So, we have 10 more classes left in the lecture series. Um, and in these 10 classes, what I'm going to do is I'm going to show you how the American Empire will fall. And I will show you that what will replace the American Empire is Israel, uh, what we call Pax Judeica. Um, so for these next 10 classes, I will we will do an overview of history and show you why history will lead ultimately to the uh Pax Judeica. Okay.
All right. So, let's do some questions from YouTube that my wife has picked out. Um, she reads all the comments. She loves reading the comments and she sends comments to me to reply to. Okay.
So the first comment is um how do we restore our right hemisphere or how do we become more creative and the answer is that you have to reject materialism that that's the only way okay you have to reject money you have to reject power you have to reject materialism in order to embrace your creativity and your right hemisphere um as a society what will have to happen is a major crisis that threatens our very existence for us to come together and for us to be uh more altruistic and more creative. Um a possibility is that if you really want to activate your right atmosphere, then you fall in love and you have children or you could also choose to volunteer, help other people, uh be kind and generous to other people. Okay, so that's how you activate your right hemisphere. The second question is um do you only give lessons to one class? How's your journey to find some LSD?
Okay. So, um I have I'm only teaching one lecture series but three different sections. Okay. Um LSD psychedelics, you know, I'm very interested in psychedelics. I myself do not want to partake in psychedelics because I don't really understand why I need to.
I read a lot of books. Um, I I practice a very altruistic lifestyle and therefore I don't feel as though I need psychedelics to break out of this materialistic world. Okay, I'm already connected to the divine. So, um, yeah. Okay, let's move on.
All right, some more questions. Um, could you make a video on how to understand history without bias? And a response is, first of all, it's impossible to be unbiased. Okay. And that's and that is correct.
We're all subjective. Um so um he suggests that you have to look at documents and try to be really critical when you analyze documents and that's correct as well. Okay. Uh the problem is that often we don't have documentation or we have documentation from only one source. So it's very hard to do.
So what I'm trying to do um with this class is try to propose a new theory of how to understand history and if you adopt this model I guarantee you that your understanding of history will improve and also your understanding of how the world works will improve as well. So there are three components to this new history model which I call predictive history. Okay. The first is to understand historical patterns. And so when you try to look at history and the event there, you ask yourself, does this fit into a larger pattern or model of history?
If it does, it's probably correct. If it doesn't, then there's something wrong here. Okay. Second uh tool is idea of game theory. And the idea of game theory is to understand that all historical actors are motivated by their interests or worldview.
And so are you looking at all different historics and are you trying to figure out what their best strategy is? Okay. And the third uh facet is the idea of religious esquetological. What this means is that all cultures, all individuals have a certain religious outlook, a religious worldview. You can often find this worldview within their sacred text.
For example, the Bible or um the Quran. Okay? And these texts will give you insight as to how they perceive history but also how they want history to eventually develop. So you you can understand the strategies moving forward. Okay.
All right. Um and we will look at these three strategies and we will adop we will adapt them for um our historical understanding. Okay. All right. Uh another question is um this is really interesting.
What the question is most of the greats across history were not Jewish. The domination by Jews of various industries is a relatively new phenomenon. Is it possible that their creativity and power is a result of political shifts in education in the Bible? Okay, this is a really good criticism of my previous lecture. Um, and yeah, I mean the idea is that maybe there's certain aspects of the Jewish culture that makes them dominant in an industrial capitalistic globalized world.
Um, and there is some truth to that, but I often think about um, Chinese people uh, because Chinese people are extremely materialistic. Like ch Chinese love money um, but we're not as creative as Jewish people. So I think that being materialistic, being capitalistic, it's not enough. You also need to have an element of creativity within your culture. And that's why I think that um the Bible helps us better understand the success of Jews better.
Okay. So so this is a really good point and and also what's really important to understand is that this is a class on intellectual speculation. Okay. We're trying to figure out theories. We're trying to play with ideas.
There's no truth there. Okay? So um take take everything I say with a grain of salt. Doubt whatever I say. Um this class is really meant to be a platform or jumping board for you to undertake your own intellectual journey.
Okay? All right. So please keep that in mind. But um we're going to look more closely at this question today. Okay.
Why is it that Jews are so dominant? Um, so we will look at the beginning of the Jewish people and I'm going to the argument to you that Israel and the Jewish identity are constructs of the imperial imagination. Okay. Um, and this is hard to understand. So I'm going to explain it to you slowly, but the idea is that because of its ge geographic location, Israel has always been historically imported.
And as a result, different empires have tried to manipulate the identity of Israel to best um uh promote their own agenda or policies. Okay. So, um I know this is a hard concept to understand, but but we'll we'll go for it slowly. And again, we're spending like the rest of semester on this major thesis of ours. [snorts] Okay.
So, let's talk about history. Okay. So what we did last week um is look at the cultures that have emerged out of the project collapse and which are now going to dominate history. Okay. They are the Greeks, the Persians and the Israelites.
Okay. Now we're going to look at how these ideas um play out in history. But for us to do that, we first need to understand how history works. Now I've identified three different patterns of geopolitics. Okay?
And I want you guys to remember these patterns. The first pattern is this. This is really important. I didn't understand. Competition within nation states are what matter.
Okay? Competition between nation stones don't really matter or they're not as significant as competition within nation states. And the idea we have here is elite of production. So what drives a lot of conflict is the fact that domestically you have these different competing factions and they're all competing for uh power. Okay?
So you have too many elites, too few status uh positions and so they're competing against each other and this drives a lot of conflict. Okay, so that's the first idea. Second idea is that the elite have shifting loyalties. Okay, think of Game of Thrones. I'm not sure if you guys have seen the TV series or read the books Game of Thrones, but everyone wants to be king, right?
And they're going to kill their brother. They're going to kill their father. They're they're going to kill their mother to be king. Okay? And so the elite don't really have loyalties except to themselves.
The world is just a game of thrones. Okay. The third thing is that war can be a mechanism to protect the status quo. All right. The idea of equilibrium in that sometimes the conflict is really bad.
So what you do? You start a war so you can turn off people to get killed. Okay? And that way you can maintain equilibrium within your system. We'll see this we'll see this pattern throughout human history.
Okay? So these are the three ideas I want you guys to remember as we move on and discuss world history. All right. So I want to give us an example for us to understand. Okay.
