There are periods when history changes, not just in little ways, or in ways confined to a single country or region, but in a manner such that fundamental shifts in human understanding occur. Here are two examples of what I mean:

German psychiatrist and philosopher Karl Jaspers (1883-1969) called it the Axial Period, roughly the eighth to second century BCE, and mostly centered in the two centuries from 800 to 600. In that historically small time period, most of the world’s great pre-Christian religious movements and philosophical lines developed, and the consciousness of humanity changed. Confucius (555-478 BCE) and Buddha (567-487 BCE) were almost exact contemporaries as was Zoroaster, according to the best approximation, as well as Lao Tzu, founder of Taoism, and Mahavira, who is the most probable founder of Jainism. In the Middle East, the line of monotheistic prophets that began with Amos of Tekoa midway through the eighth century reached its culmination near the end of the sixth century with Deutro-Isaiac Judaism. At this same time, in the Northern Mediterranean, the Greeks were experiencing the birth of philosophical speculation with the work of Thales and his successors. And in Athens, democracy was established.1

In modern times, although it may […]