{"id":19745,"date":"2018-10-25T18:01:58","date_gmt":"2018-10-26T01:01:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dminlgp\/?p=19745"},"modified":"2018-10-25T18:01:58","modified_gmt":"2018-10-26T01:01:58","slug":"new-history-not-so-fast-buckaroo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/new-history-not-so-fast-buckaroo\/","title":{"rendered":"“New History?” Not So Fast, Buckaroo!"},"content":{"rendered":"

 <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>(Map with China “at the center” which was discussed in our Hong Kong advance)<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I grimaced when I read the words “New History” in our book’s title this week. Do those two words even go together?<\/p>\n

I must admit my attitude was immediately skeptical towards\u00a0The Silk Roads: A New History of the World\u00a0<\/em>by Peter Frankopan, even if our author was from Oxford. I bristled when I read Frankopan’s different and “new” look at our world came from reminiscing about Zeus in Greek mythology supposedly releasing two eagles, where they eventually meet at the “naval of the world”, which was amazingly in the heart of Asia. [1] Doesn’t sound too academic, scientific or even realistic to me.<\/p>\n

His so called “New History” reminded me of oxymorons like “military intelligence” and “busy doing nothing”. Some of my favorite oxymorons are in the following list:<\/p>\n

\n
    \n
  • Awfully good.<\/li>\n
  • Alone together.<\/li>\n
  • Bittersweet.<\/li>\n
  • Small miracle.<\/li>\n
  • Christian haunted house.<\/li>\n
  • Faithful agnostic.<\/li>\n
  • Deafening silence.<\/li>\n
  • Maybe Definitely.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/blockquote>\n

    Pardon me for my newfound critical thinking skills (thanks to Richard Paul and Linda Elder in\u00a0The Miniature Guide to Critical Thinking Concepts and Tools<\/em>) [2], but I find it hard to believe the center of the world is the East. \u00a0It might seem like I am splitting hairs, but the center of the world’s history, and ANY future center of the world, must be the Middle East! Case in point, I was always taught the Garden of Eden was at the confluence of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. As far as I know, this is in present day Iraq, the Middle East! The main descendants of Noah’s Ark, which reportedly landed in modern day Turkey, are not in China or the Far East. The center of civilization began afresh through the sons of Noah–Shem, Ham and Japeth–and their descendants are the following:\u00a0SHEM<\/strong>\u00a0who fathered the Semitic peoples who are considered Jewish or Arabic who settled throughout the Mideast and southern Asia.\u00a0HAM<\/strong>\u00a0who fathered the Hamitic peoples and produced the black races who moved into Africa.\u00a0JAPHETH<\/strong>\u00a0who fathered the Japhethite peoples who are the fair-skinned Caucasian races who moved northward into Turkey and Russia and then migrated into Europe and across much of Asia. [2]<\/p>\n

    I am skeptical about anyone who states the center of anything is where the most people are. Yes, China is a behemoth, but it doesn’t make it the center. Sure, they are massive, but so is India, as the following table from the United States Census Bureau shares in the following list: [3]<\/p>\n

    1. China. \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 1,384,688,986 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a06. Pakistan \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0207,862,518<\/p>\n

    2. India. \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a01,296,834,042 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a07. Nigeria. \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 203,452,505<\/p>\n

    3. United States \u00a0329,256,465 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a08. Bangladesh \u00a0159,453,001<\/p>\n

    4. Indonesia. \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0262,787,403 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 9. Russia. \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0142,122,776<\/p>\n

    5. Brazil. \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 208,846,892 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a010. Japan \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 126,168,156<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

    I realize China very well could play a roll in the end times, especially in the Battle of Armageddon, but they are not the center of the battle, Israel is (once again, the Middle East). Revelation 16:12-16 states,\u00a0\u201cThe sixth angel poured out his bowl on the great river Euphrates, and its water was dried up to prepare the way for the kings from the East. Then . . . demonic spirits that perform signs . . . go out to the kings of the whole world, to gather them for the battle on the great day of God Almighty. . . . Then they gathered the kings together to the place that in Hebrew is called Armageddon\u201d [4]. I am open to the EAST being China, but still, they are not the center, even if they have the 200 million person army described in Revelation 9:16.<\/p>\n

    If it takes 21 hours to read someone’s book, as my Kindle Edition estimated this one would take, then all these words put together must have some valid points. However, I feel like we have been misled by what our Author describes as the “East”. Is it Asia, also including Russia, plus the Middle East, or is does it farther include the Far East and India? If we are talking about that MASSIVE combination of the world, then his points begin to make sense. Reviewer Paul Van Dijk (a Dutchman) questions the validity of this book along the same lines as I do. [5]<\/p>\n

    Granted, I am not so arrogant to believe America is the center of the world, either. I am quite sure I have wrongly believed that in the past, but this LGP DMin program has cured me of that. \u00a0I don’t even think Jesus is white any more (grin).<\/p>\n

    Now, I don’t want to discount the entire book by Frankopan. He has made some extremely valid points, my favorite being “black gold” and the incredible insatiable use of oil that will need to flow to support such a massive population as China. [6] As we know, wars have been fought over this liquid black gold, and for sure will be fought in the future.<\/p>\n

    For full and honest disclosure, I am not a historian. In fact, my eyes kinda glossed over reading (or not reading) some chapters in this large compilation. I do want to highlight my favorite quote of the book and here it is, “The age of the West is at a crossroads, if not at an end” [7]. I can say I heartedly agree with that!<\/p>\n

    [1] Frankopan, Peter.\u00a0The Silk Roads:\u00a0<\/em>a New History of the World<\/i>. Bloomsbury Publishing, London, 2018. Loc 259.<\/p>\n

    [2] Barrier Roger.\u00a0Ask Roger: Answering the Tough Questions or Scripture. “<\/em>Which Nations are Involved in End Time Events?” preachitteachit.org. Assessed October 24, 2018. http:\/\/preachitteachit.org\/askroger\/whichnationsareinvolvedinendtimeevents\/.<\/p>\n

    [3] Population Clock,\u00a0<\/em>census.gov, Assessed October 25, 2018.<\/p>\n

    [4]\u00a0Barker, Kenneth L. Zondervan NIV Study Bible: New International Version<\/i>. Zondervan, 2008. Revelation 16:12-16.<\/p>\n

    [5] Van Dijk Paul. Europe Asia Studies: The Silk Roads\u00a0and\u00a0A New History of the World.<\/i>\u00a0Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 69(4), April, 2017. 699-700.<\/p>\n

    [6] Frankopan. 321.<\/p>\n

    [7] Frankopan. 519.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

      (Map with China “at the center” which was discussed in our Hong Kong advance)   I grimaced when I read the words “New History” in our book’s title this week. Do those two words even go together? I must admit my attitude was immediately skeptical towards\u00a0The Silk Roads: A New History of the World\u00a0by […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":96,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[762],"class_list":["post-19745","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-frankopan","cohort-lgp8"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19745","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/96"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19745"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19745\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19759,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19745\/revisions\/19759"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19745"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19745"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19745"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}