Hans-Ulrich Rudel: Physical Education [Der Weg 1950-12]
An original translation of "Körperbildung, ein Gruß an die Jugend"
Source Documents: German Scan
Note(s): This article appears in “Der Weg”, a German-language magazine founded in Buenos Aires, Argentina in the years immediately following the destruction of the Third Reich. See the links above for more information on the magazine and its contents.
Selectively quoting Wikipedia:
Hans-Ulrich Rudel was a German ground-attack pilot during World War II and a post-war neo-Nazi activist.
The most decorated German pilot of the war and the only recipient of the Knight's Cross with Golden Oak Leaves, Swords, and Diamonds, Rudel was credited with the destruction of 519 tanks, one battleship, one cruiser, 70 landing craft and 150 artillery emplacements. He claimed nine aerial victories and the destruction of more than 800 vehicles. He flew 2,530 ground-attack missions exclusively on the Eastern Front, usually flying the Junkers Ju 87 "Stuka" dive bomber.
Rudel surrendered to US forces in 1945 and immigrated to Argentina. An unrepentant Nazi, he helped fugitives escape to Latin America and the Middle East. He worked as an arms dealer to several right-wing regimes in South America, for which he was placed under observation by the US Central Intelligence Agency.
Title: Physical Education [de: Körperbildung, ein Gruß an die Jugend]
Author(s): Hans-Ulrich Rudel
“Der Weg” Issue: Year 4, Issue 12 (December 1950)
Page(s): 1080-1082
Referenced Documents:
[LINK / LINK] Juvenal Satura X 356 “mens sana in corpore sano”
[LINK] Deutsches Volkstum by Friedrich Ludwig Jahn
[LINK] Schwanenrede by Friedrich Ludwig Jahn
Physical Education
A Grand Offering to the Youth
Hans-Ulrich Rudel
Let us, with honest reckoning, take stock of what rights remain to us as Europeans: truly, it is not much. Yet all the greater is the joy derived from exercising these scant privileges to their fullest measure. Among the most uplifting and hopeful signs of our present age stands the vigorous ascent of the German gymnastics and sports movement—a development doubly rewarding for those who not only witness its outcomes but also cherish the potential nestled within each modest endeavor. We, bound intimately to this movement, discern in it the same vital forces that once gave rise to the Jahn Gymnastics Movement: the fullest unfolding of what we still possess is, at once, the foundation for reclaiming what we have lost.
There exists a cult of the body, rooted in the lopsided overvaluation of mere physicality, and there stands a body education, born of the belief that body and soul are one—an inheritance of both our intellectual gifts and physical capacities, bestowed upon us as a solemn and meaningful legacy. To the body cult belong the breeding of muscle-bound forms and the absurd male beauty pageants of America; to body education belongs that ancient and true maxim from Juvenal:
„Mens sana in corpore sano.“
"a Healthy Mind in a Healthy Body".
Here, aesthetics and ethics merge as one: what is “beautiful” is also “good.” How blessed must be those able to live by such a creed! “Beautiful” here has naught to do with cosmetics or veneer, but signifies the body’s harmonious formation—such that he who lets his soul grow coarse will see his body run wild, while he who tends his body with discipline will likewise nurture and refine his soul.
This first synthesis—the body as a noble and hale vessel for an upright and lovely soul—marks the dawn of sound thinking. In no other realm have we humans so let our innate endowments waste away as in this; now we strive to mask or mend these decays and neglects with sundry artificial remedies. Here, too, makeup serves merely as a symptom of a widespread mindset today—one that shirks probing the depths, lacks thoroughness, and prefers to cloak rather than confront, lauding falsehood as a cheerful fix. Yet the root cause in all this must be laid bare; it is too grave to be smothered beneath cosmetics. Thus, the call is not for adornment, but for body formation.
The more that, across millennia of progress, natural movement beneath open skies eludes us—supplanted by lives confined within walls—and the more that nature’s tempering touch and the toughening born of simple living are traded for the shield of clothing and refined habits of diet and life, the more urgent grows the need for a deliberate and methodical body education through gymnastics, sports, hiking, and climbing. On one hand lies the cultivation of physical prowess—strengthening organs, fostering resilience, agility, purposeful exertion, and quickness of reflex (as I know from my own wartime trials, and those of countless comrades, where salvation amid dire straits hinged solely on athletic or gymnastic training); on the other stands the forging of human qualities: camaraderie, discipline, a sense of liberty; love of truth, self-assurance, a wholesome drive for excellence, respect for others, and presence of mind.
„Im Dunkel verkümmert die Pflanze, im Winkel verrostet das Schwert, ohne Gebrauch wird der Geist stumpf, ohne Aeußerung der Wille zahm. Unsere Körperkraft ist ein vergrabener Schatz; wir lassen sie schimmeln, bis Fremde sie in Gebrauch setzen. — Die Leibesübungen sind ein Mittel zu einer vollkommenen Volksbildung“
“In darkness, the plant withers; in a corner, the sword rusts; unused, the mind dulls; unexpressed, the will tames. Our bodily strength is a buried treasure, left to molder until strangers claim its use. Physical exercises are a means to a complete national education,”
writes Friedrich Ludwig Jahn in Deutsches Volkstum. This gymnastic ideal has gained profound meaning for our war-wounded, for many regain life’s delight, spurred by their own efforts to feel once more as full members of the community. It becomes their wellspring of renewed courage. Not grand feats matter to them, but the joy—beside the return of bodily vigor—of partaking anew in gymnastics and games with comrades. The sting of exclusion and second-class status, all those crippling inferiority complexes that burden life, fade away, yielding to fresh resolve and rekindled resilience—offering the chance for a new start. How many of our veterans have thus blossomed again into joyful souls, standing tall in their vocations, often surpassing those spared their hard lot?
