The Utopia is Now

A moment

Nature Doors

Wind Utopia-Fall 2015

Overview: The history of Slaves

A tool to explorer question of Morality, Ethics, and his objectify, as to look into his development, not only affected—slaves is personal, not only because his economics, but they live with the masters, but also the development of the Universities especially in US is intertwine.

The definitions of Slave in Antiquity were originated from war prisoners and debt. In Herodotus in the Histories (Book VI, Book VII), Themistocles persuaded the Athenians to devote the anticipated revenue derived from a major silver vein strike in the mines of Laurion (50 Silver Talent) circa 483 BC to expanding the Athenian fleet to 200 triremes (the Greek float consisted of 378 Ships in the battle of Salamis). The mine was exploited using slaves (even today inside the mine walls, Athens left testament what though of slaves, calling dogs and Animals). The origins in antiquity of the slaves were war prisoners and their own citizens because economic debt or criminal ended as slaves.

The five book of Moses take on slave: A hebrew can be slave by court order, what they consider criminal behavior (Ex. 22:2), voluntary bondage (Ex. 21:2–6), creditors bondage (Lev. 25:39; Prov. 22:7; II Kings 4:1; Isa. 50:1; Amos 2:6, 8:6; Neh. 5:5), prisoners of wars (Numb 31:26–27 and Deuter 20:10–11), Female (fathers could sold the daughters, but with understanding will lead to marriages--Ex. 21:7; Ex. 21:7–11) and children (Ex. 23:12; Gen. 17:12, 13; Lev. 22:11).

The Torah described termination of the bondage allots also to do with master wiliness, but behavior was expected:

Hebrew slaves serve six years only and must be freed in the seventh (Ex. 21:2; Deut. 15:12), if a Hebrew slave has been sold to an alien, he must be redeemed at once; he then enters into the redeemer's service, which terminates with the jubilee year (Lev. 25:47–54). If the slave refuses to go free and wishes to stay on in his master's service, then the master pierces his ear with an awl and in this way the slave is bonded to him forever (Ex. 21:5–6; Deut. 15:16–17).

Alien slaves serve in perpetuity (Lev. 25:46) and the same rule would appear to apply to prisoners of war. Debtors he must be freed on the first ensuing jubilee year (Lev. 25:40). The same is true of a pauper. In that year he regains his lands and holdings (Lev. 25:10, 13). Female slaves sold into bondage by their fathers go free if their master's sons deny them their matrimonial rights (Ex. 21:11). Slaves must be released for grievous bodily injury caused to them (Ex. 21:26–27). The status is described: Slaves are members of the master's household, and as such enjoy the benefit and are liable to the duty of keeping the Sabbath (Ex. 20:10, 23:12; Deut. 5:14–15) and holidays (Deut. 16:11–14, 12:18). They must be circumcised (Gen. 17:12–13); partake of Passover sacrifices when circumcised (Ex. 12:44), as distinguished from resident hirelings (Ex. 12:45); and may inherit the master's estate where there is no direct issue (Gen. 15:3) or perhaps even where there is (Prov. 17:2). Although slaves are the master's property (Lev. 22:11,), they may acquire and hold property of their own; a slave who prospers, i.e., can afford it, may redeem himself (Lev. 25:29; instances of property held by slaves are to be found in II Sam. 9:10; 16:4; 19:18, 30; cf. I Sam. 9:8). The killing of a slave is punishable in the same way as that of any freeman, even if the act is committed by the master (Ex. 21:20).

In the case of a pauper who sells himself into slavery or a man who is redeemed from bondage to a stranger, no distinction may be made between a slave and a hired laborer (Lev. 25:40, 53). A master may not rule ruthlessly over these slaves (Lev. 25:43, 46, 53) nor ill-treat them (Deut. 23:17);

A master may chastise his slave to a reasonable extent (Ecclus. 33:26) but not wound him (Ex. 21:26–27). The workload of a slave should never exceed his physical strength (Ecclus. 33:28–29). A fugitive slave must not be turned over to his master but given refuge (Deut. 23:16). There was no similar rule prevailing in neighboring countries (cf. I Kings 2:39–40). The abduction of a person for sale into bondage is a capital offense (Ex. 21:16; Deut. 24:7). In general, thou shalt remember that thou was to bondman in the land of Egypt (Deut. 15:15), and that you are now the slaves of God Who redeemed you from Egypt (Lev. 25:55).

