New editorial - Western Civ & Spartans

[John_Clements]

In commemorating our martial tradition, please see the new piece on understanding the "Western" in "Western martial arts."

JC

http://www.thearma.org/essays/300_Spartans.htm

[Mike Cartier]

i like the definition of whats Western and i agree with the statement of what is western being based upon Greece and Rome.

[Justin Lompado]

Well said. It's nice thats there's a general Western Civilization historical editorial now. Also, I like the bluntness and straightforwardness. Its unfortunate that the point needs to be made so blatant and clear, but it is necessary. It's a welcome addition to the page.

I think there should be more discussion and writing on the civilizations (perhaps for our purposes in the military context) of ancient Europe. After all , without them, we'd have nothing of our beloved medieval, renaissance, and modern worlds.

[Jim Churches]

John, what a fantastic editorial. Thanks for taking the time to spell out what should be obvious to everyone who gleans the benefits of our Western Society. As Roland (Stephen King - The Gunslinger) would say, "We have forgotten the face of our father." I'm ready to jump up on my soapbox now...


Jim Churches
ARMA Las Vegas
Study Group Leader

[John_Clements]

Thanks. As delicate as it was to comment upon, we are a Western fighting arts website and association after all, so what values are culturally relevant to our heritage is something worth bringing up and putting perspective. It's a needed change from the usual fantasy role-play stunt performance and sporting context typically surrounding it all.

As I say in the editorial, our martial heritage existed within a cultural context. When studying Medieval and Renaissance combat methods and noting the societies and cultures they were a product of; we cannot disregard how fighting men of the eras dealt with issues of violence, death, personal danger, courage, fear, duty, sacrifice, etc. These were largely cultural issues of Western ethics and spirituality. As an intense student of the subject and practitioner of the craft, it’s something I, personally, cannot ignore. I would hope my fellows feel the same.

As for this topic being "politics" and not appropriate for martial studies, well, as the Spartans surely knew, I am reminded: “For that these two, learning and martial exercise, effect two things most dangerous to a tyranny: wisdom and valour. For that men of spirit and understanding, can hardly endure a servile State.” - Sir Walter Raleigh. Maxims of State, 1642

JC

[Gene Tausk]

In commemorating our martial tradition, please see the new piece on understanding the "Western" in "Western martial arts."

JC

http://www.thearma.org/essays/300_Spartans.htm

We welcome comments and arguments about this topic. However, any post that contains ad hominem attacks against the author or is clearly prepped for a flame war will be deleted and the users banned.

[Akram Loutfi]

In commemorating our martial tradition, please see the new piece on understanding the "Western" in "Western martial arts."

JC

http://www.thearma.org/essays/300_Spartans.htm

We welcome comments and arguments about this topic. However, any post that contains ad hominem attacks against the author or is clearly prepped for a flame war will be deleted and the users banned.

Mr. Tausk, please. I merely said I took exception to my culture being called "squalid" in the article. That is NOT ad hominem or prepping a flame war. It is just a dissenting voice by someone who strongly disagrees with some of the views and the value judgments expressed by the author of the article. You say you welcome comments and arguments, let's see if you walk the walk.

As I said in my original post, you can celebrate your culture without implicitly or explicitly denigrating that of others. Where exactly am I going wrong here? I find that article demeaning of other cultures, including mine, and banning me from the forum isn't going to change that.

[John_Clements]

Mr. Tausk, please. I merely said I took exception to my culture being called "squalid" in the article.

The word "squalid" is not in the article anywhere. Nor is any culture denigrated or insulted anywhere in the piece merely by pointing out the exceptional values and virtues unique to Western Civ. Do not try to hold others responsible for your own sense of adequacy and pride.

JC

[Akram Loutfi]

Well, Mr. Clements, it is, and you should know this as the author:

Unlike those sqaulid suffering regions of the globe that did not embrace reason, science, and individual rights, the West achieved unprecedented wealth, health, comfort, freedom, and personal opportunity as a direct result of its cultural values-not the blind chances of geography or climate. The importance and accomplishments of Western Civilization are demonstrable facts and to point them out or take pride in them is no ethnocentric prejudice.

The wrong spelling of the word may elude a an edit-search, but not my understanding of what you meant.

Don't give me a lecture about my sense of adequacy and pride: or else the very rules that were summarily addressed to me, after my benign first post, don't apply to you. If you post such an opinionated article, don't be surprised if people of other cultures take exception.

I'm only holding you responsible for your views, not for my negative judgment of them. As I said to Mr. Tausk, if you post something for public consumption and "welcome discussion," let's see you walk the walk without getting personal.

