Blog #4

I have always been interested in the Islam religion. At NDNU I have taken both a Women's Spirituality and World Religions class.  In both classes we talked a lot about Islam.

I think it is amazing that in the 21st century 22%  of the world identified as Muslims.  I have also found it interesting that Islam started from a single person, Mohammad.  For 22 years he had revelations which were recorded and formed the Quran.  It's not mentioned in the reading but I always found it interesting that Muhammad's wives and daughters were a big part of the recording of the Quran and had a great influence over other Muslims during the early stages of the religion.  Then, women were considered second class citizens but yet they had a huge part in the Islamic religion.  

Even though the message of the Quran challenged the ancient Arab religion and the way of life it was still able to spread across the world.  Not only did Islam spread quickly through Arabia it became their way of life with the 5 Pillars being at its core. Islam joined the church and state of Arabia, whereas Christianity has also separated the two.

I didn't know that Islam was a major influence in the Arab Empire. It created a new empire, religion and civilization.  I also found it interesting that although the conversion process was pretty intense a lot of people still converted.  While some converted because they were "believers" many also converted for social mobility.  

Journal #2

Like most people, I have always thought about empires negatively.  Empires are usually associated with political and/or cultural oppression.  Most often empires have a single ruler with a unified political system.  I found it interesting that empires such as Greece and Mesopotamia were developed and succeeded because of their common culture.  Current political values condemn empires but the majority of people before the 20th century lived in empires.  There are positive and negative aspects of empires.  A lot of empires were violent, they exploited their citizens and had a strong warrior culture.  However, empires also provided peace, a sense of security, economic and artistic development, commercial exchange and allowed for a mix of cultures. 

I have heard of the Persian Empire but didn't know much about it.  It was the most impressive empire of that time.  It spread from Egypt to India and consisted of 35-50 million people within 23 different provinces.  The Persian Empire had a very structured political system.  They had a kingship/monarch with governors and imperial spies.  I thought it was interesting that they used imperial spies.  With the empire being so large the King needed eyes and ears everywhere.  The Persian Empire had a standardized monetary system, taxes, canals, a "royal road" which helped with trading, a underground irrigation system, palaces, monuments and halls.  The Persian Empire had everything cities, states and countries have today.

With how advanced and massive the Persian Empire was I was shocked that they were not able to conquer the Greeks.  The Persians tried twice in 10 years to conquer Athens and somehow the Greeks succeeded.  Years following the Greeks experienced the Golden Age of Greek Culture.  The political unification of Greece occurred.

It was also interesting to learn about the Roman and Chinese empires.  Even though both empires were so distant they were so similar.  They both defined themselves in universal terms, they invested heavily into the public works, had a strong military and commercial system.  They invoked supernatural sanctions to support their rule and incorporated foreign religious traditions.  Although the Roman and Chinese shared these similarities, they also had significant differences.  The relationship between ruler and subject was much different.  The assimilation to its subjects was also different.  For example, Rome often granted citizenship to individuals/families who took on Roman culture.  The two also had different culture, language, political structures and thought of the environment differently.

Reading about these early civilizations/empires was very interesting.  It was eye-opening to read how these empires came into power and how they collapsed.  While each successful empire has a different story and faced different challenges they are all very similar into how they came into power and how they lost that power.  The gender, religious, cultural, patriarchal, and political systems set in place by these early empires made the world what it is today.  The majority of today's society is based on the success and failures of these early empires.