In the Talmud:

The term eved Ivri (Hebrew Slave) is reserved for, and identified with, a thief unable to make restitution who is sold for his theft or a pauper who sold himself into bondage (Kid. 14b; Yad, Avadim 1:1). This implies that a Hebrew slave may not be resold. The earlier Mishnah provides that a Hebrew slave may be acquired by the payment of money or the delivery of a deed of sale (Kid. 1:2). Many provisions applying to slaves in general do not apply to female slaves. Thus, a woman may not sell herself into slavery (Mekh. Nezikin 3; Yad, Avadim 1:2), nor is a woman thief sold into slavery, even though she cannot make restitution (Sot. 3:8; Yad, Genevah 3:12). Contrary to an express scriptural provision (Deut. 15:17), a female slave's ear may not be pierced (Sif. Deut. 122; Kid. 17b; Yad, Avadim 3:13). The female Hebrew slave can only be a minor below the age of 12 years whom her father (not her mother: Sot. 3:8; Sot. 23b) has sold into bondage (Ex. 21:7; Ket. 3:8; Yad, Avadim 4:1); he may do so only when he has no other means of subsistence left (Tosef. Ar. 5:7; Mekh. Sb-Y 21:7; Yad, Avadim 4:2) and must redeem her as soon as he has the means (Kid. 18a; Yad, loc. cit.). The non-Hebrew slave relationship has consequences eventually with Christianity

Non-Hebrew slaves (eved Kena'ani) may be acquired by the payment of money, the delivery of a deed of sale, or three years' undisturbed possession (Kid. 1:3; BB 3:1) – to which were later added barter or exchange, and the physical taking into possession (Kid. 22b; Yad, Avadim 5:1; Sh. Ar., YD 267:25).

For non-Hebrew the bondage is terminated in various fashions. Release may be by payment of money, the price demanded by the master being paid to him by a third party, either directly or through the slave (Kid. 1:3; Yad, Avadim 5:2). A deed of release may be delivered by the master (Kid. 1:3; Yad, Avadim 5:3). A verbal release, or a promise of release, is not sufficient in itself, but the court may enforce it by compelling the master to deliver a deed (Sh. Ar., YD 267:73–74). The slave is freed if the master causes him grievous bodily injury: the two biblical instances of gouging out the eye and knocking out the tooth are multiplied, and a long list of eligible injuries has been laid down (Kid. 24b–25a; Yad, Avadim 5:4–14; Sh. Ar., YD 267:27–39). While the list in the codes was intended to be exhaustive, the better rule seems to be that all injuries leaving any permanent disfigurement are included (Kid. 24a). The rule is confined to non-Hebrew slaves only (Mekh. Nezikin 9); injuries inflicted on Hebrew slaves, male or female, are dealt with as injuries to freemen (BK 8:3; Yad, Ḥovel 4:13 and Avadim 4:6). A slave may also be released if his master bequeaths him all his property (Pe'ah 3:8; Git. 8b–9a; Yad, Avadim 7:9; YD 267:57). By marriage to a free-woman, or by his de facto recognition, in the presence of his master, as a free Jew (e.g., using phylacteries and reading the Torah in public; (Git. 39b–40a; Yad, Avadim 8:17; YD 267:70) a slave obtained his freedom. Marriage to the master's daughter seems to have been a not infrequent means to emancipation (Pes. 113a).

The Talmud (Kid. 15a) states that this merely gives the master the right to give the slave a bondwoman in order to beget children. There is some early authority to the effect that a slave has no right to maintenance which can be enforced in law, notwithstanding his obligation to work (Git. 1:6; Git. 12a).

