Lesson 15 – A Review Of Human History

Lesson 15 – A Review Of Human History


“All that we call human history—money, poverty, ambition, war, prostitution, classes, empires, slavery—the long terrible story of man trying to find something other than God which will make him happy.”

C.S. Lewis
Influential Write

Human History

The human form has been involved in at least 3 to 5 million years of evolution with many experiments in the lineages of early human species. Scientists consider our current species, homo sapiens, to have emerged out of Africa between 100,000 to 300,000 years ago. In fact, it appears that all human development first began in Africa before settling on other continents. Controversy still exists over whether there was a single African origin or whether other hominids such as Homo erectus and Neanderthals made a significant contribution to the evolution of modern humans by interbreeding.

Archaeologists have found stone tools used by early human forms that were dated 2 ½ million years ago but found the first traces of art to appear 30-40,000 years ago. Obviously something developed that allowed us to express our selves using visual symbolism that wasn’t available prior to the time art appeared. Our bodies carry the imprint of our past yet we find that racial differences do not affect the fact that our DNA shows we may have all evolved over the last 100-200,000 or so years from one female, one single woman, who resided in Africa. She supposedly gave rise to a band of relatives that spread out of Africa into other continents. People from her lineage gradually began to replace other lineages that they came across until today, everyone has roots that trace back to her.

Homo erectus is thought to be the first human form to gain control of Africa as one powerful species. With home erectus, however, the brain still needed to be developed further to allow conscious rational thinking and clear complex communication. Homo erectus and earlier species may have been more like today’s severely retarded humans who cannot process thoughts well, draw from member, or convey adequate meaning.

Back in the early days of the evolution of the 7th kingdom, evolution was relentlessly pushing forward until homo sapiens were able to acquire the brain size and body configuration to accomplish the act of being “human” and the representative of the 7th kingdom who could move through all 7 stages of development. Who knows how many species have come and gone over the last several million years prior to that time. Experiments that didn’t work out perished and new ones emerged and I’m sure there were many.

It appears that the set of characteristics that evolution was looking forward to create the beginning of our species as Homo sapiens was:

  1. Bipedal motion (which preceded an increase in brain size by maybe 1 ½ – 2 million years);
  2. The use of tools;
  3. A larger (or large enough brain) to house the cerebral cortex as it grew in combination with the old brains (the limbic and reptilian);
  4. Tool diversity where life moved past just the basic survival level; and
  5. Cultural diversity which probably has been forming over the last million years and defines our mass subconscious and the rules of each society.

About 3 to 5 million years ago, we find early humans to have lived around waterways and this may be the time that we began to walk erect. Lucy is the famous archeological skeleton that was found to have lived in that era and her bones were dated to less than 3.18 million years old. There must have been a good reason to stand up since the difficult trade off was the orthopedic problems that first appeared and even child birth was very difficult for early humans since it was only until recently that the pelvis was adapted so human birth would become much more safe.

We also find that about 5 to 6 million years ago, Africa was drying up and lush habitats were drastically reduced. As food became more scarce, humans’ were prompted to begin moving out of the early settlement areas. Forest cover shrunk drastically and the earliest hominoids probably arose at least partly due to this climate change. Survival was the focus for our early ancestors and research has found that women were intensely involved in the care of a single infant. The males secondarily were involved in parenting but not as much so. Walking upright allowed the male to adapt better and to further reproductive goals for the species. Over time, Africa turned more into an open savannah and walking and running on two legs allowed early humans to travel over real distances.

In addition, heat stress was a great problem and there was a very strong push in evolution to walk upright for better and more rapid dissipation of heat. The biped is exposed less to heat by as much as 40 to 100% over walking on all four feet. This form also increases the rate of heat dissipation. Through standing further away from the hot ground, cooler air is enjoyed and less water is needed to survive. Through hair loss, better sweating mechanisms were able to come into being.

Diet was another factor for early humans. Bone marrow was an important source of nutrition for animal species and humans couldn’t compete with other more aggressive four legged animals and had to use tools to bring bone morrow into their diet. Early humans lived in great fear of other animals and stayed on the move. There were much larger and more vicious carnivores back in those times. We find the stone hand ax coming into existence around 1 ½ million years ago and its use lasted about 1 million years.

Homo erectus survived a number of lineages of tool makers. As the population began to grow and population pressure became a pressure, humans began moving around. They were able to do so when they became successful hunters and ultimately meat eaters. They could travel wherever there were animals to hunt and there was a slow and gradual population spread that encompassed maybe a few miles at a time.

