Secret History #24: Empire of Church

Okay, good morning class. We have five more classes in the semester, and the four last classes are the most. So what I will do this class is set up the background and context for the last four classes. What I want to do first is review what we've learned so far.

We discussed the Roman Republic, and it was essentially an oligarchy. Oligarchy just means rule by the few. So it's very much like Sparta. It is a war society. At this point in history, the Roman Republic was an oligarchy; basically it had about 100 families that commanded it.

Okay? And these were called the Patricians. It was actually to the advantage of Rome because at this time Rome was small, it was poor, it was at war. So in other words, even though there was nobility, they were not that much better off than other people, and everyone knew each other. So they were a very open, energetic and cohesive society. And so over time they became the most dominant society in the Mediterranean. They defeated Carthage, they defeated the Greeks. But now that they're an empire, the fact that Rome is an oligarchy is a huge problem because now they are unequal and stagnant.

And one way that we know: Roman women just start to refuse to have children. So they were dying as a society. At this point in history, what should happen is that they should build an imperial bureaucracy, a centralized system, in order to better manage the empire. Well, they couldn't really do that because the oligarchy, the families, which now are about 50, refused to give up power. So rather than a centralized bureaucracy, the Roman Empire was in many ways a system in which different families have different territories.

And what this led to was constant civil war. Remember, it started with Sulla and then it went on to Julius Caesar, and after Julius Caesar, Augustus Caesar became the first among equals, but he still failed to set up the bureaucracy. And so it kept on leading to war. Eventually what happened was that Constantine decided this system doesn't work. So what I need to do is I need to reinvent the Roman people. And you do that by moving the capital from Rome to a new place he calls Constantinople.

Okay? Which now becomes the Byzantine. And the Russian Empire now, because it's a new culture, it can now become a bureaucracy. In fact, their official language becomes Greek. It's a Greek bureaucracy.

Okay? And this is what we call the second Rome. At the same time, while this is happening, you have a massive migration of the steppe people. They're coming into Europe from many different locations. Why is this happening? Because in China, the Han dynasty is waging a war against the steppe nomadic people, the people who call the then so they're forced westwards, which forces the other steppe people to migrate into Europe and into Central Asia. So these people are called the and this is a huge problem for Rome because their people are not having children and they have all this massive migration coming in from the steppe.

And so what the Romans decided to do is divide and rule. What this means is that a lot of them are absorbed into the army as mercenaries and as soldiers in order to defend the border, in order to fight these civil wars. Now remember, last class we talked about the rise of the Catholic Church. And we discussed how the Catholic Church was in many ways being supported by these noble families. Not all of them supported the Catholic Church, but some of them did. And those that did had a huge advantage because now what they can do is absorb these new migrants into the society where they're at the top and the migrants are at the bottom.

Okay. Then the question is why would the migrants agree to this? The reason why is in the society it is very And for war purposes they would elect a war leader. But with this system, with the Catholic Church system, this war leader can now become a nobility. They can now join the 50 families to form a new nobility.

Okay. Does that make sense, guys? All right. So at this point in history, when Constantine sets up the Byzantine Empire, now the Roman Empire is going to divide into two: a western part and an eastern part.

And these two parts are going to have very different fates. The eastern part is still part of the Middle East: the Levant, Anatolia, Egypt. And so it is the wealthiest part of the empire, and as such it engages in wars with the Persian Empire. And this will define most of its history. Its capital, Constantinople, was designed to be invincible. You could not lay siege to it. You could not conquer it. And as such, the Byzantine Empire was stable. In fact, it lasted for about a thousand years, which is very, very impressive.

Okay. And as I said, it's very wealthy. And so therefore it's really able to dominate the world through mainly trade and diplomacy. So it became an imperial bureaucracy. It fought wars, but it usually used a lot of mercenaries because it had a lot of wealth. All right. So that's the Eastern Empire. And guess what, guys? This is very similar to China. So think about China. When you think about the Byzantine Empire, they're not the same, but they're very similar in how they organize the society.

The Western Empire is very different because it's the poorest part of Europe.

The other thing about this region is that there are lots of natural barriers. And so you have these competing, different cultures, different societies, and they're protected by mountains, by forests, by rivers. So there's a lot of diversity. There's a lot of diversity within the western empire. And so the power that emerges is actually the Catholic Church.

And as Western Europe increases in power and Eastern Europe decreases in power, the Catholic Church will increase in power as well. How did the Catholic Church come to dominate Western Europe? Because the Catholic Church believes it is out of history.

So you kings, you compete for who rules the earth. But we, the Catholic Church, we decide who goes to heaven. So the Catholic Church becomes the dominant power in Western Europe. In fact, you can say that they are the empire now. But they are a spiritual, a divine empire that is out of history and which speaks for God. And as such they become a very powerful empire as well. And this leads to tremendous conflicts throughout Western Europe.

But there's a problem with the Catholic Church, and we discussed this last class. It's trying to control the divine spark.

