Usury Interest Good Business or Theft

Usury (pronounced /ˈjuːʒəri/, comes from the Medieval Latin usuria, "interest" or from the Latin usura "interest") originally meant the charging of interest on loans. This included charging a fee for the use of money, such as at a bureau de change. After interest became accepted, usury came to mean the interest above the rate allowed by law. In common usage today, the word means the charging of unreasonable or relatively high rates of interest. The term is largely derived from Abrahamic religious principles; Riba is the corresponding Islamic term. The primary focus in this article is on the Christian tradition.
The pivotal change in the English-speaking world seems to have come with the permission to charge interest on lent money: particularly the 1545 Act 'An Acte Agaynst Usurie' (37 H.viii 9) of Henry VIII in England
Historical meaning


The First Council of Nicaea in 325, forbade clergy from engaging in usury (canon 17). At the time "usury" meant simply interest of any kind, and the canon merely forbade the clergy to lend money on interest above one per cent per month. Later ecumenical councils applied this regulation to the laity.

Lateran III decreed that persons who accepted interest on loans could receive neither the sacraments nor Christian burial. Pope Clement V made the belief in the right to usury a heresy in 1311, and abolished all secular legislation which allowed it. Pope Sixtus V condemned the practice of charging interest as "detestable to God and man, damned by the sacred canons and contrary to Christian charity."

Theological historian John Noonan argues that "the doctrine of usury was enunciated by popes, expressed by three ecumenical councils, proclaimed by bishops, and taught unanimously by theologians."

Certain negative historical renditions of usury carry with them social connotations of perceived "unjust" or "discriminatory" lending practices. The historian Paul Johnson, comments:

Most early religious systems in the ancient Near East, and the secular codes arising from them, did not forbid usury. These societies regarded inanimate matter as alive, like plants, animals and people, and capable of reproducing itself. Hence if you lent 'food money', or monetary tokens of any kind, it was legitimate to charge interest. Food money in the shape of olives, dates, seeds or animals was lent out as early as c. 5000 BC, if not earlier. ...Among the Mesopotamians, Hittites, Phoenicians and Egyptians, interest was legal and often fixed by the state. But the Jews took a different view of the matter.

The Hebrew Bible regulates interest taking, but interpretations vary widely. One understanding is that Israelites were forbidden to charge interest on loans made to other Israelites, but allowed to charge interest on transactions with non-Israelites. However, the Hebrew Bible itself gives numerous examples where this provision is evaded.

Johnson contends that the Torah treats lending as philanthropy in a poor community whose aim was collective survival, but which is not obliged to be charitable towards outsiders.

A great deal of Jewish legal scholarship in the Dark and the Middle Ages was devoted to making business dealings fair, honest and efficient.

Usury (in the original sense of any interest) was at times denounced by a number of religious leaders and philosophers in the ancient world, including Plato, Aristotle, Cato, Cicero, Seneca, Plutarch, Aquinas,Prophet Mohammad, Moses, Philo and Gautama Buddha.

For example, Cato in his De Re Rustica said:

"And what do you think of usury?" — "What do you think of murder?"

But one must always consider that usury, in historical context, has always been inextricably linked to economic abuses, mostly of the masses and of the poor; but sometimes of the financier and royalty, as bankrupt royalty has led to many a demise, thus frowning upon lending at interest or for a euphemistic "just profit". The main moral argument is that usury creates excessive profit and gain without "labor" which is deemed "work" in the Biblical context. Profits from usury are argued not to arise from any substantial labor or work but from mere avarice, greed, trickery and manipulation. In addition, usury is said to create a divide between people due to obsession with monetary gain. Most importantly, usury is the derivation of profit from biological time, which is linked to life, considered sacred, God-given and divine, leading to excessive worrying about money instead of God, thus subjugating a God-given sanctity of life to man-made artificial notions of material wealth.
Interest of any kind is forbidden in Islam. As such, specialized codes of banking have developed to cater to investors wishing to obey Qur'anic law.


As the Jews were ostracized from most professions by local rulers, the church and the guilds, they were pushed into marginal occupations considered socially inferior, such as tax and rent collecting and moneylending. Natural tensions between creditors and debtors were added to social, political, religious, and economic strains.

...financial oppression of Jews tended to occur in areas where they were most disliked, and if Jews reacted by concentrating on moneylending to non-Jews, the unpopularity — and so, of course, the pressure — would increase. Thus the Jews became an element in a vicious circle. The Christians, on the basis of the Biblical rulings, condemned interest-taking absolutely, and from 1179 those who practiced it were excommunicated. Catholic autocrats frequently imposed the harshest financial burdens on the Jews. The Jews reacted by engaging in the one business where Christian laws actually discriminated in their favor, and became identified with the hated trade of moneylending.

Peasants were forced to pay their taxes to Jews who were economically coerced into becoming the "front men" for the lords. The Jews would then be identified as the people taking their earnings. Meanwhile the peasants would remain loyal to the lords.

In England, the departing Crusaders were joined by crowds of debtors in the massacres of Jews at London and York in 1189–1190. In 1275, Edward I of England passed the Statute of Jewry which made usury illegal and linked it to blasphemy, in order to seize the assets of the violators. Scores of English Jews were arrested, 300 were hanged and their property went to the Crown. In 1290, all Jews were expelled from England, and allowed to take only what they could carry; the rest of their property became the Crown's. The usury was cited as the official reason for the Edict of Expulsion. However, not all Jews were expelled: it was easy to convert to Christianity and thereby avoid expulsion. Many other crowned heads of Europe expelled the Jews, although again conversion to Christianity meant that you were no longer considered a Jew.

The growth of the Lombard bankers and pawnbrokers, who moved from city to city along the pilgrim routes, was important for the development of trade and commerce.

Die Wucherfrage is the title of a Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod work against usury from 1869. Usury is condemned in 19th century Missouri Synod doctrinal statement.


In the 16th century, short-term interest rates dropped dramatically (from around 20–30% p.a. to around 9–10% p.a.). This was caused by refined commercial techniques, increased capital availability, the Reformation, and other reasons. The lower rates weakened religious scruples about lending at interest, although the debate did not cease altogether.

The papal prohibition on usury meant that it was a sin to charge interest on a money loan. As set forth by Thomas Aquinas, the natural essence of money was as a measure of value or intermediary in exchange. The increase of money through usury violated this essence and according to the same Thomistic analysis, a just transaction was one characterized by an equality of exchange, one where each side received exactly his due. Interest on a loan, in excess of the principal, would violate the balance of an exchange between debtor and creditor and was therefore unjust. The development of double entry bookkeeping would provide a powerful argument in favor of the legitimacy and integrity of a firm and its profits. As a usury is no longer morally suspect and business is accepted as a right and proper activity.
Religious context

The Old Testament From the King James Version [Exodus 22:25] "If thou lend money to any of my people that is poor by thee, thou shalt not be to him as an usurer, neither shalt thou lay upon him usury."
[Leviticus 25:36] Take thou no usury of him, or increase: but fear thy God; that thy brother may live with thee."

[Leviticus 25:37] Thou shalt not give him thy money upon usury, nor lend him thy victuals for increase."

[Deuteronomy 23:19] Thou shalt not lend upon usury to thy brother; usury of money, usury of victuals, usury of any thing that is lent upon usury: "

[Deuteronomy 23:20] Unto a stranger thou mayest lend upon usury; but unto thy brother thou shalt not lend upon usury: that the LORD thy God may bless thee in all that thou settest thine hand to in the land whither thou goest to possess it."
Torah



The following quotations are from the Hebrew Bible, 1917 Jewish Publication Society translation:

If thou lend money to any of My people, even to the poor with thee, thou shalt not be to him as a creditor; neither shall ye lay upon him interest. (Exodus, 22:25)

And if thy brother be waxen poor, and his means fail with thee; then thou shalt uphold him: as a stranger and a settler shall he live with thee. Take thou no interest of him or increase; but fear thy God; that thy brother may live with thee. Thou shalt not give him thy money upon interest, nor give him thy victuals for increase. (Leviticus, 25:35-37)

Thou shalt not lend upon interest to thy brother: interest of money, interest of victuals, interest of any thing that is lent upon interest. Unto a foreigner thou mayest lend upon interest; but unto thy brother thou shalt not lend upon interest; that the LORD thy God may bless thee in all that thou puttest thy hand unto, in the land whither thou goest in to possess it. (Deuteronomy, 23:20-21)

The Magna Cartacommands, "If any one has taken anything, whether much or little, by

way of loan from Jews, and if he dies before that debt is paid, the

debt shall not carry usury so long as the heir is under age, from

whomsoever he may hold. And if that debt falls into our hands, we will

take only the principal contained in the note." New Testament



The New Testament parable of the ten gold pieces refers to the concept of "usury" or "interest": a nobleman says to his servants:

"Finally the master said to him 'Why then didn't you put my money on deposit, so that when I came back, I could have collected it with interest?'" -Luke 19:23

"Thou oughtest therefore to have put my money to the exchangers, and then at my coming I should have received mine own with usury" - Matthew 25:27

On the other hand Luke 6:35 says "But love ye your enemies, and do good, and lend, hoping for nothing again; and your reward shall be great". Many interpret this as condemning usury, while others see it as a call to personal altruism and not a general prohibition on usury, which they see as a wise business practice that is not referenced in this verse.