Think of the war in states period of China before the emergence of the first empire, theQing empire. Okay. And as you can see from this map, uh China is divided into different waring states that are all powerful. And at this time in history, um theQing Empire, sorry, theQing state is the poorest. is most isolated and it is the least advanced.
Okay, you can see that Chu Xiao they are more powerful and you can argue that eventually one one of them would emerge to unite all of China but they did not. It was theqing the isolated marginalized backward state that came to conquer. And so the question is why this happened. And so if we use our three principles right we can understand why these three states these different states are not competing against each other. It's the elites within these states are competing against each other.
Okay el lead over production. So the way they manage this is for them to use warfare in order to maintain a status quo to create equilibrium. Okay. And how we know is from this time emerges the idea of Chinese chess. Right?
What is Chinese chess? Chinese chess is the idea of warfare that is regulated that is ritualized. [cough] Okay? So when we go to war, when we battle each other, we have to respect each other's um uh the rules of the warfare. That's stupid.
War should be about killing the other guy. It shouldn't be about following the rules. Okay. Also another piece of evidence is at this time in history wrote the book The Art of War. This is one of the stupidest books ever written.
Okay, I guarantee you if you follow this book, you're going to lose the war badly because this is this is really about how to cheat in a heavily regulated game. Okay, so uh things like using spies, oh uh uh maintain a high guard. Okay, you have they have all these rules. And guess what? In actual war, none of these things actually work.
Okay? So, if you look at history, I'm going to tell you exactly how to win a war. [cough and clears throat] Okay? And the way you win a war is first of all, you have to be completely committed to winning this war. Okay?
Total warfare. Second is that if you want to win this war, you have to make sure that talent arises. So, you have to be open and meritocratic. Okay? If a if a officer of a general is winning this war, you promote him.
That sounds easy, right? But not if your status quo power because what's important to you is to maintain that your family is always on top. So if a general arises who is very uh innovative, who's really talented, you kill him because he's a threat to you. Okay. So the third principle is make sure your soldiers are happy.
I know it sounds really simple, but again, if you're at school power, you don't really care. Okay. Um, destroy enemy civil centers, siege warfare. Okay. Go and destroy the city because that's how they produce their uh uh war capacity, right?
The food, the um soldiers, right? Kill civilians. The supply lines, overstretch your enemy, divide and conquer, strike fear in your enemy, kill their gods. Okay? If you really want a war, if you really want to win a war, this is what you have to do.
And we know because this is what the Romans did. This is what the Persians did. This is what um the Aztecs did. This is what conquests did. Okay?
This is what the Mongols did. Every single power that has conquered everyone else has done all these things. Okay? So, when they don't do these things, it's because these different waring states aren't actually at war with each other. They're actually friends.
Okay? They're all intermarried with each other. They're all trying to maintain a status quo. They use war as a game in order to maintain the status quo to create equilibrium. Okay.
So this is true for Mesopotamia. Okay. Mesopotamia is important because remember this is the cradle of civilization. This is where the first empires will emerge. This is where most technological innovation happens.
This was for the longest time the wealthiest part of the world. Okay. So remember the idea of Mesopotamia is that the first citystate is Uric and then they will develop colonies throughout the Tigers and Euphrates and then these colonies will come into war with each other and they're all friends of each other. They're all intermarried and the elite create these highly ritualized um warfare. Okay.
And one really important rule is that you don't kill each other's god. Okay? Because in their religion, the god lives in their temple. So you don't attack their temple. But guess what?
All their money, all their gold is in a temple. Okay? So you're not allowed to steal each other's gold. That's stupid. Okay?
Because now um you don't really accomplish that much with warfare. So for the longest time, this was the status quo. Then what happened is a u man named Luga Luga Zagazi. Okay. And you can think of him as lower nobility.
So what we'll see in history is that within a city state there's always be a conflict between the upper nobility and the lower low nobility. Okay, the upper nobility is in charge. They want to maintain the status quo. The lower nobility want to steal that power. Okay, this will happen in Rome where Julius Caesar is of the lower nobility and he will steal the power from the upper nobility.
Okay, the people call the ultimates. And so Lucas like Leazi is from Uma and he's like, you know what, screw this. These rules are stupid. I want to conquer everyone. I want to be the top dog.
Okay. So what he's doing that's very different from previous times is he's now going and ransacking each of each each city's temple. So now he has the capacity to be able to build an empire. Okay. But by doing that, what happens is that the other city states recognize him as a threat.
And so they invite mercenaries from place called Akad to come and help them. Okay. And this leads us to the first world empire called the Aadian Empire um named by Sargon of Akid. Now his name is interesting. His name means legitimate ruler which probably tells us he's not a legitimate ruler.
He's probably a mercenary like David who stole the throne. Okay? He saw an opportunity and he stole the throne. But this is a pattern in history where if there's if there's competition among different city states, the competition is not resolved amongst themselves because they have an equilibrium. So what happens is that an outsider, a mercenary usually comes in who doesn't respect the rules and he's able to unite everyone.
Okay, through innovations. So this this is why theQing dynasty and not the Jao or the Chu or the Wei were able to unite all of China because theQ dynasty was committed to total warfare. They didn't care about your rules. They wanted to win. Okay.
All right. So, as you can see, the Canadian Empire stretches throughout the fertile crescent. Okay. Um, conquers Mesopotamia, modern Iraq, extends over to Anatolia and captures a lot of the Leavant. Okay.
But this area, the Leavant is historically the most strategic location in the world. Why? because it gives you access to Egypt, Mesopotamia and Anatolia. Historically the three wealthiest parts of the world. So whoever controls the Levant is able to always threaten Egypt.
Okay? And for most of history this part the Levant was a Egyptian colony. But remember that after the Bronze Age collapsed Egypt was not was able to project power in the Levant. And so uh the different empires fought for the Levant in order to threaten Egypt. Okay.
So, Jerusalem is literally the center of the world and we will see that throughout history people have considered Jerusalem the center of the world both for religious reasons but also mainly for geopolitical and trade uh reasons. Okay. Uh now the other thing to remember about this area is that it's highly competitive because it's hard to protect Mesopotamia. Okay. is very very wealthy but as you can see um there are these mountain tribes over here that can always threaten Mesopotamia.
Okay. So this is a pattern in history where whoever established an empire in Mesopenia is always being threatened by the mountains the regions sorry the the borderlands okay this is a this is a pattern throughout um uh meian history and that's why these empires change all the time. Okay. So this is the Babylonian Empire. Uh this this gives us uh hemorrhabi.
