I have been reflecting on the idea of the “Axial Age.”
The German philosopher Karl Jaspers (1883–1966) coined the term to refer to a pivotal shift in human consciousness between the eighth and third centuries BCE. During these five hundred years before the Christian Era, there was an extraordinary flourishing of intellectual thought, born of deep reflection on the human condition, across mutually unrelated regions of the world, including India, China, Greece, and the land of the Jews.
Slave labour relieved slave owners from the tedium of daily chores. The leisure class indulged in pleasures, but also began to enquire into the true meaning of pleasure. Questions about happiness, goodness, virtue, and justice became important topics of discussion.
This period was accompanied by a new awareness of interiority, autobiographical memory, and social memory. Human beings looked at themselves looking at nature. This marked the beginning of culture, language, and symbolic thinking.
It was also the beginning of the theology of progress and the hubris of modernity, which culminated in the present global market economy, nation-states, and advanced technology, including Artificial Intelligence, accompanied by mass consumption.
The downside of this incredible human accomplishment has been colonisation, slavery, environmental degradation, inequality, violence, and intermittent wars. Large stockpiles of nuclear weapons, accelerating climate change, and dwindling supplies of fossil fuels and freshwater are adding to the severity and urgency of the threat to human survival.
I believe we must confront this difficult reality:
Are human beings on the brink of extinction?
And, is it time to think of the second axial age?
Let me know what you think.
Continued in The Second Axial Age →
Swami Bodhananda, 10 August 2026