Condensed History of China
por Paul Frankenstein
Xia (c. 2200 – c. 1750 BC) 13
Shang (c. 1750 – c. 1040 BC) 13
Western Zhou (c. 1100 – 771 BC) 14
Eastern Zhou (771 – 256 BC) 14
Spring & Autumn Period (722 – 481 BC) 14
Warring States Period. 15
Qin (221 – 206 BC) 15
Han (206 BC – 220 AD) 15
Earlier Han (206 BC – AD 8) 15
Wang Man Interregnum.. 15
Later Han Dinasty. 16
Years of Dinunity: Three Kingdoms and Dinasties from North & South (220-590) 16
Sui (589 – 618) 16
Tang (618 – 907) 16
Song (960-1280) 17
Yuan (Mongol) (1279 – 1368) 17
Ming (1368 – 1644) 18
Qing (Manchu) (1644 – 1911) 18
Republican China (1911-1949) 19
The People’s Republic of China (1949- ) 20
Xia (c. 2200 – c. 1750 BC)
until fairly recently, most historians thought that it was a myth. But the archeological record has proven them wrong. Xia had descended from a wide-spread Yellow River valley Neolithic culture known as the Longshan culture, famous for their black-lacquered pottery
Shang (c. 1750 – c. 1040 BC)
There are three things to know about the Shang:
- one, they were the most advanced bronze-working civilization in the world;
- two, Shang remains provide the earliest and most complete record of Chinese writing; and
- three, they were quite possibly the most blood-thirsty pre-modern civilization. They liked human sacrifice — a lot.
- Fourth, the Shang had a very odd system of succession: instead of a patrilineal system where power was passed from father to son, the kingship passed from elder brother to younger brother.
Western Zhou (c. 1100 – 771 BC)
they used a father-to-son succession system. Also, they weren’t too keen on human sacrifice. However, they weren’t as good at working bronze as the Shang.
The Zhou actually didn’t rule all of what was then China. China was then made up of a number of quasi-independent principalities. However, the Zhou were the most powerful principality and played the role of hegemon in the area. They were located in the middle of the principalities, giving rise to what the Chinese call their country — the Middle Kingdom. The Zhou were able to maintain peace and stability through the hegemon system for a few hundred years; then in 771 BC, the capital was sacked by barbarians from the west.
Eastern Zhou (771 – 256 BC)
After the capital was sacked by barbarians from the west, the Zhou moved east.
The Spring and Autumn Annals provides a history of period saw a proliferation of new ideas and philosophies. The three most important, from a historical standpoint, were Daoism, Confucianism, and Legalism.
Daoism the oldest great book of Daoism, the Dao de Jing, The Way and Virtue, was allegedly written by a man named Lao-zi.. Daoism profoundly influenced the later development of Cha’an (also known as Zen) Buddhism.
Confucius believed that moral men make good rulers and that virtue is one of the most important properties that an official can have. He also believed that virtue can be attained by following the proper way of behaving, and thus placed a great deal of stress on proper. The Emperor was the Son of Heaven (while Heaven in a Western context is a place, Heaven in the Chinese context is a divine/natural force) and had the Mandate of Heaven to rule.
Legalism derived from the teachings of another one of Confucius’ disciples, a man named Xun-zi. Xun-zi believed that, for the most part, man would look out for himself first and was therefore basically evil. Consequently, the Legalists designed a series of draconian laws that would make a nation easier to control. The fundamental aim of both Confucianism and Legalism was the re-unification of a then divided China, but they took difference approaches. Confucianism depended on virtue and natural order; Legalism used a iron fist.
The politics of the Warring States period were much the same as those of the Spring & Autumn period; the major difference was that while in the earlier period, armies were small and battles lasted only a day, much like in pre-Napoleonic wars, the later period featured what modern strategists would call “totalwar.” Massive armies (half a million per army was not an uncommon figure), long battles, sieges, were all common features of the Warring States battlefield.
Qin (221 – 206 BC)
In 221 BC, the first Emperor of China (so-called because all the previous dynastic heads only called themselves kings), Qin Shihuangdi, conquered the rest of China after a few hundred years of disunity. There are two major reasons why he won; the first is that he was a devout Legalist (so much so that he burnt all the books in the country) and did things like execute generals for showing up late for maneuvers.. The other reason is because the state of Qin had a lot of iron, and consequently, at the dawn of the iron age, had many more iron weapons than the other armies did. He linked together many of the old packed-earth defensive walls of the old principalities into the Great Wall of China.
Han (206 BC – 220 AD)
Han is an important dynasty mostly because they developed (actually, it was invented by Qin Shihuangdi, but perfected by the Han) the administrative model which every successive chineese dynasty would copy and refine. China was the biggest country in the world. This is a management issue of tremendous proportions. How are you going to do things like collect taxes, keep the peace, and basically run a government without bureaucracy? The Chinese bureaucratic system is based on the study of the Confucian Classics, which provide an ideological reference point for proper behavior and loyalty to the Emperor. By developing this system, the Han emperors were able to run China with a reasonable degree of efficiency.
Between AD 8 and 25, a man named Wang Mang ruled China. He had been part of the Han royal household; he himself, however, was a commoner and had no royal blood in his veins. He had been appointed emperor after a power struggle in the Han house. History is mixed on him. While he did seem to have some good, reform-oriented ideas (e.g. power back to the people), he really wasn’t up to the task of ruling.
Wang Mang hoped to gather support from the peasantry be introducing reforms. He declared that a family of less than eight that had more than fifteen acres was obligated to distribute the excess amount of land to those who had none. His next act as Emperor was to devise a new loan system for peasants. Instead of paying the thirty percent interest that private loaners demanded, Wang Mang offered loans to those in needs with only ten percent interest. In an attempt to stabilize the price of grain, Wang Mang made plans for a state granary. He did this, hoping to discourage the wealthy landowner to hoard grain and profit from price fluctuations.
Wang Mang was convinced that his subjects would obey his decrees, but again gentry-bureaucrats gave less importance to Confucianism than to their wealth. They and other landowners did not cooperate with Wang’s reforms, and without large media like newspapers, the local people would remain unaware of any reforms if the landowners withheld the information.
In the year AD 11, the Yellow River broke its banks, creating floods from Shan Dong in the north, to where the river empties into the sea. The people did not have grain stored as Wang Mang said they should have. In addition, the people were left without food shortly after the crisis began. In the year AD 14, they resorted to cannibalism. Thinking that his reforms failed, Wang Mang withdrew them. However, it was too late, because his opposition already took up arms against him.After his death in AD 25, the Han royal family took back the reins of power, and set up the Later Han dynasty.
The later Han were able to keep it together for about 200 years; however, towards the end of their rule, they become more and more dissolute. More importantly, they were unable to deal with two factors: a population shift from the Yellow River in the north to the Yangzi in the south; and they simply could not control barbarian tribal raiders from the north, which were one reason why people were moving to the south. Eventually, in AD 220, the center had lost so much control to the provinces that it collapsed plunging China into 350 years of chaos and disunity.
Constants wars ramped through China, with little importance. Perhaps its greatest accomplishment was to reinforce in Chinese thought the importance of having “one Emperor over China, like one sun in the sky.”
Socially, though, there were two important developments. The first was that the ethnic Han Chinese kept on moving south, while ‘barbarians’ moved into the north and assimilated themselves into Chinese society. The second development was Buddhism, which had had its start in India sometime in the 6th century BC. It was introduced into China around the middle of the first century AD but really didn’t catch on until the fall of the Han dynasty.
Sui (589 – 618)
The most important thing to know about this dynasty is that it was very short (by dynastic standards) and that it did a pretty good job of re-unifying China. Because it had a northern power base, it was part barbarian, as was the Tang. Despite the fact that the royal houses of Sui and succeeding Tang were not entirely Han Chinese, both of these dynasties are considered to be Chinese, as opposed to the Mongols and Manchus later on.
Tang (618 – 907)
The Tang are considered to be one of the great dynasties of Chinese history; many historians rank them right behind the Han. They extended the boundaries of China through Siberia in the North, Korea in the east, and were in what is now Vietnam in the South. They even extended a corridor of control along the Silk Road well into modern-day Afghanistan.
There are two interesting historical things about the Tang. The first is the Empress Wu, the only woman ever to actually bear the title ‘Emperor’ (or, in her case, Empress).The second was the An Lushan Rebellion, which marked the beginning of the end for the
Song (960-1280)
The Song (pronounced Soong) dynasty ranks up there with the Tang and the Han as one of the great dynasties. A time of remarkable advances in technology, culture, and economics, the Song, despite its political failures, basically set the stage for the rest of the imperial era. The most important development during the Song was that agricultural technology, aided by the importation of a fast-growing Vietnamese strain of rice and the invention of the printing press, developed to the point where the food-supply sy
stem was so efficient that, for the most part, there was no need to develop it further. There was enough food for everyone, more or less, the system worked, and it became self-sustaining. Because it worked, there was no incentive to improve it; the system thus remained basically unchanged from the Song up until the twentieth century. In fact, many rice farmers in the Chinese interior and in less-developed regions of south-east Asia are, for the most part, still using Song-era farming techniques.
The efficiency of the system not only made it economically self-sustaining, but also re-enforced the existing social structure. Consequently, society and economics were largely static from the Song until the collapse of the dynastic system in the twentieth century.
This is important because one of the factors behind the Industrial Revolution in Europe was that they didn’t have enough people to work the fields. There was an incentive to create better technology in Europe; there was no need in China. China actually had a surplus of human labor.
While the Song was a time of great advances, politically and militarily, the Song was a failure. The northern half of China was conquered by barbarians, forcing the dynasty to abandon a northern capital in the early 1100’s. Then a hundred and fifty years later, the Mongols, fresh from conquering everything between Manchuria and Austria, invaded and occupied China.
Yuan (Mongol) (1279 – 1368)
While time of Mongol rule is called a dynasty, it was in fact a government of occupation. While the Mongols did use existing governmental structures for the duration, the language they used was Mongol, and many of the officials they used were non-Chinese. Mongols.
The Yuan dynasty also featured the famous Khubilai Khan, who, among other things, extended the Grand Canal. While in many ways, the Yuan was a disaster, the reluctance of the Mongols to hire educated Chinese for governmental posts resulted in a remarkable cultural flowering; for example, Beijing Opera was invented during the Yuan. On the other hand, attempts to analyze the failure of the Song in keeping barbarians out China led to the rise and dominance of Neo-Confucianism, a notoriously conservative (if not outright reactionary) brand of Confucianism that had originally developed during the Song.