Eventually, early humans went Eastward toward China and India since the Northern direction was too cold and a dominate species moved into the Middle East caves somewhere around 150-200,000 years ago where they built fireplaces and used the caves for creating homes. Fire was also used to keep away predators so they could sleep at night without fear of being attacked.

As we contemplate about what it was that made us ultimately “human” we find that our development was very much brain centered. The way modern humans think is very different that the way early humans considered the world. The key to that difference was the acquisition of language and the use of the resulting ability to think and communicate with others. Logic and reason as well as intuition and the use of symbolism are both left and right brain cerebral qualities. 

In addition to becoming conscious through language and creating the ability to communicate with others, we also needed to pass our experiences on to our offspring so knowledge could grow beyond daily experience. Because of the emergence of language, we now have the ability to modify our actions, to learn from our past, and to exert conscious control over our freewill and individual and group destinies. This is what language allowed us to accomplish and more.

The acquisition of language causes the human kingdom to stand out from all animal species since we don’t find even a simple form of language in other species. We can think and discuss abstract concepts and no other life form can, and we can use of inner voice of intuition as guidance that comes from another level outside of our basic self. Knowingness and knowledge becomes a human capacity and valued commodity that has fueled and advanced today’s information society.

There was a re-structuring that occurred in the brain when homo habilis began increasing the human brain size. This is when the capacity for language first began. Scientists found that the creation of social life, concern for ecology, learning how to grow and supply food, and figuring ways to “earn” a living all started about the same time.

What is very interesting about the relentlessness of the Purposiveness behind evolution is that about 60,000 years ago, Neanderthals disappeared as a separate species. Initially, strength and endurance was required for survival but as society grew, it became less important as the ability to think and communicate and innovate took off. Over time, survival became more controllable and much easier than in the olden days. It is progressed, the cumbersome Neanderthal form began to merge into the current form of homo sapien. Scientists have found that Neanderthals cared very much about others and buried their dead and carried a more compassionate view of life. 

Neanderthals were like pure God’s children – peaceful, quiet, and loving people. Yet in the name of our future industrial society, they needed to perish from the evolutionary path. The Neanderthal mouth and throat structure, caused speech to be slow and nasal and gradually, the species was replaced to further our need to communicate and to create industrial society. Both today’s current homo sapien species and the Neanderthals lived together side by side and there is no evidence that they fought with each other in competition for survival. Today’s European features are the remnants of the Neanderthal race as it was absorbed into that of homo sapien.

It is thought that a group out of Klasies, South Africa moved North about 35,000 years ago and are the ones probably responsible for replacing the Neanderthals. While archaeologists and paleontologists continue to debate whether modern humans are descended only from the Homo sapien populations from Africa, or from a combination of Homo sapiens and Neanderthal, the Klasies River cave populations are still our ancestors, and are still representatives of the earliest known modern humans on the planet. They were modern humans complete with skills and communication abilities and were more left brain oriented and approached the world from the direction of logic and reason rather than from intuition and innate knowing. They also were able to exact great pressure at the time to condition society and cause it to become what it is today.

About 35,000 years ago, incentive after incentive flourished and provided tremendous opportunity for growth. Tools improved and capabilities to create literally took off. Things happened quickly as our problem solving capacities increased. The world also became much more complicated. This is when we began to find human art forms to appear as symbolism became important to the human race. Symbolic expression in art allowed us to share our knowledge and our history with future generation. It provided a vehicle to carry within it many important messages. At the same time, beads and pendants were used to adorn people’s bodies and were considered messages that could be handed down to children and grandchildren.

Personal adornment was also used to maintain identity as the ego began to flourish and could categorize people belonging to various levels of society. Since that time, our lives have become completely embedded in a universe of symbols.

Throughout the last 3 to 5 million years of human evolution, only one species of humans remains and all others have been replaced. It has taken close to 6 million years for the human species to move past the ape in the animal kingdom. If the process was to begin all over again, would we emerge again? Would we look like we do, communicate as we can, and would society have become the confusing and stressful place that we know find ourselves in? If you study the 7 levels of evolution as they apply to the human kingdom, you will find that we probably would emerge again and end up close to the same place. Lets take a look why that might be possible.

THREE EVOLUTIONARY PROCESS AT PLAY IN THE HUMAN KINGDOM

Three evolutionary processes are at work in the building of the 7 levels or sub-stages of development in the human kingdom.

The 1st process is the genetic evolution which pushes and pulls the development of the human body through the evolution of the DNA molecule. Over millions of years, the natural process of genetic engineering as directed by the Purposiveness behind evolution has lead to our current human form. 

