Five Cities that Ruled the World: How Jerusalem, Athens, Rome, London, and New York Shaped Global History - Softcover

Wilson, Douglas

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1595551360 ISBN 13: 9781595551368

Publisher: Thomas Nelson, 2009

Synopsis

In Five Cities that Ruled the World, theologian Douglas Wilson fuses together, in compelling detail, the critical moments birthed in history’s most influential cities ―Jerusalem, Athens, Rome, London, and New York.

Wilson issues a challenge to our collective understanding of history with the juxtapositions of freedom and its intrinsic failures; liberty and its deep-seated liabilities. Each revelation beckoning us deeper into a city’s story, its political systems, and how it flourished and floundered.

You'll discover the significance of:

• Jerusalem's complex history and its deep-rooted character as the city of freedom, where people found their spiritual liberty.
• Athens' intellectual influence as the city of reason and birthplace of democracy.
• Rome's evolution as the city of law and justice and the freedoms and limitations that come with liberty.
• London's place in the world's history as the city of literature where man's literary imagination found its wings.
• New York's rise to global fame as the city of commerce and how it triggered unmatched wealth, industry, and trade throughout the world.

Five Cities that Ruled the World chronicles the destruction, redemption, personalities, and power structures that altered the world's political, spiritual, and moral center time and again. It's an inspiring, enlightening global perspective that encourages readers to honor our shared history, contribute to the present, and look to the future with unmistakable hope.

About this title

About the Author

Douglas Wilson is a senior fellow of theology at New Saint Andrews College. Wilson isthe author of numerous books on education, theology, and culture, including: The Case for Classical Christian Education , Recovering the Lost Tools of Learning , Mother Kirk , and Angels in the Architecture , as well as biographies on both Anne Bradstreet and John Knox.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

5 CITIES That RULED the WORLD

By DOUGLAS WILSON

Thomas Nelson

Copyright © 2009 Douglas Wilson
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-59555-136-8

Contents

Introduction.........................ixJerusalem............................1Athens...............................43Rome.................................83London...............................117New York.............................153Epilogue.............................183Notes................................201Acknowledgments......................217About the Author.....................221Index................................225

Chapter One

JERUSALEM

For many thousands of years, Jerusalem has been situated at one of the busiest intersections of history. From the wars of King David to yesterday's terrorist attacks, Jerusalem has consistently been in the middle of things. Today it is a holy city for three major religions, and that has been no small part of many of our current conflicts. In years past, because Jerusalem was situated in a perilous spot between major powers-whether those powers were Egypt, Babylon, Persia, Rome, or the Parthians-many armies met to fight there. So that caused significant problems. As a result, the city has known many masters-first the tribe of Melchizedek (unless he was a Jebusite), followed by the Jebusites, the nation of Israel under David, the Babylonians, the Persians, the Greeks, independence under the Hasmoneans, the pagan Romans, the Byzantine Christians, the Persians again for a few years, the Muslims, the crusaders, the Muslims again, the British, and an independent government of Israel in 1948, with the recapture of Jerusalem by the Jews in 1967. And I have probably left out some important lords-of-the-place-for-the-time-being, and I offer them my sincere apologies.

Jerusalem, the city of peace, has been a busy place of seemingly unending conflict. Pastor and educator George Grant quoted an observer who shrewdly noted that the constant strife in Jerusalem is not an interruption of its historical charm-that is Jerusalem's historical charm. Despite this conflict (and some could argue because of it), the city has left us a legacy that does not depend on armies, a legacy of the spirit.

Moriah and Melchizedek

Centuries ago, an elderly man named Abraham and his young son named Isaac were walking slowly toward the future site of Jerusalem. Servants accompanied them, but when they got close to the mountain, the father instructed the servants to stay where they were. He said that he and his son were going up on the mountain to worship God, and then both of them would return. That was a remarkable statement, given what the father planned to do on that mountain: take his son and sacrifice him there.