Christ drives the Usurers out of the Temple, a woodcut by Lucas Cranach the Elder in Passionary of Christ and Antichrist.

Qur'an The following quotations are from the Qur'an: Those who charge usury are in the same position as those controlled by the devil's influence. This is because they claim that usury is the same as commerce. However, Allah permits commerce, and prohibits usury. Thus, whoever heeds this commandment from his Lord, and refrains from usury, he may keep his past earnings, and his judgment rests with God. As for those who persist in usury, they incur Hell, wherein they abide forever (Al-Baqarah 2:275) Allah condemns usury, and blesses charities.God dislikes every disbeliever, guilty. Lo! those who believe and do good works and establish worship and pay the poor-due, their reward is with their Lord and there shall no fear come upon them neither shall they grieve. O you who believe, you shall observe God and refrain from all kinds of usury, if you are believers. If you do not, then expect a war from God and His messenger. But if you repent, you may keep your capitals, without inflicting injustice, or incurring injustice. If the debtor is unable to pay, wait for a better time. If you give up the loan as a charity, it would be better for you, if you only knew. (Al-Baqarah 2:276-280) O you who believe, you shall not take usury, compounded over and over. Observe Allah, that you may succeed. (Al-'Imran 3:130) And for practicing usury, which was forbidden, and for consuming the people's money illicitly. We have prepared for the disbelievers among them painful retribution. (Al-Nisa 4:161) The usury that is practiced to increase some people's wealth, does not gain anything at Allah. But if people give to charity, seeking Allah's pleasure, these are the ones who receive their reward many fold. (Ar-Rum 30:39) Scholastic Theology
The first of the scholastics, Saint Anselm of Canterbury, led the shift in thought that labeled charging interest the same as theft. Previously usury was seen as a lack of charity.

St. Thomas Aquinas, the leading theologian of the Catholic Church, argued charging of interest is wrong because it amounts to "double charging", charging for both the thing and the use of the thing. Aquinas said this would be morally wrong in the same way as if one sold a bottle of wine, charged for the bottle of wine, and then charged for the person using the wine to actually drink it. Similarly, one cannot charge for a piece of cake and for the eating of the piece of cake. Yet this, said Aquinas, is what usury does. Money is exchange-medium. It is used up when it is spent. To charge for the money and for its use (by spending) is to charge for the money twice. It is also to sell time since the usurer charges, in effect, for the time that the money is in the hands of the borrower. Time, however, is not a commodity that anyone can sell. (For a detailed discussion of Aquinas and usury, go to Thought of Thomas Aquinas).

This did not, as some think, prevent investment. What it stipulated was that in order for the investor to share in the profit he must share the risk. In short he must be a joint-venturer. Simply to invest the money and expect it to be returned regardless of the success of the venture was to make money simply by having money and not by taking any risk or by doing any work or by any effort or sacrifice at all. This is usury. St Thomas quotes Aristotle as saying that "to live by usury is exceedingly unnatural". Islam likewise condemns usury but allowed commerce (Al-Baqarah 2:275) - an alternative that suggests investment and sharing of profit and loss instead of sharing only profit through interests. Judaism absolutely condemns it, whether to the alien in their midst" or "their brother (fellow Jews)". St Thomas allows, however, charges for actual services provided. Thus a banker or credit-lender could charge for such actual work or effort as he did carry out e.g. any fair administrative charges. The Catholic Church, in a decree of the Fifth Council of the Lateran, expressly allowed such charges in respect of credit-unions run for the benefit of the poor known as "montes pietatis".

In the 13th century Cardinal Hostiensis enumerated thirteen situations in which charging interest was not immoral. The most important of these was lucrum cessans (profits given up) which allowed for the lender to charge interest "to compensate him for profit foregone in investing the money himself." (Rothbard 1995) This idea is very similar to Opportunity Cost. Many scholastic thinkers who argued for a ban on interest charges also argued for the legitimacy of lucrum cessans profits (e.g. Pierre Jean Olivi and St. Bernardino of Siena).
Other contexts Usury in literature





In The Divine Comedy Dante places the usurers in the inner ring of the seventh circle of hell, below even suicides. (Showing how cultural attitudes have changed since the 14th century, the usurers' ring was shared only by the blasphemers and sodomites.)

In the 16th century it was necessary for Shylock to convert to Christianity and forsake usury before he could be redeemed in the climax of The Merchant of Venice. Thomas Lodge's didactic tirade against London moneylenders, An Alarum against Usurers containing tried experiences against worldly abuses tried to incite the educated class against the harm usurers seemed to induce in their victims.

By the 18th century usury was more often treated as a metaphor than a crime in itself, so that Jeremy Bentham's Defense of Usury was not as shocking as it would have appeared two centuries earlier.

In the early 20th century Ezra Pound's anti-usury poetry was not primarily based on the moral injustice of interest but on the fact that excess capital was no longer devoted to artistic patronage, as it could now be used for capitalist business investment.
Usury and the law


When money is lent on a contract to receive not only the principal sum again, but also an increase by way of compensation for the use, the increase is called interest by those who think it lawful, and usury by those who do not." (Blackstone's Commentaries on the Laws of England).
In the United States, usury laws are state laws that specify the maximum legal interest rate at which loans can be made. Congress has opted not to regulate interest rates on purely private transactions, although it arguably has the power to do so under the interstate commerce clause of Article I of the Constitution.

Congress has opted to put a federal criminal limit on interest rates by the RICO definitions of "unlawful debt" which make it a federal felony to lend money at an interest rate more than two times the local state usury rate and then try to collect that "unlawful debt".

It is a federal offense to use violence or threats to collect usurious interest (or any other sort). Such activity is referred to as loan sharking, although that term is also applied to non-coercive usurious lending, or even to the practice of making consumer loans without a license in jurisdictions that require licenses.
Usury and royalties

Royalties are contractual obligations of the Issuer of the royalty, made for the benefit of the holder of the royalty. Royalties require the payment of an agreed percentage of revenue of the Issuer, for an agreed period of time. In the event a royalty is purchased from an Issuer, the future revenue upon which the royalty is based is unknown at the time of the original transaction. Therefore, the cumulative amount of the future royalty payments is also an unknown. Royalty payments are not interest and royalties expire without value at their maturity. To be usurious payments made and received for the use of funds must be considered interest for loaned funds which require repayment at the maturity of the loan. Usury statutes in the United States

Each U.S. state has its own statute which dictates how much interest can be charged before it is considered usurious or unlawful.
If a lender charges above the lawful interest rate, a court will not allow the lender to sue to recover the debt because the interest rate was illegal anyway. In some states (such as New York) such loans are voided ab initio

However, there are separate rules applied to most banks. The U.S. Supreme Court held unanimously in the 1978 Marquette Nat. Bank of Minneapolis v. First of Omaha Service Corp. case that the National Banking Act of 1863 allowed nationally chartered banks to charge the legal rate of interest in their state regardless of the borrower's state of residence. In 1980, because of inflation, Congress passed the Depository Institutions Deregulation and Monetary Control Act exempting federally chartered savings banks, installment plan sellers and chartered loan companies from state usury limits. This effectively overrode all state and local usury laws. The 1968 Truth in Lending Act does not regulate rates, except in the cases of some mortgages, but it does require uniform or standardized disclosure of costs and charges.
Ethical arguments for and against usury