The 2nd process has been the evolution of the human group soul or what also can be called the mass subconscious. Through behavioral learning, entire cultures and nations carry forward from one generation to the next specific ways of relating to their outside environment. These individual and group behavioral characteristics are entirely dependent upon the experience and accumulated history of prior human life. The emergence of language and the ability to consciously communicate fueled this second process and has caused our development to geometrically occur compared to the tremendous amount of time it took to get through the first evolution of the body.

The 3rd level of evolution is uniquely specific to the human species and it is the development of the individual soul. Here is stored all life experience every created by it’s owner (the monad) from the first moment of it’s conception.

As you examine the 7 sub-stages of the human kingdom, you will find a symmetry being revealed which indicates a unique shape to the physical progression of these needs. The Arc shows us that there are two sides to the process of evolution – one where consciousness descends from the level of spirit into matter and mind becomes the pinnacle of that descent. The other side is where through heart felt actions, the human ascends out of the depth of matter and the sterility of mind to head back toward its natural home, the level of Spirit or our Source, The Purposiveness. Consciousness is evolutions focal point and its motor. As it evolves, it takes on predictable characteristics that parallel its initial emergence at the macroscopic Universal level and its essential inclusion at the microscopic human level. 

It is not until the end of the first sub-stage of the human kingdom that the human brain started to increase substantially over that of the less developed ape brain. Emphasis during the first sub-stage was on the development of a bodily vehicle that would best promote human emergence and survival and thus become the conscious carrier for consciousness. This early human stage of development was one where the early human was not truly self-aware and was totally influenced and responsive to it’s outside environment and related activities. During these 3 to 5 million years of development, the reptilian brain was utilized and called upon almost predominantly as instinctual survival needs were the primary focus. Finding food, staying alive, and protecting immediate family members were the basic requirements to make it successfully through the first stage of human development.

As creative tasks emerged which were related to survival requirements, the limbic brain was utilized for awhile to guide human development. It is through the limbic brain system that we are able to access long-term memory and it is here where we carry the knowledge of these early developmental survival oriented times of the early human race. It is also here where we draw upon the database of the mass subconscious of early human development.

Today, things are different than they were millions of years ago. When a new soul enters the physical plane in the present time, that soul naturally and instinctually focuses upon it’s survival. Even though this soul has not yet experienced the existence of the higher needs and higher levels of human development, it can draw upon the collective subconscious and tune in to its caregivers and surrounding environment. Once a critical mass is reached within the collective subconscious, everyone in the human race then has access to that particular level of consciousness and its range of experience. 

Even though an individual still has yet to experience all 7 levels of human development, because of the critical mass effect, each accomplishment within each level that has already reached critical mass becomes much easier to master. In effect, a new soul could master numerous levels of development if it had been blessed by the critical mass experience of past generations. Imagine if an avatar like Jesus appeared today rather than 2,000 years ago. His ability to work with and merge with society would be vastly different. If Krishna were alive today rather than 5,000 years ago, what would be the effect of his teachings. If Buddha existed today, how would things be different for him as well as the people he sought to teach.

If you and I could only awaken the sleeping giant within, what would be possible today with all of our past creative and cumulative development? Our potential is staggering yet we remain quietly asleep and attached to our old ways and lower needs and desires.

THE SEVEN LEVELS OR SUB-STAGES OF HUMAN DEVELOPMENT

Just as one drop of water contains all the elements present in the ocean which was its source, so too is human consciousness a microcosmic manifestation of Universal Consciousness. All that mankind can ever know already exists as potential within himself. Yet, today, we find that even with millions of years of development and experience that the most of what man perceives is a product of his sense organs.

Events and experiences that we have in the phenomenal world first trigger our five sense organs (eyes, ears, nose, tongue, and skin). The affected organ initiates a biochemical process which passes through the central nervous system and the result(s) is manifested as variations in electrical activity in certain regions of the brain. This play of electrical energy is a gross manifestation of the aspect of consciousness which we call mind. As we examine the 7 sub-stages of human development as applied to the Arc of Creation, we will find that the entire descent of Spirit into matter occurs through the sensory realm. We also find that the pinnacle of development for the descent side of the Arc as it applies to the human kingdom is the creation of mind or the use of the mind.

The Turn is the midpoint of the Arc where our goal is to let go of the attachments of the mind and instead move into our heart. It is here where a grand surrender takes place and we begin the process of letting go of the ego and the use of the mind in favor of the heart and the creative force that guides us. About ¾ of the way into the 5th sub-stage (the sub-stage immediately following the Turn) we begin to abandon the ego completely and then work on becoming powerful co-creators. This is the stage of development that you could call the Age of the Creative Genius and we’ll discuss more about that later.