God had promised Abraham a lineage, but He had promised it specifically through Isaac. When Isaac was finally born to his aged parents, Sarah and Abraham, God tested Abraham. God instructed Abraham to "go to the land of Moriah, and offer [Isaac] there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which I shall tell you" (Gen. 22:2 ESV).

This story is often read as though it were a test of Abraham's love or dedication to God. But it was actually a test of faith. God had told Abraham specifically that he would have innumerable descendants and that they would be reckoned through Isaac. The test was whether Abraham was really going to believe God's promise.

This fascinating and terrifying story fits into our history of Jerusalem because of where Abraham's near sacrifice of Isaac occurred. At the end of the previous chapter of Genesis, Abraham was in Beersheba, which is a little less than fifty miles from the region of Moriah, where God had told him to go. And when he got there, God said that He would identify a particular mountain for Abraham. On foot, that's a long journey for one donkey and four men. Centuries later, the children of Israel were told that God would choose to set His name in a particular city (Deut. 12:5). King David accomplished that final settlement when he took the city away from the Jebusites, but the process of selection began with Abraham's wrenching journey to that place.

Men lived in this place long before the Israelites did, and the name goes back that far as well. The place was called Uru-Salem in ancient cuneiform tablets that have been discovered. Uru is related to an ancient word for city, and Salem was the name of a local god. But Salem is also close to the Hebrew word for peace-shalom-and so they thought of it as Jeru-shalom, the city of peace. Malchizedek, an ancient priest-king who lived there in the time of Abraham-several thousand years before Christ-was "king of Salem, that is, king of peace" (Heb. 7:2 ESV).

David and Solomon

In the time of Abraham and Melchizedek, the Hebrews were a very small nomadic tribe. When Abraham's grandson Jacob went to live in Egypt, the band was around seventy or so. But when Moses led the people out of slavery a few centuries later, they had grown to a multitude-more than a million people. After the Israelites left Egypt and invaded Canaan from the east, from across the Jordan River, they were not able to conquer the land all at once. One obvious example was Jerusalem, inhabited by Jebusites, who were fairly certain of their prospects for defense. The Jebusites were a Canaanitic tribe, and all through the period of Israel's judges they were able to hold out against the Israelites. Their city was a natural fortress with a readily available supply of water. The time of the judges ended with the reign of Saul, who was followed by David, the second king over all twelve tribes. When David finally made the strategic decision to mount an assault on Jerusalem, the defenders were pretty cocky about David's chances. The Jebusites declared to him: "'You will not come in here, but the blind and the lame will ward you off'-thinking, 'David cannot come in here'" (2 Sam. 5:6 ESV).

Up to that point, the settlement of Canaan had been according to the allotment given to the various tribes. Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob were the patriarchs of Israel, and the twelve tribes were descended from Jacob's sons. The rise of David to power was part of a strong governmental consolidation, one that set the stage for a move away from tribal government. Once the city was in his hands, he made Jerusalem the "City of David," and it became a true capital city under his oversight.

David's son Solomon completed this task, dividing Israel into administrative provinces. Each district under Solomon had to provide the food for the palace for a month, which was no small burden. This centralization and increased taxation were "tolerable" because of the widespread prosperity, which is the way it frequently goes. David had anticipated this move because he had minimized the importance of tribal boundaries.

The ark of the covenant was the central embodiment of God's presence with Israel, normally housed in the tabernacle's holiest place. When the time of the judges came to a disastrous end, Israel lost the ark to the Philistines in battle. After the ark of the covenant was recovered from the Philistines a short time later, David eventually had it brought back to Jerusalem. He established a tabernacle for the ark on Mount Zion, but no ongoing sacrifices were performed there. It was a place for the sacrifices of praise and music. David was a notable musician, and this particular reformation introduced music into the worship of God, where it has since remained.

