World History: A Concise, Selective, Interpretive History of the World

Index

INTRODUCTION

This book provides a brief history of the world, focusing on major civilizations while employing a few strong interpretive themes. It could be used as a world history text for students and the ordinary public who are sometimes intimidated or overwhelmed by the detailed content of available history textbooks, or as a complementary book for world history classes. It could also benefit educated and intellectually inclined people by opening a stimulating topic of discussion. Upper division or graduate courses in historiography or philosophy of history might benefit from it as a review of world history, but also in the study of historiography as well. Ultimately, the book is didactic in nature and its goal is to teach history to students of history. In general, it presents an optimistic, if cautious, and realistic view of history in a coherent and meaningful narrative. It is hoped that through the understanding of history a new global ethic can ideally be envisioned and thereby achieved.

The main underlying premise in this book is that successful civilizations— ones providing safety, prosperity, and room for individual growth and creativity—have from ancient times to the present flourished when responding creatively to the major challenges of their time and their environment. Second, many successful civilizations appear to have a life span of about two hundred years or some multiple of that number (e.g., the Greek’s Golden Age, the Romans, the Persians, the Chinese Han Dynasty). This number might be a consequence of the life span of individual human beings, about thirty years, with two hundred years constituting about six generations. These six generations might be divided into two first generations (father and son) of visionaries, two second generations of benefactors, and then two generations of critics. This hypothesis assumes the father-son relationship to be more direct, stronger, and more real than ideal. Third, throughout the dialectical process and cycles of integration and disintegration (or centralization and decentralization), societies tend to move toward expansion of greater human intellectual and political unity.

By approaching history in this way, employing philosophy while exploring civilizations, we can arrive at more creative interpretations that challenge us to engage in a new dialogue about the meaning and direction of where we’ve come from and where we’re headed.

Chapter Summaries

Chapter 1 begins with a brief description of the earliest human beings, from the hunting and gathering stage of the Paleolithic Age to the first human settlements in the Neolithic Age, but it moves on to focus on the first civilizations in Mesopotamia and Egypt. These two civilizations developed in a challenging environment—hot and arid, with little rain or natural vegetation, but with rich soil. As populations at the edge of the water increased, and with them competition for land, the choice became whether to fight and kill each other off or cooperate and organize to create a sophisticated political organization to carry out the immense task of building larger and larger irrigation canals to take the water inland. They chose the latter—to cooperate for the good of all. With a large population came the need for science, math, and technologies to develop, part of which are still in use today.

In spite of this similarity, the differences in their worldview, on life and the afterlife, are discussed as the manifestation of the different environments within which they developed. This chapter shows the first major recorded example of how very difficult challenges, when responded to by creative visions, led to the first two successful civilizations, around 3000 BCE.

Chapter 2 takes us to the Greeks, who faced a different type of challenge. Like some other great civilizations, they faced shortages of land and food that prevented them from having a standing army. But their response to this challenge ended up helping them. Here, absence of wealth forced them to be creative. Lack of sufficient resources to own a standing army led to a people’s army (Haplite phalanx), and lack of sufficient flat agricultural land led to migrations to remote lands along the shores of the Mediterranean Sea and even the Black Sea. These colonies kept their strong sense of unity in vision (panhellenism—thanks to Homer’s epics) and by often going back to the motherland for religious and sports ceremonies. On the other hand, the Greeks were extremely individualistic. The golden balance between individualism and unity of vision (the secret of all successful civilizations—including that of the present-day United States) was a major factor leading to the two hundred years of their Golden Age, including the achievement of the first democracy. They also invented vowels, which contributed to a more precise expression in written language, making it possible to read Homer in foreign lands without much help, as well as to develop the concepts of philosophy.

The Greek Golden Age ended when the exquisite balance between a strong individualism and a strong sense of group identity and cooperation shifted to selfish individualism. Many lessons of their success and eventual decline could be applied today.

Chapter 3 moves us to the next two great world empires—the Persians and the Romans, about five hundred years apart—whose shared challenges involved controlling large areas of land. As the first real empire, the Persians had to employ tolerance toward others’ beliefs and customs in order to rule their large Achaemenid Empire, which lasted two hundred years. Creative organizations such as states (satrapies) and the pony express were among their achievements. The Romans, starting with a republican form of government, gradually transformed into what became the golden age of the Roman Empire (which also, interestingly, lasted two hundred years), starting with Augustus. Roman success came largely from embracing Greek achievements and then expanding geographic boundaries and spreading their civilization to many more people. Again, the lessons of a society shifting from republic to empire can be applied to the United States, and re-examining the collapse of the Roman Empire can offer much from which we can learn today.

