In which I display my stunning ignorance

[kate_nepveu]

Not once but twice!

These are serious questions, by the way—they might offend people but I'm not trying to make fun, I really am that ignorant and I really would like to know.

What was different about European colonialism?

It seems to me that European colonialism gets talked about in a different, more negative way than the various Empires that came and went in Europe, the Near East, and North Africa (Roman, Byzantine, Abbasid, etc.). First, is it the general consensus that European colonialism was either worse or bad in a different way, and second, how? Was it the method, or the timing, or something else?

How, according to Christian theology, does Jesus's death save humanity?

Okay, as I understand it, Christian theology states that Jesus was both fully human and fully divine as one part of the Trinity, one of the three beings/instances/presences that make up God. (Well, those parts of it that believe in the Trinity.) His death saved humanity.

I think the easiest way to get at my question is by contrast.

When I think of other instances where a single death saves a large group, I come up with two categories, which are basically drawn from fantasy novels. First, the death provides the, hmm, the necessary means for something to happen: life-force or energy to power a spell, a door for the gods to enter into the material world, a messenger to tell the gods that their help is really truly needed, something like that. Second, the death is part of a bargain: for that price (to demonstrate resolve or need, perhaps), the gods agree to intervene.

When it comes to Christianity, the first category doesn't seem to fit at all. Instead, the little bit of doctrine I'm familiar with seems to incline somewhat toward the second—but I can't follow the logic of such an argument. That is, Jesus is part of God, and why would you bargain with yourself or pay yourself a price? (Possibly this is another way of asking whether Jesus, as part of the Trinity, had free will.)

Is this related to the way original sin is transmitted (which I don't know either)? Or is this something not actually explained in doctrine, that needs to be taken on faith?

(I'm most interested in actual doctrinal answers to this question, but personal opinions are welcome too.)

(I am, by the way, thinking of making this my default icon for the next four to six weeks. And how are you?)

Comments

[papersky.livejournal.com]

You do in China, and I think in Japan too. And we don't know what the Incas thought about it.

Having said that, if you're talking just about Europe you're absolutely right, it's the same thing that made slavery different in the modern world from the ancient world: race theory.

[kate_nepveu]

I have a lecture on the history of China that I might listen to after my theology kick ends, because I am even more ignorant than usual when it comes to that. Thanks.

[oyceter]

Yeah, I think the rhetoric of colonization is often very similar when it comes to rationalization: there's a lot of talk on how said colonization is good for those being colonized, how it is the destiny of the colonizer, and etc.

I think the just-Europe thing comes into play not because the rhetoric is substantially different from colonization in the past, but because the impact globally was much larger, since it took place across continents and with the technology to spread colonization much faster and much more widely than it could be before. China was definitely on its way to trying to colonize all of Asia (and Japan had a lovely moment in which it decided it could take over Russiaa, hee), but because of the lack of the guns, germs and steel that Jared Diamond talks about, European colonization has much wider influence.

Um, that was a really long way to say that yes, I totally agree with you, even though I am conveniently not talking about how the modern rhetoric of colonization (modern being in the past few centuries or so) differs from ancient rhetoric of the same.

[kate_nepveu]

See the next post for more on this. I believe Diamond's thesis is somewhat controversial?

[oyceter]

Diamond's thesis is controversial, yes, and I don't agree with all of it, particularly that geography determines destiny and etc. and that that's why Europe ended up with the advantages starting from around the 15th century. But I do give him props for not painting the colonized nations as passive, backwards people, as a lot of prior scholarship on colonization have done. It's a tough balance to strike -- coming up with something that doesn't take away from the agency of colonized nations and yet doesn't paint them as corrupt empires ready to fall to the enlightened ways of the West (sadly, I have read too much of the latter, even as recently as talk of the fall of the Japanese economy).

(and now running to read the next post!)

[rushthatspeaks.livejournal.com]

I did not know that. I need more Chinese history. Thank you. I keep meaning to fill in the Chinese history, but not getting to it, and then every so often I run into my own gaps.