{"id":72421,"date":"2026-05-13T08:20:00","date_gmt":"2026-05-13T06:20:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/?p=72421"},"modified":"2026-05-13T23:49:14","modified_gmt":"2026-05-13T21:49:14","slug":"a-seeker-of-truth-dr-max-asch","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/a-seeker-of-truth-dr-max-asch\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cA Seeker of Truth\u201d\u2014Dr. Max Asch"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Marginalia on Rudolf Steiner\u2019s Life and Work No. 38.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

The physician and cardiologist Max Asch was friends with August Strindberg, Edvard Munch, and the Polish writer Stanis\u0142aw Przybyszewski. He always did everything in his power to support all of his companions. He had a gift for bringing people together\u2014including introducing many to Rudolf Steiner. But he himself remained in the background, an unknown.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Max Asch (Schneidem\u00fchl, now Pi\u0142a, Poland, August 10, 1855\u2013March 17, 1911, Berlin) came from a Jewish family but left the Jewish faith. He studied medicine in W\u00fcrzburg and Berlin before settling in the German capital as a practicing physician. There, in 1892\u201393, he moved in the literary and artistic circle known as Das schwarze Ferkel [The Black Piglet], where members enthusiastically engaged in \u201ctorpedoing bourgeois norms of behavior\u201d and indulged in \u201cmusic, poetry, song, and scandal,\u201d<\/span>1<\/sup><\/a><\/span> along with excessive drinking. This illustrious circle was frequented primarily by Scandinavians living in Berlin, foremost among them the writer August Strindberg and the painter Edvard Munch. Asch became friends with both and also supported them financially. When an exhibition of Munch\u2019s work at the Architektenhaus in Berlin had to be closed after just one week in November 1892 on account of the outrage of older Berlin painters, Asch organized new exhibition spaces for him. Together with his friend and colleague, the well-known and multi-talented physician, poet, and philosopher Carl Ludwig Schleich (1859\u20131922), he visited Munch\u2019s exhibition on January 2, 1893.<\/span>2<\/sup><\/a><\/span> In early 1895, Munch created a portrait drawing of Asch.<\/span>3<\/sup><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Asch also became close friends with the Polish writer Stanis\u0142aw Przybyszewski (1868\u20131927), so much so that at times they would meet on a daily basis. In his memoirs, Przybyszewski describes Asch as \u201ca highly interesting person, an extraordinarily intelligent physician\u201d\u2014albeit \u201cmore of an artist than a physician\u201d\u2014with \u201cbroad intellectual horizons\u201d<\/span>4<\/sup><\/a><\/span>. \u201cNothing interested him more than the long debates about Stirner and Nietzsche that we had,\u201d says Przybyszewski.<\/span>5<\/sup><\/a><\/span> This must have been around the time when Steiner was also deeply interested in the two philosophers. Przybyszewski owed his career as a writer to Asch. Asch brought Przybyszewski\u2019s manuscript Chopin und Nietzsche<\/em> to the writer Franz Servaes, who secured its publication with the renowned Fontane publishing house. At Asch\u2019s house\u2014who \u201cwas on good terms with almost the entire literary scene of the time\u201d<\/span>6<\/sup><\/a><\/span>\u2014Przybyszewski often met John Henry Mackay, whom Steiner would also frequently associate with during his early years in Berlin. Asch was also close friends with Maximilian Harden, Else Lasker-Sch\u00fcler, and Melchior Lechter. Frida Strindberg describes him in her memoirs (without naming him) as follows: \u201cAnd that gaunt, tall man, resembling a Persian king, standing next to him, is a doctor and a misogynist. He likes to play the role of Mephisto.\u201d<\/span>7<\/sup><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Asch\u2019s personal life was eventful. He first married Henriette Kantorowicz in 1885, and they had two children together. He divorced her in 1894 and married Flora Bertha R\u00f6ther in 1895. But this marriage ended in divorce in less than a year and in 1899 Asch remarried his first wife, Henriette. His witnesses at the wedding were the art critic Willy Pastor and the physician Berthold Lasker\u2014husband of Else Lasker-Sch\u00fcler. Irma von G\u00fcrgens (married name Hass-Berkow), who came to know Steiner through Asch, describes Asch as a \u201ccaptivating personality.\u201d \u201cHe was always surrounded by a circle of young people who asked him questions. He was full of sparkling spirit, wit, and ingenious vitality. On walks, he often stopped to speak with old, poor, and frail people, asking them about their destiny and trying to help them. He inspired enthusiasm through his conversation. He would delve relentlessly into the depths of a subject so that everyone fell silent. He stopped in front of every bookstore and bought many books that captivated him.\u201d<\/span>8<\/sup><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Intermediary<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