Okay. Then you have the uh Assyrian Empire. The Assyrian Empire is famous for their brutality. They'll come if you rebel against them, they will kill everyone. Okay?
They're they're notorious for their brutality. Now remember at this time in history, an empire is not the empire of today where you can exert authority everywhere. empire at this time is you're mainly controlling certain choke points of trade and everyone else just sort of like goes along because it benefits them. Okay, so an empire is more more like a loose confederation as opposed to um a nation state. Okay, so this is the Assyrian Empire.
Um and this is the uh Neoablonian Empire. Okay, so you have these empires that constantly change over time. History changes when a man emerges called Cyrus the great. Okay. Um [clears throat] Cyrus the great is the founder of something called the Persian Academic Empire.
So last class we discussed Zoroastronism and Zoroastronism is really the first great world religion uh because it provides a simple but powerful model of how the world works and um rationalism is powerful because it encourages everyone to be their best right to seek Asha. Now, for most people, what Asha means is don't ever lie. Okay? And it is actually um a really useful thing if you're trying to run an empire because when you run an empire, you need soldiers, you need generals, you need administrators, right? And if people don't lie, if people are honest and moral, well, you can expand really quickly, right?
And so that's what Cyrus the Great did. S the great is also known for his mercy and his generosity. So when he conquers a place what he will do he will identify the best people maybe the king himself and make them advisers to his regime. Okay he's known for his tolerance he's own he's he's known for his um openness and so what happens is that the Babylonian Empire basically surrender to him without a fight. Why?
because of elite overproduction, right? You have this war going on between the upper nobility and the lower nobility and they're like, you know what? Let's just invite Syus the Great and then we don't have to fight each other anymore. Okay? And and that's how Cyus the Great was able to build the first world empire.
Okay? This is um uh Babylon, the fall of Babylon. And Cyrus the Great um there are different stories, but one story is that they basically invited him in in order to resolve their inner conflicts with with each other. Okay. Um, this is a tomb of Cyrus the Great.
It's still in Iran today. There's a story that when Action the Great, you know, who who was Macedonian, when he went to conquer the Persian Empire, he discovered that the Cyrus the Great, his tomb uh was in um bad repair. They didn't really maintain or upkeep it. So, he ordered for it to be properly maintained. Okay, that's probably the story is is by the way probably false.
But it shows you that at this time in history about the year 300 400 um everyone uh uh 300 400 BC everyone was respectful of sus. Okay. Sus great is considered the world's greatest king or emperor. Okay. So as you can see the persian empire is huge.
Okay. It encompasses most of uh West Asia. Okay. So, it goes from Iran all the way to Mesopotamia to Anatolia to parts of um Greece and all basically all of Egypt and Libya. Okay.
It's a huge area and they were able to do this because of their innovations in religion as well as administration. Okay. All right. So, let me explain how do you rule empires usually. Okay.
Well, the traditional way is you control trade routes and access. Okay. So, people have to pay you a tax to go through your trade routes. That that's a tra traditional way. You can also use fear and conquest.
Then that's what the Assyrians were known for. They would come and they would kill everyone if you disobey them. Uh you took hostage hostages. That's that's a very common thing where you conquer people and you take uh the children of the king as hostages. Okay.
uh in a marriage, religion, but what the Persians did really well that allow for the Persian empire to be so huge as well as to be really well managed are four four things. Okay, effective administration. Again, when you have a religion zism where people can't lie, that's really good because these bureaucrats will now report real facts to the emperor and that allows him to make better decisions. Okay, elite cultation meritocracy. And the idea here is that if you have a very effective administration that allows for local elites to focus your energies on trying to join this administration as opposed to rebelling against you uh communication uh networks, okay?
So things like roads, things like uh uh uh postal networks. Okay. So, the Persians create the first uh global postage system and it was really effective where uh you want to send mail from Egypt over to uh Mesopotamia, what would happen is you would have these royal roads where uh people would ride on horses and they could stop at a basically a hostile rest and then keep on going. Okay. And that way you can you can um very quickly move information from one core of the empire to the other.
Okay. And the last is to divide and rule. Divide and rule is really important. So what they did was they basically had different power centers within a within a region. Okay.
So you had the sat traps which were the local governors but then you also had the local you also had the bureaucrats. Okay. You also had uh the royal representatives. So these are different factions within a re within a region. Okay.
So dividing rule is probably the most effective way to control an empire. Okay. So now let's move on to Israel. Okay. We know we now know about the Persian Empire, how they managed their system and why they are so effective.
Okay. Now let's talk about Israel. So remember that we read the Bible. Um and the Bible um came about because David needed to justify legitimize his rule. And after branches collapsed, David created a devic kingdom um in the Levant because Egypt, Anatolia, Mesopania were preoccupied, right?
But because Lavant is so important, this limited kingdom doesn't really last that long. It lasts for like 80 200 years. Okay. Um after Solomon, David's son, dies, Israel is divided into two parts. The northern kingdom, which gets conquered by Assyria as well as Judah.
Okay. Jerusalem where which tries to maintain the the kingdom but doesn't last very long. At this time in history um uh the Israelites are being pulled in different directions. Okay. The Anatolians, the Assyrians, the Babylonians, the Egyptians because they are strategically very important.
And so what's really hard for these empires is how do we maintain control over Jerusalem? Okay. And they try different techniques. They try um burning down their city centers. Okay, so the northern kingdom was destroyed.
Uh you might have heard of the 10 lost tribes of Israel. Um they tried taking hostages. Okay, but because this region is so volatile, nothing really works. And so the Jew Jerusalem, the Israelites keep on rebelling. Okay.
Um so this is king of Judah and [snorts] what happens is for the longest time the Babylonians are trying to deal with the Israelites. Okay? So they take hostages. Okay? They take hostages like thousands of them and move them to Babylon where they become scribes where they become farmers where they become merchants.
Okay. Um but again the region is so strategically important that Jerusalem uh the Israelites they switch loyalties all the time. Eventually the Babylonians are so pissed off that they decided to burn down their temple. Okay. And so at this point in history the Israelites are now gone.
Okay. Does that make sense? The Israelites are gone now. [snorts] [clears throat] Um 587 to 6. We don't know when, but Babylon's destroyed Jerusalem because they cannot they they they tried many techniques to try to control Jerusalem.
They can't do it. The Israelites are too rebellious. Uh but it's too strategically important. So they destroy. So so they decide, you know what, screw this.
