For the Anthroposophical Society, 1922 was a year of great challenge. Rudolf Steiner responded to it by traveling & lecturing unceasingly – from the ‘East-West Congress’ in Vienna to his visits to England, & sometimes to huge crowds in Berlin, & Munich.  When Steiner came to Stuttgart, where the Christian Community Priests were working after their founding on 16 Sept., he meet with nearly 100 young people who wanted to carry the new Waldorf educational impulse into contemporary culture. The series of lectures given from 3-15 October 1922 came to be called The Youth Course or The Younger Generation.

Seeing what lived in the youth movement of the time, he endeavored to guide them toward an understanding of themselves within the aftermath of the World War, & in respect to the dawning the new Michael age. In these lectures Steiner shows the spiritual reality behind the generation gap in which the older & younger generations speak “entirely different soul languages.” He saw how young people longed to find spirit, in nature, warm community life, & thru a living wisdom in their teachers. They flatly rejected the dead intellectualism, impersonal social routine & rampant egotism in the older generation. Steiner explained that while their antipathetic opposition may at first generate the fires of enthusiasm, only the will for positive creation can provide the long term working strength that can bring real change & growth.

To become teachers, Steiner emphasized the need first for inner development – “self-education” – as the foundation to all other education.

The young listeners were called to develop an inner hearing to perceive the dawning of new Spirit powers. From their desire to become a new breed of educators, Steiner said that in order to bestow true nourishment, they must recognize that the growth of such spiritual food demands that the plough must first be turned inward & the seeds of Spirit sown within. Trusting that eventually, in good time, according to the rhythms of healthy development – with the power of the Sun & the Moon & Stars – a good harvest will ripen within them, which will yield living bread, not stones, in the relationship of human being to human being.

This universal Michaelic harvest provides a greater pathway of purpose, & the certainty of spirit-companionship transcending all generations.

As we have seen in the previous installments The Circle Jubilee – The Origins of the Circle & The Eternal Circle – in the midst of this lecture series Steiner met with the 12 founding members of what came to be called The Esoteric Youth Group or The Circle.

Here is the report from Ernst Lehrs about the Founding of The Circle on Monday 16 October 1922: “Because of Dr. Steiner’s early-scheduled departure for Dornach, the gathering took place at 7 am. We waited for him on the landing of the staircase outside the room to which we were called. He met us there with Frau Dr. Steiner & Dr. Ita Wegman, & asked with interested anticipation before entering the room, if we had participated in the Act of Consecration of Man the day before. We told him we had not, because of a difficulty that came from the one of the Priests. About this he stressed several times that he would not have had anything against our participating. “Come in. We want to discuss this right now. You must tell me what stood in your way”.

Thus, the meeting that was dedicated to the festive founding of The Group began with our report of what we experienced the evening before with the pronouncement that we felt was imposed on us. This was followed by Dr. Steiner’s presentation of his relationship to The Christian Community &, in comparison, his position in the Anthroposophical Movement. He made it clear that he had a thoroughly different opinion that held no conditions for participation in the ritual…

Then he went onto something else. We remember he took the opportunity to speak of H.P. Blavatsky, in connection with a description of the esoteric movement of recent years that proceeded Anthroposophy…

Next he explained some things about being in the world as members of our community or group. From now on, it will be for every human group in the outer world – thus, for instance, for students in a teacher training institute, at which one of us studies – of karmic significance that at one time a member of this Group was part of it. Also, effects would arise in the destiny between us & human beings who are connected with us physically or spiritually. These effects would be of a good or bad nature, according to whether we were good or bad in our affairs. Yet, he warned us that this is not so easy to judge. For that, we would need a capacity that one can better express as esoteric discernment.

He said in view of future growth: “Consider yourselves as the root of the Group. About the accepting of future members, he said only that we should not take anyone who is younger than 21, as they are minors legally, & you could have conflict with parents & because of that, with the law. The Group must at all costs, however, avoid any contact with public officials. Further, he advised us not to take, when possible, a married woman whose husband is not joining, or whom you might expect that he will not find a relationship with or access to The Group.

Dr. Steiner closed this part of the conversation when, with a noticeable change of his breathing, he said that he now wanted to give us a formulation of an oath. Through the reading of this oath in the presence of the others, the admittance into the community would be effected. Thus, we were first to accept one another mutually through each of us reading the oath aloud to the others. From then on, the oath should serve to expand the Group through our own responsibility. He asked that someone write down what he then dictated freely by speaking the oath word-for-word, as if bringing it out of the Spiritual world in the moment. All the while, he held his gaze meditatively before him. Then he paused briefly, laid his hands & arms quietly in front of him, & said with deep earnestness in a voice in which cosmic firmness & humble quiet appeared to be paired: “And now consider your community as having been founded by the Spiritual world itself”.     