A generation later, when Solomon built the temple on Mount Moriah, the functions of David's tabernacle were moved to the temple, and the name Zion went along with those functions. From that time, the name Zion has been evocative. Not only did the name Zion move from Mount Zion to Mount Moriah, but by extension it also became another name for the entire city of Jerusalem.

A tantalizing historical possibility comes to us from this period. Could the Jerusalem of this era have been a key player in the exploration of the wider world? As Solomon consolidated his position on this land bridge between Asia and Africa, he gained control of a town called Ezion-geber, located on the Gulf of Aqabah. It gave Israel access to the Indian Ocean, away to the south and east. Solomon was not slow to make a treaty with the Phoenicians, a seagoing people, but a people who had no real access to the waterways of the east-where there was a great deal of water. The Phoenician city Tyre was to the northwest of Israel, and their ships were limited to the Mediterranean, and from there to the Atlantic. But Solomon built a fleet of ships at Ezion-geber in concert with the Phoenicians, and they began bringing gold back from a mysterious place called Ophir (1 Kings 9:26-28). The round trip took three years to complete (1 Kings 10:22). The phrase "ships of Tarshish" could be translated as "refinery ships," ships equipped to carry smelted ore. Although it may be a controversial suggestion to some, it is quite possible that the land of Ophir was Central America.

One of modern man's besetting sins is that of underestimating the capacities of ancient men. We do this sometimes even when faced with the evidence. The Phoenicians understood the arts of navigation well, and they had sailed remarkable distances. They had tin mines as far north as Norway, and they circumnavigated Africa by 600 BC or so. Yes, an objector might say, that they were just coastal hopping. We have no evidence that ancient men knew how to navigate across oceans, the objection continues, particularly an enormous ocean like the Pacific.

But consider this argument objectively. When modern man finally figured out how to navigate across oceans (hooray for us!), and when Captain Cook first reached the Hawaiian Islands, what did he find there? Well, he found people. It appears that some ancient men with rudimentary technology knew how to sail across the Pacific; otherwise, they wouldn't have done it. They didn't float out there on coconuts.

And when Cortez began his march across Mexico, what did he encounter? Massive civilizations, that's what. Moreover, the cultures and civilizations appeared to have quite a bit in common with the ancient civilizations of the Middle East. Those similarities would include architectural features like ziggurats and a high level of technical ability.

The Phoenicians had made it to New England across the Atlantic. It is possible that they gave Solomon the expertise to establish staging areas across Polynesia and then mining colonies in Central America. If so, that was the main source of Solomon's fabulous wealth. The lines of communication with these colonies broke down later, with a later king of Judah named Jehoshaphat attempting to reestablish them, but unsuccessfully, and so the stranded colonists had to fend for themselves until the arrival of the Spanish.

We should banish from our minds all the quaint superstitions that we have heard about ancient men-that they believed the earth was flat, and other such nonsense. Ancient men knew the earth was a globe; they had calculated (with a fair degree of accuracy) the size of that globe. They knew that people lived on the other side of the globe (calling that region the Antipodes, which means their feet were sticking the opposite way ours do) and they had done a fair amount of exploring this globe. Never forget the evidence that tells us people inhabited the entire world-long before Columbus, long before Leif Eriksson, and long before St. Brendan, God bless them all.

If we may be allowed this harmless speculation, it places Jerusalem in a significant role in world history-a leader in settling their New World about two thousand years before it was our New World.

EXILE AND RETURN

During the period of the judges before Saul and David, the twelve tribes of Israel had shared a common culture and (for the most part) a common worship, but they were radically decentralized in their political structure. Ruled by various judges in various parts of the country, on what appears to have been a pretty ad hoc basis, they first came together in a united monarchy under Saul. His dynasty never really made it past him, though his son Ishbosheth managed to rule over part of Israel for a few years. The next king over all twelve tribes was David, and the third and last king of the united monarchy was David's son Solomon. Having three kings was a pretty short run.