We'll just destroy the city. Okay. So when this happens, okay, that's really important for you to understand. The Israelites are gone. Okay, the people are still around.
The identity of the Israelites are now gone. [sighs] 539 Cyrus the Great conquers Babylon. Okay. And he says, "I want the Israelites to return to Jerusalem." It's called the Edict of Cyrus. All right?
And this is celebrated in the Bible. What is controversial is why would he do such a thing? Okay? Because again, the Israelites are now gone. um the Israelites who go who went to Babylonia, they may still keep their religion a bit, but they no longer have their land.
They no longer they're they have changed as a people. Okay? So, as an Israelite, you pray in the temple, but the temple is now destroyed. So, now you um pray in a synagogue. Okay?
So, the people have changed a great deal. So, the question now is why would Cas the Great go to Babylon and said, "You know what? I want you Israelites to return to Jerusalem. I want you to reconstitute the nation of Israel. Why would he do that?
Okay. So, this is going to this is a going to be a debate that will never ever end. Okay. So, the Bible tells us that Cyrus the Great did this because God told him to do that. Really simple.
God says, "I love my people. The Israelites send them home." Okay? And Cy, yes, of course, you're the great God. I'll do so. Okay, guys.
That's how it happened. Okay. All right. So, there are different explanations. Um, maybe the idea is that Cyrus wants to show all the Persian Empire, I'm religiously tolerant.
You can practice your religion. You can set up your religion. That's what the Persian Empire is, an open, tolerant, generous empire. Okay, that's true. What's also true is that Cyrus thought himself as a righteous and merciful king uh who wanted to be generous to everyone.
Okay, so he saw the Israelites uh want home. He says, "Well, can go home." Okay. Um he it's also possible that there's a faction within the Israelites who supported his Babylon takeover. Okay, I don't know if this is true. It's probably not true, but we consider that consider that as as a possibility that the Israelites in Babylon supported his takeover.
And so to thank them, Cyrus said, "Fine, I'll give you back Jerusalem." Um, another possibility is that uh when Cyrus the great conquered Babylon, he discovered that you know what these Israelites are really good administrators and this is true found history because remember the Israelites have their Bible and the religion requires them to study the Bible and as we discussed the Bible is one of debate, openness, asking questions and so these are very literate intellectuals and they rise up very high in the Babylon administration. But this is true throughout history where where Jewish people will rise very high in all empires including including the Islamic empire including u the American empire. Okay. Um I think the best reason for what happened is divide and rule. Okay.
So the idea is that you need to control the Levant because Levant gives you access to Egypt which is historically the wealthiest part of the world. Okay. Whoever controls Egypt controls the world. So what you do is you set up a group of people in the Levant that are only loyal to you. Okay?
Does that make sense? Okay. You set up people in the Levant that only exist because you, the empire, allow them to exist. If you the empire did not support them, then the locals, the everyone in that region would would get rid of them right away. Okay?
And that's why we have the Jews. So the Jews were invented by the Persians to control the Leavant. The Jews is actually a Persian term. Okay. So before the Jews were of course the Israelites.
Now we have the Jews. All right. So um this is Jerusalem. And as you can see what's really important to understand is that this is actually only a really small part of the Lat. But this part is specifically for the Jews.
Um, and it's part of this Persian province called Beyond the River. Okay? And they call it the province of Yahoo. That's that's why we have the term Jews. Okay?
Because they are part of the province of Yahoo. And and what's really important to understand is they're surrounded by enemies. The Samrians are Israelites who have stayed in the Levant. Okay? Do you understand?
So most people around them are in fact Israelites who uh adapted to local circumstances and that means that they practice different religions. That also means that they married foreign women as well but they still consume as Israelites. Okay? Right? Does that make sense guys?
[snorts] So what but what happens is that these exiles from Babylon, they come back and they say, "No, we're the true Israelites. You guys are the false Israelites. The reason why we're true is we have stayed loyal to um our religion." Okay? So what's going to happen over the next few decades is almost a civil war between Israelites who've stayed and Israelites who left but come back. All right?
All right. And this is what the Persian Empire wants in order to maintain stability in the Levant. Right? Because you have this small minority um of exiles from Avalon who've come back and they're in conflict with everyone else. All right.
This is divine rule. Okay. So um um could you sorry let let me Okay. Let me Okay. Okay.
So could you help me read the Bible? Okay. Okay. All right. So we're going to read two books of the Bible.
They're called Ezra and Nhema. Okay. And these two books are really important and they're not really discuss that often um by scholars. But Ezri Namya shows us how Persia helped the Jews to reconstitute their nation, the process. And by studying these two books, it will give us insight into how current people in the nation of Israel think.
And then we can analyze how they will behave moving forward. Okay. All right. So, so can you read this? This this is the beginning of the book of Ezra.
Okay. In the first year of King Cyrus of Persia in order that the world of the Lord by the mouth of Jeremiah might be accomplished. The Lord stirred up the spirit of King Cyrus of Persia so that he sent a herald throughout all his kingdom and also in a written edict declared. Okay. So, this is really important for us to understand.
Okay. the Bible. Cyrus is doing this because God told him to do this. Okay? Not because of imperial ambitions or imperial strategy.
It's just God told him to do this. Okay? Keep on going. Thus says King Cyrus of Persia, "The Lord, the God of heaven, has given me all the kingdoms of the earth, and he has charged me to build him a house at Jerusalem in Judah. [snorts] any of those among you who are of his people, may their God be with them, are now be are now permitted to go up to Jerusalem in Judah and rebuild the house of the Lord, the God of Israel.
He is the God who is in Jerusalem, and let all survivors in whatever place they reside be assisted by the people of their place with silver and gold, with goods, and with animals, besides free will offsprings for the house of God in Jerusalem. Okay. So, Cyrus the Great is considered the Messiah by the Jews. Um, the Jews are extremely thankful for Cyrus because not only do they does he allow them to go back to uh Jerusalem, but he also finances the rebuilding of the temple. Okay?
But when this happens, when they go back and try to rebuild a temple, the locals get pissed off. Okay? Because like, who are you people? you you're still our religion like like what's going on here? Okay.
And this creates a lot of conflict. That's good for the Persian Empire because they want this conflict, right? As part of their divide and rule strategy. Okay. All right.
