Chapter 5: Eurasian Cultural Traditions

            This chapter is one impressing and two interesting, it pretty much hands us a whole bunch of cultures and their traditions. All these cultures had something in common that happened all in a similar time zone where gods or spirits explained what happened in this world. In the reading these various cultures and the religions that follow have survived thousands of years such as Buddhism, Confucianism, Hinduism, Judaism, and Christianity. These beings of spirituality seemed to be similar to human beings though more powerful and all knowing. New ways in worshiping were coming in order and some source out in the universe a higher power shaped mankind and influenced a change of thinking. This new way of thinking included morals a way of living and a way of worshiping changed generations after.

            Two religions that really stood out to me were Confucianism and Buddhism. Confucianism impressed me because it really wasn’t about the all mighty god but the way of standard living and the morals that come along with life. Buddhism had changed the way I thought about the culture just because I am use to seeing a figurine with a round belly and that’s not who he is apparently it’s a man named Siddhartha Gautama a prince from a small north Indian state.  The people to follow Buddhism achieved enlightenment, but were taught nirvana and karma.

            As I was reading the book on page 126 to 127 the last paragraph contained all these questions and some analysis to why, and what happened. The question that stood out was “what is the relationship between human life in this world and the moral spiritual realms that lie beyond?”  And it says “precisely why various societies developed their own distinctive answers to these questions remains an elusive mystery a tribute, perhaps, to the unpredictable genius of the human imagination.” With these two quotes left me speechless because it just shows how outstanding the human mind is and how we can shape reality with a combination of high spirituality.

Chapter 4 Part 2: Eurasian Empires

Chapter four included some of histories finest moments with empires and civilizations clashing. The definition of an empire is states with political systems that exercise coercive power. Empires have generally a quantity of people with a variety of cultures within a single ruling system. From this chapter we get a taste of an ongoing feud between the Persian Empire and the Greeks. But this section does not stop there it keeps going with one of history’s greatest conqueror Alexander the great, and after that we get to see Roman, Chinese, and the collapse of empires.

            The Persian Empire (500B.C.E) is the largest and most impressive of the world’s empires was constructed on an imperial system. “It was centered upon an elaborate cult in which kingship and/or monarchs could only be approached through rituals, when a king died, sacred fires all across the land were extinguished” (Page 99). Two important rulers of the Persian Empires because they surpassed those before them is Cyrus (557-530 B.C.E.) and Darius (522-486 B.C.E), these monarch’s effectively earned their titles. Cyrus the man who won the gratitude of the Jews in 539 (B.C.E.) allowed those who were exiled in Babylon to return to their homeland and rebuild their temple in Jerusalem.

            The Greeks were an Indo-European civilization that took shape in a small peninsula that was divided by steep mountains and valleys. Greece was based upon hundreds of city states with around 500-5000 male citizens. What really impressed me about this civilization was their political life this idea of “citizenship” of free people running the affairs of state and equality for all citizens before the law. The council was composed of twenty eight men over the age of sixty who served for life and provided political leadership.

Chapter 3 Part 1: First Civilizations

            Honestly for the first month of school this was my least favorite chapter, it is repetitive, too factual and unorganized. By reading this chapter I learned about this global phenomenon where these huge civilizations were around the same time eras around 3500 to 1000 B.C.E. but scatter in 6 different regions of the world. However even though these cities were impressive and lead to a new way of life I learned that they eventually absorbed the homelands and abandoned them. Aside from these six big societies there were more minor civilizations that prevailed from this we have examples from Nubia south of Egypt and in China a city known as Sanxingdui from the Shang Dynasty.

            The only outcome that surely impressed me was not knowing the origins of these civilizations or knowing if they conflicted with other local cities or groups but the equality in classes. In the reading they pull out a quote from the epic story of Gilgamesh describing its city as “Even the great gods are kept from sleeping at night” pg 63, yes this is impressive but the classes that come within the city as the scribes create the rules but the farmers and peasants are slaves but even within that almost an inception of classes we accumulate greater knowledge of the importance of gender and education. As you read into the middle of the section you run into this word called patriarchy and they never fully give the definition but it is a system of society or government in which men hold the power and women are largely excluded from it. We see an example documented by a historian named Gerda Lerner and how in the second millennium of Mesopotamia started to create laws to enforce and offered women an extension of protection. This is huge it means that our ancestors really believed in equality to an extent and this goes to show that biases on sex is old news.

First Farmers

Chapter 2: First Farmers

            Even though last week I had read chapter 3 instead I don’t mind back tracking. In chapter I had read about the amazing evolution of the first farmers in the Neolithic era “agricultural revolution” and the first human process to operate on a global scale with initial settlement of the earth. What seemed most interesting was the coming of this agriculture revolution this represented a transformation in human life. Human farmers all over changed things putting up boarders and selective breeding this way taming and changing nature benefitted human kind. Through a long history people developed deep knowledge for this natural world, they learned how to make use of a larger number of plants, obtained the abilities to hunt and gather.  

            In the agricultural revolution new opportunities appeared with the improving conditions that came after the ice age, humans gained new knowledge and technology that helped communities to expand and exploited the environment.  The agricultural revolution led to an increase in human population, productivity increased, the ability to stabilize a community in great numbers because of productivity was huge.

Chapter 2: Writing And Power

Chapter two goes into detail about how writing has greatly impacted and influenced religion and power. What I learned from this section was that the development of writing withheld many advantages for a culture; we are talking about communication, religion, water regulations, agreements, and money. Religion, philosophy and literature go hand in hand in this chapter because with language you’re able to bind people together. Forms of writing are as old as humanity itself; even then cave paintings have been used to imply messages such as self-expression. What impressed me other than how many different languages that are around the world was they all contained a common theme and that was religion and how the earth was created or how we have a God or Gods. By studying written passages of creations from the bible, to rah, and rig veda, we are able to understand peoples cultures their values, morals, and their relationship to the world. Works of religion and the philosophy/ morals that come attached to it gives us a sense and the people who follow a sense of their past and missions to shape their collective thoughts. Writing offered cultures with that it possess certain advantages the ability to read and write elevated certain individuals, groups, and classes within cultures for example Greeks and the first New Testament author “Mark”, he wrote his gospel “around 70 C.E” in a common language and this creates complexity for religion as they were trying to convince the upper class they were expected to listen to these people and this changes history because it defies it. Language is so powerful because it creates these relationships and it pushes to traditions and rituals.  If we look more into the chapter and these sources of writings that given to us we can compare and contrast these similar themes of how the world was created with source 1: Excerpts from Atra-hasis, 2: excerpts from book 10 of the Rig Veda, and 3: Book of Genesis, this theme is a god that creates everything from nothing and we have a mother and a father which brings people all over the world together because we are all one brother and sister.