TIMELINE of EVOLUTIONARY SPIRITUALITY

Meet the pioneers of modern spirituality’s most provocative idea

1600s

Jakob Böhme (1575–1624)
German shoemaker and mystic
The modern concept of evolutionary spirituality begins with Böhme, whose mystical insights revealed to him that God is striving to develop a world of increasing wholeness and perfection.

G.W. Leibniz (1646–1716)
German polymath
Picking up where Böhme left off, Leibniz’s scientific and theological genius produced the first broad conceptions of an evolution of biological species, which he saw as a process ordained by God.

1700s

Immanuel Kant (1724–1804)
German philosopher
A student of the works of Leibniz, Kant explored the idea that God’s physical laws are working to fashion the material world “by a natural evolution into a more perfect constitution.”

J.B. Robinet (1735–1820)
French philosopher
Ultimately derided for his belief in mermaids, Robinet was among the first to explore the idea that evolution is driven by a spiritual energy or “force.”

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749–1832)
German polymath
Embracing evolution as a spiritual process, Goethe’s theory of the development of plant morphology inspired both philosopher Friedrich Schelling and naturalist Charles Darwin.

J.G. Fichte (1762–1814)
German philosopher
A student and reinterpreter of Kant, Fichte proposed that both subjective mind and objective nature are the evolving ephemeral expressions of a transcendent consciousness.

1800s

F.W.J. Schelling (1775–1854)
German philosopher
Schelling, a student of Fichte, fused the mysticism of Böhme and the logic of Leibniz into an unprecedented vision of cosmic evolution that saw God fully pervading all levels of being.

G.W.F. Hegel (1770–1831)
German philosopher
Schelling’s erstwhile friend and professional rival achieved widespread acclaim for his in-depth treatises on Spirit as the guiding power behind humanity’s cultural development.

Lorenz Oken (1779–1851)
German naturalist
A student of Schelling, Oken’s scientific theories expanded on his mentor’s philosophy, proposing a mystical impulse behind the evolutionary transformations of living species.

Arthur Schopenhauer (1788–1860)
German philosopher
Another of Hegel’s rivals, he combined Eastern mysticism and Kantian idealism into a philosophy that made the evolutionary impulse, or “will to live,” a fundamental tenet of existence.

Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
American essayist
Profoundly influenced by German idealism, Emerson’s transcendentalism synthesized the Eastern notion of karma with the Western concept of evolution.

Alfred Russel Wallace (1823–1913)
English naturalist
Wallace famously developed his own theory of natural selection contemporaneously with Darwin, but he held that evolution also had a spiritual dimension.

Helena Blavatsky (1831-1891)
Ukrainian Theosophist
Founder of the Theosophical Society, she was largely responsible for the resurgence of occult thought and the popularization of an esoteric form of evolutionary spirituality in the late nineteenth century.

1900s

Richard M. Bucke (1837–1902)
Canadian psychiatrist
Following an experience of “cosmic consciousness,” Bucke composed a comprehensive chronicle of the evolutionary history and future potential of the human psyche.

William James (1842–1910)
American psychologist
One of modernity’s foremost authorities on mystical experience, James applied an evolutionary perspective to the study of psychology and the development of consciousness.

Henri Bergson (1859–1941)
French philosopher
Bergson’s concept of the élan vital, or a “vital force,” behind the evolutionary process fueled his masterful writings, for which he earned the 1927 Nobel Prize in literature.

Rudolf Steiner (1861–1925)
Austrian polymath
Esotericism gained new notoriety through the work of Steiner, who wrote about the spiritual evolution of humankind from an occult and astrological perspective.

Alfred North Whitehead (1861–1947)
English mathematician and philosopher
Whitehead’s influential “process philosophy” essentially redefined God as a process inseparable from the evolution of the material universe.

Swami Vivekananda (1863–1902)
Indian mystic
Having introduced Hindu mysticism to the West, he found no incompatibility between Eastern concepts of spiritual growth and Darwin’s evolutionary theory.

Sri Aurobindo (1872–1950)
Indian mystic-philosopher
This enlightened thinker created a comprehensive synthesis of Eastern and Western philosophies and redefined spiritual practice as a conscious engagement with evolution itself.

The Mother (1878–1973)
French mystic
An esoteric evolutionist and spiritual partner of Sri Aurobindo, she saw evolution leading to a fundamental cellular transformation that would give rise to a new human species.

Alice Bailey (1880–1949)
English Neo-Theosophist
Expanding on the ideas of Blavatsky, Steiner, and other occult thinkers, Bailey’s writings laid the foundation for many New Age notions of spiritual evolution.

Pierre Teilhard de Chardin (1881–1955)
French priest and paleontologist
Influential beyond his lifetime, Teilhard challenged rigid dogmatisms in both mainstream science and Christianity with his inspired vision of the evolutionary destiny of human consciousness.

Julian Huxley (1887–1975)
English biologist
Member of the distinguished Huxley family, he popularized the idea that humanity is the first known species in which the evolving universe has become self-aware.

Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan (1888–1975)
Indian president
This statesman and scholar promoted the philosophy of German idealism alongside Eastern mysticism as he advocated an evolutionary vision for humanity.

Gerald Heard (1889–1971)
English historian
Heard’s studies on how individual consciousness evolves through focused intention led him to postulate the emergence of “leptoid man,” or human beings who have “leapt” to a higher state of being.

Dane Rudhyar (1895-1985)
French astrologer
Master of many disciplines, including music and astrology, Rudhyar saw evolution leading to a global awakening, which he outlined in his 1970 book The Planetarization of Consciousness.

Jean Gebser (1905–1973)
German cultural theorist
An influential forefather of contemporary “integral” theories of development, Gebser’s pioneering work focused on the evolution of human society, which he traced through five distinct stages of consciousness.

Arthur M. Young (1905–1995)
American inventor and philosopher
After developing the first commercial helicopter, Young’s innovative mind lifted off into the realm of cosmology and metaphysics to devise a new evolutionary theory of consciousness.

2000s

With many contemporary thinkers contributing important new insights to this ever-changing field, the history of evolutionary spirituality is still being written . . .