Remember, Jesus came to tell us that there's a divine spark in us. And as long as we try to glow this divine spark, we can be with God. And the Catholic Church says, "No, no, no. This divine spark, it is that of the devil and we must imprison it." And this works most of the time. But now and then you have religious leaders who arise and say, "No, no, no. The divine spark is within us." And so this leads to a lot of conflict. And ultimately the solution the Catholic Church proposes is the idea of crusades, where warriors go and kill those who believe in the divine spark.

And then they set up a secret police called the Inquisition in order to search for those who oppose the Catholic Church. The major idea is, if you believe in the divine spark, you're not an evil person, you're a stupid person because you don't know better. So the idea of the Inquisition is to educate you in the truth, which is the divine spark is that of Satan, that of the devil, and therefore you must obey the Catholic Church. But if you insist on defying the Catholic Church, then you are a heretic and therefore you must burn at the stake before you can pollute other people.

Okay? Now eventually what will happen is that as the conflict in Western Europe gets worse and worse, certain states will break away from the control of the Catholic Church and they will embrace a new religion called Protestantism. And this is something we'll discuss next. So that's a history of Western Europe.

So now I want to talk about Constantine and the rise of the Byzantine Empire. What Constantine does that's very important is that he makes Christianity the official religion of Rome. So before Constantine you had Christian emperors, but they did not make Christianity the official religion, but he made Christianity the official religion.

Okay. The problem, though, and we discussed this last class, is that Christianity is a franchise model. So different churches teach different. And so Constantine was like, no, we can't have this debate; if we make this the official religion, what we need to do is have one orthodoxy, a unified ideology. All right. So at this time in history there are two major debates, or two major sources of confusion. The first is what we call. What this is is the question of what's the nature of Jesus. Remember the story is that Jesus is in heaven, then he comes to earth.

Mary gives birth to Jesus. Then he preaches his message, the gospel. Then he is killed and he is resurrected and then he returns to heaven. Okay, that's the official story of Christianity. But there are lots of problems with the story, as you can imagine. If Jesus is divine, how did Mary give birth to Jesus? Right? If you're a human woman and you give birth to a god, that means that you're God yourself. Right? So who is Mary and what is her power? The second question then is, is Jesus divine or is he human?

Okay? Because if he's human, he dies. That's a sacrifice, right? But if you're divine, you can't die. So his death and his resurrection doesn't make any sense. So this is a problem of Christology. Is Jesus human or is he divine? And there are different interpretations. The first interpretation is Jesus is divine in heaven, but he's human in the world. Does that make sense? So yes, Mary gave birth to Jesus, but she gave birth to the human Jesus and not the divine Jesus, because you cannot give birth to divine God.

Okay? And that's why his death makes sense, because the Jesus who died was the human Jesus, but once he died and he was resurrected, then he went to heaven. That's one explanation, that Jesus is really human. Another explanation is, no, Jesus is divine. So Mary, the death doesn't really matter. He's just divine. So both are possibilities.

What the church says officially is Jesus is human and divine at the same time. This is the official ideology of the church. This makes no sense, guys. All right, but that's what you're taught. And so there are a lot of, of course, people who are like, this is a stupid idea. And these people are called the Nestorians.

And they were persecuted by the Catholic Church. And so they went to Persia. They went to the Middle East. They went to Persia. They went to Arabia, where they spread the message of Jesus. They taught Jesus as a human as opposed to a God. They taught that Jesus was a messenger. Okay? Which is what I taught you, right? That he's really a messenger of the Monad. All right. So, does that make sense?

Now the second debate is actually more confusing than the first debate. And it has to do with the nature of the three powerful forces, right?

The three gods. You have God, the ultimate God, and you have Jesus and you have the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is God expressed in the world. So when someone speaks to you, you think it's God. It's actually not God. It's the Holy Spirit. All right. So now the question is what's the relationship between these three: God, Jesus and Holy Spirit? And again there are different explanations and they kind of make sense. The first is the idea of modalism. Modalism is the idea that Jesus and God and Holy Spirit are just different modes of the same thing.

They just change. So when Jesus is in heaven, he's God. When Jesus comes to earth as a human, he's just Jesus. And then when Jesus wants to communicate with us, he's the Holy Spirit. So remember, Paul talked to Jesus, but Paul didn't really talk to Jesus. Paul talked to the Holy Spirit. So it's the same force but expressed differently. Okay, that makes sense, right? The second is the idea of partialism.

Partialism is just the idea that God, Jesus, the Holy Spirit are all part of the same divine force. Something of an ocean, right? The Pacific Ocean. The Pacific Ocean is huge, but there are different parts to it, right? So that's the idea of partialism. That makes sense too, right? Okay. The third idea is the idea of Arianism. Arianism is just the idea that God came first, and then afterwards he created Jesus. So in other words, Jesus is God, but he's second to the real God. Okay, that makes sense as well, right?

Now, there are problems with all three. The first problem is, if you read the Bible, Jesus talks to God. Jesus talks to the Holy Spirit. That's kind of confusing, because why would Jesus talk to himself? So there's a lot of inconsistencies in the Bible. So this doesn't really work. Partialism doesn't work either, because if you think about it, if God, Jesus and Holy Spirit are part of a divine aspect, then that divine aspect should be God, right? Not these three. That doesn't really make sense. And Arianism doesn't really make sense, because the entire point of Christianity is to say that Jesus is God, right?