 Maimonides: It is permissible to work the slave hard; but while this is the law, the ways of ethics and prudence are that the master should be just and merciful, not make the yoke too heavy on his slave, and not press him too hard; and that he should give him of all food and drink. And thus the early sages used to do – they gave their slaves of everything they ate and drank themselves, and had food served to their slaves even before partaking of it themselves. 

Slaves may not be maltreated or offended – the law destined them for service, not for humiliation. Do not shout at them or be angry with them, but hear them out, as it is written (Job 31:13–14): If I did despise the cause of my man-servant or maid-servant when they contended with me, what then shall I do when God rise up? and when He remembered what shall I answer? (Yad, Avadim 9:8; and cf. YD 267:17).

In another context, Maimonides says of the laws relating to slavery that they are all: mercy, compassion, and forbearance; You are in duty bound to see that your slave makes progress; you must benefit him and must not hurt him with words. He ought to rise and advance with you, be with you in the place you chose for yourself, and when fortune is good to you, do not grudge him his portion (Guide 3:39).

The non-Hebrew Slave when acquired his freedom consider is Hebrew, here the roots of the religious conflict between Christianity and Judaism.  Jews who work the land could not compete with a society, where labour was free, marginalizing the Jews to commerce and cities.

Rome economy was based on slaves, St Paul favor the slave owners Ephesians 6:5-9; Colossians 4:1; 1; Timothy 6:1-3.

The first Council of Nicaea 325 set the base of the relationship between Judaism and Christianity (set Christian Anti-Semitism and delegitimize the Jews), the two rules: Christians not need to be circumcises and Jews were not allot to own slaves, because if the slave was Christian will be converted to Judaism (Eusebius Pamphilius: Church History, Life of Constantine, Oration in Praise of Constantine).

On the other hand Islam and Slave Only children of slaves or non-Muslim prisoners of war could become slaves, never a freeborn Muslim (Du Pasquier, Roger, Unveiling Islam, p.67). Slaves were widely employed in irrigation, mining, pastoralism, and the army (Efrain Karsh:  Islamic Imperialism; Andrew Wheatcroft: Infidels: A History of the conflict Between Christendom and Islam). Some rulers even relied on military and administrative slaves to such a degree that they seized power. In some cases, the treatment of slaves was so harsh that it led to uprisings, such as the Zanj Rebellion (Clarence-Smith (2006), pp.2-5), as the vast majority of labor in the medieval Islamic world consisted of free, paid labor (William D. Phillips (1985). Slavery from Roman times to the early transatlantic trade).

For a variety of reasons, internal growth of the slave population was not enough to fulfill the demand in Muslim society. This resulted in massive importation, which involved enormous suffering and loss of life from the capture and transportation of slaves from non-Muslim lands (Lewis 1990, page 10). In theory, slavery in Islamic law does not have a racial or color component, although this has not always been the case in practice (Bernard Lewis: Race and Color in Islam, Harper and Row, 1970, PP: 38).

Slaves are mentioned in at least twenty-nine verses of the Qur'an, most of these are Medinan and refer to the legal status of slaves. The legal material on slavery in the Qur'an is largely restricted to manumission and sexual relations (Encyclopedia of the Qur'an: Slaves and Slavery).

While the Portuguese, Spaniards import closed to 13 Million slaves and where for British colony only (US) was only 500,000 (Henry Louis Gates Jr: Black in Latin America), but the innovation of the British system was used of Color as a legal instrument to create the perpetuated (Hugh Thomas: The slave Trade, 1997); Charles Johnson and Patricia Smith: Africans in America: America Journey through Slavery (In 1656 Virginia, Elizabeth Key Grinstead, a mixed-race woman, successfully gained her freedom and that of her son by making her case as the daughter of the free Englishman Thomas Key. She was also a baptized Christian. Her attorney was an English subject, which may have helped her case. (He was also the father of her mixed-race son, and the couple married after Key was freed). Shortly after the Elizabeth Key trial and similar challenges, in 1662 the royal colony of Virginia approved a law adopting the principle of partus sequitur ventrum (called partus, for short), stating that any children of an enslaved mother would take her status and be considered born into slavery, regardless if the father were a freeborn Englishman or Christian (Taunya Lovell Banks: Dangerous Woman: Elizabeth Key's Freedom Suit – Subjecthood and Racialized Identity in Seventeenth Century Colonial Virginia, Digital Commons Law, University of Maryland Law School).