Ming (1368 – 1644)
Then came the Ming. The Ming rulers distinguished themselves by being fatter, lazier, crazier, and nastier than the average Imperial family. After the first Ming Emperor discovered that his prime minister was plotting against him, not only was the prime minister beheaded, but his entire family and anyone even remotely connected with him. Eventually, about 40,000 people were executed in connection with this case alone. They were also virulent Neo-Confucianists.
In the early 1400s, a sailor named Zheng He (with a fleet of some 300-plus ships)sailed as far west as Mogadishu and Jiddah, and he may have gotten to Madagascar. But once the sailors came back, the trips were never followed up on. Conservative scholars at court failed to see the importance of them. For the first time in history, China was turning inwards, clinging to an incorrect interpretation of an outmoded philosophy.
Qing (Manchu) (1644 – 1911)
In 1644, the Manchus took over China and founded the Qing dynasty. The Qing weren’t the worst rulers; under them the arts flowered and culture bloomed. Moreover, they attempted to copy Chinese institutions and philosophy to a much greater extent than then the Mongols of the Yuan. However, in their attempt to to emulate the Chinese, they were even more conservative and inflexible than the Ming. Their approach to foreign policy, which was to make everyone treat the Emperor like the Son of Heaven and not acknowledge other countries as being equal to China.
Other problems that plagued the late (1840 onwards) Qing included rampant corruption, a steady decentralization of power, and the unfortunate fact that they were losing control on too many fronts at the same time. Rebellions sprouted like mushrooms after a rain. In hindsight, it is clear that the entire system was slowly collapsing.
The attitude of the Western powers towards China (England, Russia, Germany, France, and the United States) was ambivalent. On the one hand, they did their best to undermine restrictive trading and governmental regulation. On the other hand, they did do their best to prop up the ailing Qing, the most notable example being the crushing of the Boxer Rebellion in 1900 by foreign troops (primarily U.S. Marines). What the Western powers were interested in was the carving up of China for their own purposes, and that, paradoxically, required keeping China together.
But two things happened to prevent that. First, in 1911, the Qing dynasty collapsed and China plunged headlong into chaos. Second, in 1914, the Archduke Ferdinand told his driver to go down a street in Sarajevo he shouldn’t have, and Europe plunged headlong into chaos.
Republican China (1911-1949)
During World War I, the Chinese Government, such as it was, sided with the Allies. In return, they were promised that the German concessions in Shangdong province would be handed back over to the Chinese Government at the end of the war. They weren’t, and to add insult to injury, the Treaty of Versailles handed them over to Japan. On May 4, 1919, about 3,000 students from various Beijing universities got together in Tiananmen Square and held a mass protest. In the early 1920s, Dr. Sun Yatsen, as the leader of the (up-to-then unsuccessful) Nationalist Party (KMT), accepted Soviet aid. With the Communist help, Sun Yatsen was able to forge a alliance with the fledgling Chinese Communist Party (CCP), and started the task of re-unifying a China beset with warlords.
Unfortunately, Sun died of cancer in 1925. The leadership of the KMT was then taken over by Chiang Kaishek.
After Chiang took over the KMT, he launched his famous “Northern Expedition” — all the way from Guangzhou to Shanghai. This unified Southern China and, more importantly, let the Nationalists control the Lower Yangzi. Once they got to Shanghai, Chiang, who had never liked the Communists anyway, launched a massacre of CCP members. Among those who managed to escape the carnage was a young communist named Mao Zedong.
The Communists were forced to abandon their urban bases and fled to the countryside. There, the Nationalist forces (aided and abetted by German ‘advisors’) tried to hunt t
hem down, and in the words (more or less) of Chiang, “eliminate the cancer of Communism.” In 1934, the Nationalists were closing in on the Communist positions, when, under the cover of night, the Communists broke out and started running. They didn’t stop for a year. This was the Long March. When the Communists started, they had 100,000 people. A year later, when they finally stopped, they had traveled 6,000 miles, and were down to between four to eight thousand people.
While all this was going on, the Japanese were busy occupying Manchuria. This proved helpful for the Communists — the troops sent by Jiang to the North to contain and eventually eliminate the CCP much preferred to spend their time fighting the Japanese.
In 1937, the Japanese invaded China proper from their bases in Manchuria, using the notorious “Marco Polo” incident as an excuse. Once whole-scale war had been launched, it didn’t take the Japanese long to occupy the major coastal cities and commit atrocities. By the time that the war had ended in 1945, 20 million Chinese had died at the hands of the Japanese. The Nationalist Government fled.
In 1939, World War II started. This initally had little effect on the situation in China, as the Japanese were not involved with war in Europe. However, after the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941, the main thrust of the Japanese war effort turned away from fighting the Chinese and towards fighting the Americans.
After the Americans entered the war, the Communists started to consolidate their control over North China in preparation for the resumption of the civil war that would occur after the Japanese had been defeated. The Nationalists, in contrast to the Communists, were disorganized and corrupt, problems that would only intensify after the war. Moreover, their attempts to fight the Japanese were ineffective at best.
At the end of World War II, the war between the Nationalists and the Communists started up again. The Communists were hampered by the fact that the Japanese were under orders to surrender only to the Nationalists, not the Communists. This, however, did not end up making much of a difference. By early 1949, the Nationalists were hamstrung by intractable corruption and huge debts; they paid off their debts by printing more money, which only lead to hyperinflation. By that October, the Nationalists had fled to Taiwan and Mao Zedong had proclaimed the creation of the People’s Republic of China.
The People’s Republic of China (1949- )
In 1958, Mao, who was growing increasingly distant from Moscow, launched the Great Leap Forward. The idea was to mobilize the peasant masses to increase crop production by collectivizing the farms and use the excess labor to produce steel. What ended up happening was the greatest man-made famine in human history. From 1958 to 1960, poor planning and bad management managed to starve 30 million people to death. Officially, the government blamed it on “bad weather.”
By 1962, the break with the Soviets was complete,
In 1966, Mao launched the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution. The origins of the Cultural Revolution are vague, but probably stem, in part, from a growing separation between Mao’s clique and the rest of the CCP. Mao called upon students to rebel against authority, and they did, forming units of Red Guards. China promptly collapsed into anarchy. While the Cultural Revolution ‘officially’ ended in 1969, and the worst abuses stopped then, the politically charged atmosphere was maintained until Mao’s death in 1976.
Deng Xiaoping, who was purged twice during the Cultural Revolution eventually emerged as the paramount leader in 1978, and promptly launched his economic reform program. Deng’s actions, initially limited to agricultural reforms, gradually started to spread to the rest of the country. One of his favorite sayings is “It doesn’t matter if the cat is black or white; what matters is how well it catches mice.” This is in direct contrast to the ideology of the Maoist years, where a favored slogan was “Better Red than Expert,” which meant, in practice, that totally unqualified ideologues were put in charge of projects that really needed technical expertise.
In 1993, Deng Xiaoping, in one of his last major public appearances, toured the Shenzhen Special Economic Zone and emphatically voiced his approval. After that, the Chinese economy exploded.
¿Soy amigo de mis amigos? Un test de amistad
/in Curso de Cristianismo /by Bobby A LopezSoy amigo de mis amigos: un Test de Amistad
Amistad no consiste en sentirse bien junto a una persona, sino en querer de verdad el bien para ella. Y esto, aunque el amido no lo valore o no lo entienda.
¿Qué es ser amigo de otro?
· ¿Le digo las cosas malas a la cara, sus defectos y las cosas que no me gustan, o bien no le digo a él estas cosas pero se las digo a otras personas sobre él?
· Hablo biene de él a sus espaldas? ¿Trato de que no hablen mal de el delante mía?
· ¿Le contamos sobre lo que tenemos dentro de nosotros (nuestros problemas, nuestras alegrías) o ¿preferimos ser ídolos impasibles, lejanos, sin problemas ni miserias?
· ¿Sabemos escucharle aunque para nosotros no tenga interés lo que dice?
· ¿Conocemos a su familia, su cuarto, sus aficiones?
· ¿Nos hemos sacrificado alguna vez por ellos, renunciando a nuestros planes a nuestgro tieimpo por ellos? ¿Llevamos cuenta de las veces que nos hemos sacrificado por ellos, como una cuenta con debe y haber?
· ¿Ponemos cara de sufirmiento cuando nos estamos sacrificando por ellos?
· ¿Pensamos que somos mejores que nuestros amigos?
· Si queremos lo mejor para nuestros amigos:¿tratamos de que nuestros amigos se acerquen a Dios? ¿Qué cosas concretas, de oración, mortificación y acción hemos hecho para que nuestros amigos metan a Dios más en sus vidas?
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Russia’s History in 3 paragraphs – – Summary
/in Resúmenes de Lecturas /by Bobby A LopezRussia’s History in 3 paragraphs
A relatively advanced state began to develop along the Dnieper River in the ninth century. Its capital, Kiev, became an important trading city. Cultural contacts were established with the Byzantine empire, and the inhabitants became converts of the Greek Orthodox Church.
This promising beginning was cut short by the Mongol invasion in 1240.During the Mongol period, contact with Constantinople had been reduced, leaving native elements free to re-emerge. By the sixteenth century, culture and social life reflected both native Russian and Greek-Byzantine characteristics
Ivan III’s grandson, Ivan IV (1533-1584), called the Terrible, won control of the entire Course of the Volga River by conquering several Mongol states, and the penetration into Siberia was begun In 1550 Ivan IV summoned the first full meeting of the ZEMSKY SOBOR to give its approval to some projected reforms. This institution, which in many ways resembled the estates-generals in the West, consisted initially of appointed members of the clergy, boyars, and service gentry, but townsmen were later added, and on at least one occasion the crown peasants participated.