Chapter 4 examines medieval Europe and the rule of the Church in the chaotic aftermath of the collapse of the Roman Empire in the fifth century. Here—not unlike the rise of the mullahs in the chaotic aftermath of the Safavids’ collapse, which ultimately brought theocracy to present-day Iran—the Catholic Church rises to power to fill the sociopolitical vacuum and the challenge of political and spiritual chaos. It collapses after two hundred years of success from the eleventh century to the thirteenth century.

Within the larger down cycle of the Middle Ages are the three minor cycles of the Early, High, and Late Middle Ages. With the collapse of the Roman Empire (in Western Europe) the mostly chaotic Early Middle Ages followed. The High Middle Ages represents the apex of political security, organization, and intellectual and artistic creativity of that time—all under Church domination. The Late Middle Ages, often referred to as the worst period in European history, experienced not only political wars and religious interfighting and confusion within the Catholic Church but also a fearsome plague that wiped out nearly half the population of Western Europe. Not surprisingly, these terrible crises prepared the stage in Europe for a tremendous breakthrough, the Renaissance (~1400), and then two other innovative and visionary cycles, each lasting approximately two hundred years, the Scientific Revolution (~1600), followed by the contemporaneous French (political) and Industrial revolutions (~1800), for a total of six hundred years, from approximately 1400 to 2000.

The rest of the world did not sit idle during this time, although nowhere else did it produce anything remotely comparable to the lasting influence of the European Renaissance.

In Chapter 5, we explore the rise of religion/philosophy in India and China and compare the two. The main challenge in India was an intellectual one. That means, different interpretations of Hinduism responded to and complemented each other. That led to Bhagavata, Jainism, and Buddhism. In China, on the other hand, the need to resolve the prevailing political chaos led to the complementary visions of Daoism, Legalism, and Confucianism. In addition to the syncretistic nature of the Chinese philosophy and its comparison with Indian philosophies, this chapter examines the fundamental differences between Western and Eastern outlooks. The Western confrontational cosmic battle between forces of good versus evil originating with Zoroastrianism is compared with that of Eastern complementary dualism of yin and yang, rooted in Daoism.

Chapter 6 focuses on Islamic civilization and civilization in Africa, starting with an explanation of how the grand Islamic vision solved the immediate and local challenge of tribally divided Arabia and subsequently created a vast empire united economically, scientifically, and intellectually. Through three consecutive periods, each lasting about two hundred years, the Islamic civilization managed to grow until its collapse after Mongol invasions. The early period was that of the more centralized caliphates of Umayyad and Abbasid (650-850). The middle period witnessed decentralization and the rise of regional dynasties (850-1050). In the last period, a larger and more centralized period of the Seljuks dominated the Islamic world in the Middle Eastern region (1050-1250).

The examination then diverts to sub-Saharan Africa and the three climate zones in which three different civilizations, each facing its own particular challenge, developed: the centralized Islamic civilization, created by the kingdoms of Ghana and Mali (trans-Sahara trade challenge); the centralized Christian kingdom in Ethiopia (agricultural challenge); and the advanced and sophisticated decentralized Swahili civilization on the east coast of Africa (how to succeed in trans-sea trade, similar to that of Italy during the Renaissance and almost the same time).

In Chapter 7, we revisit Western Europe as it emerges from the Middle Ages into modern times. While the fifteenth century mainly embraced the new vision of the Renaissance, sixteenth-century Europe faced the challenge of the Protestant Reformation. For the first time in Western Europe, religious truth was not unique but rather tested by two claims for the same God.

This next new vision comes roughly two hundred years after the Renaissance, in the 1600s, when Europe was being torn apart by fervent and bloody religious wars between Catholics and Protestants to contend for the ultimate truth. European intellectuals were now faced with the question of whether any real truth could be objectively verified, tackling endless subjective and cumbersome theological arguments to that end. The Scientific Revolution, challenging medieval dogmatism, sought new understanding of the universe and the role of human beings in it.

A century later, in the 1700s, the battle against the Church now won, the age of Enlightenment sought to apply the newly discovered methodology of science to a completely new field. The question was, Can human beings study and understand themselves from a scientific standpoint both socially and as individuals? From this eventually emerged the birth of behavioral and social sciences, which challenged the old medieval concepts of humanity.