Lincoln emancipation proclamation of 1863 had to do to brake the south economic system, where in the north even when slaves where own, the land was small holders, where in the south the work of Tabaco, and cotton required intense manual work, because the spirit of the law was no there, segregation took place.

The story of the University in the west, while from the 6 century education was accomplish in cathedral and monastic schools, the association of groups and guilds created association, what we call universities (there is also Universities model after the Islamic Madrasas in Islamic Spain and Emirate of Sicily (Alatas, S. F., 2006: From Jami`ah to University: Multiculturalism and Christian–Muslim Dialogue Current Sociology 54 (1): 112–132), in the end University when to educate the nobility and the merchant elite.

While in British colonies education had another purpose, was to civilize the first nations (brain washed) to the white civilization, but because is so in grade in US, slaves from donations was used economic foundation of the institutions (Craig Steven Wilder Ebony & Ivy (2013)).

Hitler World not far away

theguardian.com/world/2015/sep/16/hitlers-world-may-not-be-so-far-away

Hitler World

nybooks.com/articles/archives/2015/sep/24/hitlers-world

Shadows

Summer Reflections

Reflections-Summer-2015

The Negation of Individual Identity by the left

Marx on the Jewish question written in 1842 and published in 1843, criticizes his fellow Hegelian, Bauer, who propose if only the Jewish will leave their Jewish Conscience they could achieve political parity, Marx respond, the Religion was more than the state, he give example in US, which there is not an official religion, like Prussia, still more religious (which still truth today).  

For Bauer has stated that the renouncing of religion would be especially difficult for Jews, because Judaism consider by him as a primitive stage in the development of Christianity., Marx argues that the Jewish religion does not need to be attached to the significance it has in Bauer's analysis, because it is only a spiritual reflection of Jewish economic life.

For Marx defined the Jewish Question as pre-capitalism, Marx stereotype of the Jew as a financially apt huckster and posits a special connection between Judaism as a religion and the economy of contemporary bourgeois society. Thus, the Jewish religion does not need to disappear in society, as Bauer argues, because it is actually a natural part of it. Marx figuratively equated practical Judaism with huckstering and money, Marx concludes, that the Christians have become Jews; and, ultimately, it is mankind that needs to emancipate itself from practical Judaism, is not doubt about Marx Antisemitism (this tradiont is carry in all the Socialist, labour and communist party in Europe), but profound intellectual schisms, will reappear later on between Post-Modernism specially Derrida and Marxist, New Left and neo-Marxism.

But as political project in the left took root with Lenin (While Bakunin openly was Antisemitism, his Antisemitism was lashing against Marx machinations of the Expulsion of the Libertarian Left from the first international), while the left way of though as Lenin dealing with the Jewish Question, from the outset of Lenin's activities, the Jewish *Bund, whose representatives took part in Russian Social Democratic congresses, was a factor to be dealt with in his tactics as head of the Bolshevik faction, as the Bund increasingly threw its weight to the Mensheviks and sometimes swung the balance against Lenin.

Lenin attacked with vigour than others, the anti-Jewish policy of the Czarist regime. On his initiative the Bolshevist faction in the 4th state Duma (1912–1917) proposed a law to annul all restrictive measures against Jews, including education, state service, the Pale of Settlement in part, and others.

Lenin viewed the assimilation of the Jews and their complete disappearance into the surrounding culture and society as an inevitable and even desirable result of human advancement. He believed that Jewish separateness, even in the modern and secularist image of the Bund and Socialist Zionism, was a remnant of the precapitalist era and had begun to disappear quickly in Western capitalist countries such as Germany, France, and England.

