Predictive History - The Story of "Civilization", "Secret History", "Game Theory" and more - Civilization #23 - Cyrus the Great as Messiah

Episode Date: October 7, 2025

Civilization #23 - Cyrus the Great as Messiah

Good morning. So let us do an overview of the history of the ancient Israelites. From about 10-10, the year 10-10 BC until 586, this is what is referred to as the first temple period. So remember, the nation of Israel is created by King David, and it's a coalition of different tribes, different cultures, different religions. And what makes this nation possible are two things. The first thing is the charisma of David. And second is the tremendous literary power and genius of the Yahweh. the individual who wrote the first stories of the Bible, Adam and Eve, the patriarchs, Moses. Okay?

And what centers or unifies this nation is the first temple in Jerusalem. Remember to create centralized authority, David and Solomon, his son Solomon, they build a temple. where everyone has to come in order to make sacrifices to Yahweh. Okay, so the first temple is the house of Yahweh. All right. And at this point, there are certain characteristics about this new religion or this new nation. And again, I will have to oversimplify

for the sake of clarity. So the first thing I would say about this new religion is it's polytheistic. Okay? It aspires to a monotheism, but it's only aspirational, because the reality is it's a multicultural coalition. And people are going to believe what their fathers and the grandfathers believe. They may, and so people at this point have multiple faiths.

And so the religion that we refer today as Judaism. is only shared by the elite people, King David, his family, and the priests, and maybe other people in the elite. Second thing is, it is a monarchy. And the third thing is, this religion is an open, tolerant, and optimistic religion. Because remember, in the Bible, it's really

the story of two people, Yahweh and David, forming an everlasting friendship that becomes the basis for the nation of Israel. I also remember that in the Yahweh's understanding of Yahweh, Yahweh is a poet God. He's fallible, he's sensitive, but he means good. He's willing to grow and help the Israelites grow as well. And in this religion, to show faith to Yahweh, to show your devotion to Yahweh, you must argue with him. You must learn and grow with him as well. Okay, so this is a very open, confident, generous, and optimistic religion.

By the time we reach the second temple period, okay, from 539 to 70, C.E. Okay? 539 BC to 7 C.E. This is called the second temple period. Why? Because in 586, their temple is destroyed by the Babylonians. Okay?

By the time we reach this period, the Israelites are no longer referred to as Issyrilites. They're referred to as Jews. And the Jewish people and the Israelites, they sear the Bible. They see the Bible, but in terms of culture and values, they're very different. So at this point, the Jewish people have become what we call Hino-theistic. An idea of Hino-theism is you believe there are gods, but your God is the best. Your God Yahweh is superior to all gods, and all the gods are false idols. are deceivers. Second thing about the second temple period is it's very anti-monarchy

okay and so it focused on the priesthood and the idea of ritual, religious ritual. So by the second temple period the focus of power has shifted from the monarchy to the priesthood and in a minute I'll explain why there was this change. Okay? The And the last thing for our purposes to understand about the culture is it's become extremely focused on purity. You can also say it is focused on fanaticism. It's a very close and conservative culture now. They believe their culture is the best, and they believe it's important not to intermix with other cultures. So, for example, Jewish women are explicitly forbidden to marry foreign men.

And then, from a lot 100 c. onwards, there's another transition to the religion. And the reason why is, remember, in the second temple period, Relish worship is centered around the second temple. But in 70 CE, the Romans destroy the temple and banished the Jews from Jerusalem. And so this makes massive changes to the religion after about 100 C.E. That carries it to the present day.

The first thing is, it becomes fully monophistic. They only believe there's only one God, and that's it. Second is because there's no more temple and you can no longer make any sacrifices to Yahweh, the center of authority in this religion called Judaism are the rabbis. And rabbis means teachers. So the word for this period is called rabbinical Judaism. In other words, the Bible becomes the center of religious worship in Judaism. Judaism before it was a temple.

Now it's the Bible. It's the rabbis who interpret for you what the Bible means. The last thing about this is the idea of Diaspora. Diaspora just means they are now spread out all around the world. They are no longer in Jerusalem. They're spread out all around the world. And as such, you will have multiple strands of Judaism because their religion now has to face with local culture and local customs so this is a very broad overview about

over a thousand years of the history of the development of Judaism as you can see there are these massive cultural changes about every 500 years and the reason why is the historical circumstance of the Israelites and the Jewish people change over time remember the issue of The nation of Israel was founded as a historical accident. It was because of the Bronze Age collapse. Historically, the Le Levant was controlled by a superpower either in Anatolia or in Egypt or Mesopotamia.