Toward the beginning of the nineteenth century—four centuries after the Renaissance of the fifteenth century and two centuries after the Scientific Revolution of the seventeenth century—two powerful new, simultaneous and related visions inspired by the Enlightenment changed Europe and the rest of the world: the French Revolution and the Industrial Revolution in Britain.

Chapter 8 surveys the sixteenth, seventeenth, and eighteenth centuries in the Middle East and India, when three major Islamic empires—the Ottoman, the Safavid, and the Mughal—ruled a vast region between Europe and China. How did each of these political entities/empires manage large territories of culturally and ethnically diverse lands? We investigate why the Ottomans lasted for six hundred years while the Safavids failed after two hundred years, and we examine the important interplay between them and the Europeans. We look at how the great constraints they imposed on trade forced Europeans to come up with a creative solution that proved fundamental to the rise of the West: establishing new sailing technology led not only to the accumulation of huge wealth but also to the discovery of new lands and new peoples. The chapter also studies developments in China and Japan between 1400 and 1800.

Chapter 9 discusses the French and Industrial revolutions in greater detail. These two fundamental transformations—favoring equal political rights and the right to pursue material wealth through industrial development—were far from smooth and peaceful, accompanied by horrendous death and destruction. But ultimately a Second Industrial Revolution transformed old Europe with the discoveries of electricity, oil, public health, zoning and city planning; and numerous advancements in the rights of workers, children, and women. A bright and happy Europe seemed to be at hand. In the field of biology, Darwin’s theory of the evolution of species revealed a new understanding of the origin of humanity, but misinterpretation of this theory often led to social Darwinism and racial theories that turned the previously progressive vision of nationalism into a racial nationalism—which in turn justified colonialism, imperialism, and two horrendous World Wars.

These shattering, breathtaking advances, as well as the euphoric victories over nature and the rest of the people of the world, were enjoyed only in the West. A small population, in an even smaller portion of the world, had now become the masters of the human race. Not only could they implement their superiority by physical force; they were now convinced they were socially and culturally superior and had created the freest societies in all human history. In a dangerous turn, they began to apply Darwin’s biological theory of the species to human social history. This misinterpretation of the survival of the fittest became accepted as natural and scientifically accepted as how the body works and led to the racist theory of social Darwinism.

In Chapter 10, we examine the new relationship between the two worlds, the West and the rest. We examine the astonishing sociopolitical and economic–military advances in the West and review how different parts of Asia and Africa responded to this configuration and imbalance. We look at the Islamic world and the different and mostly unsuccessful alternative paths taken by their leaders and intellectuals in the form of traditionists, Westernizers, and socialists to solve their problems, as well as the alternative responses of Japan and China.

As the dialectical nature of history continuously shows us, we note how the West ironically becomes the victim of its own success, entering a new phase in which another scientific revolution emerges around the beginning of the twentieth century.

Chapter 11 discusses this new scientific revolution, which is still under way, in the form of quantum physics, new cosmology, and the theory of relativity. It is suggested that quantum physics broke not only the determinism paradigm of the Scientific Revolution but also the determinism in the social sciences established by the eighteenth-century Enlightenment. That prompts the re-xamination of the fundamental premises of the social sciences.

Modern physics also seems to affirm the author’s premise that every phenomenon in the universe moves in a cyclical, curvature pattern rather than a straight line. String theory, the frontier in discovering the ultimate subatomic unit of existence, appears to reflect the cyclical conception of human history. This, along with the speculation about pre-Big Bang multiuniverse theories in modern physics, forever crushes the border between science and philosophy, both of which are ultimately merging.

Chapter 11 also examines how this fundamental paradigm shift in physics has influenced the rise of modern arts, philosophy (existentialism), and social sciences.

Chapter 12 discusses the two World Wars and their aftermath in Europe, focusing on how the nationalism that united each country from divisive religious wars, combined with the destructive ideology of social Darwinism, led to the two most catastrophic conflagrations in history. It is also noteworthy to see that the Europeans, with so much history in common, had to go through such a painful, transformative experience to realize their commonality. Today they are united in such a way that one is unaware when passing from one country to another. Did it take those two horrifying wars for European countries to realize they have more in common than not? It is suggested that, in addition to the sociopolitical and economic conditions contributing to these wars, deep psychological anxiety caused by the sudden discoveries in modern physics that the universe is ultimately unknowable and unpredictable had an impact on causing the wars.

The ending of those World Wars also signaled the end of the old, corrupted, racial vision of nationalism. The vision of a grand unification of humanity, based on Marxist philosophy, was the legacy of the incomplete, deterministic understanding of science based on the old vision of the Enlightenment. A major flaw with the Marxist dialectical approach, however, was its primacy to violent confrontation as opposed to more accommodative opposition in the pursuit of a higher, more evolved synthesis.

