Chap. 11 Worlds of Islam

The Islamic culture has a truely interesting history that has impacted many of its surrounding neighbors and how they maintain order in society today. Much like its counterpart, Christianity, the Islamic religion began in a tiny civilization in the Mediterranean and Middle East, unlike the other the religions that had already sparked in the well established civilizations of China, Persia, and Greece. These early stages of Islam were started by a small band of Jews within the Roman Empire, whereas in Arabia, the religion spread throughout the desert and many cities. For many long years, only nomadic tribes wandered about the Arabian peninsula, herding their sheep and camels during the seasonal migrations. Constant rivalry flashed between many tribes for who could have what land or where one could travel. They worshipped nature in the forms of certain gods, personal bravery, group loyalty, and hospitality as their way of maintaining harmony with each other. Villages soon sprang up around oases, the mountains, the northern and southern regions of Arabia, which later developed into vast cities and small kingdoms within the desert. Order was established, but even then, not everyone agreed with one another's ideas or practices. One group, the Meca grew wealthy and strongest when they began to tax the trade routes that fed the tribes' seasonal times of migrating their livestock. Many small tribes and different individuals (refugees, outcasts, etc.) joined the Meca, but thankfully the growing power of wealth was in the hands of a few ruling families. This is when Muhammad comes to play his part in Islamic history. Muhammad, a man born in Meca, lived a rather good life, with the exception that he had a tremendous religious experience that made him feel withdrawn from society. He believed himself to be the Isamic god's (Allah) messenger to the Arab people to comission them to a scripture, written in their own language, of their language and belief system. While Muhammad fancied himself to be much like the prophets before him (Abraham, Moses, Jesus, etc.), this call to faith was nothing more than a way to provoke people to come back to the old days or worship. For one to sumbit to Allah, if they were to be promised a paradise after death, they had to live by harsh terms. Wealth was held from people, the poor exploited, rates of interest were high, business deals were corrupt, women abused, and widows and orphans were neglected. This called for a community for all believers, the umma. With everyone together sharing the same beliefs, tribal, ethnic, or even racial identities were eventually lost. Later on, what are called the Pillars of Islam, were created to stress the requirements of how all believers should worship Allah. They called for daily prayers, acceptance to the idea that Allah is the true God and Muhammad the messenger, equal distribution of wealth, no lust for food or anything during Ramaden (the 9th lunar month of the islamic calendar) Finally, there's the assembling of all believers during rituals and leading away from a life of greed and selfishness. It was a very demanding religion, but for most followers, they could not see who else they could look to but their one own god, Allah. Even so, Muhammad came into conflict with many wealthy families on whether he was really delivering the message of God correctly to the people. This made Muhammad and his loyal band of believers to flee Mecca, in order to spread their religion to the other kingdoms and hope to sustain the existance of their type of society.

IV. 5

This excerpt caught my attention for a couple of reasons. 1) How it states one of the aspects of human nature and 2) how relevant it is to our past history and even today. It has always been in the nature for us to strive for progress in fields of science, prosperity, power, etc. Whatever we can lay our hands on and put into meaningful use, it's ours! No questions ask. While the world has its share of people and governments who care for others, there are those who seek to triumph over who they consider inferior in order advance as a society. Competition and wars have left their marks for who lost or gained the most out of it. Anyone can recognize that with the best riches or economic stability, man can seek to prosper and endure as a species. The empires of old (Egypt, Persia, Roman Empire) sought to expand their cultures out into the world so they can make great advances in stabilizing the lives of their people and to enrich cultural apsects. For some time, these empires fought over what they claimed to be rightfully theirs, not giving up even the slightest inch of land to their enemies. This is connection to the verse in the excerpt "...The superior man does not, even for space of a single meal, act contrary to virtue." This idea was passed on to nations who created empires, fashioned in a similar but different way of how the Persians, Egyptians, and Romans maintained control over their territories. Nowadays, with empires as a thing of the past, people in general work to support themselves and their families financely and economically. Sadly, some can't afford to stay stable above the poverty line and end up in poor houses or in the streets. Anyone else who lives in a nice home as middle class people go to work and do what's neccessary to stay on top of their bills, so that their children can get educated and eventually live on their own. Many of the rich, however, use their money for their benefits and create taxes upon those below them financely. It's sad and many feel that there should be some kind of balance between the rich, middle class, and poor. The 'riches' stated in this excerpt may pertain to everything we want to progress in life - money, a job, and satisfying lifestyle. If there's any proper way to avoid going the opposite way of where we want, education and work are the answers for future success.

Chapter 2 Writing and Power: Defining World-Views

We may not think about it as much, but it truly is fascinating how much of an effect literature has had on society - the laws we make, the common language we share, and the history we create. It started out between the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers in modern day Iraq when various forms of writing were first put on stone, clay, tablets, and papyrus in the many ancient towns in that area. Even before that, though, cultures in Egypt, North America, Australia, and Nigeria had different forms of "writing" that started the age of written communication. Egyptians told their history by painting pictures on their temple walls to indicate the thoughts and actions of the people in the paintings. This is known as ideographic writing or thought writing. Another form of writing is phonetic writing, the ancestor of writing that we use today. It's mainly signs (letters in our writing) that represent a sound and combines with another sign to make the sound come out of a word. Western Europeans created a new form of phonetic writing, using the Roman alphabet to create new words and give them usage. I had no idea, until I read this chapter, that the Roman alphabet originally had only 21 signs (letters). It eventually expanded to 26 letters, but that section of the chapter didn't explain why. Most likely the need for more letters to create more words came up among the scribes back then. The nice thing about phonetic writing is that it requires memorization for only a few signs, which can be grouped to make new sounds, as well as new words. It made sense to me that historians highly benefited from the earliest forms of writing so they can study and understand more about the people back then, their culture, their way of life, the events that took place, and so on. Ancient writings allowed historians the opportunity to read how people back then interpreted the world, the role of humans, and the universe itself. This eventually led many to believe that there was some kind of creator that build the universe and created humans for a purpose no one can quite uncover. The Christian, Hindu, and Buddhist religions came out from the ancient times when certain people began to think this creator(s) had given them life and for that, they felt the need to pay their respects and thanks for the life they cherish. This has given many religious followers a reason to think about why they're here in this world or so their religion says. Some religions, such as Buddhism, believe that people can live and relive again, depending on the direction they went in life. The belief of reincarnation has been widely adopted by many Buddhist followers since then. Yet, for all the progress and agonizing events that earlier humans went through, literacy has improved people's way of thinking for thousands of years. It has given them the knowledge to interpret and question the laws they abide by, as well as provide new ideas to improve the status quo. Sadly, not every part of the world, is so strong in literacy to understand enough to take a stand against the actions created by their government or society. Even today, we still have quite a ways to understand the relationship literacy has with politics and economics.