Lenin viewed the separate cultural and social existence of the Jews of Russia as a corollary of the anti-Jewish discrimination and persecution and as a symptom of the backwardness of Russia, in which medieval divisions had not yet crumbled. He therefore denounced not only all manifestations of antisemitism, but also all forms of Jewish nationalism and separatism as reactionary phenomena that deflect the Jewish workers away from revolutionary solidarity with their non-Jewish comrades and from the struggle for the future revolution to overthrow all class barriers and finally solve the Jewish problem.

Lenin expounded his views on the Jewish question and on the national question in general in: The Position of the Bund in the Party (1903: Collected Works, (19614), 92–103), Theses on the National Question (1913; ibid., 19 (19634), 243–51), Cultural-National Autonomy (1913; ibid., 503–7), Critical Remarks on the National Question (1913; ibid., 20 (19644), 17–51). During the Civil War he refused to confiscate the Gorkis' pamphlet: On the Jews, despite warnings that it would become an anti-Bolshevist tool in the hands of the counterrevolutionaries.

After the Revolution, when Lenin took power in Russia (end of 1917), he endorsed the establishment of special departments for Jewish affairs in both the ruling Communist Party (the Yevsektsiya) and the Commissariat of Nationalities, headed by Joseph Stalin.

Lenin or Stalin at first did not object to the recognition of Yiddish as the national language of the Jews, since the masses of Jews – especially in the former Pale of Settlement – were a large ethnic bloc, with its own culture and language that should be addressed through means – especially linguistic – understood by it.

Together with his acquiescence in the de facto recognition of a Jewish nationality in Soviet Russia, Lenin campaigned vigorously, both orally and in writing, against antisemitism and incitement to pogroms by the anti-Soviet right-wing forces (the White Army, the Ukrainian nationalists, peasant anarchists, etc.) and initiated, soon after the Revolution, the decree outlawing pogroms and their instigators (July 1918).

Thus not only did Lenin abide by one of his ideological principles, he also faced and fought the most demagogic challenge of the counterrevolutionary forces that rose agains this regime

Lenin took note of the higher percent of Jews in the revolutionary movement than their proportion in the population, and he initiated the promotion of Jews to higher positions in the State and party apparatus.

Lenin did not oppose the persecution of Zionists and suppression of the Hebrew language and the Jewish religion by the Soviet authorities, although in his time many arrested Zionists and rabbis were eventually allowed to leave Russia and go to Palestine. The assassination attempt on behalf of the Social Revolutionaries (1918), carried out against him by a Jewish woman, Fanya Kaplan, did not change his approach to the Jews at all.

Lenin attempted to oppose the Russian great power chauvinism of the Soviet regime, which intervened, to the excessive cruelty in the lives of other nationalities in the country (such as the Georgians) and thus violated his principles on the national question.

In the 1930, in Nazi Germany as described by John Weiss in Ideology of Death: Why the Holocaust Happened in Germany and Richard J. Evans   the Third Reich in Power, where, the National Socialism view of communism as their twins, where for the communist their adoration of party discipline, and for National Socialist discipline base on race, for the communist class, but for both, for the National Socialist, the only race and ethnic group was Germany, and for the communist the utopia a new technocratic class defined by the elite, the communist legitimize as only the righteous of working class, only their suffering was  righteous.

After, the failure of the communist utopia in the Soviet Union and Russia was reduce itself to a Kleptocracy society, with an economy based on a single commodity oil, or China, where communist party transform itself to state capitalism, while, the criticism of inequality of the capitalist society is valid, but their analysis were wrong and the solution failed, the only, story line left was to attack individualism especially since their ideals was based on a collectivism, and a homogenous society, this utopia, the individual does not exist, there is not room for outsider, as Marx, Lenin of Hitler defined the Jewish outsiders.