In Chapter 13, we consider the recent history of the Arab and Islamic world to better understand the current situation in the Middle East. We survey the often-unsuccessful Islamic societies’ responses to modernity and the West. Political and intellectual leaders in Muslim-dominated lands have tied Western-style nationalism to different types of socialism. Although modern Islamism dates as far back as the Ibn Saud family in early twentieth-century Arabia, more recent versions of politically active and militaristic anti-West Islamics have sprung through. Unfortunately they have mostly been reactionary (reactive and hateful toward gender equality and human and religious rights achieved by the French Revolution).

The unsuccessful attempts to create a new advanced Islamic civilization may be due to the fact that the intellectuals and potential visionaries in Islamic societies have yet to synthesize their past with that of post-Enlightenment achievements.

The Palestinian-Israeli situation receives its own examination here as well. The creation of the nation of Israel cannot be understood simply as a colonial invention in isolation from the immediate conditions surrounding the Jewish people in the twentieth century or even in the larger context of Jewish history. We look at the possible resolution of this important issue—and perhaps the main challenge of our time—in the context of my larger approach to understanding history.

Although it was to some degree inspired by progressive ideas among a number of intellectuals who supported it, the Iranian Islamic revolution was aborted before it could realize its vision by the political domination of the brutal, self-installed clergy as personified in the medieval-minded Khomeini. Nonetheless, the world Islamist movement may call to mind the contradictions in the Protestant revolution in Europe. Protestantism, along with its progressive historic content, had its own fanatic, overzealous actors.

In the conclusion we assess where we are today and note the most pressing challenges facing humanity. Most prominent in this is the Palestinian-Israeli situation, which has morphed from a basic land-rights and secular political issue into an irrational and seemingly unresolvable religious conflict, attracting global sentiments and the dangerous intervention of outside powers.

It is suggested that the initial visions of the creators of Israel must be recast in light of present realities, namely the rights of the Palestinian people and the place of nationalism and religion in the larger global context.

The final resolution of this conflict could in the best scenario elevate humanity as a whole to a more advanced and unified body. With a new grand vision, the sons of Abraham may finally realize they are closer to one another than they thought.

Moreover, the elevation of the understanding of the meaning of God among the three primary religions could lead to a greater understanding between the Western and Eastern religions—and then even to resolve the apparent conflict between all truth seekers who divide themselves into theists and atheists.

CHAPTER ONE

The Earliest Civilizations in Mesopotamia and Egypt

Why Did They Appear? (The Challenge of the Land)

Recently, there has been an interesting and innovative approach to history by presenting human history in the larger context of the history of the universe. In big history the authors have tried to include the event of the Big Bang and the subsequent geological and biological development on Earth as a necessary component of explaining human history on Earth. The present work, in the spirit of this larger vision, albeit much more philosophically inclined, attempts to integrate the achievement of modern sciences from the Big Bang to general relativity and quantum physics in one human history—or at least part of humanity’s intellectual history. We will later examine how this recent understanding of the universe impacts our interpretation of the meaning of human history.

Let us take a quick look at what today’s science tells us about the beginning of time as we know it. The Big Bang, or the moment of creation of the universe, happened some 13.7 billion years ago. The Earth was created around five billion years ago (roughly two-thirds of the way back in time), but the remains of the oldest humanlike creature (Lucy) are known from only as far back as about 3.7 million years (remember that a billion is one thousand million), which is a very short time considering the age of the universe. The appearance of the oldest civilizations, the Sumerians and the Egyptians (5,500 years ago), is far more recent than that. If we consider the life of the universe as one year, these oldest of all civilizations appeared just a few seconds before midnight on December 31.

Until just a few decades ago, scientists believed that the universe always existed. Eternity was the perceived status of the universe. The Big Bang theory, now increasingly supported by scientific evidence, has replaced that view with a much broader view that includes not only the evolution of species as discovered by Darwin but also an evolutionary view toward all of existence. In the new cosmology, as scientists try to uncover the physical laws governing moments closer and closer to the instant of the Big Bang, they increasingly enter the realm of philosophical speculation as opposed to mere science. The understanding of the history of the universe cannot be separated from the understanding of the philosophy of existence. The urge to retry in light of the new scientific paradigm is irresistible.