We worship Jesus, not God. So if you're saying that God's superior, why shouldn't we worship God instead of Jesus? So this is problematic as well. So what Constantine did was he organized all the bishops of the different churches to come to Nicaea. It's called the Council of Nicaea, in order to come up with a solution to this problem. And their solution is actually even more problematic than these three. And it's called the Holy Trinity. So let's go over the Holy Trinity.

What the Holy Trinity says is this. And the Holy Spirit, they are separate. Okay? But they are equal. They are separate, but they're part of the same thing. They're both separate and they are equal to each other. Now, if you think about it, it makes actually no sense whatsoever. The only solution to this problem is that this Holy Trinity is both nothing and everything at the same time. It becomes a reality unto itself.

And the only way to understand this is to accept this as a reality. All right? So I know there's confusion, but think of the idea of money. Right?

Okay. So the idea of money is both nothing and everything. Money is nothing, but it can be everything at the same time as well because it symbolizes wealth. Does that make sense? Right? So none of this actually makes any sense. And the only way that it makes sense is if you force it to make sense. If you just memorize it. So think of math class. Okay, guys, I'm not sure if you appreciate this, but the entire point of math class is to make you stupid. Why? Because it is impossible for you to reason using mathematics.

Because mathematics doesn't really apply to the world. So the only thing that you can do is just memorize the formulas and apply the formulas to each other. And that just requires massive memorization and regurgitation. That's why, if you think about it, the best mathematicians are always in their 20s or 30s, because your brain has to be really energetic in order to process this information. But the older you get, the less capable you are in mathematics. Does it make sense? This is really important, guys. The more math you learn, the stupider you become.

Okay? But this goes against, say, philosophy or teaching, right? The older you get, the better you become. Why? Because the information that you're learning, you can apply to reality and then figure out what information makes sense as you test this information against reality. All right. So then the question is why would they do this? And the answer is very simple. To make you stupid. So let's just use an analogy. Let's do a thought experiment. The sky is blue, right? So we know the sky is blue.

And now we're like, okay, why is the sky blue? And is it always blue? And why are certain things blue? From this first principle, the sky is blue, you can now start to ask more questions. Based on this idea you can start to reason out more things. Does that make sense? But let's just say I change. I say the sky is red. You're like, "No, the sky is blue." I say, "No, no, the sky is red." If you do not say the sky is red, you are a heretic.

I will burn you at the stake. You're like, "Okay, all right. So what you're saying is this. You're saying that blue is red. Red is blue." And I'm like, "No, no, no. Blue is blue. Red is red. The sky is red." And you're like, "That makes no sense." And it's like, "Okay, well then I don't care, because if you do not say the sky is red, I will burn you at the stake. I will fail you in school." Okay, you understand?

So another way of saying this is, your brain, the way it processes information is by using logic, right? So think about building. Think of a building.

Okay, well, this makes sense, right? You're just stacking blocks on top of each other to build a building, right? But let's just say I make you, I say, "No, no, this is what the building looks like. This is empty." You're like, "Well, that makes no sense." So what I've done by forcing the idea of the Holy Trinity onto you is I've basically taken a part of your logical system, of your brain, and emptied it out. So it's impossible for you to connect things. Because from this, what you can do is say, well, now I can just keep on building more things, right?

But if the principle is there's a layer that is unseen or unknowable, you can't build on top of it. So your brain ceases to be able to process and be creative. Does that make sense? And I saw people who learn math well and also have strong ability in computer science. They all work in Silicon Valley and they are wealthy. But I think that also aligns with our concept that they are pursuing the materialistic and, you know, the world is ruled by Satan. Is that true?

All right. Is that clear, guys? Any questions? Okay. But as you can see, what's happening is that because people are forced to learn this, they don't want to learn this. And this starts a series of wars within the Roman Empire, because Constantine and the Byzantine Empire is going to enforce this orthodoxy onto every Christian church, and it starts a series of wars. At the same time the Byzantines are fighting the Sassanid Persia.

Sassanid Persia. Egypt, the Levant, and this is Arabia. Okay, so guys, this is really important. This is a time in history, about 500 to 600, where there's a lot of conflict going on. Remember, the first major conflict is between Byzantine and Sassanid Persians. The second major conflict is the church orthodoxy against the independent church franchises. So the Byzantine Empire is trying to enforce the orthodoxy on all different churches who refuse the Holy Trinity because it's such a silly idea. What this is going to do is it's going to force to the Sassanid as well as Arabia, the desert.

Okay? And these are called Nestorians. Now, again, they believe that Jesus is a divine messenger as opposed to God on earth. Also, we have the Jews as well, because the Jews keep on resisting against the Romans, because the Romans forced the Jews to obey Christianity, and so the Jews escape into. And at the same time the Jews want to return to Jerusalem.

Right now, what's interesting is that most people don't know this, but Arabia is at this point in history the most energetic, open and cohesive society in the Middle East. So first of all, it's open because Arabia has always been a point of trade between the Levant, Egypt and the Indus Valley civilization. India. So Arabia, they do a lot of trading, but they also are great fighters because they're great mercenaries. Why? Because as the Sassanids and the Romans fight more and more, the Arabians are recruited in as mercenaries for their armies, and as such they learn the most innovative warfare, and they're poor as well.