Freedom of trade
The primary ethical argument in defense of usury has been the argument of negative freedom against the "restraint of trade" since the borrower has voluntarily entered into the usury contract. Opponents note, however, that borrowers may be tricked into signing such contracts, assume there is a usury law cap on interest that does not exist, or be driven to accept such an interest rate out of necessity. At the same time however, except for related party transactions where feelings of compassion, guilt, etc, compel the lender to lend without interest, in un-related party transactions where neither the borrower nor the lender has any predetermined attachment to one another, there is no incentive for the lender to lend or for the borrower to repay the debt without usury.
Investment



A practical argument for usury in welfare economics is that charging interest is essential to guiding the investment process, based on the claim that profits are required to direct investments to their most productive use (solving the economic calculation problem). According to this argument, interest-driven investment is essential to economic growth, and therefore to the very existence of industrial civilization. This practical argument for the utility of usury treats all "unearned" returns to capital as interest; traditionally, guaranteed interest is usurious, whereas dividends from shared ventures are less so. In this tradition, the practical case against usury does not completely apply (although replacing debt market investments with stock market savings may not always be desirable). Officially, this is how capitalist Islamic states solve the calculation problem. An example of the 'moral' difference between dividend income and interest income is found in The Merchant of Venice: Shylock lends Antonio money for trade speculation, demanding repayment in flesh should Antonio's project fail utterly (accepting none of the business risk).
Excessive rates



In addition to the defense of interest as such, the practice of charging high interest rates is defended by those who point out that such rates reflect the very fact that the loans are being given to creditors with a high risk of default (in a competitive debt market the interest spread simply covers the credit risk). Economists of the Austrian school say that there is no such thing as a "just" interest rate separate from the free market equilibrium determined by the time-preferences of individual lenders and debtors. (Other free market theorists take a similar view on the merit of an unregulated debt market, but may not explain the subjective estimate of a worthwhile interest-rate bargain through time preference.)
Adverse selection and enforcement methods


Some have defended the threat or use of force (legal or illegal) against non-payers (such as required by Shylock). This position is based on the idea that without force there will be a market failure—since very high interest loans will only be taken up by those intending to default. The need for enforcement stems from this adverse selection problem rather than any immorality inherent in moneylenders. See: "The market for lemons".

Today's credit reporting system in industrialized countries obviates much of the need for the use of force. Since all potential lenders can quickly learn of one's delinquent status, non-payers may find an unwilling seller for many important goods, like apartment rentals, mortgages, renting of expensive equipment without a deposit, and in many cases, insurance or employment. In the minds of many debtors, such considerations outweigh fear of force brought against them.
Charities


Some low-interest charity loans (such as small business micro-loans) defend interest-charging since it allows for the indefinite administration of the charity, the replacement of defaulted loans, and in some cases, the creation of additional loan pools in other regions. These people say that the final "ethical result" of the interest rates justifies the means of charging them.
Avoidance mechanisms and interest-free lending


Islamic banking
In a partnership or joint venture where money is lent, the creditor only provides the capital yet is guaranteed a fixed amount of profit. The debtor, however, puts in time and effort, but is made to bear the risk of loss. Muslim scholars argue that such practice is unjust. As an alternative to usury, Islam strongly encourages charity and direct investment in which the creditor shares whatever profit or loss the business may incur. Interest-free banks

The JAK members bank is a usury-free saving and loaning system. Other examples of interest-free banking come from the Islamic banking used in the Muslim world. Interest-free micro-lending

Growth of the internet internationally has enabled global micro-lending charities where lenders make small sums of money available on zero-interest terms. Persons lending money to on-line micro-lending charity Kiva for example do not get paid any interest, although the end users to whom the loans are made are charged interest by Kiva's partners in the country where the loan is used.

The Greatness of Ancient Africa

 

The roots of "Western" civilization, culture, science, technology and religion are to be found not in Greece, but in Black Egypt and Nubia-Kush. From as early as 10,000 B.C. to 1500 A.D., Blacks were in the forefront in the development of science, culture and technology. Black empires and civilizations from the prehistoric Zingh Empire of 15,000 B.C. of Mauritania to ancient Khemet (Egypt) and Nubia-Kush, which existed about 17,000 years ago, experimented in various aspects of science and technology. Some of these sciences and technologies were so advanced that stories of flying machines and the invention of advanced machines has been passed down through ancient writings. Later Black civilizations such as Khemet and Mali experimented and created various sciences and technologies such as the chemical and mystery sciences of ancient Khemet and the surgical sciences of Mali, in West Africa. As early as about 400 B.C., a Black Pharaoh named Pi Di Amen built a model glider to conduct experiments in flight. Centuries before, the Black Egyptians had already invented gunpowder for use in their temples and mystery schools.

The mathematical and astronomical sciences necessary for high technologies such as those used in space technology and industries were first began by Blacks in Khem (Egypt) and Kush (Sudan). These sciences and high technologies were then passed on to the Sumerians, Babylonians, Elamites (all originally Black civilization), Greeks, Hebrews, Romans and Arabs In fact, it was the Black Sabeans of South Arabia, members of the Kushitic branch of the Black African race who established the first civilization in the Arabian Peninsula...thousands of years before the emergence of the Bedouin Arabs

Black medicinal sciences began in Khemet (ancient Black Egypt) and led to later Greek medicinal sciences. These ancient African sciences were copied by the Greeks and others from the ancient Papyrus texts composed by the ancient Khemites and Nubians.

From about 711 A.D. when the Moors, a Black people from Senegal, West Africa and Morocco, invaded Europe. They introduced Black Moorish science, technology, civilization and education to Europe and raised the Europeans from the Dark Ages of about 400 A.D. to 711 A.D. The Black Moors introduced advanced learning to Spain, similar to what had been taking place in Ghana, and at the university city of Jenne in Mali for hundreds of years. They introduced advanced learning to the cities of Toledo, Seville and Cordoba. These cities became centers of Black Moorish and European scholarship, science and culture, where Europeans and others learned new and advanced sciences, arts and technologies. That led to the European Renaissance of later years. The Black Moors introduced art, architecture, sciences, medicines, animal husbandry and other advanced disciplines to Spain and the rest of Europe. This was the catalyst which led to the European Renaissance

Compared to Africa and East Asia where the Europeans learned more technology from the Chinese such as the making of gunpowder and guns, Western and Eastern Europe, (excluding Rome, Greece, etc.) have very little history of great civilization and achievements before the Middle Ages. Africans and the Blacks of India, have had thousands of years of great contributions to world culture and civilizations. The British, French, Spanish, Dutch, Scandinavians, Germanics, Celts, Russians, Poles and many of these groups who claim "superiority" to Blacks and others, were from prehistoric times until the 1500's A.D., much less advanced economically, culturally, intellectually and scientifically as well as socially than most Black nations, kingdoms and empires during that period. From the time of the Roman conquest of Europe about 400 B.C. to the about 1200 A.D., much of Northern and Western Europe was in a stage or barbarism and backwardness. The Roman settlements and cities built by the Romans were the only areas of advanced culture

The claim by some people of racial superiority over Blacks is based on recent developments The introduction of gunpowder to Europe from China via the Arabs played a major part in elevating the Europeans to a level of military superiority. This advantage over some Africans made colonialism and the theft of African lands as well as the defeat of some African armies easier than in past eras. When the Europeans fought with sword and lance against sword and lance, their victories against Africans were few. For example, Hannibal, the African from Carthage defeated Rome's legions with as little as 15,000 men and ruled Italy for many years.
However, even with modern weapons during the modern era, Europeans were sometimes soundly defeated. Nations such as the Zulus, Mossi States, Ashanti, Dahomians, Ethiopians, Herrerros and others defeated the Europeans in a number of wars and battles.

Queen Tiye Black people were the original inventors of the disciplines that helped bring the world into the technological age. Mathematics, physics, astronomy, building in stone and bricks, metallurgy and all the root subjects that were necessary to push the world into today's modern age, were begun by Blacks in Egypt, Nubia-Kush, Mesopotamia, Sabea and Black Naga India. Therefore, even if people of European origins have made improvements in ancient technologies and ancient inventions, such as rocketry, computer technology, aerodynamics and others, the basic mathematical formulas and ancient prototypes were invented by Africans and Chinese. For example, the Africans invented the binary system which is still used in the Yoruba oracle and was copied by German scientists and applied to computer programming. Many ancient formulas in trigonometry, calculus and physics as well as chemistry (Khem mysteries) came from the scientific discoveries of Blacks in Egypt and Nubia-Kush.

