Gaining a Global Perspective Along The Silk Roads
In many ways, The Silk Roads by Peter Frankopan is the quintessential book for this doctor of ministry leadership and global perspectives track. Frankopan’s stories of leaders, networks, conquests, religion, economies, and of course, his conclusion that the Silk Roads are rising again, each epitomize what we learned last year and what we are currently studying this term. It is more than coincidence that we were “advancing” in Oxford last week where Frankopan currently teaches.
The Silk Roads largest gift to me is the reorientation and reframing of world history eastward. As a high school history teacher I witness first hand every day how westerners westernize world history. This book made me fall in love with history again! Wearing my local church pastor hat, I appreciate the reminder of “the East” because Jesus was middle eastern. Growing-up in various churches in southern California in the 1970s and ‘80s, I was taught about a God who was white and conservative and American. It’s a big world and we serve a big God who chose a people for himself at a specific historical time in a specific geographical location. Just like Ken Bailey’s Jesus Through Middle Eastern Eyes, The Silk Roads takes us to a place where history actually happened and gives us the ears to hear these stories in their proper context. There are two main interactions stand out to me in this book.
The Interaction of People: Students and Teachers
The importance of conversations and leaders really hit me in the preface of this book. It is here that Frankopan tells us that his parents gave him a globe. This sparked an interest in the world inside of him that would not be quenched. Then as a teenager he had a teacher who taught him Arabic and Russian and would tutor him after school. People are important!
Sometimes we don’t know what is really being passed on when we have what seems to be a casual conversation. As I attempt to reengage in my “normal” life after our advance in England I am setting aside purposeful time to process all the lectures and random conversations I had with people. I heard the most profound ideas over lunch in the dining hall at Christ Church. I got some great pastoral advice while walking the beautiful Oxford path to punting. Bus rides, tube rides, and my 90-second interview of Steven Chalke on our way to the tube, all have the potential of taking a profound place in shaping who I am as a pastor and teacher.
These conversations made me think of all the conversations that must have happened on horseback during the crusades. The Silk Roads, for the author himself, and for all of world history, are spaces where crucial conversations happened and continue to happen today. Belief systems, knowledge, culture, and secrets are transmitted through the everyday conversations of life.
The Interaction of Religion: State and Authority
One thing this book makes clear is how world history has been shaped by various religions. It is fascinating to me how religions spread along the Silk Road. I also love how Frankopan explains how the world’s great religions enjoy power for a while and then another religion comes in vogue and that power shifts. Another aspect of the book is how different religions incorporated similar aspects into their ethos. For example, the use of the halo shows up not with just christianity, but with buddhism and other religions as well.
Not only do many religions have similar characteristics, but leaders throughout the ages have used religion to legitimize their power. Various shahs, Asian emperors, and European monarchs look to their respective religions to show divine empowerment and legitimacy. One of my favorite moments on the advance was celebrating the Eucharist in Westminster Abbey. It was wonderful to take the tour the day before and learn so much about this sacred space. I definitely got a strong sense of the “cloud of witnesses” that have gone before me. However, one thing about this beautiful place really bothers me. It was built to, not worship Jesus, but to legitimize the power of the English monarch. King Edward was a devout man and was said to have actually healed people. Because he had this healing power, the people of England found it easy to accept him as their king. Consequently, future monarchs saw to it that an abbey was built to remind them of the healing power of King Edward. This abbey would be where all kings and queens would be coronated. By being coronated in Westminster Abbey, English royalty is communicating that they are chosen by God to lead, they possess some of the divine. Here in the U.S. we don’t have royalty, but we do have a presidential election every four years. Just like the english monarch being crowned in Westminster and using religion, every American presidential candidate seeks the endorsement of American evangelicals. This is such an embarrassing practice to me. I feel my religion is being used. Just like leaders from time immemorial have been using religion, our current world leaders use religion for their state authority.