Under Alexis, the Russian Church had reintegrated with the Greek-orthodox and the penetration of Western ideas into a few circles had continued, but it remained for his son, Peter the Great (1689-1725), to bring Russia into the mainstream of European politics
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La decadencia de Constantinopla: desde Basilio (1025) hasta los Otomanos (1453) – by About.com – Summary
/in Resúmenes de Lecturas /by Bobby A LopezLa decadencia de Constantinopla: desde Basilio (1025) hasta los Otomanos (1453)
Byzantium Overview by About.com
LA DECADENCIA DE CONSTANTINOPLA: DESDE BASILIO (1025) HASTA LOS OTOMANOS (1453) 7
El saqueo de CONSTANTINOPLA por la cuarta cruzada en el 1204. 7
Los cruzados deciden invadir Egipto y contratar a Venecia para la construcción de una flota naval 7
En vez de 35,000 cruzados para los que se construyó la flota, se aparecen en Venecia en el 1202, 10,000. Esto no es suficiente para pagar. Se comprometen los cruzados a conquistar Zara para Venecia. 7
Un aspirante la trono bizantino les promete a los cruzados el oro y el moro si le ayudan a sacar a un usurpador de Constantinopla, y lo pusieron en el trono junto con su padre Isaac. 8
El imperio resulta no tener para pagar a los cruzados, por los que estos conquistan y saquean la ciudad en 1204 y fundan el Imperio Latino de Oriente que dura 60 años. 8
La Caída de CONSTANTINOPLA: desde la 4ta cruzada hasta la conquista Otomana en 1453 8
La cima y edad de oro del Imperio Romano de Oriente (Bizancio o Constantinopla) tuvo lugar a principio del siglo 11, durante el reinado de Basilio, el matador de búlgaros, que murió en el 1025. A partir de entonces el Imperio entró en un declive lento pero marcado. Las dos puntillas que marcaron el fin de este milenario imperio fueron, 200 años más abajo del pico, el saqueo de la ciudad por la cuarta cruzada, y finalmente la conquista por los otomanos en el 1453.
A. EL SAQUEO DE CONSTANTINOPLA POR LA CUARTA CRUZADA EN EL 1204
Los cruzados deciden invadir Egipto y contratar a Venecia para la construcción de una flota naval
Al convocar el Papa Inocencio III la Cuarta Cruzada, a principios del siglo 13, una ingente cantidad de caballeros y soldados rasos de toda Europa occidental se ofrecieron como voluntarios. Surgió la idea de que, para conquistar la Tierra Santa la mejor estrategia era conquistar Egipto, de donde salían la mayoría de los alimentos para el mundo musulmán. Y para ir Egipto hacía falta desplazarse por mar. Para desplazarse por mar hacía falta construir o una flota de barcos. Decidieron los caballeros negociar con la ciudad de Venecia, los mejores astilleros y navegantes de la época, y acordaron la construcción de una flota para transportar 35,000 personas así como todo el alimento que sería necesario para ellos. Con la promesa de una ingente cantidad de dinero todo la ciudad de Venecia se dedicó por un año exclusivamente a la preparación del a expedición.
En vez de 35,000 cruzados para los que se construyó la flota, se aparecen en Venecia en el 1202, 10,000. Esto no es suficiente para pagar. Se comprometen los cruzados a conquistar Zara para Venecia.
En la primavera de 1202 solo se aparecen en Vencia para la cruzada 10,000 soldados. Con esto no había dinero suficiente para pagar por una flota hecha para 35,000. Cuado se vio que no iba a aparecer más gente, el duque Dándola de Venecia les propone que, para pagarles, les ayuden a conquistar la ciudad de Zara, en la costa de Dalamcia (Yugoslavia) que se había pasado de ser tributaria de Venecia a serlo del rey Húngaro.
Pero el rey de Hungría, por haber prometido participar en la cruzada, era también un cruzado. Finalmente, tras mucho debate, como necesitaban el apoyo de los venecianos para ir a Egipto, se decidieron atacarla y la conquistaron en diciembre de 1202. Cuando el Papa se enteró, furioso, excomulgó a los cruzados.
Un aspirante la trono bizantino les promete a los cruzados el oro y el moro si le ayudan a sacar a un usurpador de Constantinopla, y lo pusieron en el trono junto con su padre Isaac
Así la situación, les llegó una oferta de Alejo Angelo, un depuesto emperador bizantino, que estaba exilado en Hungría: si le ayudaban a reconquistar Bizancio el les prometía: más oro del que ellos debían a los venecianos, un ejercito de 10,000 hombres, comida para todos, 500 caballero que guardarían las tierras conquistadas en Tierra Santa y, sobre todo, el sometimiento de la iglesia Ortodoxa a Roma.
Hubo mucho debate sobre si aceptar la oferta. A los soldados no les gustaba la idea de atacar a otros cristianos. Por otro lado pensaban que si conseguían la unión de la iglesia Ortodoxa, esto podría hacer que el Papa les levantara la excomunión. Finalmente embarcaron y, en junio del 1203 la flota cruzada llegó y acampó al lado asiático del Bósforo, frente a Constantinopla. Sitiaron la ciudad y el 17 de julio de 1203 los venecianos lograron romper una puerta, tomar una parte de la ciudad.
El emperador Alejo, cuando parecía que sus tropas iban a ganar a los cruzados, las mandó retirarse. No se sabe bien porqué. Pero aquella noche huyó de la ciudad con su familia. La mañana siguiente, al verse sin emperador, el pueblo fue a la cárcel donde Alejo había encerrado a su hermano, Isaac Angelo, que era el previo emperador, y lo nombró de nuevo emperador. Lo primero que hizo Isaac fue contactar a su hijo, el príncipe Alejo que era el que venía con los cruzados tras haberles prometido oro y la unión de la iglesia ortodoxa. Las puertas de Constantinopla se abrieron entonces pacíficamente para los cruzados.
El imperio resulta no tener para pagar a los cruzados, por los que estos conquistan y saquean la ciudad en 1204 y fundan el Imperio Latino de Oriente que dura 60 años
El hijo de Isaac, ahora co-emperador como Alejo IV, tiene ahora que cumplir su parte de la promesa y pagar a los cruzados. Pero en los cofres del imperio no había ni una parte de lo que tenía que pagar. Empezó a coger oro de las iglesias, lo que enfadó bastante al pueblo. Mientras tanto los cruzados estaban dando vueltas por la ciudad en espera de ser pagados y poder continuar su viaje. Alejo IV les pidió que acamparan al otro lado del bósforo en lo que les conseguía el dinero. Mientras tanto los estuvo alimentando generosamente.
En enero de 1204 estalló una revuelta popular y se proclamó emperador Alejo Ducas Murzuflo, como Alejo V. Los cruzados, sin la presencia de Alejo IV, se sintieron libres de sus promesas, y planearon tomar la ciudad, lo que hicieron el 13 de abril del 1204, entrando por un agujero en las murallas. Alejo Ducas huyó y los bizantinos se rindieron. Empezó un saqueo sistemático de la ciudad del que las iglesias y los monjes fueron las principales víctimas.
Los cruzados se impresionaron tanto con poseer la ciudad, que no quisieron abandonarla para ir a Egipto, porque consideraban que era la defensa contra la amenaza sarracena a Europa. Así que decidieron establecer allí un Imperio Latino de Oriente. Eligieron como emperador a Balduino de Flandes, y se repartieron las tierras entre los venecianos, los franceses y las otras nacionalidades
B. LA CAíDA DE CONSTANTINOPLA: DESDE LA 4TA CRUZADA HASTA LA CONQUISTA OTOMANA EN 1453
La mayoría de los pocos habitantes griegos que había en Constantinopla huyeron de la ciudad tomada por latinos (francos, les llamaban ellos) y se refugiaron en Anatolia, donde fundaron cuatro reinos. En 1261 recuperaron de nuevo la ciudad. Pero tardaron en reunificar los reinos. En 1347 la Peste Negra reduce la población de Constantinopla en un 90%. En 1453 un terrible terremoto daña muchos del sus edificios.
Cuando el último emperador Constantino XI toma la púrpura, la ciudad tenía unos 50,000 habitantes. Y ese era todo el terreno que quedaba del imperio bizantino. Con la ayuda de los primeros cañones de la historia, un ejercito de 100,000 hombres y 300 barcos, Mehamet consiguió conquiestar la ciudad. Desaparecía el Imperio Romano de Oriente.
Barroco – Vila Selma – Summary
/in Resúmenes de Lecturas /by Bobby A LopezBarroco
Por J. Vila Selma en GER
Entre el último tercio del s. 16 y los tres primeros cuartos del 17.
El barroco europeo, en general, coincide con la depresión económica del s. XVII y la crisis social en la que la sociedad burguesa es suplantada por otra de tipo agrario y señorial. La guerra de los Treinta Años marca un estallido de dos tendencias antagónicas:
1. de un lado, los partidarios del orden tradicional que pretenden imponer los ideales de la Contrarreforma; y de otro,
2. los países protestantes del Norte apoyados por la Francia del card. Richelieu que propugnan una organización del Imperio bajo principios difundidos por el Renacimiento, es decir, racionalismo, un cierto movimiento nacionalista y un equilibrio mecanicista entre los Estados independientes.
El nuevo orden europeo creado por la paz de Westfalia (24 oct. 1648) abandona la concepción jerárquica y organicista tradicional (la monarquía hispana), y la sustituye por un mosaico de Estados independientes. El ideal sereno del Renacimiento se vio interrumpido por la revolución religiosa que supuso el protestantismo.
La trayectoria internacional española en el s. XVII (imperialismo de Olivares, derrota de Westfalia) Hay una primera etapa de optimismo «austracista» que preconiza la monarquía universal representada por la casa de Austria bajo los auspicios del Papado y el Imperio. Después se efectuará un giro hacia una postura realista que aceptará el orden resultante de Westfalia, es decir, el equilibrio de los Estados europeos frente a principios de orden superior preconizados por España. El fracaso de estos ideales de magnificencia espiritual provoca una crisis y un repliegue de España sobre sí misma que se hace patente en todas las manifestaciones de la vida española. El barroco popular y conservador opone el empirismo a la especulación renacentista.
Dónde estará la economía mundial dentro de 15 años
/in Charlas Variadas /by Bobby A Lopezenero 2008 por Roberto López
Para adivinar dónde estará la economía mundial dentro de 15 años hay que despejar tres incógnitas que nos ayudarán a pronosticar si habrá un cambio de liderato en este período:
Un análisis profundo de la economía mundial nos permite hacer estas tres profecías:
Conclusión: el panorama económico mundial a mediano y largo plazo luce esperanzador, a pesar de que a corto plazo estemos sufriendo la crisis de la subida del petróleo y la crisis de las hipotecas.
La explosión económica que estamos viendo en China no es el nacimiento de una nueva superpotencia sino más bien, el sprint inicial que da un corredor que llega tarde a una carrera, con la adrenalina alta por llegar tarde y, en este caso además, por estar bajo los efectos de esteroides inyectados por el gobierno chino, en forma de subsidios.