So they're really good fighters. And now what's happening is that the Arabians, the Arabs, are being exposed to new religions, the Nestorian Christianity as well as Judaism. And both preach the coming of the Messiah.

Okay. So Arabia is rising in energy, but the Byzantine Empire and the Sassanid Persians are decreasing in energy. The Byzantines are fighting too many wars and they're imposing too much orthodoxy, which is turning people into slaves. And because the Sassanids are fighting the Byzantines in war, and as the Byzantines become more orthodox and become more bureaucratic, the Sassanids are forced to become much more bureaucratic as well. Much more orthodox as well. And so the Nestorians are also being persecuted by the Sassanids. So the Jews want Jerusalem to return, and the Sassanid says to the Jews, "Hey, if you fight for us, we'll return Jerusalem to you." Okay?

And so the Jews went back to Jerusalem, and that pissed off the Byzantines. So they come and they kill a lot of Jews. Now the thing about the Jewish tradition is they believe that when they're most persecuted, when all hope is lost, their Messiah will come to save them. So the Jews are like, "Oh my god, the Messiah is coming. The Messiah is coming." The Christians also believe the Messiah is coming as well. They believe that Jesus is going to return. And all it will take is for one charismatic leader to emerge in the Arabian desert to say, "I'm Messiah.

Follow me. What I will promise you is this. I promise you that you will have the right to believe in whatever religion you want, because the divine spark is in you and you know how to best celebrate God by yourself. I promise religious tolerance for the Jews, for the Christians, for the Arabs, for everyone." And so what will happen is this leader will emerge, and his name is. And Muhammad will unite Arabia and then he will unite the Nestorians. He will unite the Jews, and they will together fight to get Jerusalem back.

They will fight against Persia. And guess what happens? They basically win without much resistance, because there's so much anger, so much opposition towards the Sassanid Empire as well as the Byzantine Empire. Plus, both empires are exhausted. And so this gives us the Islamic revolution, right? The Arabs are able to sweep through and conquer most of the world very, very quickly. But when they do so, what happens is that Muhammad dies. And now what's going to happen is they have lots of different factions, right? The Nestorians, the Jews, the Arabs as well.

And they're going to fight a civil war amongst themselves as well. And then from the civil war will emerge a new religion that we call Islam. But remember, this is really Muhammad himself did not preach Islam. All he preached was, I'm Messiah. I'm the messenger of God like Jesus and I will promote religious tolerance. We'll have a community of believers and followers in Jesus. But it doesn't matter if you're a Jew. It doesn't matter if you're a Christian. It doesn't matter what type of Christianity you are. You're free to believe whatever you want, because that's what God wants.

Okay, that's always the process. All right. Okay. Clear. All right. So let's do the PPT, so we can better understand what happened. So as we discussed, at this point in history the Roman Empire is huge, but please remember that it's not a bureaucracy and therefore each region is controlled by a certain noble family. And these are like the 50 top families in Rome, and there aren't that many. And then what will happen is there are certain families that will adapt well to the change in the Roman Empire, mainly by embracing the Catholic religion.

Okay. By being early investors in the Catholic Church, and as such they will continue on to today. We call these people the black nobility. All right. So as I mentioned, there are different migrants coming in from the steppe. The Huns, the Germanics, the Slavs, they're basically all the steppe people. But they will come into different regions and they will be absorbed into Europe differently. In the north they're much more independent, and this is where the Vikings are. These are where the Germans are.

They're very independent people. But as they approach the Roman Empire, they are assimilated and absorbed by the Roman nobility using the Catholic religion. And so the people at the very bottom here, they become Christians. But they become different types of Christians, and eventually they'll fight the Byzantines because the Byzantines want to enforce an Orthodox Christianity onto them.

Okay? And this is what Europe looks like when the Western Empire falls. As you can see, there are different societies as well. And again, what makes this possible is the fact that Western Europe has a lot of mountains. So it's pretty easy to defend your territory.

Okay, so this is Constantine, and he is going to make Christianity the official religion of the Roman Empire when he becomes emperor. So again, even after Julius Caesar the Romans cannot help but keep on fighting civil wars, and Constantine wins one of them, becomes emperor, and he moves the capital from Rome all the way to Constantinople. This is really important, because now he can establish a new culture called the Byzantine Empire. They call themselves Romans, but they're not really Romans, they're more like Greeks.

Another major difference is this. Rome is over in Western Europe. Constantinople is off in Eastern Europe. And so now Rome is able to defend its wealthy provinces of Anatolia and Egypt much more effectively. The other thing about Constantinople that's really important is it's pretty easy to defend. Because it's by the sea, and if you build high walls, it's almost impossible for people to invade Constantinople. This is the Hagia Sophia, which is the official church of the new religion. Today we call it Eastern Orthodox, but back then it was just the Catholic church.

Okay. And this is the Hagia, this is what Constantinople looks like at its peak. And what's really important to understand is it's very wealthy, but as you can see it's surrounded by these sea walls, which makes it impossible to defend. And that's why it was able to stand for about a thousand years.

