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How Christianity Changed the World

Fri, 23 Sep 2011 02:02:41 +0100

   This story is kind of contradictory because when someone asks you, "How did Christianity change the world?" You might think a lot of things such as the spreading of Christ's gospel and peace among men, or charity toward others, but when I think of how Christianity changed the world I think of all the major political and religious changes that happened all over the planet after Christ's death. And of course as with any major political or religious change comes blood shed and death. And not just a little bloodshed or just a few deaths, but a ton. Over the course of the last two thousand years, millions of people would die in the name of christianity. In fact, as I was doing my research for this I started counting up how many 'recorded' deaths there were, all in the name of Christ I was sickened by what I was able to find. Between the year 33 AD and 1994 AD 220,187,325 people have died. That's just what I have been able to add up, and of course those are only the 'recorded' deaths.
   As you can see, just from the numbers, christianity has been able to mold and shape the world in ways we're probably unaware of. So to start this out I want to take a look at the major events that happened between Christ's death and modern times. Then we'll break those events down and look at why christianity had such an important role. For instance, would the infamous Salem Witch trials have even happened had the people to colonize the Americas not been Christian? Or, would the Ottomans have ever invaded the city of Constantinople if the Emperor Constantine never built the elegant Hagia Sophia? And if the Ottomans had never invaded, would the villainous Vlad Tepes III have ever preformed all of the atrocious things he had done, such as impaling over 100,000 people of his own country? It's a lot to think about. What, for me, is even more mind boggling, is that all of these events, all of these things that we're about to discuss happened, ultimately, because of one man, ONE! That is just something so impressive to me I can't even fathom living a life that for the next two thousand years after my death completely changes everything everyone will ever know.
   Between the year 30 and 33 AD, it's hard to say, Jesus Christ was crucified. But before we go too much into his death and more specifically how he was killed we should probably understand a few of the reasons why he was killed.
   By the time Jesus was born the Jewish Church, which was the Church and Religion Jesus belonged to, was so completely corrupt that most people couldn't discern what rules and religious laws were set in place originally by Moses and what had been set in place by the current Jewish Priests. You see, this kind of goes back to my previous blog about Human Nature. The Jewish priests, or the men who were in charge of running the Jewish Church were extremely powerful men. They more or less ruled the cities of the middle east where they were like dictators. And they were rich because of it. Now of course, the Roman Empire at this time really ruled over the land, but the Romans left the people like the famous Harod in charge and he let the Jewish priests rule under him to a certain extent. The reason for this was simple, the more people you have under you running things, the less you have to do when it comes to ruling your land.
   So the Jewish priests are rich and powerful and more or less run things the way they want. Now Jesus, from what I can gather, from the only real 'documentation' of his life, the Bible, seems to be a traditionalist. A fan of the old school way of running the religion. And he was more or less a Jewish reformer. He began teaching the people from his parables the things that he felt were more important than making money or becoming powerful. And it's Jesus' hope, I'm assuming, that if he can get enough people to see that the Jewish religion is built on more than what the current Jewish priests were doing, then he could actually reform the religion and fix things. And I don't think that Jesus really wanted power or control over the Jewish people, or their religion, but because of his overwhelming influence, it was becoming obvious to the Jewish priests that that was exactly what Jesus was doing. He was turning the people, the money makers, away from the pockets of the Priests. And with that many people backing Jesus, it worried the Priests that he might over throw them and take away their power.
   So the Priests, afraid of the impending change of hands that Jesus, intentionally or unintentionally was bringing about, scurried off to the roman officials to have him arrested for Heresy. And of course we all know the story of what happens. The Priests bribe one of Jesus' close friends, Judas, and have him point Jesus out to the Roman guard. Now this to me sounds more James Bond than the Bible reads. We always see these movies where Judas, backed by two Roman legionnaires, walking up to Jesus and kissing, which is the sign to the Roman soldiers that the man Judas kissed is the man to be arrested. Why would Judas kiss him as a sign if the Romans were standing right behind him? Wouldn't make more sense that Judas just points and says, "There, that man with the long hair and the beard."? I don't actually think that's how it played out. I think the Jewish Priests and the Romans were afraid that if Jesus knew that they were planning on arresting him, he would flee the city.