But because of the Bronze Age collapse, the Hypatites and the Egyptians have to retreat from the Levant, which gives space for a localized empire to emerge. And that's Israel. But over time, because the Levant was so strategically important, empires started to take over the Levant as a staging post for an invasion of Egypt. So what would happen over time is the Assyrians and the Babylonians would come and conquer Israel. Also, because the nation of Israel was multicultural and multilingual, it was only

held together by the personal charisma of David. So when he died, it was very hard to hold the nation together. And when his son, Solomon died in 9 to 31 BCE, the nation of Israel was about into two kingdoms, something called the Northern Kingdom Israel and then Judah. The problem with this is the nation of Israel is centered around the religion, and the religion is centered around religious rituals in the temple. So, and the temple was found in Judaism in Judah. So the people in Northern Kingdom had to make changes to religion. Basically change the sites of religious worship.

In 586, the Babylonians came and destroyed Judah, and they burned, the first temple. And the policy of the Babylonians was to capture the elite and hold them hostage in Babylonia. And then send in a foreign delegation to control the territory. And this is what is called the Babylonian captivity. And while the Israelites are there, they're trying to hold on to.

the memory of who they are. There are two memories that sustain them in this period. The first is the memory of the greatness of King David, how they were once a united monarchy under the leadership of David. So that's, they're very proud of that, that's what sustains them. The other thing that sustains them is the Bible, the stories of the Yahwehs, Adam and Eve, the patriarchs. And because they are so focused on these memories, and because these memories are written down,

they specialize, the Israelists specialize in intellectual activities. So in Babylon and then elsewhere, they become very successful. They become administrators, they become teachers, they become intellectuals. And they, over this time, will also produce their own literature as a diaspora people to sustain them and to unify them. Also at this time, what's important to understand is the identity as Israelite people becomes much more concrete and much more locked in. Before, when they were back in Judea, in the Levant, their identity was very fluid, it was very open, it was very dynamic.

But now that they are part of the diaspora, they have left Jerusalem, their identity becomes much more concrete. The analogy would be here in China, we use simplified Chinese. But guess what? When you go to overseas Chinese communities, the diaspora in Southeast Asia, they all use traditional Chinese characters. They hold on to Chinese culture much more fanatically than in China. Does that make sense?

So a very concrete identity in my mind. emerges during the Babylon captivity. Also, what's important is they need to, if they are to survive as a people, they need to explain why this is happening to them. During the David kingdom, okay, they were at the height of their power. And the Bible was written at the time,

and they believe that from now on, this kingdom of David would last forever. And that's what God put. promise. So why is it that the Norman kingdom and Judah split and why were they conquered by the Assyrians and then the Babylonians? And why have they lost their land that God promised to them? And the answer is because they broke their covenant with Yahweh. There's something called a covenant, a contract. If you, the Israelite people, are loyal to me, meaning you only worship me, then the I, Yahweh will protect you as my chosen people.

So if Yahweh has abandoned us, it's because of three reasons. Okay? The first reason is because we start to worship foreign gods. Okay? That's the first reason. Second reason is because we start to have kings. And our religion does not allow kings. because the authority of kings

contradicts the authority of Yahweh. And the third reason is because we broke the Ten Commandments, because we continue to sin as a people. And the people who argue this are called a prophet. So, after the first temple period, being in the second temple period,

the Jewish people adopt a prophetic tradition. They believe that Jewish people must remain peer to their love of God if they are to survive as a people. Okay. So they are in Babylon captivity for almost 70 years, and then the Persians conquered the Babylonians. The Persian Empire is really the first multinational empire in human history. and their ruler, Cyrus is known for being an extremely open, tolerant, and generous ruler. So he releases the Jews from Babylon and have them return to Judaism where they will rebuild their temple, called the Second Temple. And this starts the beginning of the Second Temple period.