At that he got up & we did also. He then came to each of us, stood quietly before each, took our right hand in both of his, & looked us briefly in the eyes with a gaze that cannot be described in words. Perhaps we may say, thinking of a term used later in one of his Rosicrucian lectures of January 1924, that his was a ‘star-gaze’. Here we were allowed to look into eyes from which no personal gaze proceeded, but rather through which starry worlds looked & rayed forth.

 Before he left he asked us to please report it to him should anyone decide in the end not to join the Group. This surprised us, because we all thought such a thing unimaginable. Later, looking back at emerging difficulties led us to understand his precaution. Nonetheless, it told us that in the future we should give those seeking admittance the opportunity for a last examination of their decision, after they have come to know what is involved with our Group…

How surprised we were when Dr. Steiner turned back to us as he was leaving & said warmly: “And now get to know one another well!” This gave us the idea to tell each other our biography that same evening at our mutual acceptance into the membership. This then became a permanent practice with admittance to membership.

During the rest of the time before his departure, Dr. Steiner allowed us to ask him any kind of questions of a more or less personal nature…

One question was about Dr. Steiner’s position in relation to both the School that was a kind of Esoteric Section that existed in the Society until 1914 & to what has been newly formed here. About this he said: “As I began teaching, I had to connect my work with the thread of the old tradition. What came thusly into being had to be broken off due to outer circumstances. What has taken place now is a first in the post-Christian age; human beings themselves chose, out of freedom before the Spiritual World, to join together esoterically.”

Here is added something that we understod only later. As at the end of World War 1, some of the older Esoteric School members asked Dr. Steiner about the possibility of taking up what had been interrupted by the war, he said that ‘the old could no longer be taken up; Though, it could come to ‘a new Esoteric form’ within the Society. However, that would depend first upon people coming to him out of freedom & asking for an esotericism in common with one another. He said such could only happen from those belonging to the younger generation.’

We then understood his so surprisingly positive demeanor as Rath spoke the question in the committee discussion before the first lecture of the course! (see Origins of The Circle)

As Rudolf Steiner finally left the room in order to travel to Dornach, with the car that was already waiting for him, he turned several times at the door & waved warmly with both hands.

Herbert Hahn added a few more details in his report: “Among other things, Rudolf Steiner spoke about being young & growing old. He said for instance: “It is unavoidable that you will one day get grey hair here & a wrinkle there as the physical body shall & must grow old. For every grey hair that appears & for every wrinkle that imprints itself, the soul can add a fresh, young ‘something’. Only then does aging proceed the way it is willed by the Spirit”.

In connection with this, he said that we should again & again enliven the impulse that led us to the founding of our community, so that it lives as it did on the first day.

He said: “You see, in the day to day world, the old adage. ‘New brooms sweep well’ holds true. It means that the bristles of the broom gradually wear, even though in the beginning they were ever so good. That must not be the case with you! Your ‘broom’ must receive new Bristles every day”. 

When mentioning how Rudolf Steiner gave the Youth Group an esoteric lesson during the re-founding of the Anthroposophical Society, Herbert Hahn considered the Founding of The Youth Circle to be “one of the Preparatory steps for the Christmas Conference of 1923. This community is given an inner obligation for carrying through the great impulse of the Christmas Conference.”

Dear friends – Thank you for your earnest interest in this initiative. It has been a potent experience to share these founding impulses with you. May we all take up the deed, in our own ways, during this powerful Centennial time, to enliven Anthroposophy.

~hag

Dear friends – a few young people have written in asking me to share more background around the ‘Wandervogel’ Youth Movement & how it was manifesting in the Anthroposophical Movement of Steiner’s day to bring forth “der Jugendkreis” (the Youth Circle) You can read about the Circle Jubilee here.

The best source is in “Esoteric Lessons Vol. 3 – 1913-1923, (CW 266/3) from the Collected Works of Rudolf Steiner” giving a moving account of the origins & development of the Esoteric Youth Group. Friends, I wholeheartedly recommend reading these recollections, notes & testimonies from the young people who were part of this revolutionary time. It seems especially important for those who are members of The Circle now to review this material, since as Lehrs related, Steiner gave the advice that members “should reflect again & again upon the foundational impulse of the Group”

I will highlight a few details to help bring some perspective of what was living in the souls of these young people 100 years ago; who may be seeking to work with us from the spiritual world today.