   So instead I think the Roman guard were no where near judas when he approached Jesus. he greeted him as if it were any other day and kissed him on the cheek. And from across the street the Roman Legionnaires would see that sign and know, okay, now we can move in and arrest that man. That, at least to me, sound more like something the Romans would do, and more likely how the story went down.
   Jesus was arrested, tortured and then condemned to death by crucifixion. Now crucifixion was a common form of execution for the Romans. They did it all the time. But, they only reserved that punishment for people who had done really horrible things. Most of the time, when the Romans wanted to kill someone they just stabbed them...a lot. So when the Romans, under pressure from the Jewish Priests and the Priests money, kill Jesus. Had anyone known what that would mean for the people that followed Jesus, they probably would have never done it.
   This is a really interesting thing. Because until this time, being crucified was just a bad way to be executed for your crimes. Now it was the symbol of a martyr. And the idea that crucifixions were so common has almost been lost on people today because of how strong this symbol of Jesus dying on the cross has become.
   It's also interesting that the Jewish Priests, or even the Romans didn't see Christ's martyrdom coming. For hundreds of years the Romans had been dealing with martyrs. From the year 133 BC with Tiberius Gracchus, the famous Tribune, who appealed to the people of Rome in an attempt to reform laws set by corrupt politicians, to even Julius Caesar in 44 BC whose death eventually led to a third civil war in Rome.
   Still, Jesus' death would be the beginning of a new world. His followers would grow in size, and it would threaten the power that the Jewish Priests had over the people in the area. The Jewish Priests, by the way, were very smart people, which is how they got their power to begin with. For example: It was Jewish law that you could not leave your property on the sabbath, so instead of staying home all day, because of course being at home means you can't make money, the Priests would take bits of dirt from around their home and put it in their pockets so that when someone asked, "Why have you left your property on the sabbath?", the Priest could reply, "I haven't left it, I have brought it with me." and show that person the dirt in their pocket. So these smart Priests come up with a plan and appeal to the fears and senses of the Romans. They ask the Romans, who made all the 'real laws' to outlaw Christianity or as it was call at that time Christo-Judeism. Because the Christians still felt that they were practicing the Jewish faith that Christ had reformed. They called themselves Christian Jews.
   When the Jewish Priests asked the Romans to outlaw Christianity the Romans probably laughed, they probably asked, "Why should we outlaw that religion? Even though we do not share the same faith as you, we do not out law the Jewish faith?" See, the Romans never forced their pagan beliefs on the people they conquered because they realized that letting people have their own religions made them easier to control. Easier to govern. Outlaw something and the people will rebel, which is exactly what the christians would eventually do! But the Jewish Priests probably played on the Roman's fear of being conquered. Its funny that the Romans were ready and able to conquer anyone, had practically all ready done so, but they feared anyone who had the power to do the same to them. They feared the barbarians from France and Germany for this reason. Among all the nations the Romans had ever fought, the people of Europe were the most formidable and capable of conquering the Empire. I could see the Jewish Priests saying something like, "These Christians are on bent taking over. They tried to reform the Jewish church and the Pagan church will be next if you don't stop them now!" So of course, the Romans outlawed Christianity, to preserve the Empire.
   What happens after that would be a long a bloody battle over control of Rome and religious freedom. By the year 100 AD somewhere between 4,500 and 144,000 people had converted to Christianity. And this was about the time the Romans had outlawed the religion in an attempt to slow or stop the growth of followers. (probably should have listened to the Jewish Priests earlier right?) But don't get me wrong. The decision to outlaw Christianity didn't come from some power hungry, disgruntled Jewish Priests. The Romans themselves were smart enough to see that the Christian faith was growing in size, and if left unchecked would be too difficult to control or govern. Unfortunately for the Romans, it would not be enough to simply outlaw the religion.
