Gebser’s Project \ Integrative Explorations Journal
Gebser’s Project: What Must We Do Now? Michael Purdy Governors State University It was Sunday morning. Most people are in church on Sunday morning. I was shopping, and thinking about what Georg Feuerstein wrote about Jean Gebser. Gebser, he said, considered the big questions of life: “Who am I? Whence do I come? Whither do I go? How shall I live?” I was thinking about the big questions of life while I was buying curtain rods in Venture department store. As I stood in the checkout line I looked around and wondered if anyone else was thinking about the big questions of life. Actually, although I was thinking about the big questions of life I was also thinking about Gebser’s project. What was Gebser attempting to do in writing the Ever–Present Origin (EPO. What did he hope to accomplish with this monumental two volume work. In looking for a way to comment meaningfully on Gebser’s project I searched many avenues of thought but I also interviewed four of the people (Al Mickunas, Noel Barstad, Elizabeth Behnke, Georg Feuerstein) whom I felt knew Jean Gebser’s work best. These interviews gave support to my ideas and fleshed out unfamiliar parts of Gebser’s life and thought. From what I have gathered, Gebser wrote EPO for several reasons: 1. He wanted to make sense of his own times and express that understanding to others. He was in exile from his own country, Germany, beginning in 1931 because of the Nazi regime and wanted to understand the culture of Europe that led to this tragedy. Barstad has suggested that the explosion of the atomic bomb in 1945 may have given even more impetus to publishing his work. Certainly, the Preface to EPO made clear that the world faced a crisis which could “only be described as a ‘global catastrophe.’” His research on EPO was in part an attempt to answer the question: How could this happen? 2. Gebser wanted to portray an optimistic future. The popular works of Spengler and others that gave meaning in the popular mind to the events of the early 20th century were pessimistic. Gebser was very optimistic and wanted to express what he felt was a more optimistic possibility for Europe and the world’s future. 3. Barstad suggested that Gebser wanted to have an impact on shaping and building the future of Europe (and the planet). This is one reason he published EPO with an East German publisher who had published other important works of the time. He wanted to indicate what he perceived as the optimistic trend of civilization and mark the way for others to follow. He no doubt felt that the development of the integral consciousness would progress more rapidly if people could identify it and act in harmony with it. Let me expand on each strand of Gebser’s reasons for writing EPO. In the process I also intend to reflect upon what Gebser's project might mean to us in the context of today’s lived world.
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