When the United States was first being established and the Constitution was being debated, the men who wrote the Federalist Papers (urging adoption of the Constitution) were well aware of the regional strains and tensions that were already present between North and South. War did not erupt until the middle of the next century, but foresighted men could already see the trouble brewing. A similar tension was present throughout the course of the united monarchy of Israel, and when the split happened, it happened along the fault line.

The ten northern tribes broke off and formed their own nation, and Jeroboam, their first king, decided to establish distinct forms of worship for them. His reasoning was that if his subjects had to go to Jerusalem three times a year in order to worship God (which the law of Moses required), their allegiance would be perpetually divided-they would have civil loyalties to the North and religious loyalties to the South. And so he established centers of worship in the North for the North, at Dan and Bethel.

The Northern Kingdom of Israel was carried away into exile by Assyria in 721 BC. This event has led to many assumptions about "the ten lost tribes of Israel," along with theories that claim to have found them again. Yet these ten tribes were not really lost. Their national structure was lost, and unlike that of the Southern Kingdom, it was never recovered. Tribal identity is not the same thing. We have every reason to believe that numerous Israelites continued to be faithful to Yahweh, the covenant God of Israel, and that they continued to worship in the South. Elijah was told there were still seven thousand who had not bowed the knee to Baal. And because of the enormous pressure to submit to Baal worship, it is likely that a number of these faithful Israelites had moved south to Judah.

Seven centuries after the Assyrians took the ten tribes away, the apostle Paul could still refer to "our twelve tribes" (Acts 26:7 ESV). Anna the prophetess, who greeted Joseph and Mary at the temple, was of the tribe of Asher (Luke 2:36), one of the northern tribes. The Southern Kingdom consisted of Judah and Benjamin, and Levi supplied the priests for temple worship. So four of the twelve were mentioned by name, and the others included generally. The real problem with tribal identity did not occur until AD 70 when the temple was destroyed along with all the official genealogical records that were housed there.

After the Assyrian zenith, the Babylonians took their place as that region's superpower, and so Babylon destroyed the city of Jerusalem in 586 BC. Nebuchadnezzar conquered Jerusalem and the Jews were taken (in waves) into exile. Jeremiah had prophesied that the exile would be seventy years in length, but the waves going into exile, along with the waves coming out of exile, make the start and stop times difficult to pinpoint.

The simplest way to state the problem is to ask whether Ezra and Nehemiah were contemporaries or whether they lived in back-to-back generations. For our purposes here, I am assuming that Ezra and Nehemiah lived at the same time. This means I am assuming that the same rulers are sometimes referred to by different names. A common practice in ancient times was the use of throne names. We see this readily in other circumstances. If someone today were to refer to Caesar, a natural question would be, "Which one?" The same is true of "Pharaoh."

One thing we should grant is the very real possibility that Darius and Artaxerxes were throne names. Other throne names in the Bible would be Ben-Hadad (Jer. 49:27; Amos 1:4) and Abimelech (Gen. 20; 26; Ps. 34). So an assumption in using the short chronology is that the shift from Darius to Artaxerxes in Ezra 7 does not represent the reign of a different king, but a change in the name used for him.

The pagan kings overseeing the return were Persian, but we will use the Greek names for them: Cyrus (539-530), Cambyses II (530-522), Darius I (522-487), Xerxes I (487-466), and Artaxerxes Longimanus (465-425). The period involved stretches from 539 to 425 BC, and a glance elsewhere shows us that it was a busy time. The Greeks defeated the Persians at Marathon and Salamis, Pericles ruled in Athens, the Greek tragedians flourished, Socrates taught, Cincinnatus was dictator in Rome, and the Buddha and Confucius both lived and died.

(Continues...)

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Edition details

• Publisher: Thomas Nelson
• Publication date: 2009
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1595551360
• ISBN 13: 9781595551368
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 256