And the Jews are so grateful that Cyrus is the Great. is called the Messiah in their Bible. Masiah means the Inorted one, the one chosen by God, to save the Jewish people. And Saras de Great is the only foreigner who is called Masaya in the Bible. Sarasirate sponsors both the building of the Second Temple, as well as encouraged the Jews, to start the project that we now refer to as the Bible. And this was led by a priest named Esra, who was part, who was in Babylon, but he returned to Jerusalem to rejuvenate their religion and to start the Bible. So that's the very brief overview of the history of the first thousand years of Judaism. Any questions so far?

Are you guys clear about this? So what I will do now is I'm going to focus specifically on this period, okay? When Cyrus conquered Babylon and released the Jews to return to Jerusalem. Because this marks a fundamental shift in the religion. At this point, what will happen is the merger of the religion. of the Persian religion with the Israelite religion, which creates a new religion. Now, the religion of the persons is called Zoroastrianism.

And the merge of these religions will become the basis of a new religion that will come to dominate the world called Christianity. All right. Okay, so to understand this history, I will have to first talk about the history of Mesopotamalian, okay? So as we discussed in class, the history of Mesotania is one of violent struggle.

Because there are many violent people in this area. And this area is the center of the world, basically. It's where all the trade goes through. It's very wealthy. It's very multi-ethnic and multinational. So conflict and violence arises all the time. So you have over here a place called Arabia. And Arabia are nomadic people.

And over here you have something called the Zagros Mountains. Up here is Anatolia, which is also very wealthy. And over here are the two rivers, okay? The Euphrates and the Tigris. And the city-states are built along the two rivers. The domestic people in the desert of Arabia and the mountains of Zagrots are opportunistic, They will trade with you, but they will also raid you and steal from you. They'll possibly be raiding and trading with the city states.

What keeps them in check is these city states have walls. As well, these city states will fight each other for dominance. Because in Mesopotamia, the religious religious is people must fight for the honor and glory of their patron god what keeps the city states destroying each other is they believe that each city state in each city city state in a temple lives a great god so you can destroy the enemy's army in the battlefield but you can't go and ransack the city and the temple because that would encourage the wrath of the God.

So there are these religious taboos that keep the system in check. And so for centuries, they've been funding each other and struggling against each other. And in this process of struggle, they will create many tremendous innovations that will forever change human history. For example, they create writing. They create many forms of knowledge, mathematics, and a struggle. astronomy. So this is considered the cradle of civilization. This system broke down when a king named Luga Zagasy of a city-state called Uma. And Uma is always in conflict

with a city state called Lagash. And Lugga Zegesi, he is so ambitious that he's willing to defy the gods. He decides this is stupid. I keep on attacking my enemy, but I have to retreat after I win because I'm afraid of offending their God. Well, I'm going to test their God. I'm going to go into Lagash, destroy the temple, steal all their wealth so I can fund other military adventures and see if their God will seek revenge. Okay? So he's bringing the taboo. He's basically, It's basically like the equivalent of using a nuclear weapon today. Okay? So he goes to the Gage and destroys the Gash, burns on the temple, steals all their wealth, and nothing happens.

In fact, he becomes even more successful. And he goes around and starts slowly and slowly conquering the city-states of Mesopotamia of Sumer. And he's about to unite all the entire region. And now the city-states are unified in their hatred of this person. He has defiled their temples. He has mocked their gods. This creates an opportunity for another warlord named Sargon of Akkad. And Sargon Akkad is determined to destroy Lugazegi and restore the honor and glory of

the gods of Mesopotamia. Why is he doing this? Because he himself has a legitimacy problem. He was a mercenary and he was part of the city-state of Kish. So he was supposed to be loyal to the king of Kish, but he was an extremely ambitious and charismatic soldier, so he did what David did and he usurp the throne. And so now this creates a legitimacy problem. remember in this religion kings are descended from the gods so now you by

us from the throne have offended the gods so Sargon his name means legitimate king by the way okay legitimate king which tells us no one thought he was a legitimate okay he decides that he will create legitimacy by destroying Lugazegesi and he does that okay he destroys like Lucas de Gasey he captures him parades him around and then kills him to show that he is favored by the gods and by doing this sorgon of Akkad unifies all of Mesopotamia and he creates the first world empire called the Akkadian Empire but also by doing this by creating the first empire Sargon of Akkad will now unleash a cycle of violence okay and so over time everyone will have will be forced to become

more violent in order to maintain balance it becomes an arms raised of fear terror and violence and empires rise and fall all the time okay again the problem with this area is you have extremely aggressive nations and there are no natural boundaries to protect you So even though it's very easy for you to pull an empire, it's also very easy for you to lose the empire. Okay? By 600 BCE, there are three major powers in this region.