On the other hand, in the super-small quantum level of reality, the statistical nature of particle movement (as opposed to a rational cause-and-effect nature) has opened the possibility of ultimate indeterminism in nature. Human beings, with the grayish matter called the brain, which is part of this physical universe, could well have a free will unexplained by science. Leaping into the social science explanation of human history, with the long approach of social historians (historians acting as sociologists), the fundamental understanding of historical explanation might have to be revised to include a directional urge toward a more historically advanced humanity. I am well aware that the previous era’s historicism and altruism have come to an end after leading to various types of authoritarianism, all in the name of historical truth. However, considering history as a series of meaningless and random events has devalued our lives to where we have become empty observers and neutral explainers, allowing fanatics of all types to fill the vacuum. Einstein’s relativity theory has been misinterpreted and has led to social relativism in much the same way Darwinism has been misconstrued to create social Darwinism.

How does all of this new information impact my telling of the story of humanity? Quite simply. Every so often, human societies have faced grave challenges. In spite of all the conditions and limitations imposed on them, their free choice of a creative, new vision that included all the past and went beyond all the present conflict moved humanity into a higher orbit of intellectual and material advancement. We are facing such a moment at this time in global history. In medieval times, petty divisions between Catholics and Protestants ended with a new vision of nationalism after more than a hundred years of bloodshed. A new, larger nationalism, as a new vision and new transcendence, corrupted itself with racial nationalism and led to the two bloodiest wars in human history (WWI and WWII). New socialism failed to bring the promised human unity. Now, in a new cycle back to religious transcendence, humanity is facing a new challenge, this one much graver and potentially more destructive than anything human beings have seen in the past. Only with awareness and a vision that includes all past religious beliefs can we minimize the damage and pass through this time into a bright, new future. It will not happen automatically; it depends on our collective free will.

Venus of Willendorf

1. PREHISTORIC PERIOD

Most historians refer to the period of time before the rise of writing systems, around 3500 BCE—which also coincides with the rise of the first human civilization in Mesopotamia, the Sumerian civilization—as the prehistoric period. Technically, this is a time before we can even talk about human history. However, because everything is related, in presenting human history, we shall begin with a brief description of these earliest human beings in prehistory from the hunting and gathering stage of the Paleolithic Age to the first human settlements in the Neolithic Age.

a. Paleolithic Age (One Million to Ten Thousand Years Ago)

There have been many ice ages in the life of the Earth. The last one started around one million years ago and ended about ten thousand years ago. The end of the last ice age coincided with a major revolution in human life, called the Neolithic Age, which included the Agricultural Revolution (the beginning of agriculture) and the domestication of animals, the two earliest steps of human beings to control nature. We will discuss the significance of this revolution later in our discussion of the Neolithic Age.

Let us now go back to the time before the last ice age and look at the evolution of our species. As we said, the oldest hominid discovered so far dates back to 3.7 million years and was found in Africa. It is a body of a short woman whom anthropologists call Lucy. Moving on through history for another few hundred thousand years to around 150,000 years ago, we come to another major discovery: the Neanderthals, who are not quite us. The most amazing discovery from this time is a Neanderthal gravesite. They not only buried their dead but also decorated the bodies with flowers. Even more fascinating and telling about who they were and what they thought is that they buried tools along with the dead. What do you think that tells us about the Neanderthals? They were thinking about life and death and what happens after death. In other words, they were philosophical beings, just like us. As far as we know, no other creature does that. They believed there is life after death, which is why they laid the tools with the bodies, to be used in the afterlife. They respected death, as indicated by their adornment with flowers. Only human beings do that.

If you recall, we are still in the Ice Age or the Neolithic Age. From around forty thousand years ago, we have found the first traces of our species, homo sapiens sapiens, also known as Cro-Magnon or modern man. The earliest findings from our species are some small statuettes dating to about 25,000 BCE. They are all female figures with large hips and breasts, collectively called Venus of Willendorf (see photo). Why do you think these statuettes were made? Were they decorative figures? Were they toys for their children? Were they sex enhancement objects?

From what we can speculate, their function was none of the above. These objects had religious significance and were goddesses. The female body produces life; women nourish and sustain life. These statuettes were perhaps paths to communicate with the forces of nature in the hope that they would give them the blessings of fertility and therefore guarantee the survival of the group or the tribe.

Lascaux Cave Paintings

Moving in time to around 13,000 BCE, we find some extraordinary archeological findings in a major cave network in Lascaux in southern France, with beautiful cave paintings (see images). In these huge and dark caves, we have discovered large paintings, images of wild animals such as horses, bulls, oxen, and other hunted animals, some showing arrows piercing their bodies. Why did these humans paint these images? What was the significance of these paintings? Were they done to pass the time? Were they instructions for how to hunt? Were they just decorations and for pleasure?

