Discussion Post I submitted for my Atlantic University TP5100 Course – November 12, 2020
Part A
I had not heard of yugas before, and I found them fascinating and very believable. The book was also an easy read, and with numerous examples from history, it went quickly. I’m a student of history, so I found Joseph Silbie and David Steinmetz book very accessible, unlike Ken Wilber’s material, which make my eyes glaze over. Unlike Wilber’s theory, despite his “pre/fallacy” contention, which I’ve criticized previously, the yugas theory provides a reasonable and plausible ideas for some of the amazing achievements of our ancestors, ones that are largely ignored by “mainstream science.”
The pyramids come to mind, which also jives with theories presented in Ancient Aliens, another go-to source for me! As more and more archaeological information comes forth about our past, it’s clear there was an age when humans (or aliens) knew a great deal more than we do even today. A stone structure built thousands of years ago with rocks weighing many tons, cut to exact dimensions, and fit together so precisely that you can’t even slip a credit card in between speaks of an incredibly advanced culture. Their design and construction rival our own in terms speaking to their incredible level of consciousness and technological capabilities.
The yugas theory also fits nicely with Edgar Cayce’s view of human origins and the evolution of consciousness. Although Cayce’s Christian worldview is evident in his ideas, and the yugas have an Eastern bent, they both present ancient cultures as actually more advanced than ours. This immediately puts them at odds with Wilber’s straight line, forward-only, theory of the evolution of consciousness. Cayce doesn’t see as much of a nice, neat pattern as the yugas, yet he speaks clearly of lost civilizations like Atlantis and Lemuria, both of which Cayce sees as being impacted by “major upheavals in the Earth’s crust” around 50,000 B.C. (Van Auken, 2005). According to Silbie and Steinmetz, given that a full yugas cycle is 24,000 years, in approximately 60,000 B.C. was the start of a new cycle. According to the diagram, at this point, the beginning of the cycle was the descending Satya Yuga, the most advanced spiritual age (2010, p. 6). By 50,000 B.C., the world would have left Satya Yuga, gone through Treta Yuga, and into the same age we’re now entering, Dwapara Yuga (2010, p. 6). Therefore, the destruction of highly advanced spiritual societies like Lemuria and then Atlantis makes sense when you consider the yugas’ timeline.
Part B
The yugas theories make a great deal of sense when you consider how far we’ve come since the “Age of Enlightenment,” which began in the early 1600s. This period coincides with the transitional period of the darkest or least knowledgeable Kali Yuga period to the beginning of a more conscious and aware period of the current Dwapara Yuga, which began in 1,700 (2010, p. 85). Two hundred years later, as we got more ensconced in the Dwapara Yuga era, our knowledge, technology, and consciousness took off over the past century. As the authors indicate, this awakening touches every aspect of our lives, including education, health & healing, the arts, and what we’re seeing playing out right in front of our eyes, the individual versus the institutions (2010, pp,. 58-81).
The primary difference between the theory of Spiral Dynamics, like Wilber’s earlier models, and the yugas, can be boiled down to the difference between a straight line and a circle. Ingrained in the Spiral Dynamics is a sense that our prehistoric ancestors were barely one step above wild beasts. The basic theme of Beige, for example, which started 100,000 ago, is that humans did what they must to stay alive and live ‘off the land’ much as other animals” (2002, p. 7). The Purple meme, which began 50,000 years ago when Cayce saw the end of a Lemuria, a far more advanced society than ours, disappear, Beck only gives humans a slight upgrade over Beige. Purple’s basic theme is to “Keep the spirits happy and the tribe’s nest warm and safe” (2002, p. 7). The evolution of consciousness and technology can be seen in both the yugas and the Spiral Dynamics theory. However, again, the yugas are a 24,000-year cycle that contains all that the Spiral Dynamics presents in a 100,000 year period, and from Beck’s model, the line is straight forward with no recognition of any previously advanced culture.
References
Roemischer, J. (2002). “The never ending upward quest,” What is Enlightenment magazine, Fall/Winter( 22), 1-24. https://www.dailyevolver.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/spiraldynamics.pdf.
Selbie, J. & Steinmetz, D. (2010). “The yugas: keys to understanding our hidden past, emerging energy age, and enlightened future,” Nevada City, CA: Crystal Clarity Publishing.
Van Auken, J.( 2005, September), “How old is humanity? The timelines keep expanding,” Ancient Mysteries, p. 1, 3 & 4). Retrieved from https://moodle.atlanticuniv.edu/pluginfile.php?file=%2F55211%2Fmod_resource%2Fcontent%2F1%2F2005_09_AM.pdf.