Over here in Anatolia, people will call the Lydians. The Lydians. Over here, Here in Mesopotamia are people who call the Babylonians and over here okay are the medians and these are three superpowers that check and balance each other out they're powerful but they're not powerful enough to destroy each other okay around this time will emerge a new power center called the Persians They were led by a great king named Cyrus the Great. He is considered to be the greatest ruler in human history.

Axon of the Great saw him as a role model. When Axelma the Great invaded Persia, and he saw that the tomb of Cyrus of the Great had been desecrated or abandoned, he was furious and he stopped his campaign. to make sure the tomb was renovated and returned to its former glory. If you go to Iran today, you can still visit the tomb of Cyrus the Great. Because throughout history, everyone had a higher opinion of him. Even the Greeks thought he was fabulous.

His own people, of course, loved him. So for the longest time before Alexander Graham and Julius Caesar, he was considered the greatest ruler in human history. Okay? So, but the problem is because we don't have access to writing, their writing, we have absolutely, we know very little about him, okay? Here's what we do know about him. He was in charge, he was king of a local people called the Persians, who of course are descended

from the Yamaya. So they use horse archers in their warfare. Over time, he's able to conquer the medians. encroces of the Lydians saw this as an opportunity to conquer the Medians as well. So he attacks. But Cyrus the Great defeats him. So now Cyrus the Great is in charge of two empires. What he does next is revolutionary in Mesopotamia.

Instead of parading them around, like the captor kings around, and executing them like Sargon of Akad, Scystriot, decides to make them. advisors to his court. He shows mercy, he shows clemency, he shows forgiveness. And this shocks and awls the people of Mesopotamia. It shows Cyrus the Great is confident, it's powerful, and is favored by the gods, because he is willing to show mercy to his enemies. But knowing that, what happens next is really interesting. empire is the last empire in Mesopotamia okay if such a great wants to

unify Mesopotamia he has to conquer the Babylonians at this time the Babylonians have an internal conflict the king and the nobility aren't getting along the king wants to change the official God of Babylon for monarch to sin because the king wants to establish his own religious authority so this This creates tremendous conflict eternally in Babylon. And normally they would go to civil war. And normally when they hear that Cyrus the Great has conquered the Medians and the Lydians, then they would think they have to unify in order to defeat Cyrus the Great.

But they hear that Cyrus the Great, he's merciful and he's generous and he's wise. So what they do is the nobility strikes the deal with Cyrus the Great. and Cyrus the Great, Congress Babylonia, without doing anything. And in the official history of Cyrus to Great, he claims that the Congress of Babylonia was the greatest conquest, was his greatest conquest, because he did it through his generosity and his mercy, as opposed to killing lots and lots of people. And at this time, what starts to grade and the persons realize is, if you really want to control people, you have to use a policy called divide and rule. And the idea is this. Before these empires, the Acadians, the Syrians, the Babylonians, they believe they have to use violence and fear to control people.

When you do that, all you do is you anger people, unite them, and force them to rebel. force them to rebel against you okay but if you recognize that in each society there are these natural factions who are clothed with each other you're able to balance these factions then they're relying on you for stability okay does that make sense okay this is what we call it divide and rule so the persons created not an empire but what we call a federation In other words, a federation is the idea that people choose to be part of this federation because it benefits them. Okay? Why does it benefit them? Because first of all, it brings peace.