[John_Clements]

Oops, you're right, my bad. My misspelling failed to find it in a word search.

Still, unless you are prepared to argue that there are in fact no "squalid regions of the world, your complaint is meaningless. No one has a right to "not be offended." If you have a counter argument feel free to make it, but our Forum here is about martial arts.

JC

[Gene Tausk]

Well, Mr. Clements, it is, and you should know this as the author:

Unlike those sqaulid suffering regions of the globe that did not embrace reason, science, and individual rights, the West achieved unprecedented wealth, health, comfort, freedom, and personal opportunity as a direct result of its cultural values-not the blind chances of geography or climate. The importance and accomplishments of Western Civilization are demonstrable facts and to point them out or take pride in them is no ethnocentric prejudice.

The wrong spelling of the word may elude a an edit-search, but not my understanding of what you meant.

Don't give me a lecture about my sense of adequacy and pride: or else the very rules that were summarily addressed to me, after my benign first post, don't apply to you. If you post such an opinionated article, don't be surprised if people of other cultures take exception.

I'm only holding you responsible for your views, not for my negative judgment of them. As I said to Mr. Tausk, if you post something for public consumption and "welcome discussion," let's see you walk the walk without getting personal.

Mr. Loutfi:

If you wish to continue on this forum, and disagree with Mr. Clements' article, then present an argument that refutes the ideas raised in Mr. Clements' article. Griping about word choice is not an argument.

If you have a counterargument, bring it forward.

[Alina Boyden]

I think this article is full of generalizations that have little or no historical merit whatsoever. To begin with, Mr. Clements asserts the following:

The civilization of the "West" refers not to those of, for instance, Turkey, or pre-Columbian Mexico, or the indigenous Neolithic tribes of the Americas, but specifically to those of the European continent that trace their roots to the ancient cultures of Rome and Greece.

How can Turkey be excluded from having roots in Greece and Rome? The fact is, that modern Turkey is descended from the Ottoman Empire. From the reconstitution of the Ottoman empire after the crushing loss of Yildirim Bayezid Sultan to Timur Sultan in 1402, until the Balkan revolts of the 19th century, the entirety of Greece was under Ottoman control (with the exception of Constantinople itself which was captured in 1453). As such, the Turks were regionally one in the same with the Greeks for a time span of four centuries. Moreover, the Byzantines, the people conquered by the Turks, were themselves ethnically and culturally Greek. Their culture heavily influenced the culture of the Ottoman empire - to the extent that many sultans of the Ottoman empire were ethnically Greek themselves. It's clear, then, that Turkey has a much clearer claim to the cultural history of ancient Greece than does England, or even worse yet, America.

Western Europe didn't know how to read Greek until the 14th century, and most of the Greek texts the West was familiar with came from Latin editions. The first full Greek texts came to the West via the Arabs. Arabic translations of Greek classics were translated into Latin in dozens of translation centers in medieval Spain and Sicily - notably the city of Toledo. Without this influx of Arab learning, the West would have been bereft of the Greek classics.

Mr. Clements goes on to say:

Western Civilization alone produced the concepts of scientific inquiry, religious tolerance, individual liberty, economic freedom, and the rule of law, which have over centuries led to unsurpassed scientific discoveries, a monumental flowering of art and literature, and a standard of living unequaled in history.

This is of course refuted by what I already stated on Arabic learning, but I will go further still. One of the favorite medical texts of Medieval and Renaissance Europe was written by Avicenna - Abu Sina, a Persian who wrote in Arabic. Another was the work of Rhazes, or Al-Razi as he is properly known in his homeland in the middle east. To suggest that the West alone was responsible for the advancement of science is ludicrous.

Furthermore, the West was not responsible for the rule of law. The first code of laws is Hammurabi's code from Mesopotamia, which is, by Mr. Clements' definition, not a part of the West. Moreover, the Arabs were known for having well developed codes of laws throughout the medieval period. In the early modern period, Suleyman the Magnificent was known to the Turks as Kanuni Sultan Suleyman - Sultan Suleyman the Lawgiver.

As to notions of economic freedom, it was the Arabs in the middle East, and not the West that was the first to really developing banking. Banking in the Medieval West was limited because of religious codes concerning usury. It was only once such rigid codes were dropped in the 13th and 14th centuries that banking itself really took off.