The most plausible answer, based on what we know of other recent prime cultures we find today in Africa, South America, and Asia, is that these paintings had important religious significance and piercing might have served similar function as the more recent voodoo practice in South America. Considering the time these paintings were done (before the Agricultural Revolution and the domestication of animals) and that the lives and survival of these people depended solely on a successful hunt, we can appreciate the religious value of these images. This was also a way to communicate with the forces of nature at a time when the divine had not been separated from natural and supernatural forces. This respect for nature, long forgotten when later dogmas taught us to believe we are here to dominate (and even destroy) nature, not to live in harmony with it, could have been seen until recently, for example, in the Native Americans’ treatment of nature and appreciation of what it gives them.

You might have heard of the buffalo dance in which the natives would embark on a hunting mission with ceremony, music, and dance. When they succeeded and brought back their gift of nature, they treated the animals as though they were escorting a dignitary into the village, also with music and dance, not just to show how happy they were but to also thank nature for the blessing.

This brings us to the important notion of the most basic definition of religion. In the most general sense, one can say religion is about survival. From these early and primitive cultures to the modern Christian faith, in which faith in God guarantees eternal life in heaven, we see this deep and fundamental human yearning for survival. Egyptians longed for it too when they built the magnificent pyramids to preserve the bodies of their pharaohs, equipping the tomb with everything he or she might need in the next life. The only major difference between these early religions and later more sophisticated ones is the rigidity of their dogmas, the later religions creating the concept that humans are separate from nature.

b. Neolithic Age (Ten Thousand to 5,500 Years Ago) The Age of the Agricultural Revolution and the Domestication of Animals

As we mentioned earlier, the Paleolithic Age (New Stone Age) corresponded to the last ice age, which lasted from about one million to about ten thousand years ago (or 8000 BCE). Perhaps as a result of the melting of the ice and exposure of the dry land, the end of this ice age produced the opportunity for agriculture. This in turn resulted in a profound transformation in the way human beings lived and set the stage for more rapid cultural development. With the start of the Neolithic Age, the tribes, instead of moving around all day and spending the energy of all the members to find nuts and fruits or meat, began to settle down in villages (they no longer needed to be in caves because of the warming of the climate at the end of the last ice age).

In addition, instead of chasing animals for their meat, milk, and skin, they brought them inside fences and raised them close to their huts. These major steps in controlling nature worked well in freeing a surplus of human energy (and therefore a surplus of time) and led to a major creative expansion. Building huts and boats and making pottery, along with specialization of religion by some members of the group who claimed to have the power to communicate with the forces of nature, set the foundation for the first civilizations, which came about five thousand years later (see the timeline).

2. BRONZE AGE (3500-1500 BCE) THE BEGINNING OF CIVILIZATION

Most of this chapter focuses on the first civilizations in Mesopotamia and Egypt. These two civilizations both appeared in a very challenging environment—hot, arid, with little rain or natural vegetation. The soil in these two areas was agriculturally productive. With the increase in population at the edge of the water and competition for land, the major choice these humans faced was either to fight and kill each other off or cooperate and increasingly organize to create a sophisticated political organization to carry out the immense task of building larger and larger irrigation canals to carry the water inland. They chose the latter—to cooperate for the good of all. With a large population came the need for developing science, math, and technology much of which are the basis of our science and technology today. In short, the challenge was hard, but the reward was great: They gave humanity the gift of the first two civilizations and all their lasting impacts.

Map of Ancient Near East

Ziggurat of Ur

These two civilizations were a major step in the development of human society, and by far the most dramatic change came with the formation of political systems; social stratification (creation of social classes); the beginning of the first writing system; and, as the name of this age implies, the first use of metal— bronze—for tools and weapons. Ironically, the first civilizations appeared in the least likely places where, in general, there was little rain or natural vegetation growth. In examining the first four major civilizations, Mesopotamia, Egypt, India, and China, we observe interesting similarities. All four faced the challenge of the shortage of agricultural water. There was not much natural moisture from rain and, therefore, not much natural vegetation, such as one might find in Europe or Hawaii. Ironically, these four earliest civilizations in human history all began in geographic and climatic conditions that were more desertlike, and therefore harder to live in, compared to many other parts of the world where there is more natural greenery and milder conditions. Throughout this book we will also see why different types of challenges facing different groups of humanity, if responded to in a cooperative and creative ways, has been the source of success in producing great civilizations in human history. And, when this delicate balance of individual value and unifying vision had seized to exist, their collapse had been inevitable.