If there's a conflict, you don't fight each other, you go to the Persians for a conflict resolution, okay? So it brings peace. Second of all, it brings prosperity through trade. Okay? So the persons create all these roads that enable trade within the empire. And so you're better off actually trading than you are fighting. And third of all, you're able to access new knowledge and culture through this process. So the persons were the first to create a national, imperial, post.

system it was very very clever so all they did was they set up checkpoints throughout the empire and these these checkpoints they were like hotels for postmen they had food they had new clothing that a place to sleep these postmen would on the horses carry mail throughout the empire and stop at these checkpoints to rest okay so the persians showed that by participating in this empire, you could benefit a lot more than if you didn't participate, and therefore, you should participate. And so it was an amazing achievement, because remember,

these nations were at war with each other throughout their history. And these are very aggressive people with lots of religious differences. And Cyrus de Great, and his descendants, were able to create a system that allowed them to work together and prosper together. And that's why he is remembered today,

is remembered today as the greatest rule of all time, okay, in human history. No one comes second. And also, while the Jews refer to him as Messiah, God's chosen, God's anointed, a man picked by God to come to save the human people, the human race. So with this federation, with this empire, what's important is the idea of administration. Okay? administration you need administrators who will be conscientious and loyal and good people okay

because remember they are working with local governors so each region is allowed allow local autonomy and each governor is called satraps so they are working with the satraps to govern the local area and remember these satraps are allowed maximum autonomy and freedom to do what they believe. Everyone's allowed to practice their own religion. So what the administrators are doing is ensuring divided rule, right? That there's enough internal conflict within this region

so that they're all dependent on the empire for guidance and authority. These administrators have to be, they can't get into bed with a satchaps. corrupt together because the system will break down so there had to be a system to keep the administrators loyal to the empire and this system is a religion called Zoroastrianism okay Zoroastrianism and this is the religion of the Persian people and this is the religion of the imperial administration if you want to be

a bureaucrat within this system you have to believe in Zoroastrianism you have to participate in the rituals and the rights of Zoroastrianism and what made the system work is Zoroastrianism was at this time 600 BC, 500 BC the best religion in the world okay so this is a new concept for us the best religion in the world we discussed the best military in the world right the best military in the world has three characteristics. Discipline, they fight a lot, they have a lot of experience, cohesion, they like each other, they get along, and devotion. They have a common purpose. They have a great leader that they love. Okay. It turns out religions can also be measured. And there are certain

religions that are better than other religions based on three criteria. Okay? These three criteria are grandness, completeness, and unity. grandness, completeness, and unity. And this is not a hard concept. So think of religion as a story, and ask yourself, what makes a good story? What makes a story so wonderful you want to hear it? And it's these three things.

Grandness, it's a big topic. Kings and gods and wars and love, okay? Completeness. There's a beginning, and there's an end. And unity. There's a plot. Things are united, okay? So if I were to tell you a story about Gilgamesh, who's a king who fought these gods in a search for immortality, and in the end he discovers immortality is impossible, well, that's a complete, unified, and grand story. And you wouldn't want to hear that story.

But if I would tell you a story about a guy named Robert who wants to get AIDS in school, and so he studies all the time, you don't want to hear the story, okay? It's not grand, it's very boring, it's not complete, there's no ending, is that really unified because something really happens. Does that make sense? It's the same with religions. The problem with most religions is the structure, okay? So the typical religion is a three-tier structure. So at the center are gods, and gods are the ones who participate in human affairs. They're the ones manipulating us. But there's a There's also a higher tier that governs the gods as well. These are cosmic forces like fate and fortune. And then the highest tier are these invisible laws of the universe that give it structure,

what is referred to as the immutable and unwritten laws of the cosmos. This is what the Greeks believed. This is what the Romans believed. And as you can see, this system, it's not complete, it's not unified, okay? It may be grand, but it's not complete or unified. It's a very loose system. Zoroastroism is the first really grand, complete, and unified religion. So let's talk about Zoroastrianism.

So in the religion, they believe there is a creator, God, called the Ahura Master. And he is the God of creation, he's the God of light, he's the God of order. And he creates a perfect world, perfection. And within this world, we humans are created, okay? But then there is an evil presence, an evil. God which comes and corrupts the perfection. And this evil or darkness is a match for the Creator God. So the world is a perfect balance of dark and light.

