Civilizations and space 4 ( formation of cosmopolitan civilizations )

Unlike the other three civilizations, which were based on great rivers, European civilization was born from the Mediterranean Sea like great lake . Greece and Rome emerged from the commercial influences of Egypt, Syria and Phoenicia as the agricultural production of the Orient civilizations increased. One of the reasons why Greece did not become an empire (with the exception of the Macedonian dynasty) was that it was not an agricultural civilization based on rivers, but a commerce and money civilization based on the Mediterranean Sea. It seems that So would the Roman Empire (Rome was heavily influenced by Greece*1). Compared to Indian and Chinese civilizations, Islamic civilization also includes a variety of geographical environments and is similar to Greek and Roman civilizations. 

 

*1 Rome influenced by Greece

During the Persian Wars, Persia and Carthage were linked, and Greece and Rome (against Etruria) were linked. Macedonia and Carthage were united in the dispute over Sicily, and Rome was united with the League of Greek Cities. While the activities of the Greek cities and the Roman cities showed some similarities and differences, both Greece and Rome continued to circulate in various forms of their ``government'', inheriting trade areas. I feel like In modern terms, it may be said that Hegemony moved from Greece to Rome in the Mediterranean world - economy.

*2 The Persian Wars, the Peloponnesian Wars, and the Punic Wars are all ancient wars, but just as Toynbee was inspired by them, there is an impression that these wars have something in common with modern times because these wars were fought over trade spheres. The fact that it was a battle must have been a big factor. Gradually, the Roman Empire began to grant Roman citizenship to dependent territories, but this idea itself was cosmopolitan. In other words, the major characteristic of the cosmopolitan type is that it is a cosmopolitan type society, regardless of the system or era, but the "world economy" has become a system of exploitation through two pipes that make use of internal disparities and external disparities. It seems that Toynbee drew up the idea of the rise of the proletariat inside and the rise of belligerent groups outside.

 

 

There was a time when European civilization tried to preserve the unity of imperialism like Chinese civilization. Such was the flow from the start of the Roman Empire, through the era of the Five Good Emperors, to the era of confusion, and eventually to the establishment of the Byzantine Empire. The Byzantine Empire was a trading nation and had long served as a bulwark for Roman civilization, but in the west it was invaded by Germanic tribes and others, and the period of integration (the Kingdom of the Franks) was short-lived. It continued to receive it frequently*, and European civilization was formed in it, accompanied by separation.

* The Avars and Magyars attacked the Holy Roman Empire, and the Saracens and Normans attacked the Merovingian and Carolingian dynasties respectively.

 

Even though they were cosmopolitan civilizations, the difference between Islamic civilization and European civilization is that Islam spread the Koran, Arabic, and the immigration of Arabs gradually spread, and  that civilization repeated expansion movements, while the Roman Empire as commerce declined,* Christianity spread. As a result, a cosmopolitan civilization has been formed by taking in what various ethnic groups have entered. In this sense, the cosmopolitan type of European civilization seems to have been formed in a way that differs greatly from the cosmopolitan type of Islamic civilization. Also, Christianity did not expand in the same way as Islamic civilization during this period, and the confusion caused by repeated ethnic invasions may have been great for a long time.

 

*Economic decline in the Roman Empire

Since the time of Diocletian, social status and occupation have been fixed, creating a system reminiscent of the Indian caste. First of all, it was the property class (council members) in the city that was placed at the center of state control. State control over trade unions of traders and craftsmen was likewise strengthened. In this way, the cities that formed the cells of Greco-Roman society fell, and the measures taken by the government for military personnel and government officials during a period of instability (inflation) in the value of money in the sector of state finance ) produced an irregular national economy.

 

A surplus was generated by the improvement of agricultural productivity, and it became possible to distribute it, cities were established, and commerce began. The earliest trade began in the Orient. The civilizations of Mesopotamia and Egypt arose, leading to the integration of them into Assyria and Achaemenid Persia, which led to the establishment of Phenicia, Greece, and Rome. On the other hand, in the east, it influenced the distant Indus civilization* and the Yellow River civilization. In India, a wave of Aryans, separate from the Persians, surged.

