Rudolf
Steiner and the OTO (Ordo Templi Orientis)
Was Rudolf Steiner ever a member
of the notorious OTO (Ordo Templi Orientis)?
The simple answer is no. This issue has been
investigated in depth by Peter-R.
Koenig. You can read the
entire report on his
web site, along with transcripts of all
the supporting documentation. The conclusion:
"After decades of incomplete media
reports and propaganda efforts by partial
parties regarding Rudolf Steiner's alleged
membership in Theodor Reuss' German lodge
of the Ordo Templi Orientis, for the first
time, the archive of Rudolf Steiner's
probate opened its vault (for the book
"Der Grosse Theodor Reuss Reader"),
thereby giving historians the ammunition
needed to finally put the matter to rest
(extant are 4 letters of Reuss to Steiner
and 21 of Reuss to Marie von Sivers. Steiner's
letters to Reuss are missing or never
existed; 4 drafts of Sivers to Reuss survive.
Reproduced in "Der Grosse Theodor
Reuss Reader" is the Contract, the
Edict of Reuss to Steiner, and two letters
concerning Franz Hartmann.)
There is no evidence that Rudolf Steiner
ever accepted anything from Theodor Reuss
with the sole exception of Reuss's permission
to use the term "Misraim". There
exists no evidence nor any documentation
which made Steiner a member of the Ordo
Templi Orientis."
Koenig, Peter-R. "Rudolf Steiner
and Theodor Reuss" The Ordo Templi
Orientis Phenomenon. 8 Jan 2004 <http://www.cyberlink.ch/~koenig/steiner.htm>.
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Steiner's commentary on the
issue as written in his Autobiography is also
interesting:
Even in this sphere we broke with the
ancient traditions. Our work was carried
on as work must be carried on if one investigates
in spiritual-content in an original manner
according to the requirements of full
clarity in the mind's experience. The
fact that the starting-point for all sorts
of slanders was found in certain attestations
which Marie von Sievers and I signed in
linking up with the historic Yarker institution
means that, in order to concoct such slanders,
people treated the absurd with the grimace
of the serious. Our signatures were given
as a “form.” The customary
thing was thus preserved. And while we
were giving our signatures, I said as
clearly as possible: “This is all
a formality, and the practice which I
shall institute will take over nothing
from the Yarker practice.”
It is obviously easy to make the observation
afterwards that it would have been far
more “discreet” not to link
up with practices which could later be
used by slanderers. But I would remark
with all positiveness that, at the period
of my life here under consideration, I
was still one of those who assume uprightness,
and not crooked ways, in the people with
whom they have to do. Even spiritual perception
did not alter at all this faith in men.
This must not be misused for the purpose
of investigating the intentions of one's
fellow-men when this investigation is
not desired by the man in question himself.
In other cases the investigation of the
inner nature of other souls remains a
thing forbidden to the knower of the spirit;
just as the unauthorized opening of a
letter is something forbidden. And so
one is related to men with whom one has
to do in the same way as is any other
person who has no knowledge of the spirit.
But there is just this alternative –
either to assume that others are straight-forward
in their intentions until one has experienced
the opposite, or else to be filled with
sorrow as one views the entire world.
A social co-operation with men is impossible
for the latter mood, for such co-operation
can be based only upon trust and not upon
distrust.
Rudolf Steiner, The Course of My Life.
Online
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A more detailed description
of the various OTO relationships is given in Koenig's
Q&A section (scroll down to the Rudolf
Steiner section). Koenig shows that at the time
that Steiner was in contact with him, Reuss had
not yet begun the activities for which he became
particularly notorious.
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