Imhotp, The Father of Medicine. Imhotep was also the world's first physician and wrote many books on medicine. He was a great architect and was the first to use hewed stone in building Most Western European scientific discoveries or rather copies of the original discoveries of Africans and Chinese were put to use during the sixteenth to the twentieth centuries. It was during this crucial period that some of the great scientific and technological discoveries and inventions were made. Yet, these discoveries and inventions were and are merely improvements on ancient discoveries made by Africans, Chinese and Black Kushite Arabs. For example, gunpowder was invented by the ancient Egyptians and Nigerians who used the cola nut to make gunpowder. The Chinese reinvented it and used it in fireworks and explosives. Steel was invented by Africans in ancient Tanzania, where ancient cone-like blast furnaces with bellows still exist to this very day and are still used. The hydraulic pump for lifting water and irrigation was invented by Africans in Egypt

 

Who Were the Pharaohs?

Nubia is the name of a region historically located in southern Egypt and northern Sudan, at the gates of Black Africa, stretching from the first cataract to the sixth cataract of the Nile River.





The Egyptians called the main Nubia kingdom 'Kush'. Kush was located on the region of the third cataract and was attested since 2,000 BC.

Egypt was better developed, economically and culturally, than Nubia, but Nubia was rich in gold, ivory, cattle and slaves. That's why the Egyptians attempted to conquest Nubia; they did it gradually. Under the 12th dynasty (2,000-1,800 BC) the region up to the second cataract was annexed, and during the New Kingdom (1,600-1,200 BC), the Nubian territory between the first and the fourth cataract is organized as a vice-kingdom. Around 1,500 BC, Kush and its capital Napata were under Egyptian domination, and the Kushan culture and civilization were profoundly influenced by the Egyptian one. The Egyptian god Amon-Re was worshiped by Nubians, who even mimicked Egyptian art and pottery, and used the hieroglyphic writing (but transcribing the Nubian language).The pharaoh Tutmosis II built a temple of this god at Gebel Barkal, temple that would stand for 1,500 years.

To the year 1,000 BC, with the decline of the New Kingdom, the Nubian hostility towards the Egyptians would intensify and the Nubian army led by the king Kashta (745-742 BC) would invade the southern Egypt, founding a dynasty of Nubian pharaohs. This dynasty would unify and rule the whole Egypt. The capital of the new Egyptian kingdom was Napata, where the Nubian pharaohs were crowned.

The other Nubian pharaohs were Piankhi (742-715 BC), Shabaka I (715-701 BC), Shakatak (701-689 BC), Taharka (680-664 BC), and Tanutamun (664-650 BC). They made the 25th dynasty. Nubians were typical African Blacks, and their language (and in the ancient population, the race too) was similar to that of Dinka (from southern Sudan) or Turkana and Masai (of Kenya).



The Black pharaohs built pyramids in the Egyptian style too, but much smaller - with sides of 12 m (40 ft) and heights of 20 m (66 ft). The Nubian pyramids were preceded by chapels. These pyramids can still be seen at the four cataract, near Gebel Barkal.

The invasion of the Assyrian army, in 650 BC, much better armed than the Egyptians, forced the Nubians to retire in their ancient territories, even if, after their victory, the Assyrians withdrew. The Kushan kingdom would stand further, changing its capital from Napata to Meroe, until the 3rd century AD, when it would be destroyed by the Ethiopian army of the Aksum kingdom.

Pharaoh Hotepsekhemwy

Hotepsekhemwy (in Greek known as Boethos), was the first king of the Second dynasty of Egypt. His name means "Pleasing in Powers." Little is known about his reign.

Biography

Pharaoh Hotepsekhemwy became ruler of Egypt through his marriage to a daughter of the first dynasty king, Qa'a. However it is not known whether he was related to the old Thinite line of rulers. After Qa'a's death, Hotepsekhemwy made offerings in his memory and was possibly responsible for Qa'a's funeral. Seals with the name of "Hotepsekhemwy" have been found outside the tomb of Qa'a at Abydos.

Pharaoh Hotepsekhemy is believe to be bury at Saqqara Necropolis

His tomb has been identified in Saqqara; the substructure has survived, however nothing remains of the superstructure.

In Manetho's account, a chasm opened at Bubastis, causing many to perish during the 38 year reign of Boethos. While this may refer to a major earthquake, as Manetho wrote in the third century BC, over two millennia after the king's reign, the reliability of Manetho's information is uncertain.

Hotepsekhemwy's son was Perneb, but Hotepsekhemwy's successor was Raneb, who was his brother or another male relative.

The Great Confucius

Confucius (Chinese: 孔子; pinyin: Kǒng zǐ; Wade–Giles: K'ung-tzu, or Chinese: 孔夫子; pinyin: Kǒng Fūzǐ; Wade–Giles: K'ung-fu-tzu), literally "Master Kong", (traditionally September 28, 551 BC – 479 BC) was a Chinese thinker and social philosopher.


His philosophy emphasized personal and governmental morality, correctness of social relationships, justice and sincerity. These values gained prominence in China over other doctrines, such as Legalism (法家) or Taoism (道家) during the Han Dynasty (206 BC – 220 AD). Confucius' thoughts have been developed into a system of philosophy known as Confucianism (儒家). It was introduced to Europe by the Italian Jesuit Matteo Ricci, who was the first to Latinise the name as "Confucius".










His teachings may be found in the Analects of Confucius (論語), a collection of "brief aphoristic fragments", which was compiled many years after his death. For nearly 2,000 years he was thought to be the editor or author of all the Five Classics (五經) such as the Classic of Rites (禮記) (editor), and the Spring and Autumn Annals (春秋) (author).

The Analects of Conficius

Kong Qiu (孔丘), as Confucius is commonly known, is a combination of his surname (孔) and his given name (丘), and he was also known as Zhong Ni (仲尼), which is his courtesy name. He was born in 551 BC in the Lu state (This state was in the south of modern-day Shandong Province) in the later days of the Spring and Autumn Period. Confucius was from a warrior family. His father Shulianghe (叔梁紇) was a famous warrior who had military exploits in two battles and owned a fiefdom. Confucius lost his father when he was three years old, and then his mother Yan Zhengzai (顏徵在) took him and left the fiefdom because as a concubine (妾), she wanted to avoid mistreatment from Shulianghe's formal wife. Thus, Confucius lived in poverty with his mother since childhood. With the support and encouragement of his mother, Confucius was very diligent in his studies. When Confucius was seventeen years old, his mother died as a result of illness and overwork. Three years later, Confucius married a young woman who was from the Qiguan family (亓官氏) of the Song state (宋). Though he had a mild tempered wife who loved him, he left his family to strive for his ideals. Confucius sought to revive the perfect virtue of Huaxia (Chinese civilization) and the classical properties of the Western Zhou Dynasty to build a great, harmonious and humanistic society.



Teachings



In the Analects (論語), Confucius presents himself as a "transmitter who invented nothing". He puts the greatest emphasis on the importance of study,and it is the Chinese character for study (or learning) that opens the text. In this respect, he is seen by Chinese people as the Greatest Master.Far from trying to build a systematic theory of life and society or establish a formalism of rites, he wanted his disciples to think deeply for themselves and relentlessly study the outside world, mostly through the old scriptures and by relating the moral problems of the present to past political events (like the Annals) or past expressions of feelings by common people and reflective members of the elite, preserved in the poems of the Book of Odes (詩經).