 

*Indus Valley Civilization and Mesopotamian Civilization

Which came first, the Mesopotamian Civilization or the Indus Valley Civilization? The Indus civilization is said to have been around 2500-1800 BC, and the Mesopotamian civilization around 3000 BC. And if the migration of Indo-European tribes was around 1500 BC, it is said that the Indus civilization was not destroyed by the Aryans, but was destroyed before that. The Indus Valley civilization is said to have spread farther than Mesopotamia, Egypt, and the Yellow River civilization*, but it is said to have disappeared without a trace. It is believed that a variety of factors, including weather, logging, and changes in watersheds, contributed to their disappearance.

 

There were great differences between the urban civilization of Mesopotamia and the Indus civilization in terms of the form of the city and the lifestyle of the inhabitants. Also, the method of carving cuneiform characters on clay tablets was not known in the Indus civilization.

 

In addition to the two major language families (Semitic-Hamitic and Indo-European), there were peoples of unknown origin, including the Sumerians, who built the first urban civilization on the Mesopotamian plains, collectively known as the "Japhetic" language family.

It was the Sumerians who built these city-states centering on the southern part of Babylonia, and they laid the foundation of Mesopotamian civilization.

 

Considering the above, the development of bathing facilities, the improvement of urban planning, etc., are somewhat similar to those of Rome. *Although the deeper part of the stratum is unknown, there might be a possibility that the Indus civilization, the Dravidian civilization, was older than the Mesopotamian civilization. Considering this fact, the fact that it was an unknown ethnic group, and that it was not cuneiform from the beginning, it may be possible to consider the theory that the Indus civilization preceded it.

  

It should be noted that around the 5th century BC, many influential religious figures and philosophers were born, such as Zoroaster in Persia, Socrates in Greece, Buddha in India, and Confucius in China. The establishment of a "complicated human society" was considered to be the background to this, and the existence of cities would have been assumed. And the emergence of cities led to the formation of nations and empires. Alexander's Empire, the Roman Empire, the Mauryan Empire, the Qin-Han Empire, and the Persian Empire.

  

Zarathustra 6th-7th century BC

Socrates 469-399 BC

Shaka 563-483 BC

Confucius 552-479 BC

 

However, it seems that these empires were different. While Greece and Rome were civilizations centered on trade (markets) based on the network of the Mediterranean Sea, Persia, India, and China were civilizations centered on agricultural productivity and despotic power. . Although Indian civilization (especially the Satavarhana and Pallava dynasties in the south) may be a little different. And tyrannical power would have been better to prevent the nomadic tribes from constantly invading from the north.

 

The establishment of these empires cannot be regarded as the establishment of cosmopolitans, because it was a space where peoples different from cosmopolitans live based on common values rather than by coercive power. Rather than being a cosmopolitan type of civilization, the Byzantine Empire also transformed into an empire like Persia and China.

 

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Civilizations and space 3 ( cosmopolitan civilization and local civilization are replaced )

6 Cosmopolitan civilization and Local civilization are replaced.

 

However, cosmopolitan civilization and local civilization may be replaced. Chinese civilization and other civilizations relatively repeatedly exerted their unifying power and continued to renew the shifts of local civilizations, but after the Sung Dynasty, conquering dynasties ruled in the order of Liao, Jin, Yuan, and Qing (but Ming in between). On the other hand, India was not unified after the Mauryan dynasty until the Gupta dynasty, Vardhana Dynasty, the Three Kingdoms*1 period, Delhi Sultanat, and the Mughal Empire. The Mughal Empire was a conquering dynasty. Looking at Chinese civilization and Indian civilization, it seems that local civilization and cosmopolitan civilization alternate, but one major trend can be sensed. The values that were established in ancient times remained strong, and the phenomenon of introverted mass psychology, which is the driving force of civilization, was remarkable. It is also an interesting similarity that the Chinese civilization and the Indian civilization were greatly different in the north and south.

