Meredith Sprunger's Synopsis of The Urantia Book
Synopsis of Paper 69
PRIMITIVE HUMAN INSTITUTIONS
1. Emotionally, man transcends his animal ancestors in his ability to appreciate humor, art, and religion. Socially, man exhibits his superiority in that he is a toolmaker, a communicator, arid an institution builder.
2. Man should control his institutions rather than permit himself to be dominated by these creations of advancing civilization. Human institutions are of three general classes:
1. The institutions of self‑maintenance...
2. The institutions of self‑perpetuation...
3. The institutions of self‑gratification...
These three groups of social practices are intimately interrelated and minutely interdependent the one upon the other.
3. Primitive industry slowly grew up as an insurance against the terrors of famine .... Wealth is not a natural gift; it results from labor, knowledge, and organization... The time element in labor, the idea of doing a given task within a certain time limit, is entirely a modern notion.
4. The necessity for labor is man's paramount blessing. The Prince's staff all worked; they did much to ennoble physical labor on Urantia. Adam was a gardener; the God of the Hebrews labored—he was the creator and upholder of all things ,,, But many of the religions of the world reverted to the early ideal of idleness. Jupiter was a reveler, and Buddha became a reflective devotee of leisure.
5. All down through the ages the taboos have operated to keep woman strictly in her own field. Man has most selfishly chosen the more agreeable work, leaving the routine drudgery to woman. Man has always been ashamed to do woman's work, but woman has never shown any reluctance to doing man's work. But strange to record, both men and women have always worked together in building and furnishing the home.
6. The medicine men were the first human beings to be exempted from physical toil; they were the pioneer professional class. The smiths were a small group who competed with the medicine men as magicians. Their skill in working with metals made the people afraid of them. The "white smiths" and the "black smiths" gave origin to the early beliefs in white and black magic.
7. Smiths were the first nonreligious group to enjoy special privileges ... But through gross abuse of these privileges the smiths became universally hated, and the medicine men lost no time in fostering hatred for their competitors. In this first contest between science and religion, religion (superstition) won. After being driven out of the villages, the smiths maintained the first inns, public lodginghouses, on the outskirts of the settlements.
8. The origin of one of the earliest castes of priests, apart from the tribal medicine men, was due to the superstitious exaltation of a family of expert swordmakers. The first group specialists in industry were rock salt exporters and potters... The early traders were women; they were employed as spies, carrying on commerce as a side line. Presently trade expanded, the women acting as intermediaries‑jobbers. Then came the merchant class, charging a commission, profit, for their services.
9. The first barter was conducted by armed traders who would leave their goods on a neutral spot. Women held the first markets; they were the earliest traders, and this was because they were the burden bearers; the men were warriors. Very early the trading counter was developed, a wall wide enough to prevent the traders reaching each other with weapons. A fetish was used to stand guard over the deposits of goods for silent barter.
10. For ages silent barter continued before men would meet, unarmed, on the sacred mart place. These same market squares became the first places of sanctuary and in some countries were later known as "cities of refuge." Any fugitive reaching the market place was safe and secure against attack.
11. Modern writing originated in the early trade records; the first literature of man was a trade‑promotion document, a salt advertisement ... Writing progressed up through the stages of the "message stick," knotted cords, picture writing, hieroglyphics, and wampum belts, to the early symbolic alphabets. Message sending evolved from the primitive smoke signal up through runners, animal riders, railroads, and airplanes, as well as telegraph, telephone, and. wireless communication.
12. Capital is labor applied as a renunciation of the present in favor of the future ...The basic urges which led to the accumulation of capital were:
1. Hunger—‑associated with foresight...
2. Love of family...
3. Vanity...
4. Position...
5. Power ... The moneylenders made themselves kings by creating a standing army of debtors...
6. Fear of the ghosts of the dead—priest fees for protection ... The priesthoods thus became very rich; they were chief among ancient capitalists.
7. Sex urge—the desire to buy one or more wives...
8. Numerous forms of self‑gratification.
13. Poverty became so abhorred that only the rich were supposed to go direct to heaven when they died. Property became so highly valued that to give a pretentious feast would wipe a dishonor from one's name.