In times of division, chaos, and endless wars between feudal states, he wanted to restore the Mandate of Heaven (天命) that could unify the "world" (天下, all under Heaven) and bestow peace and prosperity on the people. Because his vision of personal and social perfections was framed as a revival of the ordered society of earlier times, Confucius is often considered a great proponent of conservatism, but a closer look at what he proposes often shows that he used (and perhaps twisted) past institutions and rites to push a new political agenda of his own: a revival of a unified royal state, whose rulers would succeed to power on the basis of their moral merits instead of lineage;these would be rulers devoted to their people, striving for personal and social perfection. Such a ruler would spread his own virtues to the people instead of imposing proper behavior with laws and rules

The Tomb of Confucius in Qufu

One of the deepest teachings of Confucius may have been the superiority of personal exemplification over explicit rules of behavior. His moral teachings emphasized self-cultivation, emulation of moral exemplars, and the attainment of skilled judgment rather than knowledge of rules, Confucius's ethics may be considered a type of virtue ethics. His teachings rarely rely on reasoned argument, and ethical ideals and methods are conveyed more indirectly, through allusions, innuendo, and even tautology. This is why his teachings need to be examined and put into proper context in order to be understood. A good example is found in this famous anecdote:



廄焚。子退朝，曰：“傷人乎？” 不問馬。

When the stables were burnt down, on returning from court, Confucius said, 'Was anyone hurt?' He did not ask about the horses.



Analects X.11, tr. Arthur Waley



The passage conveys the lesson that by not asking about the horses, Confucius demonstrated that a sage values human beings over property; readers of this lesson are led to reflect on whether their response would follow Confucius's, and to pursue ethical self-improvement if it would not. Confucius, an exemplar of human excellence, serves as the ultimate model, rather than a deity or a universally true set of abstract principles. For these reasons, according to many Eastern and Western commentators, Confucius's teaching may be considered a Chinese example of humanism.



Perhaps his most famous teaching was the Golden Rule stated in the negative form, often called the Silver Rule:



子貢問曰：“有一言而可以終身行之者乎”？子曰：“其恕乎！己所不欲、勿施於人。”

Zi gong (a disciple of Confucius) asked: "Is there any one word that could guide a person throughout life?"

The Master replied: "How about 'shu' [reciprocity]: never impose on others what you would not choose for yourself?"



Analects XV.24, tr. David Hinton



Confucius's teachings were later turned into an elaborate set of rules and practices by his numerous disciples and followers who organized his teachings into the Analects. In the centuries after his death, Mencius (孟子) and Xun Zi (荀子) both composed important teachings elaborating in different ways on the fundamental ideas associated with Confucius. In time, their writings, together with the Analects and other core texts came to constitute the philosophical corpus known in the West as Confucianism. After more than a thousand years, the scholar Zhu Xi (朱熹) created a very different interpretation of Confucianism which is now called Neo-Confucianism, to distinguish it from the ideas expressed in the Analects. Neo-Confucianism held sway in China, Korea, and Vietnam until the 19th century.

The Danheng Hall; The Main Temple of Confucius in Qufu
Names



* Michele Ruggieri, and other Jesuits after him, while translating Chinese books into Western languages, translated 孔夫子 as Confucius. This Latinised form has since been commonly used in Western countries.

* In systematic Romanisations:

o Kǒng Fūzǐ (or Kǒng fū zǐ) in pinyin.

o K'ung fu-tzu in Wade-Giles (or, less accurately, Kung fu-tze).

+ Fūzǐ means teacher. Since it was disrespectful to call the teacher by name according to Chinese culture, he is known as just "Master Kong", or Confucius, even in modern days.

+ The character 'fu' is optional; in modern Chinese he is more often called Kǒng Zi (孔子).



* His actual name was 孔丘, Kǒng Qiū. Kǒng is a common family name in China.



(In Wade-Giles translation by D. C. Lau, this name appears as Kung Ch'iu.)



* His courtesy name was 仲尼, Zhòng Ní.

* In 1 C.E. (first year of the Yuanshi Era of the Han Dynasty), he was given his first posthumous name: 褒成宣尼公, Lord Bāochéngxūanni, which means "Laudably Declarable Lord Ni."

* His most popular posthumous names are

o 至聖先師,Zhìshèngxiānshī, lit. "The Most Sage Venerated Late Teacher" (comes from 1530, the ninth year of the Jianing period of the Ming Dynasty);

o 至聖, Zhìshèng, "the Greatest Sage";

o 先師, Xiānshī, literally meaning "first teacher". It has been suggested that '先師' can be used, however, to express something like, "the Teacher who assists the wise to their attainment".

* He is also commonly known as 萬世師表，Wànshìshībiǎo, "Role Model for Teachers through the Ages".





Philosophy



Although Confucianism is often followed in a religious manner by the Chinese, arguments continue over whether it is a religion. Confucianism does not lack an afterlife, the texts express simple views concerning Heaven, and is relatively unconcerned with some spiritual matters often considered essential to religious thought, such as the nature of the soul.



Confucius' principles gained wide acceptance primarily because of their basis in common Chinese tradition and belief. He championed strong familial loyalty, ancestor worship, respect of elders by their children (and, according to later interpreters, of husbands by their wives), and the family as a basis for an ideal government. He expressed the well-known principle, "Do not do to others what you do not want done to yourself" (One of the earliest versions of the Golden Rule). He also looked nostalgically upon earlier days, and urged the Chinese, particularly those with political power, to model themselves on earlier examples.

Because no texts survive that are demonstrably authored by Confucius, and the ideas most closely associated with him were elaborated in writings that accumulated over the period between his death and the foundation of the first Chinese empire in 221 BC, many scholars are very cautious about attributing specific assertions to Confucius himself.



Ethics



The Confucian theory of ethics as exemplified in Lǐ (禮) is based on three important conceptual aspects of life: ceremonies associated with sacrifice to ancestors and deities of various types, social and political institutions, and the etiquette of daily behavior. It was believed by some that lǐ originated from the heavens. Confucius's view was more nuanced. His approach stressed the development of lǐ through the actions of sage leaders in human history, with less emphasis on its connection with heaven. His discussions of lǐ seem to redefine the term to refer to all actions committed by a person to build the ideal society, rather than those simply conforming with canonical standards of ceremony. In the early Confucian tradition, lǐ, though still linked to traditional forms of action, came to point towards the balance between maintaining these norms so as to perpetuate an ethical social fabric, and violating them in order to accomplish ethical good. These concepts are about doing the proper thing at the proper time, and are connected to the belief that training in the lǐ that past sages have devised cultivates in people virtues that include ethical judgment about when lǐ must be adapted in light of situational contexts.



In early Confucianism, yì (義) and lǐ are closely linked terms. Yì can be translated as righteousness, though it may simply mean what is ethically best to do in a certain context. The term contrasts with action done out of self-interest. While pursuing one's own self-interest is not necessarily bad, one would be a better, more righteous person if one based one's life upon following a path designed to enhance the greater good, an outcome of yì. This is doing the right thing for the right reason. Yì is based upon reciprocity.



Just as action according to Lǐ should be adapted to conform to the aspiration of adhering to yì, so yì is linked to the core value of rén (仁). Rén is the virtue of perfectly fulfilling one's responsibilities toward others, most often translated as "benevolence" or "humaneness"; translator Arthur Waley calls it "Goodness" (with a capital G), and other translations that have been put forth include "authoritativeness" and "selflessness." Confucius's moral system was based upon empathy and understanding others, rather than divinely ordained rules. To develop one's spontaneous responses of rén so that these could guide action intuitively was even better than living by the rules of yì. To cultivate one's attentiveness to rén one used another Confucian version of the Golden Rule: one must always treat others just as one would want others to treat oneself. Virtue, in this Confucian view, is based upon harmony with other people, produced through this type of ethical practice by a growing identification of the interests of self and other.



In this regard, Confucius articulated an early version of the Golden Rule:



* "What one does not wish for oneself, one ought not to do to anyone else; what one recognises as desirable for oneself, one ought to be willing to grant to others." (Confucius and Confucianism, Richard Wilhelm)



Politics



Confucius' political thought is based upon his ethical thought. He argues that the best government is one that rules through "rites" (lǐ) and people's natural morality, rather than by using bribery and coercion. He explained that this is one of the most important analects: 1. "If the people be led by laws, and uniformity sought to be given them by punishments, they will try to avoid the punishment, but have no sense of shame. If they be led by virtue, and uniformity sought to be given them by the rules of propriety, they will have the sense of the shame, and moreover will become good." (Translated by James Legge) in the Great Learning (大學). This "sense of shame" is an internalisation of duty, where the punishment precedes the evil action, instead of following it in the form of laws as in Legalism.