Uh when the builders laid the foundation of the temple of the Lord, the priests in their vestments were stationed to praise the Lord with trumpets. And the Levites, the son of the Levites are important. Levites are actually the priest class of of the Israelites. Okay, keep on going. The sons of Asaf with symbols according to the direction of King David of Israel.
And they sang responsibly, praising and giving thanks to the Lord, for he is good, for his steadfast love endures forever towards Israel. And all the people responded with a great shout when they praised the Lord, because the foundation of the house of the Lord was laid. But many of the priests and Levites and heads of families, old people who had seen the first house on its foundations, wept with a loud voice when they saw this house, though many shouted aloud for joy, so that the people could not distinguish the sound of the joyful shout from the sound of the people sweeping. For the people shouted so loudly that the sound was heard far away. This is the happiest moment in Jewish history when they rebuild the temple.
Okay. What they call second temple. And this is important because the second temple was destroyed. [clears throat] And what they want to do now in Israel is build the third temple. And this is important because the third temple sits on the alacic mosque which is the third holiest site in the Arabic world.
So what this Bible is telling us that eventually the Israelis will destroy the Alic mosque so that they can build the third temple or what they call the temple of Solomon. Okay. All right. Can you can you can you continue? Um uh from when Yeah.
When the adversaries When the adversaries of Judah and Benjamin heard that the returned exiles were building a temple to the Lord, the God of Israel, they approached Zeru Babel and the heads of families and said to them, "Let us build with you, for we worship your gods as you do." Okay, so they're saying, "We're Israelites just as you guys. Okay, we stayed, but you guys left. So actually we're better than you are. Okay. Because we stayed where you left.
Okay. Keep on going. And we have been sacrificing to him ever since the days of King Srar haden of Assyri Assyria who brought us here. But Zir, Zerubbabel, Jerushia, Josh, Joshua, and the rest of the heads of families. And Israel said to them, "You shall have no part with us in building a house to our God.
But we alone will build to the Lord, the God of Israel, as King Cyrus of Persia had commanded us." This is really weird, right? You're all you're all Israelites. Why? Why is it that No, we are the true Israelites. You guys are You guys are the false Israelites, and so you can't help us.
Okay? Why is there this conflict going on, right? That's strange. And so the only way to understand this is the conflict is part of the imperial strategy. Okay?
Divide and rule. Keep on going. Then the people of the land discouraged the people of Judah and made them afraid to build and they bribed officials to frustrate the plan throughout the re reign of King Cyrus of Persia and until the reign of King Darius of Persia. Okay. So they try to build the temple, but it doesn't really work out because there's so much opposition, right?
The the the Jews who come back from Babylon, it's like, "We're the real Israelites, so only we can touch the temple. No, no one else can participate." And the others are like, "This is not this is this is wrong. We should all participate in the building of the temple. This is this is one religion." Okay. So it seems as though these Jews in Babylon, they're actually imperial agents who are trying to show discontent within the region.
Okay. Uh sorry this is a bit long. Okay. But um c can can you try to read? Okay.
This is a copy of the letter that king and can you help me? Uh art artoxes. Okay. Artex. Artexis is this great warrior in Persian.
Okay. Great warrior. Keep on going. gave to the priest Ezra, the scribe, a scholar of the text of the commandments of the Lord and his status for Israel. Okay, so Ezra is one of these Israelites who was who comes from a family that was exiled to Babylon.
Okay, but he's a priest and he's an intellectual. So he is considered actually the uh creator of the Bible that we have today. Okay, keep on going. Artisex says, "King of kings to the priest Zarah, the scribe of the law of the God of heaven, peace. And now I decree that any of the people of Israel of their priests or Levites in my kingdom who freely offers to go to Jerusalem may go with you.
For you are you are sent by the king and his seven counselors to make inquiries about Judah and Jerusalem according to the law of your God which is in your hand. and also to convey the silver and gold that the king and his counselors have freely offered to the God of Israel who whose dwelling is in Jerusalem with all the silver and gold that you shall find in the whole province of Babylonia and with the free will offerings of the people and the priests given willingly to the house of their God in Jerusalem. With this money then you shall with all diligence buy bulls, rams and lambs and their grain offering and their drink offerings and you shall offer them on the altar of the house of your God and to raise. Okay, stop. Okay, this is really important.
Okay, this is a letter um by King Ardis authorizing is Ezra to build the second temple. Okay, why is this important? because this is called the Balfford declaration 1917. What's going to happen is that the British government um Lord Balfford he writes to Lord Rothst who is a Jewish finance and he says we uh actually just just read this. Okay.
Okay. I have much pleasure in conveying to you on behalf of his majesty's government the following declaration of empath sympathy with Jewish Zionist aspirations which has been submitted to and approved by the cabinet. His majesty's government view with favor the establishment in Palestine of a n national home for the Jewish people and will use their best endeavors to facilitate the achievement of this object. It being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country. I should be grateful if you would bring this declaration to the knowledge of the Zionist Federation.
Okay, this is almost like the artist segregation, right? You see how in the Bible artists writes a letter to Ash says, "Hey, I authorize you to go back to Jerusalem and build the second temple." Right? So, what's happening is that they're using the Bible as a script in order to um facilitate their geopolitical ambitions. Okay? Okay, this is why reading the Bible is important because once you read the Bible, you understand the Bible, you compare it to historical development, you're able to see the connections and you're able to see connections, you can also see predict how they will develop over time.
Okay, so this battle of declaration creates the current nation of Israel, okay, which was found in 1948. So like before the nation of Israel was created by the British as part of their geopolitical strategy of dividing and conquering the Middle East and I and we'll discuss this later on. Okay. But it's really important for you guys to keep in mind as we move forward. All right.
Uh c can you um read the highlighted part? Okay. Okay. Oh my god. I'm too ashamed and embarrassed to lift my face to you.
My God, for our iniquities have risen higher than our heads. Okay, so this is a speech by Ezra. Okay, he returns to Jerusalem and now he has to reflect on on what God wants. Okay, so he's he's he's going to discuss why God exiled in Babylon, why God has allowed him return, and what God wants him to do. Okay, keep on going.
And our guilt has mounted up to the heavens. From the days of our ancestors to this day, we have been deep in guilt. And for in iniquities, we our kings and our priests have been handed over to the kings of the lands, to the sword, to captivity, to plundering, and to utter shame as it now the case. Okay. So why did the Israelites get exiled to Babylon?
Because they refused to obey and worship Yahweh. Yahweh sent prophets. Yahweh warned them, but they kept on uh worshiping false gods. They kept on uh sinning. And so Yahweh is like, "You know what?