Concerning religious tolerance, it is a well-known fact that the first official laws for religious tolerance are Arab in origin. The Dhimmi laws of the 7th century AD predate any such Western attempts to reconcile opposing religions. In fact, Western religious tolerance would not develop until the 19th century. In the West, that is to say Western Europe, the Jews were restricted in their clothing, the parts of the city in which they might live, what jobs they might hold, and what weapons they might carry for nearly the whole of the period. Many went to Medieval Spain where it was the Muslim states, particularly the Taifa Kingdoms that gave them the toleration they needed to flourish.

The standard of living in the West has only recently surpassed that of other parts of the world, from a historical standpoint. By recently, I am referring to the 19th century. Prior to that, well-kept cities in the Ottoman empire and China made European cities look like impoverished hamlets.

Mr. Clements says:

Western Civilization alone has developed a tradition that continually strives for better representative government that is transparent and accountable. This stands in direct contrast to societies where leaders are neither elected nor exposed to public audit and do not work for the common good.

However, this is patently untrue. Only in the 19th century did Democracy really develop as a primary virtue of the West, and even then it took WWI to make it catch on. Prior to WWI, Germany, Austria-Hungary, Italy, and Russia were all still ruled by despotic monarchs. To say that the Tsars of Russia, the Kaisers of Germany, or the Kings of France (who ruled for the entirety of the medieval and early modern period) strove to be accountable to their people is completely ridiculous. Louis XIV ignored his people to fight useless wars. Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette are famed for having ignored the starving masses of France. To claim the developments of a post-French Revolution Europe as some sort of standard for the Medieval period is useless.

Mr. Clements went on to say:

The legacy of rational empiricism, logical reasoning, inquiry into natural law, and technological progress are exceptional virtues of Western, and in particular, American society with its immense achievements in human progress.

But this is also incorrect. Algebra, Alchemy, Alcohol, Alkaloid. What do these words relating to math and science have in common? They're all derived from Arabic. Alchemy, the foundation for modern chemistry was first developed by the Arabs and then handed to the West in the 13th century. They laid the foundation for higher math and science - not the scientists of the West in the medieval period.

Logical reasoning and inquiry into natural law are to be considered hallmarks of Western culture? The last witches burned and hung in Europe died in the 1660s, well after many would consider the medieval period to be ended. No, the rise of logical reasoning in the West didn't occur until later - the 18th century, and again the 19th century. As such, these views have nothing to do with the people of the medieval period. Why else would German fechtbuch contain magic spells?

And, if we're going to talk about America, we must limit our discourse to the second half of the 19th century and the entirety of the 20th century to see any real impact. This is hardly indicative of the mindset of medieval Europeans, much less Spartans.

Mr. Clements said:

The traditional values of Western Civilization, in particular the Judeo-Christian ethics of Latin Europe, are reflected in our systems of law and governance, which are now the model for those of much of the planet.

But this ignores the simple fact that Judeo-Christian values aren't Western. They come from the Semitic peoples of the Middle East. One could just as easily say that the Judeo-Islamic values of the Middle East are the basis for many laws around the world. The West only claims Judeo-Christian values because it is convenient to do so. But if the idea is that the West is separate from other parts of the world, and distinct, then this concept must be thrown out as well. After all, where were all of the early centers of Christianity, but Turkey?

. Though at times it has deviated and suffered aberrations, the values and virtues found within Western Civilization are those of principled disagreement, open discourse, limitations on the power of the state, equality in the eyes of justice, individual opportunity and property rights, capitalism, free markets, and civic pride. These reflect a longstanding tradition of respect for the desire of all people to live free. They uphold the conviction that human progress, human dignity, and knowledge is gained through guided reason, not mysticism, custom, or revelation.

I don't mean to be rude, but this statement is patently ridiculous. The West killed those who disagreed with them in the Crusades. While that is a simplistic interpretation of the complicated movement that was the crusades, it is not simplistic to say that those in the West killed those who disagreed with them in the Wars of Religion, including the notoriously bloody Thirty Years War. Furthermore, the idea that Westerners wanted all people to be free is false. The West continually used slaves from the Greek period until the 19th century. To ascribe notions of liberty and equality for all to the medieval period is to do nothing less than re-write history. Having studied Medieval slavery in great detail, I can say with absolute confidence that not only did it exist, but that was pervasive in the cultures of most of the Mediterranean cultures at the time. This includes the Italian city states that gave birth to the "renaissance."

Mr. Clements says:

Unlike those sqaulid suffering regions of the globe that did not embrace reason, science, and individual rights, the West achieved unprecedented wealth, health, comfort, freedom, and personal opportunity as a direct result of its cultural values-not the blind chances of geography or climate.