While he supported the idea of government by an all-powerful sage, ruling as an Emperor, probably because of the chaotic state of China at his time, his ideas contained a number of elements to limit the power of rulers. He argued for according language with truth; thus honesty was of paramount importance. Even in facial expression, truth must always be represented. In discussing the relationship between a king and his subject (or a father and his son), he underlined the need to give due respect to superiors. This demanded that the inferior must give advice to his superior if the superior was considered to be taking the wrong course of action. This was built upon a century after Confucius's death by his latter day disciple Mencius, who argued that if the king was not acting like a king, he would lose the Mandate of Heaven and be overthrown. Therefore, tyrannicide is justified because a tyrant is more a thief than a king. Other Confucian texts, though celebrating absolute rule by ethical sages, recognise the failings of real rulers in maxims such as, "An oppressive government is more feared than a tiger."



Some well known Confucian quotes:



* "To know your faults and be able to change is the greatest virtue."

知錯能改，善莫大焉



* "What you do not wish for yourself, do not do to others."

己所不欲，勿施於人。



* "With coarse rice to eat, with water to drink, and my crooked arm for a pillow - is not joy to be found therein? Riches and honors acquired through unrighteousness are to me as the floating clouds."

疏食飲水，曲肱而枕，樂在其中矣。不義而富貴，於我如浮雲。



* "Knowledge is recognizing what you know and what you don't."

知之為知之，不知為不知，是知也.



* "Reviewing the day's lessons. Isn't it joyful? Friends come from far. Isn't it delightful? One has never been angry at other's misunderstanding. Isn't he a respectable man?"

學而時習之，不亦說乎？有朋自遠方來，不亦樂乎?人不知而不慍，不亦君子乎？



The last quote was chanted by the numerous drummers in the Opening Ceremony of the 2008 Olympics in Beijing, China.



Disciples and legacy



Confucius' disciples and his only grandson, Zisi, continued his philosophical school after his death. These efforts spread Confucian ideals to students who then became officials in many of the royal courts in China, thereby giving Confucianism the first wide-scale test of its dogma. While relying heavily on Confucius' ethico-political system, two of his most famous later followers emphasized radically different aspects of his teachings. Mencius (4th century BC) articulated the innate goodness in human beings as a source of the ethical intuitions that guide people towards rén, yì, and lǐ, while Xun Zi (3rd century BC) underscored the realistic and materialistic aspects of Confucian thought, stressing that morality was inculcated in society through tradition and in individuals through training.



This realignment in Confucian thought was parallel to the development of Legalism, which saw filial piety as self-interest and not a useful tool for a ruler to create an effective state. A disagreement between these two political philosophies came to a head in 223 BC when the Qin state conquered all of China. Li Ssu, Prime Minister of the Qin Dynasty convinced Qin Shi Huang to abandon the Confucians' recommendation of awarding fiefs akin to the Zhou Dynasty before them which he saw as counter to the Legalist idea of centralizing the state around the ruler. When the Confucian advisers pressed their point, Li Ssu had many Confucian scholars killed and their books burned - considered a huge blow to the philosophy and Chinese scholarship.



Under the succeeding Han Dynasty and Tang Dynasty, Confucian ideas gained even more widespread prominence. Under Wudi, the works of Confucius were made the official imperial philosophy and required reading for civil service examinations in 140 BC which was continued nearly unbroken until the end of the 19th Century. As Moism lost support by the time of the Han, the main philosophical contenders were Legalism, which Confucian thought somewhat absorbed, the teachings of Lao-tzu, whose focus on more mystic ideas kept it from direct conflict with Confucianism, and the new Buddhist religion, which gained acceptance during the Southern and Northern Dynasties era.



During the Song Dynasty, the scholar Zhu Xi (1130-1200 AD) added ideas from Daoism and Buddhism into Confucianism. In his life, Zhu Xi was largely ignored, but not long after his death his ideas became the new orthodox view of what Confucian texts actually meant. Modern historians view Zhu Xi as having created something rather different, and call his way of thinking Neo-Confucianism. Both Confucian ideas and Confucian-trained officials were relied upon in the Ming Dynasty and even the Yuan Dynasty, although Kublai Khan distrusted handing over provincial control. In the modern era Confucian movements, such as New Confucianism, still exist but during the Cultural Revolution, Confucianism was frequently attacked by leading figures in the Communist Party of China. This was partially a continuation of the condemnations of Confucianism by intellectuals and activists in the early 20th Century as a cause of the ethnocentric close-mindedness and refusal of the Qing Dynasty to modernize that led to the tragedies that befell China in the 19th Century.



In modern times, Asteroid 7853, "Confucius," was named after the Chinese thinker.



Quote: "Respect yourself and others will respect you."

Quote: "Today I have seen Lao-tzu and can only compare him to the dragon."



Memorial ceremony of Confucius



The Chinese have a tradition of holding spectacular memorial ceremonies of Confucius (祭孔) every year, using ceremonies that supposedly derived from Zhou Li (周禮) as recorded by Confucius, on the date of Confucius' birth. This tradition was interrupted for several decades in mainland China, where the official stance of the Communist Party and the State was that Confucius and Confucianism represented reactionary feudalist beliefs which held that the subservience of the people to the aristocracy is a part of the natural order. All such ceremonies and rites were therefore banned. Only after the 1990s, did the ceremony resume. As it is now considered a veneration of Chinese history and tradition, even Communist Party members may be found in attendance.



In Taiwan, where the Nationalist Party (Kuomintang) strongly promoted Confucian beliefs in ethics and behavior, the tradition of the memorial ceremony of Confucius (祭孔) is supported by the government and has continued without interruption. While not a national holiday, it does appear on all printed calendars, much as Father's Day does in the West.



Influence in Asia and Europe



Confucius's works are studied by many scholars in many other Asian countries, particularly those in the Sinosphere, such as Korea, Japan and Vietnam. Many of those countries still hold the traditional memorial ceremony every year.



The works of Confucius were translated into European languages through the agency of Jesuit scholars stationed in China. Matteo Ricci started to report on the thoughts of Confucius, and father Prospero Intorcetta published the life and works of Confucius into Latin in 1687. It is thought that such works had considerable importance on European thinkers of the period, particularly among the Deists and other philosophical groups of the Enlightenment who were interested by the integration of the system of morality of Confucius into Western civilization.



The Ahmadiyya Muslim Community believes Confucius was a Divine Prophet of God, as was Lao-Tzu and other eminent Chinese personages.



Visual portraits



No contemporary painting or sculpture of Confucius survives, and it was apparently only during the Han Dynasty that he was portrayed visually. Carvings often depict his legendary meeting with Laozi. In 2007 a Han dynasty fresco depicting this meeting was found in Dongping County. Since that time there have been many portraits of Confucius as the ideal philosopher. In former times it was customary to have a portrait in Confucius Temples; however, during the reign of Emperor Taizu of the Ming dynasty it was decided that the only proper portrait of Confucius should be in the temple in his hometown, Qufu. In other temples Confucius is represented by a memorial tablet. In 2006, the China Confucius Foundation commissioned a standard portrait of Confucius based on the Tang dynasty portrait by Wu Daozi.



Home town



Soon after Confucius' death, Qufu, his hometown in the state of Lu and now in present-day Shandong Province, became a place of devotion and remembrance. It is still a major destination for cultural tourism, and many people visit his grave and the surrounding temples. In pan-China cultures, there are many temples where representations of the Buddha, Laozi and Confucius are found together. There are also many temples dedicated to him, which have been used for Confucianist ceremonies.



In November 1966, during the Chinese Cultural Revolution, the Qufu Confucian monuments suffered much damage and 6000 artifacts were destroyed. The area was later restored.



Descendants



Confucius' descendants were repeatedly identified and honored by successive imperial governments with titles of nobility and official posts. They were honored with the rank of a marquis thirty-five times since Gaozu of the Han Dynasty, and they were promoted to the rank of duke forty-two times from the Tang Dynasty to the Qing Dynasty. Emperor Xuanzong of Tang first bestowed the title of "Duke Wenxuan" on Kong Suizhi of the 35th generation. In 1055, Emperor Renzong of Song first bestowed the title of "Duke Yansheng" on Kong Zongyuan of the 46th generation.