Okay. The Council of Nicaea is where they make the Holy Trinity the official doctrine of the Catholic church. Even today, guys, if you're a Christian, you still recite it. All right. It's called the Nicene Creed. So, can you read it, Alan? "We believe in one God, the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth, and of all things visible and invisible. And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the only begotten, begotten of the Father before all ages, light of light, true God of true God, begotten not made, of one essence with the Father, by whom all things were made, who for us men and for all salvation came down from heaven, and was incarnate of the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, and became man, and he was crucified for us under Pontius Pilate.

"Died and suffered and was buried. And the third day he rose again according to the scriptures and ascended into heaven and sits at the right hand of the Father, and he shall come again with glory to judge the living and the dead, whose kingdom shall have no end. And in the Holy Spirit."

You'll be burned at the stake. It is something that you must memorize. It's like a math formula, basically. In math class, you're not allowed to question a formula. You're just forced to memorize the formula.

Okay. So as you can see, what's happening is that the migrants are being settled throughout Europe. But once they're being settled throughout Europe, the conflict between these noble families in Rome then becomes a conflict amongst these different groups.

All right. So after the Council of Nicaea announced the Holy Trinity, there's still a lot of resistance to it. In fact, even by the year 500, which is about 180 years after the Council of Nicaea, most of Europe, they don't really believe in the Holy Trinity. So Arian just means you don't believe in the Holy Trinity. Catholic means you do. And as you can see, this part, which is controlled by the Byzantine Empire, is able to enforce the Holy Trinity, but most other parts are not able to enforce the Holy Trinity.

Okay, this is a really important idea to understand. The idea of the Holy Trinity only takes force a few hundred years after it is announced. But in the beginning, there's a lot of resistance to the idea of the Holy Trinity. The Byzantine Empire must fight these wars to enforce it. And it will, because as the Byzantine Empire becomes stronger and stronger, you can see these green arrows. It's going to fight all these wars in order to expand the idea of the Holy Trinity. And Constantinople can do this because it's very wealthy and it doesn't really fear any enemies because of high walls.

Okay. As you can see, it's almost impossible to attack Constantinople from by All right. And the Byzantine Empire under Justinian will expand and expand and enforce the Holy Trinity on all churches. And by 565 it is at the peak of its power. But as we discussed, when the empire reaches its peak, it's probably going to fall really quickly, and that's what happens.

All right. So because of resistance to the Holy Trinity, Christians are forced into the Persian Empire and into the Arabian desert. At first they're welcomed by the Persians because these tend to be very well educated Christians who contribute a lot to the empire. But over time the Zoroastrians see the Christians as a threat, and conflict arises between Christians and the The Christians will also go into the Arabian desert as well to promote Christianity. As you can see how Christianity spreads. The story is Christianity also spreads to China and Japan.

Okay. All right. One thing that you need to understand is that even though we don't really discuss Arabia a lot, it's a very important part of the world throughout history because it's a trade center. So if you're India and you want to bring goods into Egypt, the best thing to do is to sail into Muscat and then have Arabian nomads carry the goods all the way to Mecca and then go into Egypt. So the Arabian desert, we don't talk much about it, but it is a crossroads of empire and it's a crossroads of culture as well.

And there are Jews in the Arabian desert because as the Romans persecute the Jews, the Jews escape into Arabia, because Romans don't like sand. The Romans, what they're really good at is besieging cities, but they hate fighting sand. That's why the Romans can never conquer Persia.

All right. So this is another map that shows the extent of the trade as well. So as you can see, the Arabian desert is connecting the world, right? Because you look at India, and India is now able to connect the world through the Arabian desert. It backs as Europe, the Mediterranean and Egypt through the Arabian desert. Okay. So what's going to happen is that once Muhammad comes into place and he unites the Arabian desert into a new community of followers, they will spread really quickly throughout the world.

And as you can see, there are now over a billion Muslims in the world. And you can see how many Muslims there are in the world. So there's a lot of conflict between the Roman Empire, the Byzantines and the Sassanids as well. There are lots of major battles. These wars are exhausting both empires. And this is going to enable the Arabs to rise in power, because as these two empires fight and their energy decreases, this energy is being transferred to the Arabs. Because a lot of wealth is being transferred to the Arabs.

But also a lot of mercenaries are learning how to fight from the Byzantines as well as the Persians. Okay. All right. So the major event that sparks the Arab revolution is the persecution of the Jews. So Alan, can you read please?

So the Byzantines come and they went back to the city because the Christians help them, and they start massacring a lot of Jews.

His name is Muhammad. Okay. All right. Keep on reading.

Okay? And we know this from the Quran. So we're going to read the Quran together, which is the holy book of the Muslims. And what we'll see is that Muhammad is clearly promising tolerance for all religious factions. Doesn't matter what religion you are, you're allowed to practice whatever you want. Okay. So, Alan, can you read please?

All these differences don't matter. What's important is for you all to remember that you all believe in the one true God. That's what matters. And these differences don't really matter. Okay. Keep on Yeah.