The hate of  the Authoritarian left (today are Socialist Democrats in Europe, the Left Parties ) toward the Jews or individual—took a new life in 1990s against postmodernism, while Derrida in 1963, in the miracle year wrote 3 books, which become base of postmodernism especially, the concept of Deconstruction and Difference. In of Grammatology, describing in the text mention Rabbi Elizer (the son of Simon ben Jochai- Rabbi Elizer a mystic in his own right), where Jewish though of the interpretation of the law as multi-layer of interpretations—the left consider as relativism, where Marxist theory based on absolute certainty, while Marxist though created a rhetoric defined itself is a science, where, their assumptions or predictions are not less pseudo-science, not only economics of Marxism, but as also Economics, but justify their policies as a science, what at best can be consider liberal arts.

Derrida deal with identity issues, while early year was not known, but in his essay about Tallit (Jewish Prayer shawl) and in 2000, a book dealing the fact he never carry a circumcision for his son, this individual issue for the left consider as relativism. The left base on social cohesion where the individual stop to exist, for them any individual cannot coexist, nationalism is acceptable because is about a cohesion.

    

Zen OverView

Other Futures

OXI crises is not about Europe

The Greek Population was right to reject such draconian rules, not since Hoover, impose Lazy fare economics before, the word depression of the 1930´s with political consequence, the rise racist Germany through fascism, while is not unique, the ground was prepared in desire of imperial Germany, colony Namibia as industrial genocide carry by Kaiser against Herero a population 80,000 before the policy reduce to 15,000, and the use of concentration camps 17,000 only 7,000 survive. The Ethno racist police instituted in Rwanda between Hutu and Tutsi instate by Imperial Germany, had consequence in genocidal massacres 1994, as mention by Evans, 2015, The third Reich in History And Memory in the section Blueprint for Genocide p 6-15. While, it’s not surprise, since historically the used genocide from Europe specially—German speaking region the Genocide massacre of the Jewish communities in the Rhine during the first crusade and the rational of the genocide, and some ways the un written policy Christianity and Islam and based  for Antisemitism which is deligitimization of the Jews, due to the fact, monotheism claim have direct line to God, while the Koran have 33 versus of Genocide of the Jews and internal contradiction of the People of the book applied to Christian and Jews, where Islam have issues of power, where people of  the Book (Christian and Jews), need to submitted to a political Islam, and the one who codified the Medieval reason  for the Jewish Genocide was Luther in his 150 Pages On the Jews  and Their Lies.

But, the economic aspect of the no vote, Milton Friedman enforce a mythology if the Markers where free to flow the depression will be end soon, Friedman first chance was with Chile, and the retirement funds—but, with market fluctuation, when democracy return the Government give option to the retires to return to Government control account 80% return Government control programs due to losses of the Market Crash in the 1980´s—needs to point a reason with 2008 Meltdown feast of markets-bank deregulation which began during Clinton administration, but become to another level, where the fire wall Glass Steagall act of 1932 under Frankly Delano Roosevelt, a provision separated the commercial bank and investment, to stop the banks for gambling with the account holder monies, and Democrat congress do not let Bush administration to privatise the social security, they when to the pot of gold the public house—the banks investments first did not when immediately to the poor, but to the middle class, who the sold the idea their houses as private banks, which the price will rise and the borrow against this increase future sell, when the run out of house holders who took the bite, the pray on the poor who rented, they sold the  idea they could own a house, based on mythology of the America dream any one can accumulated wealth.

While, this crashes is unique to free market Capitalism in the case of China one party state, which encourage and give cheap rates to borrow money to invest in Market, and 2015 with the market collapse or case of Russia, which their economy base on Hydrocarbons, now with slowdown in some cases a crash of the economy, besides of Russian delusion of Russification of East Europe, they are in crises.

In the Middle East the solution is political Islam base on Neo-Islam, where, half pollution (women) or the minorities (Christians or Kurds, Yasin) are subjugated or Genocide. Begs the questions of what is the  Europe crises—the crises is about Solidarity or the rules, as we understand the rules base on certain principles send Germany trough a self-destruction, the same crises applied to political Islam, whether is theocratic state Iran, Saudi of ISES.