I really needed to teach these guys a lesson." And that's why they exiled him. They exiled them to Babylon so they can reflect and learn and grow as a people. Okay, keep on going. No, this case. But now, for a brief moment, favor has been shown by the Lord of Lord our God, who has left us a remnant and given us a stake in his holy place, in order that he may brighten our eyes and grant us a little sustenance sustenance in our slavery.
For we are slaves, yet our God has not forsaken us in our slavery, but has extended to us his steadfast love before the kings of Persia, to give us new life, to set up the house of our God, to repair its ruins, and to give us a wall in Judah and Jerusalem and in Jerusalem. Okay, so Ezra is saying, "Okay, yeah, we screwed up, but God is forgiving, and now we have a second chance to prove ourselves to God." How do we prove ourselves to God? by making sure that we only worship him. Okay. So this beginning of um uh Jewish monotheism.
Okay. Which was heavily influenced by Zorashianism. So in other words um the religion that the Jews will practice from now on is not the religion of the Israelites which is polytheistic. They they're will now practice a new religion that's heavily influenced by Zorashianism. Okay.
Which is the Persian religion. Come on. And now, our God, what shall we say after this? For we have forsaken your commandments, which you are commanded by your servants, the prophet, saying, the land that you are entering to possess is a land unclean with the pollutions of the people of the lands with their abominations. They have they have filled it from end to end with their uncleanness.
Okay. So, this is really important idea to understand. What what Ashra is saying is this these Israelites who've stayed are traitors. They are now unclean. Why?
Because now they worship foreign gods. They're they're polytheistic. And as a result, we have to clean the land. Okay, this is a fanatical understanding of Judaism. Okay, keep on going.
Therefore, do not give your daughters to their sons, neither take their daughters from your sons, and never seek their peace or propriety, so that you may be strong and eat the good of the land and leave it for an inheritance to your children forever. Okay, keep on going. After all that has come upon us for our evil deeds and for our great guilt, seeing that you, our God, have punished us less than our iniquities deserved, and have given us such a remnant at this, shall we break your commandment again, and intermar with the people who practice these abominations? Would you not be angry with us until you destroy us with without remnant or survivor? Oh Lord, God of Israel, you are just, but we have escaped as a remnant, as is now the case.
Here we are before you in our guilt, though no one can face you because of this. Okay, so now God has forgiven us. We've returned to uh Jerusalem. We can't screw this up again. Okay, and how do we prove our loyalty to God?
By making sure that we are pure. Okay, we're not going to marry other uh religions. We're not going to marry other people. we're going to be there within ourselves. So, Heroditus in his histories when he talks about the Jewish people, okay, he says the Jewish people are known for two things.
The first thing they're known for is giving Sabbath on Saturday. So, they don't work, they don't work on Saturday because that's their law. The second thing that they're known for, really known for is they don't marry outside their religion. Jewish women will not will refuse to marry foreign men. Okay?
And so, now we have the concept of blood purity. That is new. So remember it's really important for us to understand but the Jews and the Israelites are not the same people. Okay. In fact what Israel is doing is rejecting the Israelite heritage and establishing a new heritage based on blood purity and a monopistic devotion to Yahweh.
And this is new. Okay. That's why I keep on saying this. The Jews of Persia are not the same as the Israelites of David. All right.
So, um, as you can see from this map, um, the Jews are in this area and it's a very small part of the Levant, but it's a part of the Levant that's completely loyal to Persia, okay? Because they see everyone else as unclean, as the enemy. And if you're an empire, having the Jews around are really um good for you, right? All right. And so the Jews are an invention of the Persians, but guess what?
The nation of Israel is also an invention of the British Empire. And we'll discuss this later on. All right. Um so we move on to the second book called Nhema. So Ezra is the priest who will create the Bible.
Uh Nehemiah is the uh governor sent by the Persians to reestablish uh the Jewish nation. Okay. So okay, can you read the the highlighted part? At the time I was cupbearer to the king. Okay.
Cup bearer to the king is like a really powerful position, right? Because you can poison the king. So the king loves you. The king sees you as um as someone who is very competent and you could possibly be one day be um uh prime minister or the first minister. Okay, keep on going.
In the month of Nissan in the 12th 20th 20th year of King Artist Artisexes Artisexes my bad. when wine has when wine was served him. I carried the wine and gave it to the king. Now I had never been sad in this presence before. So the king said to me, "Why is your face sad since you are not s not sick?
This can only be sadness of the heart." Then I was very much afraid. I said to the king, "May the king live forever. Why should my face not be sad when the city, the place of my ancestors graves, lies waste and its gate have been destroyed by fire? Then the king said to me, "What do you request?" So I prayed to the God of heaven. Then I said to the king, "If it pleases the king, and you your servant has found favor with you, I ask that you send me to Judah, to the city of my ancestors grave so that I may rebuild it." The king said to me, the queen also was sitting beside him.
How long will you be gone and when will you return? So it pleased the king to send me. And I set him a date. Then I said to the king, "If I pleases the king, let letters be given to given me to the governors of the province beyond the river, that they may grant me passage until I arrived in Judah." and a letter to Asaf, the keeper of the king's forest, directing him to give me timber to make beams for the gates of the temple fortress and for the wall of the city and for the house that I shall occupy. And the king granted me what I asked for the gracious hand of my God was upon me.
Okay. So the Bible says that Nehemiah one day feels tremendous regret that uh the city of his ancestors is not has not been rebuilt. Okay? And he begs the king for permission to go back. Guys, this is not how empires work.
Okay? This is not how empires work. You do not ask the king or the emperor for anything because he will just cut your head off. Okay? How empires work is that you have to read the king's intentions, right?
You have to figure out what does he really want? And then you have to say please please I want to do this not because you asked me to do this but because I want to do this myself. Okay. And I will work hard to achieve this ambition. That's how empires work.
All right. The king does not tell you what he wants. You have to guess what he wants. If you can guess what he wants, then you get promoted. If you can't guess what he wants, then you get then you get your head cut off.
All right. That's how empires work. This is important because um when we move on to the nation of Israel, most people believe that the nation of Israel started with the Zionist movement which came with u the writing of a book called uh Judand um fatherland written by this German Jewish journalist called Theodore Herszel. And so people say Zionism started 100 years ago. Guys, when we do the next state of Israel, we will discover that it's actually part of the British imperial policy.