   Christianity, for multiple reasons became a very popular religion. It's beliefs in a peaceful afterlife, it's simple choices between right and wrong, which allow for simpler lives to be led more happily and of course, it's founder: The peaceful, charitable, compassionate and loving Jesus who was martyred. And as I mentioned before, the more people were told not to worship the religion of their martyred leader the more they rebelled. They begin meeting in secret and marking their houses with secret symbols so other Christians would know who they were. You've probably seen the symbol. I see it most often on the bumper of cars, the fish.
   By the year 303 the Emperor Diocletian had tightened the reigns on Christian persecution under the grounds that they were unwilling to worship him as their ruler. The Christians of course claiming there was only one true god and that it was against their faith to worship anything or anyone else. Between 303 and 311 AD Diocletian would have nearly 20,000 Christians would be killed. By 311 AD Emperor Galerius, realizing how bad things were backfiring, recognized Christianity as an official religion.
   From that time forward, with Christianity as an official religion, with an official hierarchy, the world would begin to see some major changes.
   After Rome fell, which to be honest it didn't really do. It never 'fell'. It simply relocated, and the Emperor Constantine founded Constantinople. It was a huge, I mean HUGE city, and beautiful, but it wasn't enough for Constantine. He needed the Capitol of the Byzantine Empire to be the best city in the world. A place that all the planet would look to. From the year 360 AD to 1453 when the city was taken by the Ottomans, millions of people would flock to the city and for centuries every major cathedral and church would model the look of Hagia Sophia.
   This is where I have been headed. Culturally, Hagia Sophia changed the way people built churches. Can it be said that perhaps the grandeur of Hagia Sophia caused others to strive for the same elegance? Was it some sort of contest to see who could build a bigger and better cathedral? Was this on the minds of the people who built Notre Dame? Possibly. But nevertheless, It's fact that Constantine's desire to build Hagia Sophia changed the world. Moving forward slightly on the same city and the same cathedral. Would the Ottomans have ever invaded Constantinople had Constantine never built Hagia Sophia?
   The Sultan, Mehmed II, who led the Ottoman invasion claimed to have wept at the sight of the damage done to the city and the cathedral after the battle. Was his invasion of Constantinople specifically influenced by Christianity? It is a fact that the Ottomans and the Byzantines were at war over religion, but civilizations have fought over religion in general since the beginning of time and it's not my opinion that Christianity as a whole was any different than any other religion the Ottomans might have gone to war with. With the exception of Hagia Sophia, as stated.
   On another related note, as I had also mentioned earlier, Vlad Tepes III, also known as Vlad the Impaler fought through out his entire life with Sultan Mehmed II. One of the main reasons they fought against one another for so long was the geography of the land. As Constantinople, which by this time was now called Istanbul, was the seat of Mehmed's throne. It was his base of operations. Mehmed, like many rules, wanted to conquer Europe and the most direct route from Istanbul, from Turkey to Western Europe was through Eastern Europe, through the mountains. This land, in the mountains belonged to the ruler of Walachia, who was Vlad.
   So, had Mehmed not chosen Istanbul as his place of power would he have found a different route when attacking Europe? Had Mehmed not been at war with Walachia would Vlad have ever been traded to the Ottomans as a hostage? Would he have ever been tortured, or learn to torture? Would he have ever come to hate the Ottomans as much as he did? Would he have been driven to kill as many innocent people as he had?
   It's extraordinary how something as simple as Christianity can change the world as much as it did.
   Here are other examples. Nov. 27th 1095 AD, the Christians decide the only way to protect the Holy Land and the sacred sights and relics in the middle east was to take it back from the people who currently controlled that area. The Muslims. Had Christianity and Islam not both started in the middle east, would the events that would span the next 177 years, nine crusades and cause the deaths of over 200,000 people ever happened? Had both religions not started in the same place in the world, would they have still fought so hard for control of that specific area?
   Now, I've dragged this on too long, and anyone still reading this has their doubts of reading anything else I have to say, but the point that I'm trying to get across is this. Obviously if you take something out of the world, everything that it comes in contact with changes drastically. We've all seen this in films and book. Remember The Butterfly Effect? But Christianity has had probably one the biggest influences on the planet. Sure other religions have had their influences as well, I'm not discounting them. It just boggles my mind to think of everything that has happened over the last 2,000 years and how Christianity had a role in it.