Conclusion
Frankopan has written a fresh, if not huge, new history of the world. He states in the preface that there are pathways in the world that “serve as the world’s central nervous system, connecting peoples and places together, but lying underneath the skin, invisible to the naked eye” (XVI). For Frankopan, exposing these invisible interactions and studying them prove that the secrets of the world are discovered within human interaction. As we become Doctors of the Church we do well to study Frankopan and learn from these relationships. It is as we discover new networks of interactive relationships along ancient and future Silk Roads that we journey a bit further down the path of leadership with a global perspective.
About the Author
Aaron Peterson
I am a working priest which means that I am a husband(to Lisa), dad(to four wonderful children), senior pastor and church planter(The Hub Vineyard Church), and high school social studies teacher(Verdugo Hills High School LAUSD). I am currently working towards a DMIN in Leadership & Global Perspectives @George Fox Seminary.12 responses to “Gaining a Global Perspective Along The Silk Roads”
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Aaron,
Ken Bailey is at the top of my list of scholar/teachers.
Jesus Through Middle Eastern Eyes is on my list of books for research, as I think of international students and studying cross-cultural hermeneutics. Is there a section of this book you would recommend as I think of understanding how students from other cultures read the Bible?
I would recommend all of it! I use the book like a commentary. Before Advent I will reread the sections on the birth story. When I am preaching the parables and some of the stories in the gospels I re-read the appropriate chapters. Really good stuff!
Aaron:
The London Advance was life-changing on some many levels. The influence of the East was definitely a new thought process with our Fertile Crescent emphasis as Christians.
Did you pick up on the “morality” of silk from Frankopan? Not only was silk monetized but it became a moral contagion. What do you feel is today’s “silk”?
Great post!
Phil
Hi Phil. Thanks for the response. To answer your question, I didn’t pick up on the morality of the silk roads. I was more interested in the spread of religion sections. How do you think morality plays into the new silk roads rising?
AP,
Great blog. I too saw that his book reframed the way I think. I was struck by how modern and global the east was. As a teacher, do you think our education system creates a mindset of Western dominance, or teaches the kids that the world starts and stops in the west?
You are awesome. Loved hanging out with you!
Jason
Hey Jason. I loved hanging out with you as well. I think the education system I am a part of, LAUSD definitely has a bias towards the West. All one has to do is look at the history textbooks approved by the district to see this. I am going to recommend we purchase a class set of this book and have our students read it.
Aaron,
GREAT blog! I really resonated and agree with your sentiment, from the connection of our recent advance, to returning home to normalcy, to connecting the “dots” of Frankopan’s writing. As Christian leaders in the US in local contexts, what do you think we can or should be doing with these lessons from Frankopan?
AC
AC,
Thanks for the reply. I think one lesson is to reexamine our theology. I attended a workshop on Saturday regarding peacemaking between Palestinians and Jews in and around Jerusalem. I found it heartbreaking and fascinating to hear how alive and well apartheid is in this part of the world. The leader of the workshop blames American evangelicals and our theology for allowing this to continue in the 21st century. I need to examine this more closely, but I think one lesson from the book is to really think through out theology and see where it leads.
Aaron,
Thanks you for your insight and for your perspective on this great book.
You brought up one point and I wanted to follow it up. What was our pivotal conversation? Was it at the Italian place with Glenn, Chuck and Diane? Or was it the conversation in the “great Harry Potter hall” with your wife telling stories on you and us getting to know her and your guys story? Or was it during our walking through the Library?
So intriguing to me is the fact that we don’t always know where the conversation will lead or what the conversation will be that stays with us and become part of our history.
All I know is that I am glad that we are all a part of this segment of our history together to develop life….maybe that is what all of this is truly about…..Life!
Great work
Kevin
Kevin,
Yes. Yes to all those conversations. They were all pivotal. Our time together was so rich for a couple of weeks, I know I will be reminded of the various conversations for the rest of my life. Seriously this is not an exaggeration.
Aaron,
Excellent, well written and well organized blog!
You mentioned, “As a high school history teacher I witness first hand every day how westerners westernize world history.” How do you reconcile the view of history that you are perpetuating with the Silk Roads “reorientation and reframing of world history eastward” for you?
Hi Claire. Thanks. I am going to try to get a class set of this book and help my students read through it. The textbooks we use for World History class in particular are so poorly written and almost completely ignore the East.