Despite repeated dynastic change in China, the title of Duke Yansheng was bestowed upon successive generations of descendants until it was abolished by the Nationalist Government in 1935. The last holder of the title, Kung Te-cheng of the 77th generation, was appointed Sacrificial Official to Confucius. Kung Te-cheng was offered the position of puppet Emperor of China in 1937 by the Japanese, but Kung declined the offer. Te-cheng died in October 2008, and his son, Kung Wei-yi, the 78th lineal descendant, had died in 1989. Kung Te-cheng's grandson, Kung Tsui-chang, the 79th lineal descendant, was born in 1975; his great-grandson, Kung Yu-jen, the 80th lineal descendant, was born in Taipei on January 1, 2006. Te-cheng's sister, Kong Demao, lives in mainland China and has written a book about her experiences growing up at the family estate in Qufu. Another sister, Kong Deqi, died as a young woman.



Confucius's family, the Kongs, has the longest recorded extant pedigree in the world today. The father-to-son family tree, now in its 83rd generation,[37] has been recorded since the death of Confucius. According to the Confucius Genealogy Compilation Committee, he has 2 million known and registered descendants, and there are an estimated 3 million in all.[38] Of these, several tens of thousands live outside of China. In the 14th century, a Kong descendant went to Korea, where an estimated 34,000 descendants of Confucius live today.[38] One of the main lineages fled from the Kong ancestral home in Qufu during the Chinese Civil War in the 1940s, and eventually settled in Taiwan.



Because of the huge interest in the Confucius family tree, there was a project in China to test the DNA of known family members. Among other things, this would allow scientists to identify a common Y chromosome in male descendants of Confucius. If the descent were truly unbroken, father-to-son, since Confucius's lifetime, the males in the family would all have the same Y chromosome as their direct male ancestor, with slight mutations due to the passage of time. However, in 2009, the family authorities decided not to agree to DNA testing. Bryan Sykes, professor of genetics at Oxford University, understands this decision: "The Confucius family tree has an enormous cultural significance,” he said. “It’s not just a scientific question." The DNA testing was originally proposed to add new members, many of whose family record books were lost during 20th-century upheavals, to the Confucian family tree.



The fifth and most recent edition of the Confucius genealogy was printed by the Confucius Genealogy Compilation Committee (CGCC). It was unveiled in a ceremony at Qufu on September 24, 2009. Women are now included for the first time.

It is important to note that this only deals with those whose lines of descent are documented historically. Using mathematical models, it is easy to demonstrate that every human being alive today is likely to be a direct descendant of Confucius, even using mathematical models that assume an extremely small amount of cross cultural mating, since any human alive today would have had 1.5 sextillion ancestors alive at the time of Confucius, over a quadrillion times more than the population of the earth at the time, making descent from Confucius a mathematical certainty, even accounting for consanguinity and geographical and cultural barriers, as noted by Yale professor Joseph T. Chang.

Nuh Washington No Death in a Cage Column by Mumia Abu Jamal February 5 2000

Nuh Washington passed away April 28 2000

For far too many African-Americans, the name, Albert "Nuh" Washington, is virtually unknown. For those in the know, however, and those in touch with 1960s-era black history regarding the Black Liberation Movement, his name is both known and respected.



Nuh (the Arabic form of Noah) was a committed member of the Black Panther Party and later, after the notorious FBI-engineered East coast-West Coast split, worked with the Black Liberation Army (BLA), in defending the lives and dignity of black folk.



Back in the 1970s, Nuh was shot and captured with another Panther, Jalil Muntaquin, and was later charged and convicted of murder along with Jalil and Herman Bell. Evidence has since surfaced strongly suggesting the three men were unjustly convicted in this case.



For over 28 years Nuh has been held in California and New York gulags, and repeatedly punished for his political ideas. Now, Nuh, recently diagnosed with malignant liver cancer, is dying. Doctors give Nuh between 3 to 10 months to live. ...



In the book Can't Jail The Spirit (Oct. 1992), Nuh wrote, in part:



"My family instilled in me values and a sense of pride in myself, family, and people. They were always there. I am not allowed family reunion visits because I am considered a high-security escape risk, while others, who have escaped, can get them. It is now harder for my mother to visit me. My friends must make plans to get here. I have not held my wife in a long time.



"I tell jokes and educate my fellow prisoners, which is why I am transferred a lot. The Black Panther Party is physically gone but the spirit lives in a lot of us. Just recently a brother asked me for the goals and rules of the Black Panther Party, and a few people wish to be part of it again. After 20+ years as a prisoner, the memory of being with the people still brings a smile to my face and it is something I share with my fellow prisoners: the concept of unity, movement, and love.



"I am a prisoner of war as well as a political prisoner because of the historical and contemporary acts of war carried out against Blacks/New Afrikan people inside and outside these United States by the government and those who believe in white supremacy."



Nuh's radiant spirit continues to shine nearly 3 decades after he was unjustly caged by the State. Yet, the flame of life is flickering within him.



Let us build a movement which, like the Puerto Rican Independentistas, insures that Nuh does not breathe his last in a cage.

John Henry The Man Facts Fiction and Themes

There are two John Henrys, the actual man and the legend surrounding him. Defining the first is a matter of assembling facts. He was born a slave, worked as a laborer for the railroads after the Civil War, and died in his 30s, leaving behind a young pretty wife and a baby.



Pinning down the second, the legend, is not so easy. It's as varied as the thousands of people - menial workers, scholars, professional musicians - who have studied, sung and recorded it over the years.






The story of John Henry, told mostly through ballads and work songs, traveled from coast to coast as the railroads drove west during the 19th Century. And in time, it has become timeless, spanning a century of generations with versions ranging from prisoners recorded at Mississippi's Parchman Farm in the late 1940s to present-day folk heroes.



From what we know, John Henry was born a slave in the 1840s or 1850s in North Carolina or Virginia. He grew to stand 6 feet tall, 200 pounds - a giant in that day. He had an immense appetite, and an even greater capacity for work. He carried a beautiful baritone voice, and was a favorite banjo player to all who knew him.



One among a legion of blacks just freed from the war, John Henry went to work rebuilding the Southern states whose territory had been ravaged by the Civil War. The period became known as the Reconstruction, a reunion of the nation under one government after the Confederacy lost the war. The war conferred equal civil and political rights on blacks, sending thousands upon thousands of men into the workforce, mostly in deplorable conditions and for poor wages.



As far as anyone can determine, John Henry was hired as a steel-driver for the C&O Railroad, a wealthy company that was extending its line from the Chesapeake Bay to the Ohio Valley. Steel drivers, also known as a hammer man, would spend their workdays driving holes into rock by hitting thick steel drills or spikes. The hammer man always had a partner, known as a shaker or turner, who would crouch close to the hole and rotate the drill after each blow.



The C&O's new line was moving along quickly, until Big Bend Mountain emerged to block its path. The mile-and-a-quarter-thick mountain was too vast to build around. So the men were told they had drive their drills through it, through its belly.



It took 1,000 men three years to finish. The work was treacherous. Visibility was negligible and the air inside the developing tunnel was thick with noxious black smoke and dust. Hundreds of men would lose their lives to Big Bend before it was over, their bodies piled into makeshift, sandy graves just steps outside the mountain. John Henry was one of them. As the story goes, John Henry was the strongest, fastest, most powerful man working on the rails. He used a 14-pound hammer to drill, some historians believe, 10 to 20 feet in a 12-hour day - the best of any man on the rails.



One day, a salesman came to camp, boasting that his steam-powered machine could outdrill any man. A race was set: man against machine. John Henry won, the legend says, driving 14 feet to the drill's nine. He died shortly after, some say from exhaustion, some say from a stroke.

So why would one man - one among a hundred years of other men and other stories - emerge as such a central figure in folklore and song? For this, we can only speculate.



Like Paul Bunyan, John Henry's life was about power - the individual, raw strength that no system could take from a man - and about weakness - the societal position in which he was thrust. To the thousands of railroad hands, he was an inspiration and an example, a man just like they who worked in a deplorable, unforgiving atmosphere but managed to make his mark.

But the song also reflects many faces, many lives. Some consider it a protest anthem, an attempt by the laborers to denounce - without facing punishment or dismissal by their superiors - the wretched conditions under which John Henry worked.



This old hammer killed John Henry

But it won't kill me, it won't kill me.



Another refrain perhaps allowed the men to imagine they could walk away from the tunnel. And of course they could have. The whites driving them were not their owners. But still, for many blacks, the railroad was an extension of the plantation. Whites were barking the orders; an army of blacks was doing the work. And, for the most part, they had no other option.