Okay. To say that Mary is divine. You say that Jesus is divine. It's all superstitious. They're all just messengers of the one true God, like Moses and like Moses before him. And now like Muhammad today. Moses, Jesus and Muhammad are all messengers of God. Jesus was the penultimate and Muhammad is the last. The final messenger of God.

All right, keep on. "With Him are the keys of the unseen. None knows them except He, and He knows everything on land and in the sea. Not a leaf falls but He knows it. And there is not a single grain in the darkness of the earth, nor is there anything wet or dry, but is in a clear record. It is He who takes you by night, and He knows what you earn by day. Then He raises you up in it until a fixed term is fulfilled. Then to Him is your return.

"Then He will inform you of what you used to do. He is the Conqueror over His servants, and He sends guardians over you until, when death overtakes one of you, Our envoys take him away, and they never fail. Then they are brought back to Allah, the true Master. Unquestionably, His is the judgment, and He is the swiftest of reckoners."

The main advantage of the Byzantines is they still have Constantinople, which is impossible to conquer. So Constantinople is safe, but everything else falls to the Arabs. And as you can see how fast their conquest is, and this is only about 100 years. They're able to basically conquer most of the Roman Empire. They take Spain, they take North Africa, they conquer Persia. It's a really rapid conquest because at this point in history, people are just sick of empires and they're looking for religious Okay? And over time, as Muhammad dies, the Muslims will fight amongst themselves and they will establish different empires called caliphates, and they will break up as well.

Okay? And this will give time for the Byzantines to reestablish themselves, and then Western Europe will become more and more Now the Arabs will establish something called the Islamic Golden Age. And this marks a time of tremendous peace and prosperity for the world, because the Muslims are able to establish trade networks throughout the world. Why? Well, because when you do trade, the biggest problem is one of trust, right? How can I trust you to take my money to somewhere else? But if you're a Muslim, you must swear to Allah.

Okay? So religion requires you to be trustworthy, and that allows Muslims to work together and establish trade routes throughout the world. But you can't really trust someone who's not Muslim, but you trust someone who is Muslim. So these Muslims go all around the world, including into China, and the Islamic Empire is able to establish trade throughout the world, which brings tremendous prosperity to most of the world.

And as you can, I'm not sure you understand Islam, but Islam is a beautiful, simple religion that builds trust and community. This is Mecca, and this is the Hajj, where Muslims come from all over the world and they circle around the Kaaba, the cube.

So Islam considers itself the ultimate religion because it improves on both Judaism and Christianity. Christians believe they are improving on Judaism. Muslims believe they're an improvement on Christians and Jews as well.

Now let's talk about the Western Empire, because that's where our focus will be for the rest of the semester. In 476 the Goths destroy Rome. Why? Because the power now is being shifted from the empire to the Catholic Church. So the empire doesn't really have that much power. So what happens is that it recruits mercenaries to fight for them, but it can't really pay the mercenaries.

So the mercenaries in response go and sack Rome. By this time in history Rome is no longer a power. It doesn't really matter anymore. Augustine, who is the main architect of the Catholic Church, takes Paul's ideas and systematizes them. He teaches us in The City of God that the Catholic Church is out of history. It is beyond history. It is divine. So the kings can fight over the land, but it's the church who will decide who goes to heaven and who burns in hell. And that's the power of the church.

One thing to remember about Europe is there are lots of geographic barriers, which allows for diversity within Europe. That's why Europe has so many countries, because historically it's been very hard to unify Europe because of the geography, and this allows for tremendous diversity and it creates a lot of conflict as well, which drives innovation. So this is when the Roman Empire falls in the west, there are lots of different groups fighting for the remains.

Now what's really important to understand about history is when we say the Roman Empire rises and it falls.

This is our understanding of them. But from their perspective, the empire never fell, because these warlords think that I'm the empire now. And so what's going to happen is that they're going to compete for the legacy of And eventually this leads to the rise of a new power, the Franks. So the Franks are expanding throughout Europe and they see themselves as the heir to the Roman Empire. But how do you prove that you are heir to the Roman Empire? How do you legitimize yourself? Well, you need to get the Catholic Church on your side.

So in about 800 Charlemagne, who is the king of the Franks, is crowned Holy Roman Emperor by the Pope. And from now on it is the Catholic Church, the Pope, who decides who will be the Holy Roman Emperor. There's a negotiation going on, but for the public the Holy Roman Emperor is always anointed by God.

Okay, this is Charlemagne, and today he is buried in the Aachen Cathedral. One of the most beautiful buildings in the world. His body is still there. And this is what it looks like. Okay, now the Catholic Church, because of this power, is now able to anoint the Holy Roman Emperor. It becomes wealthy. Okay. So, can you read this, Ellen, from the Bible?

Okay. If you go to the Vatican, you can still go back and visit St. Peter's Basilica. It is one of the most beautiful buildings in the world. It's extremely wealthy. Inside, guys, it's all gold. All right. So the Vatican has been historically the wealthiest organization in the world, and it was able to do this because Western Europe started to become very wealthy over time. So from about a,000 to about 1300 the population of Europe doubles, because of technology innovation, because the climate is warming, allowing for agriculture, because of the rise of cities, and because Europe is trading with everyone.

