The Work of Jean Gebser

This is a post I have been wanting to do for some time. I finally got up the gumption to tap this out. I hope you, dear reader, find this useful.

Jean Gebser (1905 – 1973) was an autodidact whose main impact was in the study of the transformations of human consciousness. He was also a linguist and poet. While he has had a loyal following both in the United States and Europe, it has been relatively small. Ken Wilber’s work has brought him to the attention of a much wider audience and Gebser’s ideas are most important to anyone who is wrestling seriously with issues of spirituality, politics and human development. His experiences in pre-war Germany, Italy, France and Spain and reflection on the sea-change of intellectual perspectives reflected in the full blossoming of post-modern thought caused him to look closely at the structures of human consciousness through human history. After fleeing to Switzerland hours before the boarders were closed after the invasion of France, we befriended Carl Jung and did most of his mature writing while connected to the Jung Institute. His most notable book is The Ever-Present Origin. His work draws on fields as diverse as poetry, philosophy, religion, physics, architecture, music, and political science. His principal thesis is that humanity has experienced various structures of consciousness that carry within them deep perspectives of time, space, human relations, cosmic connections and images. These epochs span millennia and as there is a fundamental failure in one structure, another emerges. Gebser identifies five basic structures evidenced through human history: The Archaic, The Magic, The Mythic, The Mental and The Integral Ages. Each age includes, yet transcends the ages before it.

The Archaic Structure is difficult for us to grasp – it lies at the dawn of human awareness. Consciousness is dimly aware of itself as something separate from the flow around it. There is some sense of past, present and future but it is wrapped in a miasma and is largely undifferentiated. It is a world devoid of perspectivity. Structures that associate with this stage are groups or family units much like the great apes.

The Magic Structure is characterized by five primary characteristics: 1) a sense of self, but little or no ego structure or deeper self-awareness, 2) ambigous or cyclical sense of space and time, 3) interweaving of self and nature, 4) a magical relationship between self and not-self, 5) a lack of understanding of the differences between the non-liminal and liminal. Language emerges as this stage and words are seen as powerful in their own right. Man is deeply identified with nature and surviving within the natural order is a matter of ritual, incantation, and magic. Religion tends to be shamanistic and animistic. Political organizations tend to be tribal. The cultures tend to be hunter-gathers or in their later stages, horticultural. Tool making is rudimentary. Slavery is endemic. Art begins to be produced. Time tends to be cyclical and space is holy and laden with significance. Gods begin to emerge, but they tend to be local and associated with the tribe or family. This is a highly emotive phase.

The Mythic Structure brings the advent of more sophisticated tools and with it agriculture. Myths begin to emerge and with them mythical beings who stand above nature and can control it. The afterlife begins to become an important factor in life. Formal religion, typically with priests and holy men emerges and political structures tend to be centralized and autocratic. Slavery continues to exist, often on a massive scale. This phase tends to rely heavily on images and art begins to become quit sophisticated. Poetry becomes an important communicator and oral traditions develop to share the myths and stories. Space tends to be two dimensional and time is linear but malleable by the gods. Eventually this stage develops into monotheism and creedal belief systems. This in creates a profound ideological identification and an intolerance of the myths and religions of others. Political structures tend towards the authoritarian and imperial. Technology is sophisticated but largely based on trades and crafts. Guilds and castes are common.

The Mental Structure involves humanity stepping from two dimensional space into three dimensional space. Art becomes truly perspectival and fully articulated. Intellectual abstraction becomes possible as do pursuits of philosophy, science, mathematics, and other studies. Works of fiction emerge. Monotheism continues but eventually gives way to esoteric forms of unitive mysticism, philosophy or atheism. Time is seen as linear and cause and effect are essential to understanding the nature of the world. Ultimately, the mental structure gives way to a form of reductionism in which all that exists is material. Technology is used to reshape our understanding of the universe and matter itself. Industrialization emerges. This stage sees the rise of the nation state and the corporation. Human freedom is highly regarded. The dark side of this age is a profound lack of ethical restraint. While technology can be used for great good, it also wrecks havoc with war and environmental degradation.

The Integral Structure may, according to Gebser, be emerging. He sees the fundamental changes in our understanding of space and time as highly significant – just as with the transitions of prior ages where space and time underwent radical restructuring in human consciousness. The emergent picture is that time and space are not fixed, but relative and related. This age, Geber speculates will be trans-rational, trans-personal, and diaphanous (where there is transparent recognition of the whole, not just parts). It is likely to be highly mystical with deep realizations by both individuals and societies in which truth is uncovered in large chunks of integrated wholeness. The tensions and relations between things are more important, at times, than the things themselves and process becomes of pre-eminent concern. Nothing is seen as isolated and there is a profound experience and understanding of inter-connection and even identity. Time is seen both as infinite and illusory. Sentient life is seen as connected. While it is too early in this process to determine what political structures will emerge or what art will evolve into, there is are hints on the horizon for those who are looking for these.

I find interesting is that the mental stage was adumbrated well before its more general emergence. It was presaged by the intellectual flowering in ancient Greece. Is it possible that, with the current Integral Stage, a presaging may be found in the writings of India in the writings of sages such as Nagarjuna and Sankara?

As we look at our own culture, we see examples of late mythical stages (with rational overtones) and late mental stages of development. We begin to see, in cultural creatives and many on the vanguard of spiritual and intellectual exploration, the emergence of an integral consciousness. This, it seems to me, is important news for Unitarian Universalists.

© 2007. Matthew Wesley. All rights reserved.