Take this hammer, and carry it to the captain,

Tell him I'm gone, tell him I'm gone.

Whatever John Henry meant or has come to mean, his legend has persevered. Perhaps that's because it reminds us of a time in history - the war and Reconstruction - that we know we ought not to forget. Or, perhaps it's that John Henry represents to us a man who stayed true, despite living in a time and place where, just like in Big Bend, the roads were blocked and the choices, limited.



In other words, like all good heroes, his story still applies.

Black Wall Street; Tulsa's Successful History

Greenwood is a neighborhood in Tulsa, Oklahoma. As one of the most successful and wealthiest African American communities in the United States during the early 20th Century, it was popularly known as America's "Black Wall Street" until the Tulsa Race Riot of 1921. The riot was one of the most devastating race riots in history and it destroyed the once thriving Greenwood community. Greenwood is still being rebuilt today because of the destruction over 80 years ago.

The Roots

Many African Americans moved to Oklahoma in the years before and after 1907, which is the year when Oklahoma became a state. Oklahoma represented change and provided a chance for African Americans to get away from slavery and the harsh racism of their previous homes. Most of them traveled from the states in the south where racism was very prevalent, and Oklahoma offered hope and provided all people with a chance to start over. They traveled to Oklahoma by wagons, horses, trains, and even on foot.

Many of the African Americans who traveled to Oklahoma had ancestors who could be traced back to Oklahoma. A lot of the settlers were relatives of African American slaves who traveled on foot with the Five Civilized Tribes along the Trail of Tears. Others were the descendants of runaway slaves who had fled to Indian Territory (present day Oklahoma) in an effort to escape lives of oppression.

When Tulsa became a booming and rather well noted town in the United States, the residents and government attempted to leave out important aspects of the city. Many people considered Tulsa to be two separate cities rather than one city of united communities. The white residents of Tulsa referred to the area north of the Frisco railroad tracks as “Little Africa” and other derogatory names. They were threatened by the success of the African American community and worried that the community might continue to grow. This community later acquired the name Greenwood and in 1921 it was home to about 10,000 African American men, women, and children.

Greenwood was centered on a street known as Greenwood Avenue. This street was important because it ran north for over a mile from the Frisco Railroad yards, and it was one of the few streets that did not cross through both black and white neighborhoods. The citizens of Greenwood took pride in this fact because it was something they had all to themselves and did not have to share with the white community of Tulsa. Greenwood Avenue was home to the African American commercial district with many red brick buildings. These buildings belonged to African Americans and they were thriving businesses, including grocery stores, clothing stores, barber shops, and much more. Greenwood was one of the most affluent communities and became known as “Black Wall Street.”


During the oil boom of the 1910s, the area of northeast Oklahoma around Tulsa flourished—including the Greenwood neighborhood, which came to be known as "the Negro Wall Street" (now commonly referred to as "the Black Wall Street") The area was home to several prominent black businessmen, many of them multimillionaires. Greenwood boasted a variety of thriving businesses that were very successful up until the Tulsa Race Riot. Not only did African Americans want to contribute to the success of their own shops, but also the racial segregation laws prevented them from shopping anywhere else other than Greenwood.

The buildings on Greenwood Avenue housed the offices of almost all of Tulsa’s black lawyers, realtors, doctors, and other professionals. In Tulsa at the time of the riot, there were fifteen well-known African American physicians, one of whom was considered the “most able Negro surgeon in America” by one of the Mayo brothers. Greenwood published two newspapers, the Tulsa Star and the Oklahoma Sun, which covered not only Tulsa, but also state and national news and elections.

Greenwood housed more churches than all of Tulsa’s white community and Greenwood was a very religiously active community. At the time of the riot there were more than a dozen African American churches and many Christian youth organizations and religious societies.

In northeastern Oklahoma, as elsewhere in America, the prosperity of minorities emerged amidst racial and political tension. The Ku Klux Klan made its first major appearance in Oklahoma shortly before the worst race riot in history. It is estimated that there were about 3,200 members of the Klan in Tulsa in 1921.

One of the nation's worst acts of racial violence—the Tulsa Race Riot—occurred there on June 1, 1921, when 35 square blocks of homes and businesses were torched by mobs of angry whites.

The riot began because of an alleged assault of a white woman, Sarah Page, by an African American man, Dick Rowland. This incident produced even more hatred between the whites and the blacks even though there was no proof of the assault. The case was simply a white woman’s word against a black man’s word. The Tulsa Tribune got word of the incident and published the story in the paper on May 31, 1921. Shortly after the newspaper article surfaced, there was news that a white lynch mob was going to take matters into its own hands and kill Dick Rowland.

African American men began to arm themselves and join forces in order to protect Dick Rowland; however, this action prompted white men to arm themselves and confront the group of African American men. There was an argument in which a white man tried to take a gun from a black man, and the gun fired a bullet up into the sky. This incident promoted many others to fire their guns, and the violence erupted on the evening of May 31, 1921. Whites flooded into the Greenwood district and destroyed the businesses and homes of African American residents. No one was exempt to the violence of the white mobs; men, women, and even children were killed by the mobs.

Troops were deployed on the afternoon of June 1st, but by that time there was not much left of the once thriving Greenwood district. Over 600 successful businesses were lost. Among these were 21 churches, 21 restaurants, 30 grocery stores and two movie theaters, plus a hospital, a bank, a post office, libraries, schools, law offices, a half-dozen private airplanes and even a bus system. Property damage totaled $1.5 million (1921). Although the official death toll claimed that 26 blacks and 13 whites died during the fighting, most estimates are considerably higher. At the time of the riot, the American Red Cross listed 8,624 persons in need of assistance, in excess of 1,000 homes and businesses destroyed, and the delivery of several stillborn infants.


After the riot had ended the Tulsa Tribune published another controversial article, which discussed not allowing the Greenwood district to be rebuilt. It brutally spoke about the once thriving African American community and the article made it clear that the city of Tulsa did not want to recreate the prosperity that Greenwood once possessed. But the citizens of Greenwood refused to allow a newspaper article to prevent them from rebuilding their lives. It was not an easy effort to rebuild the community out of the ashes but the residents of Greenwood were not going to allow anyone to kick them while they were down, and instead they chose to stand up among the wreckage and restore their homes and businesses. The strong religious faith of the African Americans provided support for each person and allowed them to join together in the faith that they could get their lives back.

The community mobilized its resources and rebuilt the Greenwood area within five years of the Tulsa Race Riot and the neighborhood was a hotbed of jazz and blues in the 1920s.[8] However, the neighborhood fell prey to an economic and population drain in the 1960s, and much of the area was leveled during urban renewal in the early 1970s to make way for a highway loop around the downtown district. Several blocks of the old neighborhood around the intersection of Greenwood Ave. and Archer St. were saved from demolition and have been restored, forming part of the Greenwood Historical District.
Improvements

Revitalization and preservation efforts in the 1990s and 2000s resulted in tourism initiatives and memorials. Hope Franklin Greenwood Reconciliation Park and the Greenwood Cultural Center honor the Tulsa Race Riot, although the Greenwood Chamber of Commerce plans a larger museum to be built with involvement from the national parks service.

In 2008, Tulsa announced that it sought to move the city's minor league baseball team, the Tulsa Drillers, to a new stadium to be constructed in the Greenwood District. The proposed development includes a hotel, baseball stadium, and an expanded mixed-use district. Along with the new stadium, there will be extra development for the city blocks that surround the stadium. This project will bring Greenwood Historical District out front and center and attract not only tourists but also Tulsa residents to North Tulsa.
Greenwood Cultural Center

The Greenwood Cultural Center dedicated on October 22, 1995 was created as a tribute to Greenwood’s history and as a symbol of hope for the community’s future. The center has a museum, an African American art gallery, a large banquet hall, and also the Oklahoma Jazz Hall of Fame. The total cost of the center was almost $3 million.The cultural center is a very important part of the reconstruction and unity of the Greenwood Historical District.

The Greenwood Cultural Center sponsors and promotes education and cultural events preserving African American heritage. It also provides positive images of North Tulsa to the community attracting a wide variety of visitors not only to the center itself but also to the city of Tulsa as a whole.

The story of the establishment, destruction, resurrection and final decline of America's most prosperous Black communities. Taken from the documentary "Going Back to T Town"