¿Por qué decimos que China llegó tarde a la carrera económica mundial? China experimentó su propia Revolución Industrial en el siglo XI, 600 años antes que Europa. Este éxito tan precoz puede achacarse a tres factores principales:
El resultado de estos avances económicos y sociales fue tan exitoso que en los próximos siglos se producía suficiente comida para alimentar a todos, la sociedad caminaba y, por lo tanto, dejó de haber incentivo para reformarse ni reinventarse. La diferencia con los países de alrededor en cuando a nivel de desarrollo era tan grande que China llegó a convencerse de que nada bueno podía venirle de fuera. Y en una decisión que fue mantenida por generaciones de emperadores, cerró sus fronteras durante prácticamente 500 años, negando cualquier intercambio económico, cultural o simplemente humano con cualquier país extranjero. Pero pagaría muy cara esta altanería.
Cuando a finales del siglo XIX, Inglaterra, Estados Unidos, Rusia y Alemania entraron a China a la fuerza, ésta se quedó atónita al comprobar que Occidente estaba tan avanzado, que, sin esfuerzo, pudo someterla económicamente y humillarla políticamente. Japón también se aprovechó de esta manifiesta debilidad china, invadiendo y dejando a aquel país tan herido que lo convirtió en el caldo que permitió el eventual triunfo de la revolución comunista en 1949. El comunismo, que es una extraordinaria fuerza política en todos los países donde ha regido, en el ámbito económico ha resultado un contundente fracaso. Tan rotundo que en todo el resto del mundo, excepto en Cuba, el fracaso económico propició la caída de todos los regímenes comunistas. China, en una acrobacia histórica, decidió, a mediado de los 1980s que iba a continuar siendo comunista pero con una economía capitalista. Nos encontramos entonces en una coyuntura histórica donde una país pobre (y además enormemente grande) hace su entrada a la economía mundial, además precisamente en el momento en que ésta se está globalizando.
¿Qué ocurre cuando un país pobre empieza a comerciar con un país más rico? Los dos salen ganando. El país rico consigue que alguien haga las tareas más incómodas, alguien a quien puede pagarle una cantidad menor que si no estuviera ese país pobre al lado. El país pobre se encuentra con que puede hacer las tareas incómodas del país rico y ser pagado por ello más de lo que se le pagaría por hacer eso si no estuviera el país rico al lado. Ha de notarse que el crecimiento del país rico es sobre todo una mejora de al calidad de vida, al evitar las tareas más tediosas e incómodas (cosechar la tierra, limpiar las basuras, hacer construcciones, etc) para concentrarse en las tareas más enriquecedoras de la economía. El país pobre es el que crece más visiblemente a los ojos del mundo, porque lo que crece es su ingreso monetario, que es más fácilmente detectado por las estadísticas económicas. Las estadísticas, como se llevan hoy día, no son tan buenas para medir la mejora en calidad de vida que experimenta el país rico.
Esta es parte de la explicación del crecimiento meteórico de la economía China: se trata de la coyuntura histórica de que la liberalización de su economía se dio en el preciso momento en que la globalización empezó a permitir que los productos, el empleo y el dinero (los tres fluidos que configuran la riqueza) pudieran ser comprados y vendidos en todo el planeta. En otros momentos de la Historia, sólo los países pobres que estaban alrededor de los grandes imperios, se beneficiaban del contacto entre ricos y pobres. China, sin embargo, cuando decidió a abrirse al mundo, no tuvo que depender sólo de lo que pudiera venderle a Japón. Todos los países desarrollados del planeta son ahora su vecino rico.
Junto a este factor de crecimiento, está también el impulso que suponen los subsidios del gobierno chino a la exportación. ¿No se ha preguntado usted a veces cómo puede algún producto ser vendido por China a un precio tan increíblemente barato? Parte de la explicación está en que el gobierno Chino otorga subsidios a los exportadores, que hacen sus productos más baratos en el extranjero. Estos subsidios no tiene la forma de dinero enviado directamente a las empresas, como hace la Unión Europea y Estados Unidos con los productos agrícolas. La forma que tiene el gobierno chino de ayudar a los exportadores es hacer que su moneda, el yuan, se mantenga artificialmente barata en los mercados de moneda extranjera. Como los extranjeros, o mejor, los intermediarios, tienen que comprar esta moneda
[…]
¿Hasta cuándo durará el beneficio de la relación entre pobre y rico? Hasta que el pobre se haga suficientemente rico como para que a sus jóvenes no les interese dedicarse a cosechar campos o trabajar en deshumanizantes líneas de producción, porque ya hay alternativas de empleo en oficias, tiendas o servicios. Hasta que el pobre se haga suficientemente rico.
Diferencia entre el Hombre y el Animal – Leornado Polo – Summary
/in Resúmenes de Lecturas /by Bobby A LopezDiferencia entre el Hombre y el Animal
Por Leonardo Polo, Madrid 30-X-92
Nosotros hemos sido precedidos por tres o cuatro especies muy diferentes de las restantes especies animales. En primer lugar estaría el australophitecus, después el homo habilis y en tercer lugar el homo erectus. El australophitecus, es el primer animal bípedo. Aristóteles, uno de los autores griegos que mejor estudiaron al ser humano, dudaba de si el hombre es un ser racional o un ser con manos. Ser un animal con manos significa ante todo ser un animal técnico, un animal capaz de producir. Cuando además del desarrollo cerebral en nuestra especie aparece la inteligencia, la mano se transforma en un instrumento infinito. Si tenemos en cuenta esto podemos decir que las especies que nos han precedido y nos han preparado son especies en las que surgió un nuevo tipo de evolucionar distinto al que empezó a adivinar Darwin.
En el mismo momento en que aparece la técnica a través de la mano y la cerebralización, empieza a dibujarse un nuevo modo de tener que ver con el medio que consiste en estar libre de tener que adaptarse al medio porque con sus manos hace lo necesario para vivir. Por ejemplo, el vestido.
¿Cuándo es posible el aumento de la capacidad craneana? Cuando la cabeza se apoya en la columna vertebral como un bípedo.
Hablar es una característica humana, el único ser que habla es el hombre, pero la función primaria del lenguaje es enseñar a utilizar instrumentos, dar órdenes. El lenguaje está ante todo para eso. Para tener lenguaje, hace falta tener una boca peculiar, una boca para poder articular de una determinada manera, hacen falta tener unos labios finos. Pero como los labios humanos son ligeros el esfuerzo de moverlos es pequeño y por eso el hombre puede sonreir y es además lo primero que hace un niño. El niño no tiene control de sus brazos. Pero lo primero que controla son los labios. En la sonrisa se expresan muchas cosas de una manera más o menos potencial; pero fenomenológicamente en la sonrisa está la gratitud, el reconocimiento placentero del otro, está la expresión de la felicidad interna. La gratitud, nos introduce en un tema que ya se descubre a través de la sonrisa: que el hombre es una persona, porque ¿qué es una persona? Un ser capaz de gracia. Gratitud y gracia están enteramente vinculados. La manera de dar más propiamente humana es acoger y el hombre puede acoger porque tiene una intimidad. Un ser con intimidad es un persona.
La aceptación tiene que ver con la paternidad y la con la maternidad. ¿Qué es un padre y una madre? Unos aceptadores. ¿Y cómo paga el hijo esa aceptación? Sonriendo. ¿Es un pago suficiente? Yo creo que sí.
En todas las especies que he aludido que son anteriores al hombre, acontece que son todas especies animales porque carecen de inteligencia. La inteligencia es supraespecífica, es de cada uno, no hay una especie inteligente, por eso el hombre es persona, no es sólo el individuo de una especie. Pero en todos esos animales que nos preceden evolutivamente, la individualidad está en función de la especie. Esto lo suelo expresar diciendo que todo ser vivo excepto el hombre está finalizado por su especie y si lucha, si combate en un sentido bélico parecido a lo que es la guerra humana, lo hace contra otros, no contra los individuos de su propia especie. Hobbes cometió un grave insulto al lobo cuando dijo que el hombre es un lobo para el hombre, porque el lobo no es un lobo para el lobo. Un lobo no mata a otro lobo. Los combates entre lobos son rituales, por así decirlo; en cuanto un lobo se declara vencido cuando lucha por una hembra, por ejemplo, el otro no le mata. El hombre, por ser persona, no está finalizado por la especie y puede ir contra la especie. Ir contra su especie significa ante todo guerrear. La guerra es un fenómeno exclusivamente humano, es una consecuencia de ese desequilibrio que hay entre el individuo humano que es persona y la especie humana.
En el caso del hombre el cuidado del niño dura por lo menos quince o veinte años: los que marcan la dependencia educacional del ser humano. De manera que la existencia de la familia tiene que ver con la especie. Es decir, justamente porque el hombre es superior a la especie para mantener la especie necesita de una institución: la familia.
El hombre tiene que institucionalizar la supervivencia de la especie y esa institución es la familia. Por tanto, desde el punto de vista de la persona lo peor es el aborto porque es matar a un ser personal, pero desde el punto de vista institucional o social es peor el divorcio. (Decir lo peor significa que es lo peor biológicamente porque cualquier otra interpretación de bien o de mal a mi modo de ver, cualquier planteamiento de la ética que no lo tomemos del ser humano mismo es, como diría Nietzsche moralina, una cataplasma)
Si el hombre no está finalizado por la especie, si tiene manos y con las manos lo puede hacer todo, si es capaz de tantas modificaciones, si necesita de una institución y eso quiere decir que su instintividad no es suficiente para el mantenimiento de la especie, el instinto sexual no basta para mantener la especie humana, es menester la familia, la institución, es menester la monogamia sin más. Una poligamia también sería aceptable desde el punto de vista biológico, pero en rigor, como se cumple bien la exigencia biológica es en el matrimonio monógamo.
El hombre es entonces un gran proyecto, un proyecto sin término. El hombre nunca acaba de serlo y precisamente por eso es por lo que en el hombre ya no tiene sentido hablar de evolución, escapa a la evolución. Nosotros venimos detrás del habilis y del erectus, pues nosotros somos una especie biológica superior a esas. Pero otra especie biológica que venga detrás de nosotros no es posible, nosotros trascendemos la especie en cuanto que somos personas, invertimos el sentido, sustituimos la evolución por otra cosa que es la biografía y la historia que son otros tipos de temporalidad.
El hombre es un ser temporal, es un espíritu en el tiempo, un espíritu que se va realizando, o mejor, que va sacando a luz sus potencialidades, se va actualizando. Si la instintividad humana no sirve para garantizar la supervivencia de la especie es porque en el hombre la tendencialidad tampoco es automática, tampoco se dispara como la del animal. Pues si es así, nuestro espíritu también debe tener una dimensión enormemente potencial y esa dimensión de nuestro espíritu es la voluntad. La voluntad dice Tomás de Aquino es una potencia pasiva y sólo así es natural, sólo así pertenece a la naturaleza, es lo que llama voluntas ut natura.