Although there are major similarities between the cultures of the Sumerians and the Egyptians regarding the main causes of their appearance as mentioned above, however, there are notable differences, mainly in their cultural outlooks and the manifestation of the different environments within which they developed. This chapter shows the first major recorded example of how very difficult challenges, when responded to by creative visions, led to the first two successful civilizations around 3000 BCE.

a. Sumerians: The Beginning of Civilization (3500 BCE)

The first civilization arose in a land not known for peace and productivity in our time: the south of modern Iraq, bordering Iran, and on the tip of the Persian Gulf. This land is situated between the two famous rivers, the Tigris and the Euphrates, and is also known as Mesopotamia (the land between two rivers). (See the map.)

Some have argued that the advantages of the first use of metal, bronze, as opposed to the use of stone (during the Paleolithic and Neolithic Ages) for tools, and especially for weapons, allowed for more efficient military control of the masses and therefore much larger political entities. This first civilization, called Sumerian, was actually a collection of large, independent cities (city-states), having populations of tens of thousands of people as opposed to Neolithic villages and tribal formations with as few as a hundred members and without any social division and social classes. The names of some of the most important of these city-states were Ur (the biblical birthplace of Abraham), Uruk, Legash, and Babylon (which became the center of a few kingdoms later in time). (See the map.)

Why Here?

One might wonder, out of the many places in the world where there are more natural resources (vegetation and forests) and milder climates, why the first civilization (similar to the second, third, and fourth civilizations in Egypt, India, and China, respectively) would appear in the semi-arid, desertlike environment such as that south of Iraq.

The answer to this important question could be based on two factors: (1) facing a major challenge and (2) big rewards in successful response to that challenge. Yes, surviving in such a harsh environment was tough. However, the highly productive topsoil around the Tigris and Euphrates was a big plus. The explanation goes as follows: The topsoil around the rivers was fertile, but because there was not much rainfall, if the people could cooperate and create irrigation systems to take the water out of and away from the rivers, there would be significant rewards. The increasingly larger size of irrigation canals required more and more people to come together and organize to carry out these large public works projects. Extension of the water into the land meant more food, and more food meant better survival and a larger population. A larger population meant more capability to carry out larger and larger projects, which required more organization of the people to perform works for the common good. This is exactly the definition of political organization. We see the same concept at work in the barren desert of northeast Africa, where the second greatest civilization, Egypt, appeared a few hundred years after Mesopotamia. The topsoil around the Nile River, as in Mesopotamia, was fertile. All that was needed to create a thriving civilization was a new vision that would benefit everyone. So they increasingly organized to build irrigation canals to move the water out. That is why the ten miles around the river defined that civilization.

The concept of challenge, as mentioned, is one of the main themes I am carrying throughout this book, and we will apply that concept again and again to other civilizations. The idea is that the greater the challenge, if it were responded to in the right way, the greater the civilization. In fact, the argument is that all successes, even in personal life, are mostly the result of facing and resolving challenges rather than giving up or being indifferent to them.

The Sumerians in Mesopotamia not only invented the first known writing system, called cuneiform, but they also invented the foundations for mathematics, geometry, and astronomy. Later on in Mesopotamia, the Babylonians created the first written law in human history, thousands of years before the Romans.

Again, as we suggested earlier, these important advances were a result of the need for solving real problems in society and not born out of curiosity or wanting to spend leisure time. The large numbers of people in these big city-states required inventing a method of regulating the exchange of goods, which required mathematics. Defining the limits of land ownership and constructing buildings required geometry. Writing was created to keep records and to communicate. However, one of the most significant impacts of the invention of the writing system was the accumulation of knowledge and its transmission from one generation to the next. This led to a rapid expansion of knowledge so that nothing from the past would be lost to future generations.

However, one of the major contributions of the Sumerians that has survived is in literature: their masterpiece and the first known epic work in history, the Epic of Gilgamesh. This epic work precedes Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey by three thousand years and the Old Testament by at least two thousand years. It tells us much about their beliefs and worldview and their major concerns in life.

The Epic of Gilgamesh contains multiple meanings, and there are stories within the story. The story is about a prince (real or legend, we don’t know) of Legash who is in search of a plant that brings eternal life. Gilgamesh’s beloved friend had died, and he heard about a magical land in which a plant grows that brings the dead back to life and whose consumption will guarantee eternal life.

