A couple of weeks ago, while in Los Angeles, Chappell and I went to the Huntington Museum’s current exhibit, Magna Carta, Law and Legend, 1215-2015. The Huntington (1151 Oxford Rd., San Marino) is displaying the 13th century draft in its possession, along with several other foundational books and ancient charters. Inspired by my students, and their interest in the human rights and freedoms advocated in Enlightenment philosophy, we went to see what inspired “the founding fathers” of the American nation to write the Declaration of Independence. The kids are sensitive to the forces that conspire to undermine civilization, the oligarchs, the jihadists, and other thieves. The question we must answer again, as we are called to protect our heritage: Who is civilization for?
Around 1250 B.C.E., Mycenae, Tiryns and other sites in Greece were simply abandoned after an invasion of “northern strangers,” as a tablet from Pylos called them, perhaps also because of attacks from the Sea Peoples, a coalition of groups that included the Philistines. http://www.historywiz.com/mycenaeanfall.htm The population of Greece declined by about 75 percent and the refugees resettled as far away as Cyprus.
Mycenaean kingdoms were highly centralized, with elaborate bureaucracies of scribes and groups of arts and craftsmen, but the cities and the workshops disappeared. Small, poor, agricultural villages took their place. Crete suffered a similar major decline in population as people abandoned coastal areas because of attacks from the sea. Easily defensible positions were found in the hills and new settlements built. Without palace bureaucracies to maintain it, the knowledge of writing was lost. A “Dark Age” descended over the entire Aegean region for about the next 1,000 years.
Centuries later, a new civilization was founded upon the accomplishments of the Greeks. “All the art and genius of these [Greeks] is a direct legacy of the posterity of Adamson, the first son of Adam and Eve, and his extraordinary second wife,” [Ratta] (The Urantia Book, The UB, 80:7.5).
“The Romans bodily took over Greek culture, putting representative government in the place of government by lot. And presently this change favored Christianity in that Rome brought into the whole Western world a new tolerance for strange languages, peoples, and even religions.” (The UB, 195:2.1)
Magna Carta and Constitutionalism
Brittania was a province of the Roman Empire until the year 410, “And these Romans were a great people. They could govern the Occident because they did govern themselves. Such unparalleled honesty, devotion, and stalwart self-control was ideal soil for the reception and growth of Christianity.” (The UB, 195:2.4) After Rome’s departure, and further invasions of Germanic and Viking tribes, the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of England was born, a polyglot nation, the birthplace of our democratic principles and government.
The movement to establish human rights and freedoms, to enshrine them in law, fascinates the young people I am tutoring. They have a natural curiosity about Rousseau (The Social Contract), John Locke (Two Treatises of Government … a copy of which was in the exhibit), and the Magna Carta. This English “Great Charter” was the first step in establishing constitutionalism, a set of norms whereby the principles of government, the limits of authority and the rule of law are defined in a document. In the eight centuries since its first appearance, the Magna Carta’s example has been followed around the world.
“As a peace treaty intended to ward off civil war, the original Magna Carta was a short-term failure, revoked later that summer,” said Mary Robertson, co-curator of the Huntington Library exhibit. “But it was remembered, revised, and reissued the following year and given permanent authoritative form in 1225 by King John’s son, King Henry III … three of its key principles—that no one is above the law, that justice may not be sold, denied, or delayed, and that no man may be imprisoned or his property confiscated without due process of law—have continued to resonate down the centuries.” http://huntington.org/WebAssets/Templates/exhibitiondetail.aspx?id=17272
Spiritual Idealism, The Driving Power of Civilization
“The driving power of even the most material aspects of a cultural civilization is resident in the least material of society’s achievements. Intelligence may control the mechanism of civilization, wisdom may direct it, but spiritual idealism is the energy which really uplifts and advances human culture from one level of attainment to another.” (The UB, 81:6.27)
The current warnings and fears about civilization’s ability to endure are similar to alarms we raised as young hippies in the 70’s. Back then, much as now, we saw the same environmental destruction, inequalities between the races, inequities afflicting men and women (hence the community), and excessive materialism. Our answer to these problems was a quest for a spiritual quality of life. But the hippies gave up, silenced their protests at the end of that decade and went back to work with the system as it was being run.
In our time, we stand on the shoulders of many thinkers from previous decades. In his book, The Source of Human Good, philosopher Henry Nelson Wieman, also a well-known source author of several of “The Urantia Book” papers, along with his spouse Regina Westcott-Wieman, made a summary statement in his conclusion. Its validity will one day be recognized:
"There is a creative power in history which is able to conquer and to save, but it is not any power of man, even though it works through man. In all times, both good and ill, man must live under its control if history is to be fruitful."
This “creative power” is found within, “The advances of true civilization are all born in this inner world of mankind. It is only the inner life that is truly creative.” (111:4.3) Per the UB creativity comes from consciousness of partnership with God, becoming “a willing partner with the Adjuster.” (110:2.2) “When man goes in partnership with God, great things may, and do, happen.” (132:7.9)
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“Without the presence of moral insight the advance of science becomes the menace of humanity. Morally untempered, it promises only universal destruction to that fragile plant which we call human life and civilization. It is needless to point out that, though facts might remain after such devastation, science itself would be destroyed, if not forever, at least until the birth of a new race whose moral achievement should walk hand in hand with their scientific progress.” (Ralph Flewelling, Creative Personality, 221)
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Here is how Albert Schweitzer, German physician and theologian, expressed it. “One truth stands firm. All that happens in world history rests on something spiritual. If the spiritual is strong, it creates world history. If it is weak, it suffers world history. The question is, shall we make world history or only suffer it passively? Will our thinking again become ethical-religious? Shall we again win ideals that will have power over reality? This is the question before us today.” (Religion in Modern Civilization, Christian Century, 21 November, 1934)
“The ‘real movement’ of history, it turns out, is fueled not by matter but by spirit, by the will to freedom.” (Gertrude Himmelfarb, U.S. historian, in On Looking Into the Abyss)
Our society since the day of these philosophers has become more secular and materialistic, so much so that many despair our civilization has discarded the idea of, the importance of, a spiritual foundation. History shows that this is a mistake if we want to preserve it and endure. It would be inspiring to see a real in-depth study made of spiritual idealism as a foundation of character, our best leadership, and thus our civilization’s future.
“The New and Mighty Charter for Human Freedom”
Civilization has often had institutional religion as its driving force. In our era when institutional religions are failing to command the loyalty of citizens, even contributing to war, we need a true system of ethics, a personal philosophy of religion based on the idealism of its citizens, and a credo asserting the value of the individual.
“This Roman citizen [the Apostle Paul] proclaimed to these Greeks his version of the new religion which had taken origin in the Jewish land of Galilee. They had a common goal—both aimed at the emergence of the individual. … The Greek, at social and political emergence; Jesus, at moral and spiritual emergence. The Greek taught intellectual liberalism leading to political freedom; Jesus taught spiritual liberalism leading to religious liberty. These two ideas put together constituted a new and mighty charter for human freedom; they presaged man's social, political, and spiritual liberty. (195:1.1)
The Magna Carta exhibit runs until October 12th at the Huntington Library’s West Hall.