What tips of balance is the human race. We have free will. Therefore we can choose to fight for goodness or to fight for darkness. to fight for the truth or to fight for the lie okay so the two main the economy is truth and lie you fight for the truth you're making the world a better place but if I for the lie you are corrupting the world okay so that's our choice eventually a savior a hero will arise to prepare for the final battle between dark and light and this final battle light will triumph

Once, like triumphs, a river will emerge. A river will emerge. And everyone must cross this river. Everyone will arise from the dead and everyone has to cross the river. If you have been good, if you have fought for the truth, you will cross this river and it will cleanse you. You will feel terrified. You will become an eternal soul who will live in paradise forever. will return to perfection okay but if in your life you have lived the lie if you have

committed evil if you have done wrong against other people then you will burn in the river you'll be condemned to hell for the rest of your life okay and this is idea what we call eschatology eschatology okay so this is a hard word eschatology but I I need you guys remember it because it's a very important word. Eschatology means an understanding of how the world ends. And Judaism is the first eschatolical religion. It has an ending, a final battle, good versus evil, where everyone will be judged. And so now we understand why the Persian system works.

Because if you are to be an administrator, if you are to work for the empire, and you believe, in Jerusalem, then you have a duty to fight for the truth. We're here at most for 60, 80 years. And what we do in the 60, 80 years, we'll decide how we live our lives for all of eternity, okay? We either live in paradise or we will burn in hell, depending on how we perform these 60 to 80 years. So the persons are under tremendous pressure to be a good person. This is radical in the history of humanity.

So remember, the Mesopotamans believe you are good if you achieve, right? How do you know you're good? Because you've achieved a lot. And by achieving a lot, you show that God's favor you. And Egyptians believed in status. And others believed in just good luck, okay? But the Persians believe you have to be a good person. You have to show generosity, compassion,

and mercy to others as exemplified by the life and works and words of Cyrus the great so that's Jerusalem and this is so powerful that it will be adopted into Judaism and eventually become the basis for Christianity okay but this is where started jurorastrianism any questions so far before I continue are you guys clear of what's happening okay you know that's question if this is the best religion what are the worst ones okay you're right there's really no bad religion okay but the most common religion is folk lord religions right so so you live in a village and you believe in a local god okay

that doesn't make sense and so when I say it's best what I mean is intellectually it's the best it's it's a religion that can attract the best and the brightest You understand? It's a religion where if you are a very intelligent person, you are attracted to this religion. Does that make sense? But if you are just a normal person, you're just going to believe what your father and your grandfather believed.

So think of this religion almost as the equivalent of the Confucian classics in China. How do you show cultivation in China by really? reading the Confucian classics. And if you want to become a scholar official, you have to memorize the Confucian classics, right? The same concept here, where Zoroasthenism, you have to believe in this religion if you want to become an administrator.

And the problem with this religion that makes it hard for a better to understand is it's very abstract. That's the main feeling of this religion. It's very abstract. It's very intellectual. And that's why a lot of people don't really see this as a religion and more as a philosophy.

And what's also important for us to understand is the abstraction is what makes this religion appealing, right? Because the Persians are trying to attract the best and brightest for their administration. So they don't want a popular religion. They're not trying to promote their religion. They're trying to use their religion to filter out the best and the brightest. Okay? Does that make sense? So you're right.

I can't say this is the best. religion but it's the religion that is the most intellectual and which will attract the administrators in the Persian Empire and that's why it's effective okay great question okay any more questions yes okay so if complete completeness is eschatology okay and ending because most of these most religions don't actually have an ending they don't have they don't like okay this is when the world ends okay so for example King David the Bible, right?

It's telling us that King David is really the end of history. And from now on, we will live forever in this Davidic kingdom. This is the best we can do. But it's not saying, okay, King David, we will eventually reach a point when the world ends

and when God returns to the earth. No religion is doing that before Zoroastrianism. Does that make sense? So think of completelyness as a circle, right? Because if you look at Zoroastrism, they say this is a perfection, right? But now there's corruption. So the story ends, when corruption ends and we return to perfection. So the circle closes.

Does that make sense? The same with the Bible where we start out in the God of Eden, and then we are corrupted, we are forced out of the Garden of Eden, right? But no one does it say we'll return to the Garden of Eden. no way does it say we will return to the Garden of Eden and but when we reach Christianity that's what will happen Jesus will promise well it teaches the promise of the return to the Garden of Eden okay so now the circle closes does that make sense any more questions okay all right let's continue so we have this religion

Zoroastrianism and eventually the Jews will adopt it into their own religion okay and we have size the great who is this wise generous and merciful leader okay but he he is this way because he is strategic okay he's strategic so when he allows the Jews to return to Jerusalem he's doing so for strategic purposes okay he's not doing it because he feels sorry for the Jews he's doing because there's a certain strategic purpose and allow them to return to Jerusalem. And the reason why is Jerusalem, the Levant, as we discussed, it is very important geographically. It marks access into Egypt, which is what such a great eventually wants to conquer,

because Egypt is the wealthiest nation in the world at this time. So he needs to bring stability to the Levant. And in the Persian worldview, what creates stability is the balancing of forces within the local area. Okay? So we need to create conflict in the Levant. At this point, in the Levant, there are still Israelites living there. And they are now called this the Samaritans. Okay?