Okay. So at this time Europe is becoming more and more wealthy, which makes the Catholic Church really, really wealthy. These are different urban centers of Europe at this time and they engage mainly in trade. So the church becomes a much more powerful idea than the empire. Why? Well, with an empire, it's the emperor who's in charge, right? But the emperor is still a human being and therefore he can change his mind and he doesn't really know what he's doing. But in the church, the person in charge is God, who is perfect, immutable and eternal.

Okay? So this is the ultimate authority, the church. Second is what is the mandate? Well, an empire demands that you work hard, your labor, but the church demands your soul, your Okay? Therefore the church is able to extract more wealth from you. The last thing is, okay, let's say you don't obey the empire. What's the worst thing that can happen to you? Well, the empire puts you to death. Not a big deal. But the church, what it can do is send you to hell for all of eternity. That's why the Catholic Church becomes the most powerful organization ever in human history, and it's still true today.

All right. So what makes the Catholic Church so powerful? It becomes a divine bureaucracy. And what it does is establish a very strict hierarchy. So the idea of the church is that God is distant and God demands your obedience. Right? So remember Augustine, City of God, remember Paul, right? So one thing is that when you go to church, the priest doesn't speak in your language, the vernacular, he speaks in Latin. And you don't really understand the language. You're not allowed to read the Bible, because at this time most people are illiterate.

The Holy Trinity makes no sense. But again, you're not asked to debate it. You're not asked to question it. You just have to memorize it. There are lots of rituals in the Catholic Church. Some of these rituals are just really weird. So for example the Eucharist, where you believe that you're actually eating the body and blood of Jesus through the idea of transubstantiation. The church is powerful because it can determine who goes to heaven and hell and for how long, and ultimately, if you are a king and you don't obey the church, the Pope can excommunicate you, which is to say I remove you from the Christian community, and therefore any other king can come and kill you and it'll be good in the eyes of God.

Okay, does that make sense? So this is why the church is so powerful, but it also helps us explain why the church is so corrupt as well. They have too much power, and ultimately they will use this power in order to enrich themselves. Remember, the people who control the Catholic Church are descendants of the Roman nobility. They will use the Catholic Church to enrich themselves. They sell something called indulgences. And the idea is, let's say you're a rich person and you did a lot of bad things and now you're afraid you'll burn in hell, right?

Well, Jesus will say, "Too bad." But the Catholic Church says, "Give us a lot of money and we'll give you an indulgence." Basically, you know, a ticket to purgatory. All right? And so, as you can see, there's a lot of corruption going on. Something called simony, where you can buy and sell positions in the Catholic Church, very similar to the imperial bureaucracy of China, right? They're selling holy relics. Priests are not really divine, they get married, they sell their positions. And the kings are the ones who can appoint leaders of the church as well. So there's this negotiation going on between the Catholic Church and the kings as well. The parishioners, no matter how poor they are, they're forced to pay a tax.

They pay a tax to the Catholic Church and not to the king. As you can imagine, the king is not really happy about this, because a third of his land, most of his tax revenue, is being taken over by the Catholic Church. So that's why a lot of kings will eventually start to rebel against the Catholic Church. The church controls one-third of all land in Europe tax-free. And this leads to feudalism. All right.

So at the same time though, even though the Catholic Church is so powerful in Europe, it still has a legitimacy problem. Meaning, how does it prove that it is truly Well, you have some certain problems. The first problem is the Muslims occupy the Holy Land. If you truly represent God, why is Jerusalem in the hands of the Muslims? Also, Spain is part of Europe, but Muslim Spain is actually much more wealthy and innovative than the rest of 1054, the Eastern Orthodox Church led by the Byzantines breaks with the Catholic Church.

Okay? Because both want to be the ultimate center of the world. But the Byzantines say that we're the center and the Romans say, "No, we're the center."

And there's corruption going on. Everyone says corruption, but there's also lots of religious leaders who are rebelling against the Catholic Church because they want to unleash a divine spark. So there are all these legitimacy problems going on. And so there are different solutions. One solution the Catholic Church does is that it persecutes Jews. The Catholic Church allows Jews to exist just so that the Catholic Church can scapegoat the Jews. And throughout this time, as you can see, Jews are being persecuted, mainly by being forced out of their homes where they lived for hundreds of years.

Okay? And a lot of them are forced to go east into the Muslim Empire and to go to Spain. But over time they're being expelled from these regions.

This is another map that shows the persecution of the Jews. As you can see they're forced to go east. And often there are lots of massacres as well. So the black spots, the skull spots, are areas in which they were massacred. They were blamed for certain crimes.

All right. So this is a map that shows the pilgrimages of Christians into the Holy Land. And again, it's a source of embarrassment for the Christians that their Holy Land is occupied by Muslims and they have to pay a tax to the Muslims when they go into the Holy Land.

Right now the Holy Land, Jerusalem, is being controlled by the Seljuk Turks, okay? The Ottoman Empire. All right? And that's why Pope Urban II will eventually call for the Crusades to liberate the Holy Land from the Muslims. Okay. So can you read please? "All who die by the way, whether by land or by sea, or in battle against the pagans, shall have immediate remission of sins. Oh what a disgrace if such a despised and base race, which worships demons, should conquer a people which has the faith of omnipotent God and is made glorious with the name of Christ. Let those who have been accustomed unjustly to wage private warfare against the faithful now go against the infidels and end with victory this war which should have been begun long ago.