La voluntad como naturaleza, lo que en nosotros hay de apetito es enormemente potencial en su arrancar, en su primer estadio, porque no estamos finalizados por nada finito ni siquiera por nuestra especie, porque tenemos una potencialidad respecto del fin absoluto. Nuestro espíritu está hecho de tal manera que su tender solamente se puede colmar por el absoluto y precisamente por eso la tendencia espiritual es pura potencia pasiva.
Pero también por eso nuestra voluntad es capaz de entrar en relación con la inteligencia y así es capaz de ejercer actos y en cuanto ejerce actos adquiere hábitos, puesto que como es potencial es enormemente perfectible: es un motro movido (quod movet motum, lo que mueve en tanto que es movido, así lo describe Tomás de Aquino). Pues en contacto con la inteligencia es capaz de actuar, la voluntas ut ratio, pero al actuar ella misma se perfecciona o se degrada, es capaz de adquirir virtudes y vicios.
Aquí tenemos otra vez la aparición de la ética en la pura consideración de lo que es característico de un espíritu que existe en el tiempo, de un espíritu que se encarna en un cuerpo potencial y ese espíritu también tiene una dimensión potencial, la voluntas ut natura. Esa voluntas actua en cuanto entra en relación con la inteligencia y al actuar se perfecciona o no. La manera como la libertad alcanza la naturaleza del hombre es a través de los hábitos. Los hábitos son el vehículo o la conexión entre la libertad y la voluntad. De suyo, la voluntas ut natura, no es libre. A través de los hábitos la libertad se hace cargo de la voluntad.
Somos seres libres pero ¿cómo nuestra libertad alcanza a nuestra naturaleza, a nuestras acciones? Solamente a través de vicios o virtudes. La libertad no es nativamente propia de la voluntad humana, esa es una tesis clásica olvidada porque los modernos creen que la voluntad es nativamente libre. Pero en el planteamiento clásico que es coherente con todo lo que estoy diciendo no es así. Es a través de virtudes como la voluntad conecta con la libertad.
Deismo – GER – Summary
/in Resúmenes de Lecturas /by Bobby A LopezNoción de Deismo. 21
Génesis del deísmo. 21
Deismo y religión racional. 22
La expansión del deísmo en Inglaterra. 22
Noción de Deismo.
El deismo insiste sólo en la existencia de Dios negando el gobierno divino y de toda providencia, en particular una economía histórica de salvación fundada en la revelación y en la gracia sobrenatural.
Puede hablarse de un deísmo teológico, inmediatamente derivado de la concepción naturalista de la religión; a éste muy pronto se une un deísmo filosófico, repartido en dos corrientes de signo contrario, el racionalismo idealista (francés) y el empirismo científico (inglés), mientras que el alemán pretende la síntesis de la tendencia teológica y del racionalismo científico
.
Génesis del deísmo.
Como actitud religiosa y cultural el deísmo alcanza su maduración entre mediados del s. XVII y fines del XVIII, pero en cuanto a los presupuestos ideológicos se presenta como prolongación de la crisis de algunos sectores del humanismo renacentista, desarrollándose de esta forma:
1) Se extiende en el pensamiento del siglo XVI una actitud puede definirse como intimista e individual que sobrevalora los hechos de conciencia sobre el dato objetivo. Insistiendo en la conciencia de sí mismo, el hombre pone de relieve el condicionamiento subjetivo a que está sometida la percepción de la realidad, cediendo la metafísica paso a la sensibilidad estética, a la percepción psicológica y al moralismo.
2) Rotura en la teología: Se produce así una especie de crisis entre dos mundos concebidos ahora como irreductibles o a lo sumo tangenciales:
a. Con Lutero, desde un plano teológico, se acentuó la escisión al negar toda posible conciliación entre lo que el hombre es, naturaleza, y la salvación;
b. Melanchton divide al hombre en interior y exterior, formulando una doble ley de comportamiento: a) el hombre interior y su dinamismo -espiritual de salvación, han de estar pendiente de la palabra de Dios y de su ley; b) mientras en su quehacer libre sobre el mundo y sobre la ciudad terrestre debe atenerse a las leyes espontáneas de la naturaleza y a las normas civiles.
3) El idealismo cartesiano (francés) primero y el empirismo (inglés) después acrecientan la crisis:
a. El racionalismo idealista abre un abismo entre Dios y hombre, conciencia y mundo, materia y espíritu,
b. el positivismo aprovechó esta brecha para eliminar toda categoría y orden ontológico, reduciéndolo todo al plano del puro fenómeno y sustituyendo el criterio cartesiano de las ideas claras y distintas por el de la experimentación como forma definitiva de conocimiento.
Deismo y religión racional.
Normalmente viene identificándose deísmo y fundamentación de la religión natural frente a toda forma positiva de la misma, lo cual es algo impreciso ya que existen intentos de fundamentar la religión natural a partir de otros criterios no estrictamente deístas como el sentimiento y el instinto. Prescindiendo de los antecedentes ideológicos, hay que advertir cómo las circunstancias históricas, la situación religiosopolítica de las comunidades europeas contribuyeron a este pensamiento: el Estado, preocupado por las guerras de religión, buscaba un estatuto lo más amplio posible, que asegurase una convivencia pacífica y estable. El deismo, creyendo salvar el fondo común de toda religión y desacreditando las diversas formas positivas de la misma, pensaba que ofrecía el programa -pluralista más latitudinario, cuando en realidad empobrecía la religión, la filosofía y la teología.
La expansión del deísmo en Inglaterra.
Interpretando el deísmo como un proceso de desmitificación, Ch. Blount (1654-93) emprendió la difusión del deísmo arremetiendo contra los milagros, desacreditando los portentos de Cristo y al cristianismo coetáneo.
J. Toland (1670-1722) en niega la pervivencia de todo dogma, que considera contrario, lo mismo que la revelación de misterios, a la suprema racionabilldad de Dios El deísmo fue perseguido por el anglicanismo oficial, hasta el punto que Locke, antes simpatizante con este pensamiento, negó la afinidad de sus ideas con las de Toland.
A. Collins (1676-1729) y M. Tindal (1656-1733) prolongaron el pensamiento de Toland eliminando el principio de autoridad, base de la religión positiva, como contrario al «espíritu científico» que sólo puede aceptar los resultados de un libre examen, amplio e ilustrado, como corresponde a un espíritu libre.
Falto de vigor intelectual, el deismo comienza a extenuarse, no siendo lo sobradamente lúcido como para seguir manteniendo siquiera la existencia de Dios, ya que no pudo explicar su naturaleza. Así, sin atreverse a proclamar el ateísmo, ya lo prepara. Desprovisto de base filosófica, su último reducto es la idea de causalidad y finalidad, ideas que David Hume se encarga de minar, comenzando así la religión a emigrar, en muchos autores, desde el ámbito de la razón hacia otras esferas de la intimidad humana. La religiosidad puramente científica y racional da paso a la religión como dato íntimo de conciencia, sin- más justificación que el sentimiento moral, tal y como lo planteará Kant en un supremo esfuerzo por salvarla dentro de las tendencias deístas.
El deísmo francés y alemán.
El deísmo tuvo origen inglés, su efecto propagandístico y espectacular hasta lograr la categoría de programa cultural y político, lo alcanzó en el continente trabajado por el racionalismo. Tuvo un arraigo más riguroso en consonancia con su base cartesiana, cuya certeza del ser absoluto llega a la exaltación, mientras, por otra parte, queda en lontananza como algo esencialmente retórico, indefinido y confuso. Voltaire ha sido factor decisivo del deísmo continental, no tanto por su vigor filosófico como por su efervescencia literaria. Fue el creador del clima duro, cáustico y anticlerical que cuaja en el estilo de los librepensadores, cuyo esfuerzo aunado culmina en la Enciclopedia (1715-77).
J. J. Rousseau (1712-78; v.) reduce la religión a tres únicas verdades:
1) existencia de Dios, ser supremo, cuya voluntad anima al mundo y mueve la naturaleza y del que no tenemos certeza de ser creador;
2) la existencia de la materia regida por leyes físicas constantes;
3) la existencia del alma humana libre e inmaterial, aunque no podemos pronunciarnos sobre su inmortalidad.
En Alemania, Reimarus afirma que si la religión está fundada sobre la existencia de Dios y la inmortalidad y tales verdades nos han llegado por revelación, hay que entender, que la revelación histórica no añade nada a la revelación eterna de Dios que se comunica a través de la racionalidad del universo. De lo contrario, piensa, nos tropezaríamos un Dios que corrige su propio programa. Por otro lado, es vana la pretensión de la Iglesia al querer constituirse en depositaria de dicha revelación habiendo surgido a partir, según él, del fraude de la resurrección de Jesús, presentado por sus discípulos como Mesías.
G. E. Lessing (1729-81) afirma que rl proceso de la revelación es una pedagogía divina, con lo que quiere significar un proceso educativo que no crea nada, puro estimulante que acelera el proceso de todo lo que la naturaleza posee en sí misma. La intervención de Dios conserva al hombre en el monoteísmo primero y continúa realizando este cuidado a partir de una comunidad, Israel, corriendo el riesgo de convertirse en algo nacional, patrimonio de una raza. Estrechez que supera el cristianismo, con el que el monoteísmo vuelve a recobrar su universalidadeísmo En la medida en que el hombre llega a la madurez se le impone el paso de la imagen y figura hacia la verdad racional que Dios pretendiera, superando el Evangelio escrito por el Evangelio Eterno, en el que predomina la moral del deber frente a la moral imaginaria de las penas futuras. En este proceso, según Lessing, la fe representa un intermedio hasta el advenimiento de la religiosidad pura de la razón, a.la que ha de ceder paso, en la medida en que va creciendo la conciencia interior. El resto de creencias y de culto exterior queda eliminado como sobrevivencia de un momento ya superado de la evolución natural.
