Anthroposophy and Ecofascism 73

Continuing my commentary on the 23nd paragraph of Peter Staudenmaier's Anthroposophy and Ecofascism.

His interest in, but distance from Nietzsche Steiner repeated frequently when referring to Nietzsche. In a memorial address given September 13th, 1900, Steiner speaks of himself in the following way:

It is strange that with the infatuation for Nietzsche in our day, someone must appear whose feelings, no less than many others, are drawn to the particular personality, and yet who, in spite of this, must constantly keep before him the deep contradictions which exist between this type of spirit, and the ideas and feelings of those who represent themselves as adherents of his world conception.(Steiner, Rudolf. Friedrich Nietzsche, Fighter for Freedom. Englewood, NJ: Rudolf Steiner Publications, 1960. Pages 201.)

Or in an article in the Wiener Klinischer Rundschau (14th year, No. 30, 1900):

For Nietzsche does not work upon his contemporaries through the logical power of his arguments. On the contrary, the wide dissemination of his concepts is to be traced to the same reasons which make it possible for zealots and fanatics to play their role in the world at all times.( Steiner, Rudolf. Friedrich Nietzsche, Fighter for Freedom. Englewood, NJ: Rudolf Steiner Publications, 1960. Pages 153-154. )

These are hardly the words of a man "under the sway of" Nietzsche. We find Steiner repeatedly distancing himself from the "zealots and fanatics" or even ordinary "adherents" of Nietzsche's world conception.