And then you have the Jews. The Jews is a Persian word. It means people who live in the process. of Judea, which is a Persian province. So they're called Jews now and not Israelites. Israelites are now called Samaritans. These come from the same people. But the difference is this.

The Israelites who stay have adapted to new circumstances. And so what this means is they still practice their religion, but they've also intermarried with women of different faiths. So now it's coming for a household to practice many different faiths. Whereas the Jews in Babylon, they're more fanatical. They believe it's important to practice only one faith. So when Cyrus the Great sends the Jews back to the Levant, this immediately creates conflict between the Samaritans who believe they are the true descendants of the Israelites and the Jews

who believe they are the true descendants of the Israelites. So this creates religious conflict in the Levant, which means the Persians are in the able to become the arbiter okay and this creates dividing rule now what's important first to understand is the Jews who return to Samaritans are only the most fanatical Jews okay there's only minority people the rest of the Jews are perfectly happy in Mesopotamia they have very successful careers as administrators as intellectuals as teachers they're happy where they are okay So it's only the most religious extremists who return.

And there are in a minority. The Samaritans are in the majority. So the purists support the Jews who have returned in trying to create purity, okay? So the Jews argued for purity, the Samaritans argue for tolerance. And so this is a power struggle, a religious power struggle. In 4.43B.C. around then, a priest, a Jewish priest named Ezra, he returns to Jerusalem, and he's determined to win this war. So there are certain things he does.

The first thing he does, that is extremely controversial, is he announces, if you are a Jewish man, you must divorce a foreign woman. If you're married to a foreign woman, meaning a woman who doesn't share our faith, then you must divorce her in order to maintain the purity of our people. He also announces that from now on, it is mandatory for a Jewish man to observe religious rituals to go to the temple and make your sacrifice. So he's trying to stop his purity. But his main contribution, which is the most important, is he wants to

unify the Jewish people into one faction okay so let me explain why this is important so as we discuss there are multiple Bibles out there okay and so there's at least four different schools or four different strands there is the house of David school called the Yahwehs right the Yahis or Jai or J Remember, this is the idea of the Yahwehs that Yahweh, he is a fallible, good meaning, well-meaning poet. But the main point of the Yahwehs is God has chosen David to be the legitimate ruler of Israel. God has also ordained David to build the temple where God will reside. So this is to legitimize the authority of David

and to make people understand the central authority of this religion is the temple in Jerusalem. But as we discussed, eventually, the northern kingdom will break away from Judah. But once you break away, you can't access Jerusalem anymore. So now you have to have other sites where you can practice your religious rituals, okay? But you do that, you have to change the Yahweh manuscript.

And so they do that and create new mythologies. This is what's called the E manuscript, okay, for Elois. Elois is just a different word for God. Does that make sense? So you have two competing Bibles. At the same time, you have the priestly manuals. So remember, Judaism at this point, it is a religion focus on ritual, like most religions. So you need manuals in order to tell you why you're doing this ritual and how you should do these rituals

They have to be very precise there to be effective okay The same time as the northern kingdom fell as Judah was conquered by the Babylonians as about as a Jews are forced into captivity You have to explain why this is happening okay and What this is happening most people choose to not follow religion anymore okay they adopt a new religion or they move somewhere else okay but the religious fanatics have to explain why this is happening and the explanation is because the Israelites continue to disobey God and this faction which is basically looking at Jewish history explaining what this happening is called the Deeronomis

the D score the Deereonymous okay so these are four major factions okay you understand and these are four different Bibles now what I actually wants to do is put all these four Bibles together to create the impression of a unified religion and a unified people and the way he does that which is very interesting is he basically just takes different parts from each of these books and puts them together okay and now this is the Bible and that's why if you actually read the Bible you'll find it completely unreadable. But he also makes changes to the Bible, which is very important. Remember, before, the most important person was David, because he's really a founder of the nation

of Israel. He's a founder of religion. Now, the most important person is Moses, because Moses is a priest. He is the one who was given the laws by Yahweh. So there are other changes, changes as well but this is the most important okay there are other changes that will come over time as zoroanalism merges into Judaism okay so there are three major changes the first is the idea of eschatology meaning there will be an end point to history the end point of history is when the entire world when all the empires of the world because they defy God converge against the nation of Israel in one final battle.

