new spirit. That is why I am absolutely indifferent to the wording of one point or another – what matters to me is the spirit; the wording may be better or worse. And if we can achieve that as many people as possible are able to place themselves at the service of the spirit, then we will have achieved what I want.

Carl Unger: There are no further requests to speak; I therefore close the meeting.