Condensed History of China – Paul Frankenstein – Summary
/in Resúmenes de Lecturas /by Bobby A LopezCondensed History of China
por Paul Frankenstein
XXXIV. Pre-imperial china. 13
Xia (c. 2200 – c. 1750 BC) 13
Shang (c. 1750 – c. 1040 BC) 13
Western Zhou (c. 1100 – 771 BC) 14
Eastern Zhou (771 – 256 BC) 14
Spring & Autumn Period (722 – 481 BC) 14
Warring States Period. 15
XXXV. Early Empire. 15
Qin (221 – 206 BC) 15
Han (206 BC – 220 AD) 15
Earlier Han (206 BC – AD 8) 15
Wang Man Interregnum.. 15
Later Han Dinasty. 16
Years of Dinunity: Three Kingdoms and Dinasties from North & South (220-590) 16
XXXVI. The second empire. 16
Sui (589 – 618) 16
Tang (618 – 907) 16
Song (960-1280) 17
Yuan (Mongol) (1279 – 1368) 17
Ming (1368 – 1644) 18
XXXVII. The Birth of Modern China. 18
Qing (Manchu) (1644 – 1911) 18
Republican China (1911-1949) 19
The People’s Republic of China (1949- ) 20
C. Pre-imperial china
Xia (c. 2200 – c. 1750 BC)
until fairly recently, most historians thought that it was a myth. But the archeological record has proven them wrong. Xia had descended from a wide-spread Yellow River valley Neolithic culture known as the Longshan culture, famous for their black-lacquered pottery
Shang (c. 1750 – c. 1040 BC)
There are three things to know about the Shang:
Western Zhou (c. 1100 – 771 BC)
they used a father-to-son succession system. Also, they weren’t too keen on human sacrifice. However, they weren’t as good at working bronze as the Shang.
The Zhou actually didn’t rule all of what was then China. China was then made up of a number of quasi-independent principalities. However, the Zhou were the most powerful principality and played the role of hegemon in the area. They were located in the middle of the principalities, giving rise to what the Chinese call their country — the Middle Kingdom. The Zhou were able to maintain peace and stability through the hegemon system for a few hundred years; then in 771 BC, the capital was sacked by barbarians from the west.
Eastern Zhou (771 – 256 BC)
a) Spring & Autumn Period (722 – 481 BC)
After the capital was sacked by barbarians from the west, the Zhou moved east.
The Spring and Autumn Annals provides a history of period saw a proliferation of new ideas and philosophies. The three most important, from a historical standpoint, were Daoism, Confucianism, and Legalism.
Daoism the oldest great book of Daoism, the Dao de Jing, The Way and Virtue, was allegedly written by a man named Lao-zi.. Daoism profoundly influenced the later development of Cha’an (also known as Zen) Buddhism.
Confucius believed that moral men make good rulers and that virtue is one of the most important properties that an official can have. He also believed that virtue can be attained by following the proper way of behaving, and thus placed a great deal of stress on proper. The Emperor was the Son of Heaven (while Heaven in a Western context is a place, Heaven in the Chinese context is a divine/natural force) and had the Mandate of Heaven to rule.
Legalism derived from the teachings of another one of Confucius’ disciples, a man named Xun-zi. Xun-zi believed that, for the most part, man would look out for himself first and was therefore basically evil. Consequently, the Legalists designed a series of draconian laws that would make a nation easier to control. The fundamental aim of both Confucianism and Legalism was the re-unification of a then divided China, but they took difference approaches. Confucianism depended on virtue and natural order; Legalism used a iron fist.
b) Warring States Period
The politics of the Warring States period were much the same as those of the Spring & Autumn period; the major difference was that while in the earlier period, armies were small and battles lasted only a day, much like in pre-Napoleonic wars, the later period featured what modern strategists would call “totalwar.” Massive armies (half a million per army was not an uncommon figure), long battles, sieges, were all common features of the Warring States battlefield.
D. Early Empire
Qin (221 – 206 BC)
In 221 BC, the first Emperor of China (so-called because all the previous dynastic heads only called themselves kings), Qin Shihuangdi, conquered the rest of China after a few hundred years of disunity. There are two major reasons why he won; the first is that he was a devout Legalist (so much so that he burnt all the books in the country) and did things like execute generals for showing up late for maneuvers.. The other reason is because the state of Qin had a lot of iron, and consequently, at the dawn of the iron age, had many more iron weapons than the other armies did. He linked together many of the old packed-earth defensive walls of the old principalities into the Great Wall of China.
Han (206 BC – 220 AD)
a) Earlier Han (206 BC – AD 8)
Han is an important dynasty mostly because they developed (actually, it was invented by Qin Shihuangdi, but perfected by the Han) the administrative model which every successive chineese dynasty would copy and refine. China was the biggest country in the world. This is a management issue of tremendous proportions. How are you going to do things like collect taxes, keep the peace, and basically run a government without bureaucracy? The Chinese bureaucratic system is based on the study of the Confucian Classics, which provide an ideological reference point for proper behavior and loyalty to the Emperor. By developing this system, the Han emperors were able to run China with a reasonable degree of efficiency.
b) Wang Man Interregnum
Between AD 8 and 25, a man named Wang Mang ruled China. He had been part of the Han royal household; he himself, however, was a commoner and had no royal blood in his veins. He had been appointed emperor after a power struggle in the Han house. History is mixed on him. While he did seem to have some good, reform-oriented ideas (e.g. power back to the people), he really wasn’t up to the task of ruling.
Wang Mang hoped to gather support from the peasantry be introducing reforms. He declared that a family of less than eight that had more than fifteen acres was obligated to distribute the excess amount of land to those who had none. His next act as Emperor was to devise a new loan system for peasants. Instead of paying the thirty percent interest that private loaners demanded, Wang Mang offered loans to those in needs with only ten percent interest. In an attempt to stabilize the price of grain, Wang Mang made plans for a state granary. He did this, hoping to discourage the wealthy landowner to hoard grain and profit from price fluctuations.
Wang Mang was convinced that his subjects would obey his decrees, but again gentry-bureaucrats gave less importance to Confucianism than to their wealth. They and other landowners did not cooperate with Wang’s reforms, and without large media like newspapers, the local people would remain unaware of any reforms if the landowners withheld the information.
In the year AD 11, the Yellow River broke its banks, creating floods from Shan Dong in the north, to where the river empties into the sea. The people did not have grain stored as Wang Mang said they should have. In addition, the people were left without food shortly after the crisis began. In the year AD 14, they resorted to cannibalism. Thinking that his reforms failed, Wang Mang withdrew them. However, it was too late, because his opposition already took up arms against him.After his death in AD 25, the Han royal family took back the reins of power, and set up the Later Han dynasty.
c) Later Han Dinasty
The later Han were able to keep it together for about 200 years; however, towards the end of their rule, they become more and more dissolute. More importantly, they were unable to deal with two factors: a population shift from the Yellow River in the north to the Yangzi in the south; and they simply could not control barbarian tribal raiders from the north, which were one reason why people were moving to the south. Eventually, in AD 220, the center had lost so much control to the provinces that it collapsed plunging China into 350 years of chaos and disunity.
E. Years of Dinunity: Three Kingdoms and Dinasties from North & South (220-590)
Constants wars ramped through China, with little importance. Perhaps its greatest accomplishment was to reinforce in Chinese thought the importance of having “one Emperor over China, like one sun in the sky.”
Socially, though, there were two important developments. The first was that the ethnic Han Chinese kept on moving south, while ‘barbarians’ moved into the north and assimilated themselves into Chinese society. The second development was Buddhism, which had had its start in India sometime in the 6th century BC. It was introduced into China around the middle of the first century AD but really didn’t catch on until the fall of the Han dynasty.
F. The second empire
Sui (589 – 618)
The most important thing to know about this dynasty is that it was very short (by dynastic standards) and that it did a pretty good job of re-unifying China. Because it had a northern power base, it was part barbarian, as was the Tang. Despite the fact that the royal houses of Sui and succeeding Tang were not entirely Han Chinese, both of these dynasties are considered to be Chinese, as opposed to the Mongols and Manchus later on.
Tang (618 – 907)
The Tang are considered to be one of the great dynasties of Chinese history; many historians rank them right behind the Han. They extended the boundaries of China through Siberia in the North, Korea in the east, and were in what is now Vietnam in the South. They even extended a corridor of control along the Silk Road well into modern-day Afghanistan.
There are two interesting historical things about the Tang. The first is the Empress Wu, the only woman ever to actually bear the title ‘Emperor’ (or, in her case, Empress).The second was the An Lushan Rebellion, which marked the beginning of the end for the
Song (960-1280)
The Song (pronounced Soong) dynasty ranks up there with the Tang and the Han as one of the great dynasties. A time of remarkable advances in technology, culture, and economics, the Song, despite its political failures, basically set the stage for the rest of the imperial era. The most important development during the Song was that agricultural technology, aided by the importation of a fast-growing Vietnamese strain of rice and the invention of the printing press, developed to the point where the food-supply sy
stem was so efficient that, for the most part, there was no need to develop it further. There was enough food for everyone, more or less, the system worked, and it became self-sustaining. Because it worked, there was no incentive to improve it; the system thus remained basically unchanged from the Song up until the twentieth century. In fact, many rice farmers in the Chinese interior and in less-developed regions of south-east Asia are, for the most part, still using Song-era farming techniques.
The efficiency of the system not only made it economically self-sustaining, but also re-enforced the existing social structure. Consequently, society and economics were largely static from the Song until the collapse of the dynastic system in the twentieth century.
This is important because one of the factors behind the Industrial Revolution in Europe was that they didn’t have enough people to work the fields. There was an incentive to create better technology in Europe; there was no need in China. China actually had a surplus of human labor.
While the Song was a time of great advances, politically and militarily, the Song was a failure. The northern half of China was conquered by barbarians, forcing the dynasty to abandon a northern capital in the early 1100’s. Then a hundred and fifty years later, the Mongols, fresh from conquering everything between Manchuria and Austria, invaded and occupied China.
Yuan (Mongol) (1279 – 1368)
While time of Mongol rule is called a dynasty, it was in fact a government of occupation. While the Mongols did use existing governmental structures for the duration, the language they used was Mongol, and many of the officials they used were non-Chinese. Mongols.
The Yuan dynasty also featured the famous Khubilai Khan, who, among other things, extended the Grand Canal. While in many ways, the Yuan was a disaster, the reluctance of the Mongols to hire educated Chinese for governmental posts resulted in a remarkable cultural flowering; for example, Beijing Opera was invented during the Yuan. On the other hand, attempts to analyze the failure of the Song in keeping barbarians out China led to the rise and dominance of Neo-Confucianism, a notoriously conservative (if not outright reactionary) brand of Confucianism that had originally developed during the Song.
Ming (1368 – 1644)
Then came the Ming. The Ming rulers distinguished themselves by being fatter, lazier, crazier, and nastier than the average Imperial family. After the first Ming Emperor discovered that his prime minister was plotting against him, not only was the prime minister beheaded, but his entire family and anyone even remotely connected with him. Eventually, about 40,000 people were executed in connection with this case alone. They were also virulent Neo-Confucianists.