A second synthesis lies at the heart of this gymnastic and sporting endeavor: the union of individuality and community. Few things rival certain sports in nurturing personal distinction, awakening awareness of one’s own skill and worth. In today’s battle against the tide of uniformity, the wholesome care of body education stands at the fore. Striving for self-perfection, precision in performance, and exemplary leadership in gymnastics ranks among the most fulfilling joys of every gymnast and athlete. The sense that achievement ennobles—that no mastery is granted, but each hard-won; that every contest must be fought with chivalry and utmost zeal, every triumph fiercely earned—dawns first in the hall or on the field with a stern yet formative clarity, imparting one of life’s toughest yet fairest lessons. Yet no school matches sport in cultivating an appreciation and sense of the collective. In realizing that one’s peak efforts serve not just personal satisfaction but the community’s fullest bloom—that in individual victory lies the glory and honor of the whole—rests the loftiest moral vision of the state and the reasoned measure of all national concerns.
Surely it is no accident that the Greeks, over ten and a half centuries, celebrated the national festival of the Olympic Games, naming the four-year span between them an Olympiad; that these rites unfolded at Zeus’s sanctuary, steeped in sacred ritual; that victors were hailed with boundless honor, their renown echoing across distant lands. The fusion of divine worship with martial physical discipline, of noble ideals of beauty with artistic tribute—where winners were often cast in statues for enduring fame—may jar us moderns as forced. Yet, on deeper reflection, it reveals a coherent, aristocratic outlook on life, one we’ve drifted from to our own loss. For our “veneration” in this sphere too often rests on spectacle and the sorry debasement of sport into gambling stakes. To curb and mend this would be a noble charge for those entrusted with steering the gymnastics and sports movements.
To the brink of their essence, our pre-war youth—our gymnastic generation—bled out in the titanic struggle for Europe’s freedom, and the war’s grim end plunged them into a chaotic aftermath where hope would falter, were it not for the Jahn legacy they bear within. Yet so speaks Friedrich Ludwig Jahn in his Schwanenrede:
„Männern mit feindlichen Waffen habe ich gegenübergestanden im offenen, redlichen Kampfe; kriegerischen Scharen in Gefechten und Treffen, im Befreiungskriege von ausländischer Herrschaft. Da dachte ich nicht anders, als ich hätte mich für Freiheit, Vaterland und Ehre gewappnet. Und noch jetzt halte ich meine damalige Meinung nicht für Torheit und Wahn. Ich bin ihr treu geblieben, gehe geradeaus, mitten hindurch, blicke nicht links, blinzle nicht rechts, bin keiner Genossenschaft höriger Mann, der seine gestimmte Stimme zum Frohndienst einer sogenannten Parteifragehergibt. Die Nachwelt setzt jeden in sein Ehrenrecht, denn der Geschichte Endurteil verjährt nicht, und brachte noch allemal für verfolgte Tugend den Freispruch. Das ist mein Trost! Und muß jedes Edlen Zuversicht sein.“
Swan Song
“I faced men with hostile arms in open, upright combat; warrior throngs in skirmishes and battles, in the war to cast off foreign yoke. Then I thought only that I’d armed myself for freedom, fatherland, and honor. Even now, I deem that belief neither folly nor delusion. I’ve stayed true to it, pressing straight on through—neither glancing left nor blinking right—no vassal of any faction, lending my voice to the drudgery of petty party squabbles. Posterity will set each in their rightful honor, for history’s final verdict never lapses, ever granting absolution to persecuted virtue. That is my solace! And it must be every noble soul’s assurance.”
A third synthesis emerges here: the blend of love for the fatherland and openness to the world. This may be the grandest opportunity unfurled before gymnastics and sports communities—to labor for the homeland’s glory and the world’s weal. Athletes and soldiers grasp one another across continents; where chivalry underpins peaceful rivalry, mutual respect ripens as the proudest fruit. Through this synthesis, these communities step boldly into global affairs, perhaps achieving what politicians cannot: fostering understanding and reverence among nations, laying twin pillars for a lasting order.
Whoever grasps these three syntheses will see that gymnastics and sport are not mere facets of personal leisure, but a bedrock stance toward life itself. To coming generations, we owe an accounting of what we do—and what we leave undone, despite clearer sight. Within those who endured this grievous war lies such vital substance that we must spare no effort to preserve it for our future. Let, then, the finest of our own and Europe’s peoples converge on the fields; there, more can be wrought for Europe’s tomorrow than in party chambers, and there pulse the primal forces of our humanity. To the shaping of vigorous, striving souls, their mindful binding to the collective, and the tangible forging of a concord beyond states and peoples, let this weighty work be devoted.
In this spirit, we salute the gymnasts and athletes of Germany and Europe, and the men and women in whose hands the guidance of these communities rests.