So he embarks on an adventurous journey, which resembles the contemporary adventures of Indiana Jones. On the way to his final destination, he passes a strange land with strange creatures, and he faces dangers. He learns that in this land lives a man named Utnapishtim, a prophetic figure who knows where to find the plant. He sets off to find him.

Meanwhile, the story of Utnapishtim is in itself another story that very closely resembles the biblical story of Noah and the flood in the Old Testament. He and his family have been saved from a major flood that a vicious god had created to destroy humanity (unlike the biblical story in which the flood is the result of God’s disappointment for humanity’s wrongdoing, this flood is created just so a god could have fun watching humans desperately drowning). In this story, a good god gave instruction to Utnapishtim to save his family, himself, and the animal kingdom by building an ark that could hold all of his family and a pair of males and females from every animal species to save them from this massive flood. In fact, the god gives Utnapishtim the dimensions of the ark he needs to build, the length, height, and depth, almost identical to the story of the flood in the Bible.

This story, which goes back to around 3000 BCE, was apparently written some two thousand years before the writing of the Old Testament and probably is the origin of the biblical story. There are several important concepts to be mentioned here. First, if we understand religion, and especially stories in the Bible (or Quran, or any other scripture for that matter), as having didactic meaning behind them and as representing something bigger and more important than just the chronology of a historical event, we should appreciate them even more rather than discard them as mere duplications or copying from previous legends. That means, for the story of the flood in the Bible, those who desire to understand the deeper meaning would still hold its original intention and, therefore, its values. Religion is always about symbolic representation of deeper meaning in the human mind, incapable of understanding logically, and human language, incapable of expressing it comprehensibly.

Sargon of Akkada

For those who are interested, the most recent advancements in quantum physics and relativity are generally accompanied by such terms as weird or strange by the great physicists of our time not because something is wrong with physics but rather because our language, which is the result of our human experience, is not capable of properly describing that about which we have no common experience.

It is not surprising then that, although the two stories seem identical, there are two distinct contexts for each one. In the Mesopotamian flood story, the flood happens because the god just wants it to happen, for no good reason. In the Israelite story, it is about morality. God’s punishment is for the wrongdoing of the human race and not a random act. It is to teach humanity to be moral and observe ethical principles.

So far we have discussed the biblical connection of the story, or the story within the larger story, of Gilgamesh. So what happens in the Gilgamesh story?

He finally reaches the place where Utnapishtim lives, happy that he now can learn the location of the plant of eternal life, but he encounters an unwilling and ambivalent Utnapishtim, who is not ready to tell him where to find this plant. Gilgamesh begs and begs Utnapishtim, but to no avail.

Utnapishtim asks him in a prophetic tone: My son, don’t you know eternal life belongs only to gods and human beings are condemned to die?

God Shamash giving

code of law to Hamurabi

of the Old Babylonians

(Amorites)

With more insistence from Gilgamesh and finally with the intervention of Utnapishtim’s wife, he gives the location of this plant to Gilgamesh. Happy again, Gilgamesh sets off to his final destination, and, after going through some adventurous encounters, he finds the plant of eternal life. The story ends with an amazingly annoying ending in which Gilgamesh loses the plant on the way home to his city!

But there is an important meaning to the story, showing us a deep reflection of the mindset of the Mesopotamians regarding life and death. It relates how these people seriously probed into the meaning of life and death and how pessimistically they viewed the afterlife, or in better words, the lack thereof. This story resembles the philosophies of great existentialist thinkers of the twentieth century, such as Albert Camus, Kafka, and Sartre. The fact that we find the same story about two thousand years later in the culture of other Mesopotamian civilizations, such as the Assyrians, tells us how important this story and its meaning was to the people of Mesopotamia. With their great achievement, Sumerians started a megacycle that lasted at least five cycles (of two hundred years each), or roughly around one thousand years.

b. The Akkadian Invasion (2370 BCE)

The Sumerian civilization came to an end when people from the north in Mesopotamia invaded the more advanced civilization in the south. Under the leadership of their famous king, Sargon (see the photo), they controlled the area until the rise of another power, the Babylonians. The Akkadians were from a Semitic ethnic, cultural, and linguistic background (Jews and Arabs are two of the most well-known Semitic people—you might have heard of anti-Semitism being mostly associated with being anti-Jewish; however, Arabs are also a Semitic people). After our discussion of the Egyptian civilization, we will discuss other civilizations such as the Persians, Greeks, Romans, and Indians. These peoples belong to another important ethnic background