In this battle, of course, Israel will win, and this will create eternal peace in the world. Because God has chosen Israel as his people. Second big idea is good versus evil. Before the religion of Judaism was very personal. Good and evil was in you. But now it's, there is actually good and evil. Israel stands for good.

These other nations, these other empires, like the Babylonians, the Greeks, the Romans, they represent evil. And the third change, which is the most important is there will be a hero who will come to lead the nation of Israel against all its enemies, and he is called the Mazziah, the son of man. the son of man and he will come from the house of David as written in the Bible and why is this important because

the Christians believe their Messiah is Jesus so the Christians basically take all this this merger of Zoroastrism with Judaism and their claim is the Messiah is Jesus okay and this creates Christianity which we will discuss next class all right okay any questions so far are you guys clear about all this yep excuse me okay yeah okay thanks

thank you okay okay all right so so let me explain what's happening okay so remember the Babylon's the Babylonians in 586 they take over Jerusalem they burn a temple They destroy the religion of the Jews. They take the elite, about a few thousand people. They moved them to Babylonia. But who's left behind are the majority of Israelites. But now they have to adapt to a new elite. And so they preserve their religion.

They also adopt the religion of the elite, who are the Babylonians. You'll also have Israelites who go off to Egypt. So now you create something called a diaspora. They're either in Babylon or they're in Egypt. But the majority are still at home in Judea. And in this time, because these are just ordinary people, they will adopt many faiths. It's very common back then for a person who had multiple faiths, okay? The faiths of your father, the faiths of your mother, the faith of your wife, the faith of your neighbor.

because this is how people got along right if you said that my god is better than your god you will piss off your neighbor you will piss off your colleague why why would you do that so it's very common back then for people that have multiple faiths a favor you might practice a home a faith you might share with your friends a faith you might have to share with your king okay does that make sense okay so these are extremely multi uh religious people and as we discussed when the jews are when the Israelites are forced to go to Babylon they are forced to have a more fanatical religion in order to maintain identity right it's like how do you separate yourself from these other people because if you don't do that what

happens is you become assimilated right you lose what it means to be Israelite and quite honestly most people chose to be assimilated because that was the easiest thing to do but there's a fanatical minority mainly priests were determined to keep alive their religion because only by keeping alive the religion could they keep alive Yahweh could they keep alive Israel okay so when these Jews were allowed to return to Judea they were horrified by the corruption and parity they saw right they were like we were in Babylon and for 70 years we We fought hard to save our religion, to maintain the purity of our religion.

They go back and they see their people, the Samaritans, now adopt foreign gods. And they were like, this is why we fail as a people. This is why Yahweh punished us because we refuse to be loyal. So what, so in their thinking, it's like, I would rather all these people go away than have them stay around. You understand? We don't want to get a law, we want to maintain the purity of a religion, because that's the only way to save our people. Okay? And that's why they say, hey, you're gonna stay you have to divorce your wife who is a foreigner. If you don't do it, if you don't want to do so go away man. The push of the empire is huge. Go somewhere else. But Jerusalem is only the land of the peer. Does that make sense? So, you know, I know this is a controversial idea, but it's really only the extremists who keep the religion alive, right?

This is true for all religions, okay? Does that make sense? It's only the people who are most willing to die for their religion that keeps the religion alive. If everyone's willing to compromise, the religion dies very quickly, okay? And the Jewish religion, Judaism is able to stay alive for 3,000 years because there are lots of people in the religion. a minority but still a lot a lot of people who are going to die for the religion there's something we'll discuss later on this master okay so thanks for a question any more questions okay so next class we will discuss the rise of Christianity

okay Jesus basically