Wilhelm Huebbe-Schleiden

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Wilhelm Huebbe-Schleiden

Wilhelm Hübbe-Schleiden (born October 20, 1846 in Hamburg , † May 17, 1916 in Göttingen ) was a German writer and theosophist on colonial politics .

Life

Hübbe-Schleiden was born in Hamburg on October 20, 1846 as the youngest son of state official Wilhelm Hübbe and his wife Wilhelmine Maria Sophie Eleonore Schleiden. His mother died at the age of nine. He attended a high school in Hamburg.

Hübbe-Schleiden studied economics and law . In 1869 he received his doctorate in both rights in Leipzig . Then he became a Hamburg lawyer admitted. With the approval of the Hamburg Senate, he used the double name Hübbe-Schleiden. During the Franco-Prussian War he was an attaché at the German Consulate General in London .

Hübbe-Schleiden traveled extensively through Western Europe and lived in Gabon between 1875 and 1877 , where he founded the Bolton & Schleiden trading company with Augustus S. Bolton. In 1877 he was accused and convicted of participating in a double homicide in Gabon. However, he was able to successfully challenge the verdict and then returned to Germany.

He then worked as a tax secretary in Hamburg and acted as a champion for the German colonial efforts in Africa and Asia, where he supported Friedrich Fabri and gained a certain fame himself. He also wrote several books on this, including Overseas Politics and Ethiopia .

In 1883, through his acquaintance with the Gebhard family of manufacturers in Elberfeld , he got to know the teachings of the theosophy represented by Helena Petrovna Blavatsky , with which he occupied himself from then on until the end of his life. At Mary Gebhard's instigation, the theosophical society Germania was founded in Elberfeld in the house of the Gebhard family on July 27, 1884 , and Hübbe-Schleiden was elected president. On this occasion he met Henry Steel Olcott , who accepted him a few hours before his election to the Theosophical Society. Hübbe-Schleiden stayed in Elberfeld for half a year as a guest of the Gebhard family in order to set up the organization of the partnership. A few weeks after the foundation, Blavatsky, the founder of the Theosophical Society , who had been invited by the Gebhards to Elberfeld to relax, also came. For a few weeks Elberfeld was the headquarters of the Theosophical Society. When the Coulomb affair became known in September 1884 and the " Hodgson Report " in December 1885, Madame Blavatsky and theosophy were severely discredited. Hübbe-Schleiden resigned - like other prominent members - from the society in order not to compromise himself in the scientific world, but remained a member in distant India. Left by its most respected members, the partnership was dissolved on December 31, 1886.

Since January 1886, Hübbe-Schleiden acted as editor of the monthly magazine Sphinx , which he had planned and founded since autumn 1884 , the publication of which he had been able to save by leaving. It was mainly devoted to metaphysical subjects, but also had references to theosophy. In this way, Hübbe-Schleiden was able to keep interest in the theosophy in Germany, which had been damaged in its reputation. Above all from the readership of this magazine, he was able to found the Theosophical Association in Berlin in 1892 . This was followed on November 3, 1893 by the Esoteric Circle . These two organizations were united on June 29, 1894 in the presence of Henry Steel Olcott to form the German Theosophical Society (DTG).

At the end of 1894, Hübbe-Schleiden traveled to India to find out more about the spiritual power of yoga through personal experience . In 1896 he came back with no tangible result and, despite this failure, continued to occupy himself with theosophy. He published the impressions of his trip in his work India and the Indians and in several travel letters from India in the magazine Sphinx .

During these years numerous theosophical groups were founded all over Germany, all with different goals, but each group claimed to be in possession of the “true” and “correct” theosophy. Hübbe-Schleiden himself took part in a theosophical congress on August 25, 1901, to unite these different groups in Germany. However, no agreement could be reached. Thereupon the members of the DTG, among them Hübbe-Schleiden, who had long resisted the establishment, founded on October 19, 1902, in the presence of Annie Besant , their own German section of the Theosophical Society (DSdTG). This was now directly subordinate to the headquarters in Adyar. At Graf von Brockdorff's suggestion, Rudolf Steiner was elected Secretary General.