What squalid, suffering, regions is he referring to? Japan, the second largest economy on the planet? Turkey, which has a standard of living roughly equivalent with Greece, the birthplace of Western civilization? Latin America, which lags behind other nations in standard of living, despite having fully embraced Western languages, culture and religion? To say that the West alone championed reason is to remain fundamentally ignorant on the subject of history and world cultures.

I will skip over most of the rhetoric concerning modern times and go again to another statement regarding historical development:

The modern nation state and nearly all our institutions from universities, to banks and corporations are part of a Western society that progressed from city states to republics, from feudalism to empire, from monarchies to democracies.

This is untrue. As I said before, banking was not a development of the West. It was quite common in other places of the world including the middle east and China. Moreover, the West wasn't unique in creating corporations. Guilds, and corporations existed all across the middle east alongside those being created in the Italian city states during the Renaissance. Also, this commits a fundamental flaw of logic - that history is somehow a progression to something better. In many cases, it isn't. At any rate, saying something is better than what came before it is so subjective as to be academically useless.

Western societies championed unequaled feats of architecture, engineering, scientific and medical inquiry, philosophy, literature, music, theater, sculpture, painting, cuisine, sports, jurisprudence, military science, exploration, and so many other areas of the humanities.

Again, this is a sweeping generalization than an actual examination of history can easily refute. The architecture of the West was unequaled? What about the great Mosque of Cordoba or the Alhambra in Spain? Those are works of art created by the Moors which are every bit as fabulous as what the West could create. What do we say about the Taj Mahal, created by the Mughal empire? What about the Blue Mosque and the Topkapi Saray in Istanbul? What about the Forbidden City in Beijing, or the gorgeous castles of Japan? What do we say about the enormous temple-cities of Cambodia like Angkor Wat? What about the pyramids of Egypt?

As I feel I've already disputed the points of science, and medicine, I will move to military science. If the West was alone in looking forward towards military science, why was it that Fatih Mehmed Sultan captured Constantinople with cannon while the Italians defended it with crossbows? Why was it that while Machiavelli wrote his "Art of War" advocating sword and shield wielding legionaries, Yavuz Sultan Selim was conquering the middle east with matchlock muskets - 10 years before the battle of Pavia? The West was not alone in moving forward, it simply began to out pace the rest of the world in the 18th and 19th centuries - long after the Medieval and Renaissance periods had ended.

For the values of Western Civilization are precisely those that help us ensure that life is good and humane: pluralism, rationalism, science, the rule of law, elected representative government, constitutional republicanism, liberalism, separate and independent judiciary, freedom of worship, freedom of expression, freedom of association, freedom to bear arms, emancipation of slavery, equality of women, and preeminence of the individual over the state.

This statement is not historically factual either. To begin with, women in the West weren't allowed to vote until the 20th century. They didn't begin moving out into the working world until the 1970s. This has nothing to do with notions of Western culture in a Medieval or Renaissance context. Nor does it represent a general trend of Western history. Rather, it represents a reversal of the previous policy of 2000+ years of the repression of women - a policy not found in Hindu India or in Mongolia under the khans.

Likewise, slavery is a ridiculous assertion. Slaves were held in Western nations until the second half of the 19th century. Once again, that change is a reversal of a long-standing policy, not a trend towards freedom for all.

An independent judiciary is not a western development at all. The Ottoman sultans, and many of the Sultans, Caliphs and Emirs before them had very similar systems in place. In fact, the Ottoman kadi (qadi) was known for being a fair and impartial judge, even in renaissance Italy.

Finally, my personal favorite:

These are things which, much as for the 300 Spartans who strived and persevered at Thermopylae, have long motivated warrior fighting men within Western Civilization. In a world governed by the open use of brutal force, the Spartans—flawed as they were themselves (and we are now ourselves) —fought and died not just for their own city and personal freedom, but for all of Greek society.

Freedom of all of Greek society? What about the Helots, a Greek people the Spartans continually kept in forced slavery to feed their war machine? A Greek people the Spartans butchered and murdered for practice in the art of war, and to prevent rebellions. To say that the Spartans fought for freedom is the height of ignorance into what Spartan culture was really about.

This "article" such that it is, contains no end of unsupported generalizations, rampant ethnocentrism, and a hubris that is completely at odds with the established facts of medieval and early modern history. Work like this should not be applauded, but challenged.