In the early 1400s, a sailor named Zheng He (with a fleet of some 300-plus ships)sailed as far west as Mogadishu and Jiddah, and he may have gotten to Madagascar. But once the sailors came back, the trips were never followed up on. Conservative scholars at court failed to see the importance of them. For the first time in history, China was turning inwards, clinging to an incorrect interpretation of an outmoded philosophy.
G. The Birth of Modern China
Qing (Manchu) (1644 – 1911)
In 1644, the Manchus took over China and founded the Qing dynasty. The Qing weren’t the worst rulers; under them the arts flowered and culture bloomed. Moreover, they attempted to copy Chinese institutions and philosophy to a much greater extent than then the Mongols of the Yuan. However, in their attempt to to emulate the Chinese, they were even more conservative and inflexible than the Ming. Their approach to foreign policy, which was to make everyone treat the Emperor like the Son of Heaven and not acknowledge other countries as being equal to China.
Other problems that plagued the late (1840 onwards) Qing included rampant corruption, a steady decentralization of power, and the unfortunate fact that they were losing control on too many fronts at the same time. Rebellions sprouted like mushrooms after a rain. In hindsight, it is clear that the entire system was slowly collapsing.
The attitude of the Western powers towards China (England, Russia, Germany, France, and the United States) was ambivalent. On the one hand, they did their best to undermine restrictive trading and governmental regulation. On the other hand, they did do their best to prop up the ailing Qing, the most notable example being the crushing of the Boxer Rebellion in 1900 by foreign troops (primarily U.S. Marines). What the Western powers were interested in was the carving up of China for their own purposes, and that, paradoxically, required keeping China together.
But two things happened to prevent that. First, in 1911, the Qing dynasty collapsed and China plunged headlong into chaos. Second, in 1914, the Archduke Ferdinand told his driver to go down a street in Sarajevo he shouldn’t have, and Europe plunged headlong into chaos.
Republican China (1911-1949)
During World War I, the Chinese Government, such as it was, sided with the Allies. In return, they were promised that the German concessions in Shangdong province would be handed back over to the Chinese Government at the end of the war. They weren’t, and to add insult to injury, the Treaty of Versailles handed them over to Japan. On May 4, 1919, about 3,000 students from various Beijing universities got together in Tiananmen Square and held a mass protest. In the early 1920s, Dr. Sun Yatsen, as the leader of the (up-to-then unsuccessful) Nationalist Party (KMT), accepted Soviet aid. With the Communist help, Sun Yatsen was able to forge a alliance with the fledgling Chinese Communist Party (CCP), and started the task of re-unifying a China beset with warlords.
Unfortunately, Sun died of cancer in 1925. The leadership of the KMT was then taken over by Chiang Kaishek.
After Chiang took over the KMT, he launched his famous “Northern Expedition” — all the way from Guangzhou to Shanghai. This unified Southern China and, more importantly, let the Nationalists control the Lower Yangzi. Once they got to Shanghai, Chiang, who had never liked the Communists anyway, launched a massacre of CCP members. Among those who managed to escape the carnage was a young communist named Mao Zedong.
The Communists were forced to abandon their urban bases and fled to the countryside. There, the Nationalist forces (aided and abetted by German ‘advisors’) tried to hunt t
hem down, and in the words (more or less) of Chiang, “eliminate the cancer of Communism.” In 1934, the Nationalists were closing in on the Communist positions, when, under the cover of night, the Communists broke out and started running. They didn’t stop for a year. This was the Long March. When the Communists started, they had 100,000 people. A year later, when they finally stopped, they had traveled 6,000 miles, and were down to between four to eight thousand people.
While all this was going on, the Japanese were busy occupying Manchuria. This proved helpful for the Communists — the troops sent by Jiang to the North to contain and eventually eliminate the CCP much preferred to spend their time fighting the Japanese.
In 1937, the Japanese invaded China proper from their bases in Manchuria, using the notorious “Marco Polo” incident as an excuse. Once whole-scale war had been launched, it didn’t take the Japanese long to occupy the major coastal cities and commit atrocities. By the time that the war had ended in 1945, 20 million Chinese had died at the hands of the Japanese. The Nationalist Government fled.
In 1939, World War II started. This initally had little effect on the situation in China, as the Japanese were not involved with war in Europe. However, after the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941, the main thrust of the Japanese war effort turned away from fighting the Chinese and towards fighting the Americans.
After the Americans entered the war, the Communists started to consolidate their control over North China in preparation for the resumption of the civil war that would occur after the Japanese had been defeated. The Nationalists, in contrast to the Communists, were disorganized and corrupt, problems that would only intensify after the war. Moreover, their attempts to fight the Japanese were ineffective at best.
At the end of World War II, the war between the Nationalists and the Communists started up again. The Communists were hampered by the fact that the Japanese were under orders to surrender only to the Nationalists, not the Communists. This, however, did not end up making much of a difference. By early 1949, the Nationalists were hamstrung by intractable corruption and huge debts; they paid off their debts by printing more money, which only lead to hyperinflation. By that October, the Nationalists had fled to Taiwan and Mao Zedong had proclaimed the creation of the People’s Republic of China.
The People’s Republic of China (1949- )
In 1958, Mao, who was growing increasingly distant from Moscow, launched the Great Leap Forward. The idea was to mobilize the peasant masses to increase crop production by collectivizing the farms and use the excess labor to produce steel. What ended up happening was the greatest man-made famine in human history. From 1958 to 1960, poor planning and bad management managed to starve 30 million people to death. Officially, the government blamed it on “bad weather.”
By 1962, the break with the Soviets was complete,
In 1966, Mao launched the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution. The origins of the Cultural Revolution are vague, but probably stem, in part, from a growing separation between Mao’s clique and the rest of the CCP. Mao called upon students to rebel against authority, and they did, forming units of Red Guards. China promptly collapsed into anarchy. While the Cultural Revolution ‘officially’ ended in 1969, and the worst abuses stopped then, the politically charged atmosphere was maintained until Mao’s death in 1976.
Deng Xiaoping, who was purged twice during the Cultural Revolution eventually emerged as the paramount leader in 1978, and promptly launched his economic reform program. Deng’s actions, initially limited to agricultural reforms, gradually started to spread to the rest of the country. One of his favorite sayings is “It doesn’t matter if the cat is black or white; what matters is how well it catches mice.” This is in direct contrast to the ideology of the Maoist years, where a favored slogan was “Better Red than Expert,” which meant, in practice, that totally unqualified ideologues were put in charge of projects that really needed technical expertise.
In 1993, Deng Xiaoping, in one of his last major public appearances, toured the Shenzhen Special Economic Zone and emphatically voiced his approval. After that, the Chinese economy exploded.
A SHORT SUMMARY OF THE BYZANTINE EMPIRE – by About.com – Summary
/in Resúmenes de Lecturas /by Bobby A LopezA Short Summary of the Byzantine Empire
XXXIII. I. A Short Summary of the Byzantine Empire.. 1
(1) Founded in 303 AD by Constantin as capital of Roman Empire. 1
(2) Barbarian Invasions. 1
(3) Justinian rebuilds the empire in 6 century. 1
(4) 7 th century Herclius beat the Persians. 1
(5) In 8th century the Saracens almost took Constantinople but were ketp away. 2
(6) In 8th century the Bulgars arrive and began fighting the romans for several centuries. Empress Irene messed with iconoclastism.. 2
(7) The golden age with Basel 2
(8) Descent into Chaos: empress Zoe (s XI) ; Sljuks Turks (s XII); the Forth Crusades (s XIII) 2
(1) Founded in 303 AD by Constantin as capital of Roman Empire
The Byzantine Empire began as the Roman Empire. Emperor Constantine founded the city of Byzantium on the site of a former Greek city-state, and made it the capital of the Roman Empire. The official founding date was 11 May, 330AD. He also decreed that Christianity would become the official religion, although at the start nobody was forced to be Christian. In later years, the worship of the old pagan gods was outlawed.
(2) Barbarian Invasions
In the 5th Century, barbarian invaders took control of most of Western Europe. The invasions were in general more peaceful affairs than the name might suggest. They were more a people on the move looking for somewhere new to live, than a group of warriors intent on plunder, although they would take plunder if they could get it. The Romans withdrew from Britain. Gaul (modern France) was occupied by the Franks. The Vandals first took Spain, and then moved on to occupy all of North Africa west of Egypt. Finally two groups of Goths took Spain and Italy: the Visigoths (Western Goths) in Spain and the Ostrogoths (Eastern Goths) in Italy.
(3) Justinian rebuilds the empire in 6 century
In the 6th Century, Emperor Justinian showed his mettle by brutally suppressing the Nika Riots. He then went on to build the Empire some of the way back to the glorious position it had occupied in the time of the first Roman emperors. His armies, under the command of some good generals, recovered control of North Africa, Italy and some of Spain, but it was short-lived: Spain and Italy soon left the Empire for good. The Empire was now a more eastern one, and Greek became more the language of the people than Latin.
(4) 7 th century Herclius beat the Persians
The Persian Empire had long been at war with the Byzantine Empire, constantly trying to push the border between them back and collecting rich booty from the Byzantine towns. In the 7th Century, emperor Heraclius attacked and effectively destroyed the Persian Empire. Persia was soon afterwards conquered by a new power, the Arabs.
(5) In 8th century the Saracens almost took Constantinople but were ketp away
In the mid 8th Century, the Arabs known as Saracens conquered all of North Africa, including Egypt. They made a new capital for themselves at Fustat, which later became Cairo. They then went on to push north and west from there to take the whole of the east end of the Mediterranean and moved into Anatolia (modern Turkey), eventually in 674 reaching Constantinople itself. Here the Walls of Constantinople saved the day, successfully keeping the Saracens from crossing into Europe for five years, during which time the Byzantines destroyed the Saracen navy with ‘Greek Fire’, a secret weapon somewhat akin to a flame thrower. In 679, the Saracens retreated and left Anatolia in Byzantine hands.
(6) In 8th century the Bulgars arrive and began fighting the romans for several centuries. Empress Irene messed with iconoclastism
At about the same time, a nomadic tribe, the Bulgars, first appeared at the Danube border and invaded the Byzantine lands on the west side of the Black Sea. The Byzantines would fight these Bulgars many times over the centuries.
The rule of empress Irene, at the end of the 8th Century, is instructive, as it shows the importance to the people of Byzantium of religion and how simple matters of doctrine could overthrow rulers. A great rift appeared in Christianity between those who believed that pictures of God and his saints were an important aid to worship and those who thought the pictures were evil.