   You may have your opinions, and you may disagree with me. You're entitled to that. But try this, maybe just for a week: The next time you hear about a major historical event, or hear something drastic or important in current affairs, ask your self this, "What role did Christianity have in this, if any, and how would this have played out differently if Christianity had never existed?

The Continuing Progression of Human Evolution

Fri, 16 Sep 2011 06:02:42 +0100

   This isn't a debate over creationism and evolution. That topic will be saved for another day. Instead this is a discussion on how humans are still evolving, my theories and thoughts on it. To state the properly let's pretend that we had the discussion over whether we were created by an all powerful being or whether we evolved over the course of millions and millions of years from ancient primate ancestors. Let's pretend that we listened to that discussion and decided we like the story of evolution better. It made more sense to us.
   Now to start this I need to start at the beginning...well, not THE beginning, but before humans, when we were still ancient primates. way back on the evolutionary tree we were small gorilla type creatures. Not the smartest apes in the bunch, not like apes today. They were herbivores, eating thick stalky grasses and greens. In fact, it wasn't until they decided to eat the meat of other animals that they really began to change as a species. The protein in the meat that they ate sparked brain development, made them smarter. And again it was until their offspring decided to use fire to cook their food that they began to become even smarter. And once again it wasn't until their offspring began to catch fish that they eventually, over many many many generations became human.
   Now this is a big deal. This shows that evolution isn't merely based on natural selection but diet and culture has a roll to play in it as well. The reason this is so important is because I hear a lot of people saying these day that we as a species are no longer evolving the we used to. That we have too much influence on our genetics and the outcome of our offspring to allow room for evolution. But if our ancient ancestors decided to eat meat, decided to cook food and decided to catch fish, then didn't they too have a hand in their evolution? So its because of that I feel its safe to say, even with the roll we have determining the outcome of our offspring we are still evolving, just as our ancestors did.
   Now understandably what we can do to change how we evolve and what our ancestors could do are drastically different. But on that same note, we as a species seem to rely less on natural selection to evolve. At least less than our ancestors did.
   And of course this isn't to say that natural selection has disappeared all together either. In fact a team of scientist from the University of Yale have been running an ongoing study of human evolution in the small town of Framingham Mass. where they had access to the medical histories of some 14,000 residents since 1948. Of those 14,000 they studies more specifically over 2,000 post menopausal women. The study showed that in each generation the daughters of those women were slightly shorter, slightly heavier and had better hearts than their parents. and the study concluded that if dietary and cultural changes were not made, by the year 2409 women would be aprox. 2cm shorter and about 1kg heavier. While thats not a huge change. It does go to show that natural selection is still at work in humans.
   Other studies have shown that the human brain is getting smaller with each generation. Even from the middle ages human skulls and the size of brain it could hold has gotten smaller. This is probably due to the fact that in such a close knit community, where the internet literally connects you to every part of the world, we don't need to retain as much knowledge to survive. We don't need to become a jack of all trades to build our own home, furnish it our selves and learn to hunt for our own food. We have specialist who do it for us, just as we specialize in one trade or another. And our bodies as well are becoming less adept to the physical strength and prowess that our ancient ancestors had. Truth be told, the average neanderthal woman could have easily beat some one like Arnold Schwarzenegger during his muscular prime in an arm match, or so says anthropologist Peter McAllister, author of Manthropology: the Science of Inadequate Modern Man. All this is despite the fact that since the Industrial revolution men have become taller and stronger.