Okay? But the British themselves cannot be seen as the one as the ones who are promoting the creation of the state of Israel because it makes them look bad. Okay? Um because then because everyone else would be like why are you doing this? So what they have to do is create a situation in which the Jews themselves are trying to are want to create their own nation.
The problem though is this is really important. We'll discuss this later is that 100 years ago, guess what? Jews did not want to go to Jerusalem because they were happy where they were. Okay? There were a lot of Jews who were pretty happy in Babylon, but they were sent back in order to create this um uh to create this uh province Judah um and to create all this conflict with with the locals.
Okay? That's how empires work. Okay. All right. So, when Nehemiah goes back, what what he's going to do is he's going to build the temple and he's going to build the walls.
This is going to piss everyone off, right? Because like why would you do that? [clears throat] We're all living happily together. We're all big one big family. Um and now you're building these walls which means that you're better than us or you or you're afraid you're you're afraid of us or you want to conquer us.
Okay? So this creates all these conflicts with the locals which is again what the Persian Empire wants to happen. This is how empires work. [cough] All right. Okay.
C can you can you read? Now there was a great outcry of the people and of their wives against their Jewish kin. For there were those who said with our sons and our daughters we are many. We must get grain so that we may eat and stay alive. There were also those who said, "We are having to pledge our fields, our vineyards, and our houses in order to get grain during the famine." And there were those who said, "We are having to borrow money on our fields and vineyards to pay the king's tax." Now, our flesh is the same as that of our kindred.
Our children are the same as their children, and yet we are forcing our sons and daughters to be slaves, and some of our daughters have been ravished. we are powerless and our fields and vineyards now belong to others. Okay. So what what's happening is that Nehemiah has gone back to create this new province um of Jews. What he's discovering is that there's massive corruption inequality among these Jews and this is a problem because they're minority in a very hostile region.
Right. Keep on going. I was very angry when I heard their outcry and these complaints. After thinking it over, I brought charges against the nobles, the nobles and the officials. I said to them, "You are all taking interest from your own people." And I called a great embassy to deal assembly to deal with them.
And said to them, "As far as we were able, we have brought back our Jewish kindred who had been sold to other nations, but now you are selling your own kin who must then be brought back by us." They were silent and could not find a word to say. So I said, "The thing you the thing that you are doing is not good. Should you not should you not walk in the fear of our God to prevent the taunts of the nations our enemies? Moreover, I moreover I and my brothers and my servants are lending them money and grain. Let us stop this taking of interest.
Restore to them this very day their fields, their vineyards, their olive work or orchards and their houses and their interests on money, grain, wine and oil that you have been exact exa exacting from [snorts] them. Then they said, "We will restore everything and demand nothing more from them. We will do as you say." And I called the priests and made them take an oath to do as they had promised. I also shook out the folds of my garment and said, "So many God shakes out everyone from house and from property who does not perform this promise. Thus may they be shaken out and emptied." And all the assembly said, "Amen." And praised the Lord.
And the people did as they had promised. Okay, so this is a really important aspect of the Jews that people don't really understand how unified they are. Okay, an example is that if you're a Jewish person, you can always get an interest free interest free loan if you want to buy a house or start a business. Okay, that's pretty amazing, right? If you want to buy a house or want to start a business, we go to bank, they're like, um, okay, we're going to charge you 10% interest and maybe you can't afford that, right?
But if you're a Jewish person, doesn't matter [snorts] how poor you are, there will always be Jewish organizations that can offer you interest free loans. If you want to start a business or if you want to buy a house, you want to do anything because Jews are not allowed to collect interest from each other. That's how unified they are as a people. Okay. Uh okay.
So, uh, just read the top and they highlight it and and and that's it. Okay. Okay. When the seventh month came, the people of Israel being settled in their own in their towns, all the people gathered together into the square before the Watergate, they told the scribe Ezra to bring the book of the law of Moses, which the Lord had had given to Israel. Accordingly, the priest Ezra brought the law before the assembly, both men and women, and all who could hear hear with understanding.
This was on the first day of the seventh month. He read from it facing the square before the water gate from early morning until midday in the presence in the presence of the men and women and those who could understand. and the ears of all of all the people were were attentive to the book of the law. Okay. So this is the last step of creating the Jewish identity.
Okay. So the idea of the Jewish identity is that um they follow the laws of God. They do not marry outside their religion. They not charge each other interest. They don't exploit each other.
Okay. And the last thing is this. The last thing is that their historical memory is the Bible. Okay. Who are we as Jewish people?
H what are our memories? It's whatever is written in the Bible. Okay. So Ezra is taking all these historical documents and he's combined them together in what today we call the Bible. Okay.
And this is this makes the Jewish people extremely resilient because no matter uh where they are, no matter um how low the publishing um um how low the publishing goes, their memory, their historical identity is always stored in one Bible. That makes them the the world's most resilient, flexible, and open people. Okay. So this begins the uh uh Bible. Okay.
Uh keep on going. In those days I saw in Judah people treating wine pre wine presses on the Sabbath. And Sabbath is a Saturday, the day of rest. Okay. And bring in heaps of grain and loading them on donkeys and also wine, grapes, figs, and all kinds of burdens which they brought into Jerusalem on the Sabbath day.
And I warned them at the time against selling food. Ty tyrans Tyrions also who lived in the city brought in fish and all kinds of merchandise and sold them on the Sabbath to the people of Judah and in Jerusalem. Then Ire remmonstrated with the nobles of Judah and said to them, "What is this evil thing that you are doing profaining the Sabbath day? Did not your ancestors act in this way? And did not our God bring all this disaster on us and on the city?
Yet you bring more worth and on Israel by profaining the Sabbath. In those days also I saw Jews who had married women of Ashdod, Ammon, and Moab. And half of their children spoke the language of Ashod, and they could not speak the language of Judah, but spoke the language of various people. And I contended with them, and cursed them, and beat some of them, and pulled out their hair. And I made them take an oath in the name of God, saying, "You shall not give your daughters to their sons, or take their daughters from your sons, or for yourselves." Did not King Solomon of Israel sin on account of such women.
Among the many nations there were there was no king like him, and he was beloved by his God, and God made him king over all Israel. Nevertheless, foreign women made even him to sin. Shall we then listen to you and do all this great evil and act treacherously against our God by marrying foreign women? Okay. So, Nehemiah uh enforces two major laws.