(7) The golden age with Basel
Following quickly on to Basil the Bulgar Slayer, the grandson of Constantine Porphyrogenitus, we see one man’s humiliation by the Bulgars and his successful crusade to wipe the Bulgarian Empire off the map. During Basil’s reign in the 50 years around the year 1000, the Byzantine Empire reached its Golden Age, with a strong army, well educated people and an enlightened attitude.
(8) Descent into Chaos: empress Zoe (s XI) ; Sljuks Turks (s XII); the Forth Crusades (s XIII)
a) b) Empress Irene (s XI)
Byzantine emperors could inherit from their fathers. If there were no sons, a daughter could inherit, but she would need a strong man to do the actual ruling. The life of Empress Zoe in the 11th Century saw plenty of this; Zoe was herself too old to have children when she inherited the throne. The rest of her life saw her marrying, murdering, adopting and rejecting a whole succession of emperors in her attempt to stay at the top, with a consequent disastrous effect on the Empire. This trend of a new emperor every few years continued after Zoe’s death, leaving the Empire at its weakest.
b) c) The Loss of Anatolia to the Seljuks (s XII)
A nomadic Turkish people called the Seljuks arrived on the scene in the late 11th Century. They came from somewhere around modern Uzbekistan and were Muslim. They conquered Persia (modern day Iran) and Mesopotamia (modern day Iraq). Spreading into Anatolia, they came up against the Byzantine army of emperor Romanus Diogenes. Romanus managed to push them back out of Anatolia. The two sides eventually met at Manzikert near Lake Van; the result was a disaster. Half of Romanus’s army deserted him and the rest were slaughtered. Romanus himself was taken prisoner by the Seljuks. He made a deal with their leader and was released, but his own people now turned against him for having failed them. They brutally tortured him and chose a new emperor. The Seljuk leader had made no deal with the new emperor and felt no remorse when he re-invaded Anatolia. The Byzantine Empire was rapidly losing ground. Now it was reduced to western Anatolia and the Balkan peninsula.
c) d) The Forth Crusades (s XIII)
The Byzantines made peace with their Muslim neighbours, but Western Europe felt hotly the ‘insult’ of non-believers occupying the Holy City of Jerusalem. Around this time there were many crusades to recover Jerusalem from the Muslims. Some of these were more successful, some less so. The fourth crusade was a shambles. In 1204 The Frankish crusaders ended up attacking Byzantium itself, in an attempt to pay back a debt to the Venetians who had provided them with transport. This resulted in the infamous Sack of Constantinople, possibly the worst thing to ever happen to the city before the final downfall. The crusaders methodically stripped the city of everything of value, and set up their own ‘Latin Empire of Constantinople’. Many of the Byzantines fled.
d) e) The Restoration after the latin Empire
The Latin Empire didn’t last long. About 60 years later it was so feeble that the Byzantines literally walked back into the city, when the crusaders were ‘out hunting’. A restored Byzantine Empire was set up under rulers from the family of Palaeologus. Again Byzantium became a place of learning and enlightenment, with a thriving culture of art. But it was a much reduced Empire, consisting of even less than the modern boundaries of Greece.
e) f) The Fall of Contantinople to the Ottomans in 1453
This situation could not last. Another Turkish people, the Ottomans, had their eye on the city as a handy base. Byzantium suffered three sieges by the Ottomans. The third was the last – in 1453, with the aid of a vast army and some big cannons, Mehmet the Second finally took the city. The Fall of Constantinople on 29 May, 1453 marked the end of the Byzantine Empire.
xXx
Guilgamesh – Summary
/in Resúmenes de Lecturas /by Bobby A LopezGuilgamesh
A Summary form Wikipedia and SparkNote
The Historic Guilgamesh
Gilgamesh, according to the Sumerian king list, was the fifth king of Uruk (Early Dynastic II, first dynasty of Uruk), the son of Lugalbanda. He probably reigned in about the 26th century BC.
Unlike the heroes of Greek or Celtic mythology, the hero of The Epic of Gilgamesh was an actual historical figure, a king who reigned over the Sumerian city-state of Uruk around 2700 b.c. Long after his death, people worshipped Gilgamesh, renowned as a warrior and builder and widely celebrated for his wisdom and judiciousness. One prayer invokes him as “Gilgamesh, supreme king, judge of the Anunnaki” (the gods of the underworld). Called Erech in the Bible, Uruk was one of the great cities of ancient Mesopotamia. The historical King Gilgamesh probably raised its walls, which archaeologists have determined had a perimeter of six miles. Today its ruins rest near the town of Warka, in southern Iraq, about a third of the way from Basra to Baghdad. A team of German archaeologists recently announced that they’d detected a buried structure there that might be Gilgamesh’s tomb. Though the military actions of 2003 stopped their work before excavations could begin, their claim has aroused considerable interest.
The Epic of Gilgamesh is written in Akkadian, the Babylonians’ language, on eleven tablets, with a fragmentary appendix on a twelfth. The tablets actually name their author, Sin-Leqi-Unninni, whose name translates to “Moon god, accept my plea.” This poet/editor must have completed his work sometime before 612 b.c., when the Persians conquered the Assyrian Empire and destroyed Nineveh.
Plot Overview
The epic’s prelude offers a general introduction to Gilgamesh, king of Uruk, who was two-thirds god and one-third man. He built magnificent ziggurats, or temple towers, surrounded his city with high walls, and laid out its orchards and fields. He was physically beautiful, immensely strong, and very wise. Although Gilgamesh was godlike in body and mind, he began his kingship as a cruel despot. He lorded over his subjects, raping any woman who struck his fancy, whether she was the wife of one of his warriors or the daughter of a nobleman. He accomplished his building projects with forced labor, and his exhausted subjects groaned under his oppression. The gods heard his subjects’ pleas and decided to keep Gilgamesh in check by creating a wild man named Enkidu, who was as magnificent as Gilgamesh. Enkidu became Gilgamesh’s great friend, and Gilgamesh’s heart was shattered when Enkidu died of an illness inflicted by the gods. Gilgamesh then traveled to the edge of the world and learned about the days before the deluge and other secrets of the gods, and he recorded them on stone tablets.
The epic begins with Enkidu. He lives with the animals, suckling at their breasts, grazing in the meadows, and drinking at their watering places. A hunter discovers him and sends a temple prostitute into the wilderness to tame him. In that time, people considered women and sex calming forces that could domesticate wild men like Enkidu and bring them into the civilized world. When Enkidu sleeps with the woman, the animals reject him since he is no longer one of them. Now, he is part of the human world. Then the harlot teaches him everything he needs to know to be a man. Enkidu is outraged by what he hears about Gilgamesh’s excesses, so he travels to Uruk to challenge him. When he arrives, Gilgamesh is about to force his way into a bride’s wedding chamber. Enkidu steps into the doorway and blocks his passage. The two men wrestle fiercely for a long time, and Gilgamesh finally prevails. After that, they become friends and set about looking for an adventure to share.
Gilgamesh and Enkidu decide to steal trees from a distant cedar forest forbidden to mortals. A terrifying demon named Humbaba, the devoted servant of Enlil, the god of earth, wind, and air, guards it. The two heroes make the perilous journey to the forest, and, standing side by side, fight with the monster. With assistance from Shamash the sun god, they kill him. Then they cut down the forbidden trees, fashion the tallest into an enormous gate, make the rest into a raft, and float on it back to Uruk. Upon their return, Ishtar, the goddess of love, is overcome with lust for Gilgamesh. Gilgamesh spurns her. Enraged, the goddess asks her father, Anu, the god of the sky, to send the Bull of Heaven to punish him. The bull comes down from the sky, bringing with him seven years of famine. Gilgamesh and Enkidu wrestle with the bull and kill it. The gods meet in council and agree that one of the two friends must be punished for their transgression, and they decide Enkidu is going to die. He takes ill, suffers immensely, and shares his visions of the underworld with Gilgamesh. When he finally dies, Gilgamesh is heartbroken.
Gilgamesh can’t stop grieving for Enkidu, and he can’t stop brooding about the prospect of his own death. Exchanging his kingly garments for animal skins as a way of mourning Enkidu, he sets off into the wilderness, determined to find Utnapishtim, the Mesopotamian Noah. After the flood, the gods had granted Utnapishtim eternal life, and Gilgamesh hopes that Utnapishtim can tell him how he might avoid death too. Gilgamesh’s journey takes him to the twin-peaked mountain called Mashu, where the sun sets into one side of the mountain at night and rises out of the other side in the morning. Utnapishtim lives beyond the mountain, but the two scorpion monsters that guard its entrance refuse to allow Gilgamesh into the tunnel that passes through it. Gilgamesh pleads with them, and they relent.
After a harrowing passage through total darkness, Gilgamesh emerges into a beautiful garden by the sea. There he meets Siduri, a veiled tavern keeper, and tells her about his quest. She warns him that seeking immortality is futile and that he should be satisfied with the pleasures of this world. However, when she can’t turn him away from his purpose, she directs him to Urshanabi, the ferryman. Urshanabi takes Gilgamesh on the boat journey across the sea and through the Waters of Death to Utnapishtim. Utnapishtim tells Gilgamesh the story of the flood—how the gods met in council and decided to destroy humankind. Ea, the god of wisdom, warned Utnapishtim about the gods’ plans and told him how to fashion a gigantic boat in which his family and the seed of every living creature might escape. When the waters finally receded, the gods regretted what they’d done and agreed that they would never try to destroy humankind again. Utnapishtim was rewarded with eternal life. Men would die, but humankind would continue.
When Gilgamesh insists that he be allowed to live forever, Utnapishtim gives him a test. If you think you can stay alive for eternity, he says, surely you can stay awake for a week. Gilgamesh tries and immediately fails. So Utnapishtim orders him to clean himself up, put on his royal garments again, and return to Uruk where he belongs. Just as Gilgamesh is departing, however, Utnapishtim’s wife convinces him to tell Gilgamesh about a miraculous plant that restores youth. Gilgamesh finds the plant and takes it with him, planning to share it with the elders of Uruk. But a snake steals the plant one night while they are camping. As the serpent slithers away, it sheds its skin and becomes young again.
When Gilgamesh returns to Uruk, he is empty-handed but reconciled at last to his mortality. He knows that he can’t live forever but that humankind will. Now he sees that the city he had repudiated in his grief and terror is a magnificent, enduring achievement—the closest thing to immortality to which a mortal can aspire.