The catastrophe of the World War proved that the old societal conditions were decadent, no longer serving the striving human being. Young people especially yearned for a new social practice. In 1919 the Movement for the Threefold Social Organism arose out of Rudolf Steiner, which really called to these young people.  From this came many Anthroposophical Student Groups. In 1920 the Association for Anthroposophical Collage Studies was founded. This led to the East-West Congress in Vienna in June 1922, where a group of young people set up a meeting with Rudolf Steiner.

Steiner described the youth as Wondervogel = Migratory birds – “a movement arising internationally out of elemental forces”, to announce the end of the Kali Yuga, in a series of lectures called ‘Youth and the Etheric Heart’ given especially for the young people who were grappling with many hardships & questions of their destiny following the disaster of World War I.

The young people responded by getting together & writing ‘circulars’ which were popular at that time, to try to explain what was living in them. These reports were often read at various Anthroposophical General Meetings. One such circular by Otto Palmer, Jr. spoke about the origins of the Youth Movement: “…we must see it above all as a protest that came to life in the youth against the old branch life that has up until now been customary in the Anthroposophical Society. Indeed, there actually does live in the youth something that feels the need to have Anthroposophy not be just something we do on Sunday afternoons (not like wearing it as jewelry or decoration on Sunday), but rather to bring everything that is given in Anthroposophy into life and to make it into practice…instead of a lecturer speaking from a podium, with the audience just listening, now people have joined together who want to work together on a theme…”

Another circular by Ehrenfried Pfeiffer said: “…If we ourselves add ability to our willing, then the fight against the old thinking can be taken up everywhere…”

After Steiner gave the lectures called: Mystics after Modernism to the Berlin Youth Group, Ernst Lehrs, Wilhelm Rath, Karin & Wilhelm Selling, & Kurt Walther, became inspired by the “Friend of God from Oberland” & his ‘circle of 12 Friends of God’. This enkindled in them & others the ideal of building a similar circle of Anthroposophical youth to meet the modern age. They hoped to create this ideal thru the newly formed “Bund fur freies Geistesleben (Association for Independent Spiritual Life)

Rath wrote to Lehrs: “…The request is that, since we want for all the future to come to an intensive, living working-together, that Rudolf Steiner give us the possibility of uniting meditatively at a specific time in rhythmic sequence – even though we are separated in space – by giving us a unifying meditation into which we can immerse ourselves in the morning or evening. This idea seems important to me.”

Other young people were more concerned with asking Steiner about practical career advice. So, as Rath wrote in his book “Mein Weg zum Kreis” (My way to the circle): “…the result was a long wrestling with the formation of the question to be put to Dr. Steiner”.

Over 80 young people, from the ages of 18-25, & about 20 older folks came to Stuttgart for the Youth Course, 3-5 October 1922, in what came to be called “Becoming the Archangel Michael’s Companion”. Steiner understood that the young people saw “fixed programs as something for which the time is past”, so Herr Doctor suggested they meet together to discuss what they wanted the 1^st lecture to be about, & then they could go from there. The Official local Society reps were offended that they weren’t included, although Steiner did invite the Vorstand & the college of teachers from the Waldorf School.

According to “Enstehungsgeschichte des Jugendkreises” (The history of the origin of the youth group by Ernst Lehrs) the young people were split, ‘one group wanted to bring a question about building an esoteric community, the other group rejected this flatly & demanded that only a question that concerns the pedagogical realm should be brought. Finally, they agreed on a neutrally formulated question. When it was presented to Rudolf Steiner, he appeared to be disappointed by it, so Wilhelm Rath felt compelled to bring the idea forward about the esoteric community, which Dr. Steiner was immediately willing to do.’ He suggested that the large group consult once more & that only those who wanted to take up the esoteric idea should come to the next meeting.

After much debate the majority separated off, & the Youth Course, called today THE YOUNGER GENERATION, GA 217, itself addressed their career questions; while a group of 12 went on to meet with Dr. Steiner on Friday the 13^th October 1922. (Interesting to think back on that Friday the 13^th October in 1307, when King Philip IV of France, in league with Pope Clement V, ordered all the Knights Templars to be rounded up & thrown into prison)

From Herbert Hahn we hear: “We gathered in a festive, expectant mood. Dr. Steiner entered together with Frau Dr. Steiner, with a noticeably earnest bearing. He held in his hand a violet leather-bound book, out of which later he read the meditations & let them be copied. Upon entering the room, he paused a moment in the doorway & counted us as he pointed a finger at each of us. Thereby, we ourselves became aware for the first time that there were twelve of us. Then he opened the book & said with a deep, calm voice: “I have the task of communicating the following to you”.

More tomorrow

~hag