14. Accumulations of wealth early became the badge of social distinction ... Even modern peoples revel in the lavish distribution of Christmas gifts, while rich men endow great institutions of philanthropy and learning. Man's technique varies, but his disposition remains quite unchanged.
15. Through capital and invention the present generation enjoys a higher degree of freedom than any that ever preceded it on earth. This is placed on record as a fact and not in justification of the many misuses of capital by thoughtless and selfish custodians.
16. Fire building, by a single bound, forever separated man from animal; it is the basic human invention, or discovery ... Fire was a great civilizer... The household fire ... was the first educator, requiring watchfulness and dependability. The early home was not a building but the family gathered about the fire, the family hearth. When a son founded a new home, he carried a firebrand from the family hearth.
17. Primitive man feared fire and always sought to keep it in good humor, hence the sprinkling of incense... It was a sin to extinguish a flame; if a hut caught fire, it was allowed to burn. The fires of the temples and shrines were sacred and were never permitted to go out... Women were selected as priests because they were custodians of the home fires.
18. The domestication of animals came about accidentally... The dog was the first animal to be domesticated ... The dogs keen sense of smell led to the notion it could see spirits, and thus arose the dog‑fetish cults ... Even now many still believe that a dog's howling at night betokens death.
19. When man was a hunter, he was fairly kind to woman, but after the domestication of animals, coupled with the Caligastia confusion, many tribes shamefully treated their women... Man's brutal treatment of woman constitutes one of the darkest chapters of human history.
20. Primitive man never hesitated to enslave his fellows. Woman was the first slave, a family slave ... Slavery was a great advancement over massacre and cannibalism... The hunter, like the American red man, did not enslave. He either adopted or killed his captives ... The Africans could easily be taught to till the soil; hence they became the great slave race. Slavery was an indispensable link in the chain of human civilization... it compelled backward and lazy peoples to work and thus provide wealth and leisure for the social advancement of their superiors.
21. The institution of slavery compelled man to invent the regulative mechanism of primitive society ... Slavery creates an organization of culture and social achievement but soon insidiously attacks society internally as the gravest of all destructive social maladies ... But it has always proved disastrous suddenly to liberate great numbers of slaves; less trouble ensues when they are gradually emancipated.
22. Today, men are not social slaves, but thousands allow ambition to enslave them to debt ... While the ideal of society is universal freedom, idleness should never be tolerated.
23. While primitive society was virtually communal, primitive man did not adhere to the modern doctrines of communism ... Communism was indispensable scaffolding in the growth of primitive society, but it gave way to the evolution of a higher social order because it ran counter to four strong human proclivities
1. The family. Man...desires to bequeath his capital goods to his progeny...
2. Religious tendencies. Primitive man also wanted to save up property as a nucleus for starting life in the next existence...
3. The desire for liberty and leisure... The improvident habitually lived off the thrifty...
4. The urge for security and power.
24. At first, all property, including tools and. weapons, was the common possession of the tribe... Sleeping space was one of man's earliest properties ...Presently a fire site conferred ownership; and still later, a well constituted title to the adjacent land. Water holes and wells were among the first private possessions. The whole fetish practice was utilized to guard water holes, wells, trees, crops, and honey.
25. In early days only the crops were private, but successive crops conferred title; agriculture was thus the genesis of the private ownership of land. Individuals were first given only life tenureship; at death land reverted to the tribe ... But the cities always reserved certain lands for public pasturage and for use in case of siege; these "commons" represent the survival of the earlier form of collective ownership.
26. Private ownership brought increased liberty and enhanced stability; but private ownership of land was given social sanction only after communal control and direction had failed.. . That which you have is vastly better than any system known to your ancestors. Make certain that when you change the social order you change for the better. Do not be persuaded to experiment with the discarded formulas of your forefathers. Go forward, not backward! Let evolution proceed! Do not take a backward step.
Discussion Questions
1. How do we control religious institutions?
2. Is woman's work today characterized by routine and drudgery?
3. Is trade still the major means of international relationships?
4. How are capital and power related to values today?
5. How do we prevent the improvident from living off of social welfare?
6. Is modern communism an example of evolutionary regression?
7. Is indebtedness a subtle form of slavery?
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