"Let those who for a long time have been robbers now become knights. Let those who have been fighting against their brothers and relatives now fight in a proper way against the barbarians. Let those who have been serving as mercenaries for small pay now obtain the eternal reward."

Okay? So guess what? A lot of people who join the Crusades are criminals, because here's your opportunity to get good with the church. That's why we see a lot of abuse during the Crusades. So as you can see, lots of people are now joining the Crusades in order to liberate the Holy and eventually they succeed. Even though a lot of them are criminals, they're still very good fighters because they have religious devotion. They're very energetic.

And unfortunately, they're too energetic. So they have a tendency to massacre people when they succeed, because they literally see the and the Jews as demons. That's what the Pope taught them.

One organization that developed during the Crusades is called the Knights Templar. This is very important. We'll be discussing the Knights Templar later on. But the Knights Templar is really the first multinational bank, because these pilgrims are going to the Holy Land and they need to bring money with them to fund the journey. But if they take a lot of money with them, then they'll get robbed, right?

So what they'll do is they'll give the money to the Knights Templar, and then when they get to Jerusalem, the Knights Templar will give the money back to them. So they're a bank, basically, and then they can use this money to start investing throughout Europe, and so they become very wealthy. The problem is that because they're in Jerusalem and away from the authority of the Catholic Church, they start to embrace new ideas. They start to discover the true nature of Jesus from the Muslims and from other Christians in that area.

And so the church thinks that they become more corrupt over time. And that's why their leader, Jacques de Molay, is burnt at the stake. And in 1307, the organization is banned by the Catholic Church. But a lot of the survivors will go over to other places and they will form the basis of a secret society we call the Freemasons. So we'll discuss the Freemasons later on.

Okay. There's also something called the crusade. So there are still individuals who believe in the divine spark. And these people are called Cathars. And the church sees them as a threat, and that's why they launch a crusade against these Cathars. Okay. So can you read, Alan? "Simon and many of his soldiers made determined efforts to convert the Cathar perfects but failed.

By interrogating All right? And this leads, of course, to the Inquisition. And so the idea is that if you disagree with church orthodoxy, they will figure it out. And if you refuse to recant, if you refuse to obey, they will burn you at the stake. So at this time in history, because of the Inquisition, because of the power of the Catholic Church, Western Europe is one of the least innovative places in the world.

All right. And at first this is fine, but bad things start to happen in Europe. So the Little Ice Age begins, then you have the Great Famine, then you have more wars, then you have benetry. And then of course you have the Black Death. So if the Catholic Church represents the will of God and all this is happening, then is God really happy with the Catholic Church, right? So this is the Black Death, which kills about a third of the European population. And people, because they're religious, they think that this is the will of God.

It's because the Catholic Church, it's corrupt. It's evil. It's stagnant. That's why God is punishing us. And this will lead to conflict within Europe, where the Catholic Church is actually broken into different parts as well. So there are some who believe that Rome is the true center of the Catholic Church, and there are other people who believe that Avignon is the true center of the Catholic Church, and this creates even more legitimacy problems with the Catholic All right. And then you have individuals who will emerge to challenge the orthodoxy of the Catholic Church.

Okay. So this is Fra Dolcino. We don't read John Wycliffe is a British person who was, he was not punished when he was alive, but afterwards, after he died, they decided he was a heretic. So what they did was they dug up his body and then burned him at the stake to make sure he burned in hell.

Jan Hus will lead a revolution. And this is called the Hussite Wars. And none succeed. But then another man will emerge called Martin Luther, who will eventually lead a successful revolution against the Catholic Church. And this is called Protestantism. And we'll discuss Martin Luther next class. Next class we will discuss the rise of capitalism. All right. Any questions, guys? Yes. Like there's a case of my mother's friend telling me that her husband has a severe cancer and they tried to pray to the Catholic church and later the cancer just disappears and they said it is a miracle by the Catholic church and they all believe in the Catholic church.

Can it explain the miracle? Like, is there really a miracle there?

You get better. And this happens a lot. It's called the placebo effect. So why does this happen? It happens because if you understand that mind leads to matter, your reality is shaped by your perception, your belief. So if you believe that this medicine can improve your body, then it will have effects. The question though is how much do you really believe in this. So you can argue that cancer is really a question of loss of faith. What is cancer? Cancer is a splitting of cells, right?

So why is your body literally falling apart? It's because you've stopped believing in yourself. You've stopped believing in the purpose of life. You've stopped believing that you have relevance in the world. So when you say, "I want to cure my cancer, I want to cure my cancer," what you're really saying is, "I want to find a new faith. I want to believe in myself again. I want to reestablish my relevance in the world." Does that make sense? So you have the desire. Once you have the desire, then the cure makes sense.

Okay? So, So another way of saying this is, let's just say that you don't feel well, right?

If you're able to control your thoughts, if you're able to calm yourself down, your body will heal a lot faster. Does that make sense?