   All those things show that humans are still evolving. The question isn't so much whether we're evolving but, what are we evolving into? Even though it seems like science fiction, human cyborgs do exist. Not like they do in video games like Deus Ex or movies like the terminator, but they are real. There are people today who live with robotic prosthetic limbs controlled by sensors attached to the skin, which are given commands from the brain. This technology, while still in its youth is a huge break through and begs the question: Will we control the way our bodies look in the future? Will we be able to design a new body the way we design a new car? Will we be able to go to the store and but the latest upgrades for our cybernetic arms or legs? Will we be able to chose between x-ray vision or binocular lenses on our eyes. If so, will this force our bodies to evolve into something smaller and weaker? As it is our bodies have become something quite weaker and smaller than that of our ancestors. Will our bodies become something that requires less food and energy consumption because we'll have new robotic bodies to do it for us? Might we become short and frail beings not unlike the common portrayal of "gray aliens". What will the effects be on our bodies when we begin downloading our brains to hard drives and uploading them to clones of our selves? Will our genetic data become so diluted the way a copy of a copy of a copy does that we are no longer able to reproduce at all? What can we expect from our future? What are we evolving into? Is it a more superior race of beings, one which has the ability to control what physical traits we possess as well as what abilities and skills we have? Or will we become a small frail creature unable of living without the protection and service of robotic bodies?

Human Nature

Wed, 14 Sep 2011 21:09:48 +0100

   While this subject is serious, and this is my first blog on this site. I don't want anyone to think that all my blogs will be as serious as this one. In fact. Many of the ideas and thoughts racing through my over crowded mind right now are anything but serious. So if you were hoping for comic books, zombies or my latest thoughts on movies, follow me on twitter and keep an eye out for later blogs.
   I wanted to spend this blog talking about human nature. Human nature is a complicated and tricky thing to talk about. It's one of those things that you have to be really careful when discussing because a lot of what you're talking about can be chalked up to opinion or debatable facts. But as a whole I see human nature as a repetitive cycle. A never ending wheel with steps of progression. Each step building upon the last until the balance of things is so, well...unbalanced, that it topples over and falls apart.
   We see through history that the human race as a whole is very destructive. Since the beginning of time people have been at war with one another. The purpose of those wars almost always come down to controlling other people. Humans are greedy, selfish, power hungry things. Originally groups of people organized into tribes or governments to benefit from one another. They traded goods. shared property and varied the gene pool. These are all good things. But somewhere along the road people realized that they needed structure to their group. Maybe a council or chief or a king. These people helped make the tribe or community run more smoothly. They made decisions for the group as whole, always making sure the community or tribe benefitted most from those decisions. And in the beginning this was a good thing. Looking back at ancient or so called primitive cultures, tribal leaders and chiefs lived their lives just like anyone else. They didn't have palaces or castles or bigger tents than anyone else. They were common people, usually appointed by the people in the community, realizing that this specific person had some sort of affinity for making good decisions.
   Now eventually these communities became bigger and eventually more powerful. The reasons for this vary, but mainly it comes down to the fact that some places in the world were able to grow better crops than others. These crops were quick growing grains in an area of the world called the fertile crescent, near the modern day mediterranean and southern europe. These better crops supported larger communities which allowed for people in those communities do more than work as farmers or hunter gatherers, such as engineers or philosphers. For more detail on this and other related subjects I recommend a great book by Author Jared Diamond called Guns, Germs and Steel.
   But somewhere during this time when different cultures were expanding and growing into complex civilizations, the rulers of these civilizations; the chiefs and elders and kings began to realize something. Their word is law and they could exploit this. If they said they were the son of a powerful God or they were God incarnate as we know different rulers had done (i.e. Egyptian Pharaohs, Mayan Kings.) the common people, fearing the wrath of their gods would follow the word of their rulers to the letter. And if the king or ruler said, "The God's demand gold!", the people would pay it. This made the rulers rich. And with money comes more power.
   If a ruler had a lot of money they could bribe other rulers to marry off their daughters, which meant that the rich ruler now had control over more territory which meant in turn more people would pay gold or valuables to the ruler. This cycle built empires. Sometimes, though, someone would want to keep the power or control they had over a certain group of people or land. This is where war comes from. People fighting for control over an area of land or a group of people.
   Ultimately this desire for power, this greed that rulers had would destroy the civilization or community they lorded over. We see this time and time again. Sometimes it doesn't happen over night. Sometimes it doesn't happen in a single lifetime. Sometimes it takes generations or centuries.