The gulf that existed from the beginning between Annie Besant and Steiner's conception of Christ became more and more conscious in society and the differences finally seemed to become irreconcilable. Following a request from Annie Besant, Hübbe-Schleiden had introduced the Order of the Star of the East in Germany, founded by Besant in India in 1912 , which proclaimed the Hindu boy Jiddu Krishnamurti as world teacher. In doing so, he sharpened the contrast considerably. When the board of directors of the German Section demanded Annie Besant's resignation at the turn of 1912/13, the entire German Section was ruled out by Annie Besant, who knew how much the German theosophists were behind Rudolf Steiner, on March 7, 1913. As a precaution, Steiner had already founded an Anthroposophical Society in Cologne at the turn of the year 1912/13 , which could now start its work.

Annie Besant authorized Hübbe-Schleiden, whose loyalty she had previously assured, with a new foundation deed to re-establish the German Section. This society, now reduced to about a tenth, was no longer really gaining momentum. After Hübbe-Schleiden initially acted as general secretary of the new German section, Johannes Ludovicus Mathieu Lauweriks was elected as the ordinary general secretary in May 1913 , but Hübbe-Schleiden remained the most important figurehead of the small group loyal to Adyart. Internal disputes led to a steady decline in membership, which was exacerbated by the outbreak of the First World War . With Hübbe-Schleiden's death on May 17, 1916, the DSdTG disintegrated.

On July 6, 1912, Hübbe-Schleiden applied for membership in the Rosicrucian Order " Order of the Temple of the Rosy Cross ". It is not known whether he actually became a member.

He was also a member of the Munich local group of the Pan-German Association .

Works

  • Sphinx . (Monthly magazine, published between 1886 and 1896)
  • Existence as pleasure, suffering and love . Braunschweig 1891
  • Seeking the Master. Conversation between a church Christian and a mystic . Rohm, Lorch 1916
  • German colonization . Hamburg 1881
  • Ethiopia . Hamburg 1879
  • Colonization Policy and Technique . Hamburg 1882
  • Motives for an overseas policy of Germany . Hamburg 1881
  • Overseas Policy, 2 volumes . Hamburg 1881–1883
  • World economy and the driving force behind it . Hamburg 1882
  • Indian diary 1894/1896. Edited by Norbert Klatt with notes and an introduction . Klatt, Göttingen 2009, ISBN 978-3-928312-25-7 . Online: Indian diary 1894/1896

literature

  • Emmi von Gumppenberg: Open letter to Dr. Hübbe-Schleiden in response to his "message of peace" . Altmann, Leipzig 1913.
  • Norbert Klatt: The estate of Wilhelm Hübbe-Schleiden in the Lower Saxony State and University Library in Göttingen . Klatt, Göttingen 1996, ISBN 3-928312-04-9 .
  • Norbert Klatt: Theosophy and Anthroposophy, new aspects of their history from the estate of Wilhelm Hübbe-Schleiden (1846-1916) with a selection of 81 letters . Klatt, Göttingen 1993, ISBN 3-928312-02-2 .
  • Thekla von Reden: Dr. Hübbe-Schleiden's “Memorandum”, viewed impartially . Philosophisch-Theosophischer Verlag, Berlin 1913.
  • Carl Unger : Against literary piracy! A clearance from Mr. Hübbe-Schleiden . Philosophisch-Theosophischer Verlag, Berlin 1913.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Corinna Treitel: A Science for the Soul: Occultism and the Genesis of the German Modern , Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore MD 2004, p. 86f
  2. ↑ Michael Peters: " Alldeutscher Verband (ADV), 1891-1939 ", in: Historisches Lexikon Bayerns .
personal data
SURNAME Hübbe-Schleiden, Wilhelm
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German writer and theosophist on colonial politics
DATE OF BIRTH October 20, 1846
PLACE OF BIRTH Hamburg
DATE OF DEATH May 17, 1916
Place of death Goettingen