 

India's Three Kingdoms Period (around 750-975), a three-way state of the Pala Dynasty, the Rashtrak Dynasty, and the Pretihara Dynasty. China's Three Kingdoms period (around 220-280) was fought by Wei, Wu, and Shu after the fall of the Later Han Dynasty, and its history was recorded. In China, the revival of the dynasty was always expected, and the dynasty that was established in the next generation compiled the history of the previous dynasty. Before the Three Kingdoms period of India, there was the Vardhana dynasty, but although it is not known whether there was a unity like the Later Han, the countries fought over Kanawji (the capital of the Vardhana dynasty) in the middle reaches of the Ganges.

Indian civilization and Chinese civilization are included in the classification of local civilizations with strong unity as a whole, because they have the resilience to unify even if they are divided. However, the resilience of Indian civilization was considerably weaker than that of Chinese civilization.

The Chinese civilization had a strong element of politics (government through imperial examinations), while the Indian civilization had a strong element of culture (religion). There was also a similarity in the transition from the upper and middle reaches to the Ganges (lower reaches). Both were agricultural cultures, and as productivity improved, cities arose. In the Chinese civilization, there were 100 families, and in the Indian civilization, there were 62views*, and nations arose, and eventually empires. And although the empire was divided and weakened from the inside and the outside respectively, the Chinese civilization and the Indian civilization were revived each time.

* 62views

In Buddhist texts, the new ideas and thinkers that emerged during this period are referred to as '62 views'. Sixty-two, in many senses, corresponds to the “hundred” of the 100 families of China. It is interesting to note that similar developments in the history of thought took place in China and India at exactly the same time, with similar political, economic and social backgrounds. And after this, Emperor Shi Huang, Ashoka, the emperor and king who created the basic model of Chinese civilization and Indian civilization, appeared.

 

I have mentioned European civilization and Islamic civilization as cosmopolitan civilizations, but Islamic civilization, like Chinese civilization and Indian civilization, was formed on the rubble of the oriental civilization with the Nile River and the Tigris-Euphrates River as the mother of the great rivers. was done. Agricultural production increased, cities were established, nations arose, and empires were established. It is a series of empires that started with Assyria, but Hellenism and others were added to the soil of such an oriental empire, and finally, the innovation of the social community (Umma) generated by the Arabs who were the peripheral part became Islamic civilization.  After going through the Umayyad dynasty (ruled by the Arabs) and the Abbasid dynasty*1 ( Islamic empire), Islamic civilization was divided, and from there it shifted to a cosmopolitan form (Islamic system)*2.

 

*1 During the heyday of the Abbasid dynasty, in the second half of the era of Harun al-Rashid, the Barmak family, which had been the prime minister and high officials, was suddenly purged by the caliph Harun al-Rashid. The Barmak family is originally from Balkh (the former capital of Bactria) in Central Asia and was originally Buddhist. After Al-Rashid, disputes arose over the issue of succession, followed by the rebellion of Khorasan, the establishment of the Saffarid dynasty, and the establishment of the Samanid dynasty. Before long, the Mamluk (Turkish slave group) took over the Abbasid court, and the center of Islamic civilization moved from Baghdad to Damascus and Cairo. The power of the caliphate as a despot was weakened, the power of the secular monarchs dispersed, but the Islamic civilization itself remained united.

 

*2 Cosmopolitan form (Islamic system)

It was ruled by the Mongols around the 14th century, and it was a little later, but if you read Ibn Battuta's "A Tour of the Three Continents," you can get a glimpse of the cosmopolitan atmosphere of Islamic civilization. Ibn Battuta ended up as a kadi (law official) in his hometown of Morocco, but the story depicts a situation in which he was welcomed as a highly educated jurist in India and the Maldives. From the 9th century Islamic jurisprudence developed in Islamic civilization, while mysticism (Sufism) also developed, and the Islamic society, the Umma, expanded. Although Ibn Battuta's time preceded the height of Islamic civilization, the Ottoman Turks, the Safavids, and the Mughal Empire, such cosmopolitan consciousness continued.

