The large scale organization, dynamics and material properties of biological active matter, are set by an intricate interplay of its constituent elements actuated by molecular scale motors. One prime example for this, is the cytoskeleton, a highly crosslinked cytoskeletal networks, which actuates our cells. Two other examples are suspensions of swimming microbes, or carpets of cilia that coat ciliated tissues and pump fluid in our lungs, kidneys and brains. Thus, to decipher how complex biological systems are controlled by molecular scale processes, and to build bioinspired controllable active matter systems in the lab, theory that derives the emergent properties of an active material from microscale interaction rules is needed. In this talk, I will discuss our progress in deriving large scale continuum theories for active matter from simple micro-scale interactions rules and motor models. I will touch on two classes of systems: (i) highly crosslinked network of polymer filaments and molecular scale motors that use chemical energy to do work; and (ii) suspensions swimming microbes or motor-proteins, that do work on their environment by going though a periodic sequence of shapes, where fluid mediated interactions between particles can lead to the phase-synchronization of their duty cycles. I will also highlight how our theories can serve as predictive models of cytoskeletal active matter in-vitro and in-vivo contexts. In particular I will show how they explain microtubule fluxes in Xenopus meiotic spindles, contractions of the starfish actomyosin cell cortex, and cytokinetic rings in C. elegans zygotes.