[david welch]

JC, I linked this to another site and in the discussion someone made the following statement:

Horse crap. The American experiment? If this was the triumph of "The Age of Enlightenment" so called, why is America, the most religious nation in the industrialized world, the only one really defending anything? Has this guy actually talked to the people on the front lines of this "defending?" The Enlightenment types are too elite and proud to fight. It's the religious hicks doing the fighting.

More End-of-History types, sipping wine and hoping the autopilot knows how to land the plane.

I had not taken the article that way and responded:

You have to remember the audience for this piece is amateur mediaeval historians that study and are trying to re-constitute the lost systems of European martial arts.

In that context, consider a couple of things.

We didn't give up our religion, we gave up our mysticism. We quit letting our rulers be picked by letting them fight it out and accepting the winner as "Gods choice" and therefore ruling by Devine right.

We quit determining innocence by trials of ordeal, where God lets you live if you are not guilty.

We quit determining innocence by trials of combat, where the guilty party is the first one slain (in a trial by combat, it was possible for both participants to die. In that case, the first one to die is guilty, the last, innocent).

We no longer accept that whatever we do, if God lets us win, we are in the right.

Growing as a culture out of these "mystic" attitudes is not an attack on religion.

Also, consider the condition and attitudes of the world as a whole at that time. Eastern mysticism, shamanism, a variety of "magic" beliefs world wide. The West was the only place to pull itself out of that kind of thinking along with gaining the other insights to allow us to become what we have become.

I believe you are reading it as an attack on religion, where none exists.

And that is how I took it, but I thought you might like to clarify your position.

[david welch]

The West has some great achievements, but it's not a zero sum game (zero invented by the Arabs, by the way, while we are on the subject).

And that is the bulk of your argument.

Zero was invented by the Chinese.

At the most the middle east can be credited with transmission. For the most part they took over civilizations that had a contribution to make and destroyed them, with anything valuable surviving by accident or by being intentionally hidden.

[Alina Boyden]

JC, I linked this to another site and in the discussion someone made the following statement:

Horse crap. The American experiment? If this was the triumph of "The Age of Enlightenment" so called, why is America, the most religious nation in the industrialized world, the only one really defending anything? Has this guy actually talked to the people on the front lines of this "defending?" The Enlightenment types are too elite and proud to fight. It's the religious hicks doing the fighting.

More End-of-History types, sipping wine and hoping the autopilot knows how to land the plane.

I had not taken the article that way and responded:

You have to remember the audience for this piece is amateur mediaeval historians that study and are trying to re-constitute the lost systems of European martial arts.

In that context, consider a couple of things.

We didn't give up our religion, we gave up our mysticism. We quit letting our rulers be picked by letting them fight it out and accepting the winner as "Gods choice" and therefore ruling by Devine right.

We quit determining innocence by trials of ordeal, where God lets you live if you are not guilty.

We quit determining innocence by trials of combat, where the guilty party is the first one slain (in a trial by combat, it was possible for both participants to die. In that case, the first one to die is guilty, the last, innocent).

We no longer accept that whatever we do, if God lets us win, we are in the right.

Growing as a culture out of these "mystic" attitudes is not an attack on religion.

Also, consider the condition and attitudes of the world as a whole at that time. Eastern mysticism, shamanism, a variety of "magic" beliefs world wide. The West was the only place to pull itself out of that kind of thinking along with gaining the other insights to allow us to become what we have become.

I believe you are reading it as an attack on religion, where none exists.

And that is how I took it, but I thought you might like to clarify your position.

First of all, I'm not an Arab, I was born in Texas and I'm of Germanic descent. It shouldn't be an issue, but I don't like the assumption you make on my ethnicity based on my knowledge of medieval history.

Secondly, I didn't claim that the West was bad, or that the East was somehow superior. What I claimed was that this article is filled with unfounded generalizations that have no basis in historical fact, and I think I have shown that fairly clearly. The West made important cultural, scientific, and military achievements, but it didn't do it alone. Indeed, any separation of the world into "The West" and "The Rest" is flawed because it ignores the historical reality of a trade in ideas. Just as the Silk Road brought goods from China, India, and the Middle East to Europe, so it also carried with it ideas. This flow was by no means one way, and it ebbed and flowed throughout the medieval period. What it means, however, is that you can't neatly discern what developments are "purely" Western and what developments are not. It's useless to try to separate the world into such rigid categories.

As to the West being the only group to leave Mysticism behind - what about Japan? What about China which is officially an atheist country? They seem to have left mysticism and religion behind to me. What about Turkey? I don't see the Turks engaging in suicide bombings or running a theocratic government. Your assertion is fallacious, and like it or not, insulting to many groups of people.