 

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Civilizations and space 2 ( cosmopolitan civilizations and local civilizations )

4 Cosmopolitan civilizations

 

Civilizations that are separated from each other but share some common values and have active exchange of information and trade are called cosmopolitan civilizations.

 

Such civilizations include Islamic civilization (after the Umayyad dynasty) and European civilization (from the late Middle Ages through the emergence of capitalism to the present day). At first, there was a strong focus on the introduction of the monetary system and common languages (Arabic and Latin)*1, but it later became politically divided into nations and transformed into a world-economy*2.

  

*1 The earliest example of the introduction of a monetary system and a common language at about the same time may be that of the First Emperor of Qin (around 213 BC). At first, China was also a collection of several nations, but after the Qin and Han dynasties, it went beyond the cosmopolitan type to a despotic type of government, and became a regional civilization. Later, during the Umayyad period, Abbul-Malik (ruled 685-705) introduced a common money and language (Arabic). In European civilization, Latin was the common language in the west and Greek was the common language in the east. A common currency did not materialize, especially in the west. In European civilization, money was used in each region, and a network between cities was gradually formed over a wide area, resulting in the establishment of a cosmopolitan civilization.

 

*2 world-economy  Fernand Braudel's concept: It does not mean the world economy, but refers to the state in which several nations gather to form a single economic system.

 

 

5 Local civilizations

 

What are the characteristics of local civilizations in contrast to cosmopolitan civilizations? A civilization that has a strong center and is strongly controlled by politics or culture at the center is called a Local civilization.

 

I mentioned Chinese civilization and Indian civilization as such civilizations.

 

Chinese civilization was modeled by Qin Shi Huang, and Indian civilization was modeled by Ashoka of the Mauryan dynasty. However, as mentioned earlier, Indian civilization was often politically divided. Both the Chinese civilization and the Indian civilization may have initially had a situation like the "world economy" mentioned earlier, but they could not expand outward like European civilization and Islamic civilization.

 

Chinese civilization*1 and Indian civilization*2 were classified as local civilizations in that expansion was slowed down and internal despotism and control increased. It may be said that Chinese civilization is controlled by politics, and Indian civilization is controlled by culture. The impetus for Chinese civilization to become such a civilization was the introduction of the imperial examination system by the Sui Dynasty, the establishment of a financial state in the Northern Song Dynasty, and the development of control over the surrounding ethnic groups through economic policies, followed by the conquests of the Liao, Jin, Yuan, and Qing dynasties. It became a civilization ruled by a dynasty.

 

*1 The order is Qin, Former Han, Later Han, Wei and Jin Southern and Northern Dynasties, Sui, Tang, Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms , Northern Song/Liao , Southern Song /Jin, Yuan , Ming , Qing , Republic of China,  the People's Republic of China (underlined parts are dynasties ruled by non-Han people).

 

*2 Transition of Indian civilization Indus Civilization Early Vedas, Late Vedas, Kosala Magadha, Maurya, Satavahana Kushana , Gupta Pallava Pandya, Vardana Charukya Pallava, Three Kingdoms (Puitihara: Rajput dynasties, Rashtrakuta, Pala )・Chola, Slave Dynasty , Delhi Sartanat Vijayanagar, Mughal Empire , Indian Empire , Indian Republic

The rise and fall of dynasties in Indian civilization was violent in the north and relatively stable in the south.

 

In contrast, what is interesting is that Indian civilization became a local civilization because Buddhism and Jainism, which were commercial powers during the Gupta dynasty, declined, and Hinduism, which was linked to the dynasty, became a local indigenous religion. This is the point of absorbing religion, and rather the complex caste system deepened during the Rajput dynasties. After the Gupta Dynasty, although there were differences between the north and the south, India was culturally common, but politically divided, a state similar to European civilization in the Middle Ages.