As Steiner noted in his eulogy, Asch \u201chad to endure many things in his eventful life that can make it difficult for a person to join a purely spiritual movement.\u201d<\/span>9<\/sup><\/a><\/span> It is not possible to determine exactly when Steiner and Asch first met, though probably as early as the pre-theosophical years in Berlin\u2019s literary circles, since they had so many mutual acquaintances.<\/span>10<\/sup><\/a><\/span> In any case, on October 1, 1904, Asch joined the German Section of the Theosophical Society. Although overcome by doubts, he must have soon resigned and taken a job as a ship\u2019s doctor,<\/span>11<\/sup><\/a><\/span> as Irma Hass-Berkow reports. After his return, he eagerly attended Steiner\u2019s lectures and asked for readmission, which was granted to him because he was \u201ca seeker of truth,\u201d as Steiner is said to have remarked. He suggested to the doctor that he and Marie Ritter \u201cdevelop anthroposophic medicine with his help.\u201d Asch tried for a time, but soon doubts returned.<\/span>12<\/sup><\/a><\/span> And so he accepted another offer: work at an X-ray institute. The constant exposure to radiation, however, took a heavy toll on his health, and he had to spend many months at an institute for radium treatment. He died on March 17, 1911.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Asch was a vaccine skeptic, as Steiner once critically noted: \u201cFor this fanatical stance against such things is precisely what I would not recommend at all\u2014not for medical reasons, but for general anthroposophical ones. A fanatical position against such things is not what we strive for; rather, we want to bring about a different approach to these matters on a larger scale through insight. Whenever I was friends with doctors, I always regarded this as something to be fought against, for example where Dr. Asch was concerned, who absolutely did not vaccinate.\u201d<\/span>13<\/sup><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In April 1910, Asch warmly recommended the young Heinrich Goesch\u2014a friend of his son-in-law, the lawyer Fritz Kalischer\u2014to Steiner: \u201cFor about two weeks now, I have been engaged in a lively personal exchange of ideas with Herr Dr. phil. Heinrich Goesch, who, it seems to me, is predestined for occult training. He is among the most gifted people I have ever met, and about a year ago he had such remarkable inner experiences\u2014which came to light during an eight-day state of ecstasy\u2014that I am inclined to believe this case might also be of special interest to you. He has recently immersed himself entirely in the study of your writings\u2014Theosophy<\/em>, Occult Science<\/em>, etc.\u2014and the incredible speed with which he has grasped these things leads me to assume that he has already undergone some kind of esoteric training in a previous incarnation\u2014it seems to me the specifically Christian kind, given the experiences during the aforementioned ecstasy. Herr Dr. Goesch will be attending the lecture tomorrow evening; if you wish, I will introduce him to you. He also wants to become a member of the Theosophical Society immediately.\u201d<\/span>14<\/sup><\/a><\/span> For some time previously, Goesch had immersed himself intensively in psychoanalysis. Now he threw himself with the same vehemence into the works of Steiner and became an ardent adherent for several years\u2014before turning into a likewise ardent opponent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Asch introduced Steiner to a second acquaintance, even as he lay on his deathbed. In a letter dated February 9, 1911, he asked him to visit him at the sanatorium, where Steiner met the well-known physician Carl Ludwig Schleich. During this visit, he experienced something very interesting, as he recounted in a lecture in September 1924; he met Schleich in the presence of \u201canother personality,\u201d namely Asch: \u201cI had known this other personality very well for quite some time; he always made a\u2014I wouldn\u2019t say exceptionally deep\u2014but a thorough impression on me nonetheless. A thorough impression, for the reason that this personality took extraordinarily great delight in being together with people who, to the greatest extent, were specifically concerned with a somewhat outwardly conceived occultism. But this personality also loved to talk about his many acquaintances who spoke about all things occult, particularly about those things from the occult that relates to what today\u2019s artist\u2014lyricist, epic poet, or dramatist\u2014is supposed to strive for as an ideal. And this personality was surrounded by a kind of, I would say, moral aura. I use the word \u2018moral\u2019 for everything connected with the soul qualities governed by the will. In the presence of this personality, whom I had actually come to visit, I now found the other man whom I knew of and greatly esteemed for his literary career and his medical practice. And what took place during this visit truly left a deep impression, which inspired me to take the whole matter into the realm of spiritual research.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Although Steiner could not immediately examine Schleich\u2019s personality \u201cin terms of the connections of his life and destiny,\u201d \u201che, as it were, cast a light upon the other person, whom I had known for a long time, and it turned out that the other [.