The Master Idea of the New Epoch is the name of a talk Mr. Bennett gave to students on the third course at Sherborne House, in 1974. The year before, he’d given a similar talk on my course. At the time, I heard it as a forecast of things soon to come. As a child of the 60’s, I related to the analogy that was used of institutions being like dinosaurs. That is, lumbering bodies with small brains that couldn’t adjust to the times and would die, leaving society in shambles. And that it would be up to small self-sufficient communities (like Claymont) to model a new paradigm.
Over the ensuing decades, we waited for the “unexpected” which Bennett had also predicted. “A catastrophic event will occur that no-one foresees.” Many of us heeded his call to “leave the cities by the 1980’s.” By then Claymont was well underway with vegetable gardens, farm animals, crafts, a healthy resident community and well-attended basic courses led by Pierre Elliot.
The Master Idea Fades
However, nothing catastrophic happened. Institutions and corporations continued to grow. The Master Idea began to fade into the background as we raised families, sought ways to support them, delt with relational and community issues, and times that were a changing. Just not as we’d expected. To survive, Claymont had to change too. Thus, the seminar business was born as fewer people remained on the property to support it.
Fast forward to 2016. Former members of the Claymont community had long established homes and lives of their own. Many had moved away. For my Claymont friends and me, society and politics had become hard to understand or relate to.
What was clear, was that the opposite of our vision of a New Epoch was taking root. Corporate aggregation and greed. Crippling bipartisan politics. Seemingly laughable Presidential and legislative candidates. Political blindness to the reality and danger of climate change. The assumption that “the truth” was immutable.
I’d all but forgotten Bennett’s talk about the future.
Re-enter the Master Idea
First a transcript, and then a very clear audio recording of Mr. Bennett giving the talk called The Master Idea of the New Epoch became available through the JG Bennett Foundation. This talk from 1974 has had a profound effect on me.
What seems obvious, is that fifty years ago, we were being told about the times we are in now. For some of us, we’re realizing that now is what we were being prepared for on those courses at Sherborne.
In his talk, Bennett lays out the long view in millions of years. He says real change happens incrementally, not through institutions or politics. This gives me hope in a near future I can help myself and others to navigate. I can use the Master Idea as a guide towards a new paradigm for society that I’m working towards through my own efforts.
To be continued…
“We will probably not know in our lifetimes whether we are serving as deathbed attendants to a dying world or as midwives to the next stage of human evolution. We simply don’t know. So, what is it going to be? With nothing to lose, what could hold us back from being the most courageous, the most innovative, the most warm-hearted version of ourselves that we can possibly be?”
— Joanna Macy
This seems to be a big part of the work in front of us. Thank you for the quote!