For now, I would like to share that at the pinnacle of the creation of the logical rational mind, we also find the height and peak of the Information Age. It is a place in our development where we try to determine everything according to law and logic and reason and it becomes our sterile knife to pierce through the illusion of reality to only find another illusion – mind is not the ultimate goal but rather only an important tool.

Mind presents sensory date to the intellect and ego for evaluation and action. It is from these sense perceptions that all desires arise. Desire is the essence of the evolutionary Process and if we did not possess desire, there would be no life. Desires are the motivations of life. Early man and man through at least the 5 sub-stage, lives to fulfill his desires.

Desires can be grouped into three classes, depending on their nature:

  1. Physiological desires are those necessary for survival of the physical body. Eating, drinking, sex, and sleep are some of the major physiological desires.
  2. Sociological desires are physiological desires that are colored by the social context and pressures.
  3. Psychological desires all stem from the desire for identification of the self, and specifically, the ego.

Physiological needs are recognized by all societies. No restrictions are placed on their fulfillment. Sociological desires vary from society to society. Psychological desires are common and include man’s complexes and achievements, disturbances and honors, enjoyments and traumas. All these desires result from the sense perceptions and the faculty we call mind. All are biochemical states of the organism and hence, all desires truly are chemical states.

The physiological desires are often called animal needs for they are the desires that man has in common with the animal kingdom and instinctual survival. Psychological desires are often classified as higher needs for they are concerned with the attachment of ego and the sense of fulfillment which comes from complete identification with the object of desire.

Whatever the source of the desire, the ego acts to fulfill it through the five work organs (hands, feet, tongue, genitals, and anus). The action comes only after the sense perception has passed through the mechanisms of mind and intellect. Each action triggers a reaction. The quality of the action determines the quality of the reaction. The reaction is manifested as a change in consciousness. Positive actions raise the level of consciousness. Negative actions trap a person into negative experiences which need to be resolved before allowed to experience positive reactions again.

The Law of Karma basically states that what you sow, you also shall reap and it is through the cycle of learning that we awaken to the error of our ways. At the mid point which is the position of The Turn in the Arc Of Creation, sits the cycle of learning and the secret repository of the other two missing numbers that I earlier spoke of. It is here where 7 becomes 9 in the evolutionary process. It is also here where the number 5 becomes the pivot point and is the actual source of the life force of the Purposiveness as it exists within the physical plane (within the 4th kingdom of molecules at the position of the Turn). I will explain this further on.

For now, I’m only attempting to set the stage for your understanding of the 72 levels of consciousness before I actually describe them. Once you have reviewed all 72 levels of consciousness, I will share with you the actual Manifestation Process and how to go about utilizing the energies that lie within The Arc Of Creation Process for your own personal development. To become a powerful manifestor, however, you will need to gain the knowledge contained within the Arc and understand the inter-relationship of all of these levels.

Within these 72 levels of consciousness and roadmap of human development, we live our life and experience the reactions of all of our actions (past or present). As a living organism, our life force moves from level to level, from conception at birth, to childhood, to adolescence, youth, and eventually old age. During the span of our lifetime, we operate from within seven distinguishable and specific energy centers (that can be represented by the 9 numbers 1-9). Each of these centers correlates exactly with one of the seven levels or sub-stages of the Arc. The ancients called the levels chakras and considered them located along the axis of the spinal column. As energy is focused from center to center or level to level, there are observable changes in our gross behavior.

Consequently, the presentation of the 72 levels of consciousness should be expanded to allow for the qualities attributed traditionally to the chakras. The two are really the same. We’re now finding these two different means to describe the same thing tells us that our exercise of using a scientific method to erect the Arc of Creation has only confirmed what the sages already knew from their intuitive and meditative research. Today’s quantum physics is beginning to come to the same conclusions with ancient truths and it is no surprise. The common denominators of life are the same no matter what methods you use to uncover them.

For a level to exist, there must be a next higher level above it as it’s goal. Even though there are only 7 kingdoms in the Arc of Creation, there must be one more, an 8th or else the 7th cannot exist. This 8th is the Plane of the Absolute or what some might call heaven or the realm of The Purposivesness. This 8th level is not the only one but rather is the last where consciousness is able to reside as an individual point within an out of body container while duality exists around it.

Before we reach this 8th level, this is where the three phases of cosmic existence drive evolution and in the Vedic tradition are called the 3 gunas. It is here where I consider the ability for our individual points of consciousness to still exist but without a body. It is what I would consider the Plane of the Ascended Master – our ultimate final development and place where we no longer have a human form and are able to carry with us the history of our entire evolutionary existence.