\u00a0.\u00a0.] had lived in ancient Egypt and, strangely enough, had been mummified there [.\u00a0.\u00a0.].\u201d This embalming as a mummy of the present-day Asch was carried out by two individuals whom Asch was to introduce to one another in his current life: \u201cThe personality with whom I met Schleich, of whom I spoke in such a way that he had indeed been mummified by Schleich himself in his ancient Egyptian life\u2014this personality is indeed the same one of whom Schleich tells in his memoirs that he brought Strindberg to him, brought him back to him. There had been a collaboration on the corpse: this soul that was in this body\u2014it was he who brought them back together.\u201d<\/span>15<\/sup><\/a><\/span> Schleich mentions this in his memoirs: \u201cIt was in the early 1890s when one day my colleague Dr. Max Asch entered my study with a man unknown to me. \u2018Here, I bring you Strindberg.\u2019 It struck me as rather peculiar to be able to look so suddenly into the eyes of this man I had long shown reverence for and to shake his hand warmly.\u201d<\/span>16<\/sup><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Connecting Spirit and Matter<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

According to Irma Hass-Berkow, Asch apparently tried, even from his deathbed, to bring as many people as possible to Steiner: \u201cFollow this path; every word of Dr. Steiner is true.\u201d He is even said to have told Schleich: \u201cYou, old sinner, still haven\u2019t come to terms with Steiner\u2019s spiritual science.\u201d On his deathbed, he confided to her that \u201che had not fulfilled his earthly task because he had not sufficiently connected spirit with matter and had not brought order to his life circumstances.\u201d<\/span>17<\/sup><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Rudolf Steiner paid tribute to the dear Section member \u201cDr. Max Asch\u201d in a memorial address. He noted that Asch had \u201cultimately found his way to us in such a way that he, the physician, discovered the best remedy for his sufferings in the study of theosophical literature and thought. He repeatedly assured me that no other belief could spring up in the soul of a physician for any other remedy than that which can come spiritually from theosophical books, that he felt theosophical teaching flow like balm into his pain-ridden body. Truly, right up to his dying hour, he cultivated theosophy in this sense.\u201d Asch\u2019s daughter, Else Kalischer,<\/span>18<\/sup><\/a><\/span> asked Steiner to say a few words at Asch\u2019s grave. For him, it was \u201ca heavy sacrifice\u201d that he could not fulfill her wish, \u201csince my lecture cycle in Prague began on that day, and it was therefore impossible for me to render this final service to my theosophical friend on the physical plane. You can be assured that the words I should have spoken at his grave were sent to him as thoughts into the world he had then entered.\u201d<\/span>19<\/sup><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Asch\u2019s son, Walter Erich Asch (b. 1889), was interested in spiritual matters and contacted Steiner on several occasions; he also had conversations with him and wrote a moving letter from the front in 1915. However, it does not appear that he developed a lasting connection with anthroposophy. Walter Erich Asch was deported to Auschwitz in 1943 and murdered.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

Translation <\/strong>Joshua Kelberman
Image <\/strong>Edvard Munch, Max Asch<\/em>, 1895, drawing, The Art Institute of Chicago<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Marginalia on Rudolf Steiner\u2019s Life and Work No. 38. The physician and cardiologist Max Asch was friends with August Strindberg, Edvard Munch, and the Polish writer Stanis\u0142aw Przybyszewski. He always did everything in his power to support all of his companions. He had a gift for bringing people together\u2014including introducing many to Rudolf Steiner. But he himself remained in the background, an unknown. Max Asch (Schneidem\u00fchl, now Pi\u0142a, Poland, August 10, 1855\u2013March 17, 1911, Berlin) came from a Jewish family […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9190,"featured_media":72107,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[11473],"tags":[11794,11795,8814],"class_list":["post-72421","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-about-rudolf-steiner","tag-ausgabe-18-2026-en","tag-english-issue-20-2026","tag-musings"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72421","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9190"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=72421"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72421\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":72439,"href":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72421\/revisions\/72439"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/72107"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=72421"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=72421"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dasgoetheanum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=72421"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}