   For instance look at the fall of the Roman republic. Men in government realized the potential to make massive amounts of money by conquering other nations and exploiting them for taxes. Their desire to live lavish, over the top lives led to corruption in the government. These politicians eventually gained so much power that the only people they had to worry about conquering them were the other men in the government that they served with. Soon these men were fighting for the top dog spot and through tons of in fighting and backstabbing and conspiracy the republic eventually fell. The entire civilization was torn apart.
   The Roman Republic was set up for the people. It was a form of government that allowed the common people to vote, to have a say in the way their lives would be lived out. The concept was good, the intensions under which it was developed were good. But human nature, the nature to be greedy and power hungry and to serve only themselves made men warp and twist that 'goodness' and caused the civilization to fail.
   Another example of this is Communist Russia. The Russian people revolted against a power hungry, greedy ruler, the Czar, and through a lot of fighting and war and greed eventually formed, what is in theory, almost a perfect government. Communism. The idea of where everyone gives 100% of what they make or earn to the government. If they're chicken farmers and they harvest eggs, 100% of the eggs go to the government. If you make ten dollars and hour at forty hours a week, all four hundred dollars of that week's pay goes to the government and then based on your family size and needs the government 'ideally' gives you what is needed to live a normal healthy life. Basically the government owns everything and they divide everything up among the people equally. No one ever needs anything because they all ready have it and they're giving everything by a caring and fair government.
   Of course this never actually worked the way it was set up because the people in charge or the government were corrupt. Even Lenin stated, and I paraphrase of course, "If there's one person I don't want taking over this government after I'm gone, It's Stalin." Because even Lenin knew how corrupt Stalin was. And that is a lot to say. Not to mention what happened to the USSR. They entered a cold war with the U.S. and both nations nearly destroyed the planet with a nuclear war.
   Even now, in our time I feel that we are experiencing the same thing. The United States of America was set up Republic, very similar to the Roman Republic. The Roman Republic's structure of government was so ideal and perfect in the founding father's eyes, in fact, that it was the model and basis by which the founding father's developed the United States' Government. The idea that every person votes on what rights and laws govern their life is a great idea of how to run a nation. But in recent years its become very apparent that we no longer live in a republic. It's not even called a republic anymore it's called a 'democracy'.
   Today people don't vote for what laws they want governing their lives, they vote for the best actor. The better publicized politician. And those politicians are controlled by funding, by people called lobbyists, companies that pay politicians in return for the laws and rights that the company wants. And now our economy is crashing.
   So, a politician's greed allows them to be bought out by company to feed his or her self interests, their big house, their expensive car, their nice clothes, nice schools for their children, the summer home, the extended vacations. And in turn for all of that the politician passes or presents laws that allow the lobbying company to run their business with out restrictions from the government such as lower wages for the common people. This is also a huge example of greed.
   Look at any national or international corporation. I have worked for companies in the past that in only six months make over $150,000,000! That's a ton of money. And while this company might have a lot of departments and a lot of overhead A hundred fifty million dollars in six months is more money than the company needs to function properly. Of course the people at the bottom of the totem pole are making minimum wage while the people at the top live like kings. This is greed, self interest, this is Human nature. But why?
   Why is it in human nature to build a structure that helps everyone and then warp or twist it to meet the needs and interests of only one person? Why form governments to serve the people or build a nation or religion or anything at all if the ultimate goal is serve yourself above others?
   What is it in our nature that makes us do all of those things? Is it something left over from the lizard part of our brain? Some primordial piece of DNA tied into everything else that makes us human? How can we overcome this cycle of destruction? If we as a race can not over come this major flaw how can we ever progress? If we can create governments with good intensions, if we can form religions with caring and loving teachings, if we have the ability to create these passionate thoughts I feel we have the ability to overcome the greed, the desire for power and the self interest. But first we have to understand it. How do we understand this thing I've been calling Human Nature? That is the first step to over coming it. Maybe you have some answers? Let me know what you think about this. I'll take what everyone has to offer and compile it. I'd like to know how many people agree with me on this, or disagree.