The first law is that you shall not work on the Sabbath because that is God's rest day. Okay. Second major law is that if you marry a foreign woman, you must divorce her. He's bringing up families. Why?
because he believes that um religious purity requires blood purity. If you marry a foreign woman, she's she's going to make you believe in their foreign god. Remember, it is by worshiping false idols. Um it's because of this that Yahweh decided to punish the Jews. Okay?
So, the Jews must only worship Yahweh. All right? So, this is their interpretation of monotheism. So as you can see um there are certain traditions uh about the Jews that was created during the Persian Empire in order to facilitate Persian's control of the Lavant. But these traditions because they are encoded in the Bible they stay with us even today.
But not only that, but by reading the Bible carefully and understand how to connect the Bible to historical development, you can now figure out how Israel will develop over the next 10, 20 years. Okay? And these are my sorry, see these are my three predictions. First of all, they're going to rebuild the temple of Solomon. Okay?
They're going to build the third temple by destroying the Alex mos. They're going to do that sooner or later. Okay? That's the first thing they're going to do. And and you can you know why?
Because when we when we read the Bible, you can see how how happy they were. Okay? Because they felt completed. They felt as though God is with us. God has forgiven us.
God loves us. Okay? So building the third temple is crucial to the identity of Israel today. Okay? Okay.
So, they're going to do this and it's going to cause a lot of problems because again the mosque is the third holiest site in the Islamic world and it's going to create a lot of conflict between Israel and the Islamic world. Okay. Do they care? Not really. Okay.
Number two, you can see how um when the Jews returned, they were convinced that they were forced out of Jerusalem because they offended God. Okay? So in other words, if Jews want to maintain control over Israel, they need to obey the laws of God, which means that they have become a theocracy. Okay? Now, now I'm not sure if you've been to Israel.
I've been to Israel. And if you go to place like Tel Aviv, it's a very open, liberal, cosmopolitan, forwardlooking place. Okay? I think that um Tel Aviv has um one of the world's highest concentrations of gays in the world. Okay.
[snorts] Guess what? That's that's gone. Okay. As Israel develops over time, it's become more and more of a theocracy where the Bible is the law. Okay?
And the third thing is that we we can expect that as the past past Judea expands, more and more Jews will return to Israel. Look, the reality is this. If you look at the Middle East, [clears throat] Israel is the greatest power in the Middle East. There's no force in the Middle East that can prevent Israel from expanding and expanding including the pacts Judea which is their ambition. Okay.
So um this is just an introduction but the thing I want you guys to remember is that first of all the Jewish identity it is uh fluid. It's flexible. It's open. It was created by empire for the purpose of maintaining empire. Okay.
And we're going to see this throughout history as well. All right. So, um, is was this clear to you guys? Are there any questions about today? Okay.
Yeah. So, how does the the Persian state control like Persian control of uh of Jerusalem transfer to modern day society? Like, how does it still work? because I think we're seeing like a a trend that is Israel's going kind of more back to to like depending on the Bible and everything. So, how does it like transfer to modern day society and all the conflicts that's happening?
Okay, so Persia wanted to divide and conquer the Leavant. Okay. They're afraid that if one if the vant becomes too stable, the lavant might settle with Egypt or another power and they lose control of the lavant um which directly impacts your capacity to trade and control um the world. Okay. So the way you control the lavant is you create this entity um that has conflict with everyone else.
And now what happens is that both this entity um um Jerusalem and the its enemies rely on you Persia to manage a conflict. Okay? And this what's happening today in Israel because who's the empire? America's the empire, right? Israel has all these conflicts with nations in the Middle East, right?
They have conflicts with Turkey. They have conflicts with Egypt. They have conflicts with uh the Gulf nations. They have conflicts with basically everyone. Okay.
So, who does everyone require need to manage this conflict? America, right? Saudi Arabia, Israel, Turkey, Egypt, they all require the United States to come in and say, "Hey guys, let's just get along. We're just one big family." Okay? This is all intentional in order for America to maintain dominance over the Middle East.
Who's very unhappy about this? Which nation is very unhappy about this? Israel. Okay. Right.
Israel is going to piss about this. So we can expect that over time what's going to happen is a major major conflict between America and Israel. There's going to be a divorce basically. And my argument to you is that um Israel will win this conflict and as a result Israel will become the dominant power in the Middle East because the Jews know their own history. The Jews read the Bible every day.
They know what the Persians did. They know what the British did. They know what the Americans are doing today. They don't like they don't they don't want this. They don't they don't want to become a servant a slave to empire.
They are ser servant and slave to their god but they don't become a servant and slave to the empire. So they need to get rid of the empire and establish a sovereignty. Okay? And that's why there's so much conflict in the Middle East today because Israel needs to figure out how to get rid of the American Empire so that they can be independent and um fully achieve their sovereignty. Okay.
That does that make sense? Yeah. I think one question I have is about like I think currently the Jews stop attacking Palestines. Okay guys, okay, this is really important. Okay, don't say the Jews.
Okay, there are different groups. There's the Israelites. The Israelites are the time of King David. They're gone. Okay, let's forget the Israelites.
There are the Jews and the Jews are people who practice Judaism. Okay, then there are the Israelis. Israelis are citizens of the nation of Israel. It's the Israelis that are doing this, not the Jews. There's a difference, okay?
The because the Jews are spread out throughout the world, okay? What we call the Jewish diaspora. And there are a lot of Jews in the world who oppose the nation of Israel because well, what nation nation of Israel is is doing they believe goes against the will of God. Okay. So, Israelis not Jews.
Okay. Okay. So the Israelis is I think like the news just disappears about how Israelis attacks Palestine. It's just because previously is it was like all on those host searches but recently we can just it's just just gone the newses. Okay.
Um look the reality is that if you read the Bible it's clear what's going to happen. Uh, Israel is going to clear the West Bank and Gaza of Palestinians to re to establish their theocratic state. Okay? They can't have Palestinians and Arabs around. It has to be completely Jewish.
Um, and these Palestinians can be moved elsewhere to Jordan, to Egypt. They don't really care. Okay. But but this process process will take time. Okay.
Okay. All right. Any more questions, guys? Okay, great. So, um was this clear?
The the ideas in this class were are clear. Okay, so next class what we will do is we will do the Greek Empire. Okay, and then after that we'll do the Roman Empire and after that we will do Christianity. Okay, so we're going through history fairly quickly. But um I want I need you to keep these ideas in mind because they will build on top of each other.