 

But unlike European civilization, Indian civilization was conquered by Islamic civilization. The slave dynasty, the Delhi sultanat, the Mughal empire, the Indian empire and the Indian civilization also became a civilization dominated by the conquering dynasty.

Around the time of the Mongol Empire, the cosmopolitan Islamic civilization came to encompass the Chinese and Indian civilizations, both of which were local civilizations, for a short period of time.

 

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Civilizations and space 1 ( Each civilization is a pillar that supports the earth )

Civilizations and space

 

1 Each civilization is a pillar that supports the earth.

 

Today, the planet Earth itself is like a temple to mankind. It would be a temple supported by at least four pillars.

 

The temple may be a lighthouse that illuminates the vast universe.

 

2 This temple has four main pillars.

 

 The four pillars are European civilization, Islamic civilization, Indian civilization, and Chinese civilization.

 Why are these four pillars of civilization?

This is because each of these four pillars is the center of a large vortex, and has influenced the semi-civilization* around it. Christianity was at the center of European civilization. Islam was at the center of Islamic civilization. The center of Indian civilization was Hinduism, and in ancient times Buddhism. Confucianism was at the center of Chinese civilization.

 

*A semi-civilization is a smaller civilization under the influence of the vortex of civilization.

 

Among them, Islamic civilization is the only one whose religion is the name of the civilization. This is because there are a wide variety of regional names, such as North Africa, West Asia, Central Asia, and Southeast Asia.

European civilizations are diverse, including North and South America, Russia, and Oceania, so it may be possible to call them Christian civilizations. However, it is not called as such because North and South America and Oceania  cnsisted of  immigrants from Europe, and Russia was also established by Normans and Slavs, and on top of that, they are the heirs of Greek Orthodox Christianity, so it is called European civilization. Called by the name of the region*.

 

*European civilization is composed of Latin, Germanic, and Slavic races, so the name of the region is attached to the head of the civilization, not the religion.

 

Although there are geographical and racial differences, Islamic civilizations differ in their origins. Before that, there was the Orient, into which Mesopotamian and Egyptian civilizations flowed, the Assyrian Empire and the Persian Empire, to which Hellenism joined. After the birth of Islamic civilization, Turkish and Mongolian culture was added to Arab culture, and it gradually spread and influenced the surrounding area. Islamic civilization turned out to be a very complex civilization (although Islamics formation and ideas were very simple). This is why Islamic civilization is not called by name of regions .

 

3 Civilizations include cosmopolitan civilizations and regional civilizations.

 

Cosmopolitan civilizations are civilizations like European civilization and Islamic civilization, while regional civilizations are civilization like Chinese civilization and Indian civilization*. The "cosmopolitan type" is a community centered on a network of nations with thriving trade, while the "regional type" is a community centered on despotic rule.

 

*Indian civilization may not be unconditionally a regional civilization. Indian civilization is not a civilization like the Chinese civilization, where unified dynasties repeatedly rise and fall. The period of division was long, and the situation was often different between the north and the south.

 

Although the Indian civilization was often politically divided, the cultural state was largely unified by Hinduism after the Gupta dynasty. In addition, before the British Industrial Revolution, India was very economically developed by exporting cotton cloth (Even after being incorporated into the British Empire, Britain's balance of payments deficit was covered by India's current account surplus). . Even before that, the Kushan dynasty and the Satavahana dynasty had a cosmopolitan element, such as the discovery of gold coins of the Roman Empire. However, what is not included in the cosmopolitan type here is that the expansion of Buddhism stopped midway (although Buddhism and Hinduism also advanced into Southeast Asia *１), and that Indian civilization somehow withdrew halfway through. Since it seems, it was included in the regional type civilization. This is markedly different from European civilization and Islamic civilization, in which trade continued to expand along with missionary work.

 

*１　There are two stages of “Indianization”. Around the time of the Satavahana Dynasty (1st century AD), Indian civilization expanded to Southeast Asia, where port city states were established. Later, during the Gupta period, Hinduism and Buddhism influenced Southeast Asia (late 4th century to early 5th century).

 

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