Full transcript of “How the Persians Constructed the Jewish Identity - Prof. Jiang Xueqin”. Click a timestamp to open the video at that moment. Need another video? Use the YouTube transcript generator.
0:00 So we will look at the beginning of the Jewish people and I'm going to the argument to you that Israel and the Jewish identity are constructs of the imperial imagination. Okay. Um and this is hard to understand. So I'm going to explain it to you slowly but the idea is that because of its ge geographic location Israel has always been historically imported and as a result different empires have tried to manipulate the identity of Israel to best um uh promote their own agenda or policies. Okay. So um I know this is a hard concept to understand but but we'll we'll go for it slowly. And again, we're spending like the rest of semester on
0:46 this major thesis of ours. Okay, so now let's move on to Israel. Okay, we know we now know about the Persian Empire, how they managed their system and why they are so effective. Okay, now let's talk about Israel. So remember that we read the Bible um and the Bible um came about because David needed to justify legitimize his rule and after branches collapsed David created a Davidic kingdom um in the Levant because Egypt Anatolia Mesopania were preoccupied right but because Lavant is so important this kingdom doesn't really last that long it lasts for like 80 200 years Okay. Um after Solomon David's son dies,
1:32 Israel is divided into two parts. The northern kingdom which gets conquered by Assyria as well as Judah. Okay. Jerusalem where which tries to maintain the kingdom but doesn't last very long. After some in history um uh the Israelites are being pulled in different directions. Okay. The Anatolians, the Assyrians, the Babylonians, the Egyptians because they are strategically very important. And so what's really hard for these empires is how do we maintain control over Jerusalem, okay? And they try different techniques. They try um burning down their city centers. Okay? So the northern kingdom was destroyed. Uh you might have heard of the 10 lost tribes of Israel. Um they tried taking hostages. Okay? But because this region
2:19 is so volatile, nothing really works. And so the Jew Jerusalem, the Israelites keep on rebelling. Okay. Um, so this is king of Judah. [snorts] And what happens is for the longest time the Babylonians are trying to deal with the Israelites. Okay? So they take hostages. Okay? They take hostages like thousands of them and move them to Babylon where they become scribes, where they become farmers, where they become merchants. Okay? Um but again the region is so strategically important that Jerusalem uh the Israelites they switch loyalties all the time. Eventually the Babylonians are so pissed off that they decided to burn down their temple. Okay. And so at
3:07 this point in history then the Israelites are now gone. Okay. Does that make sense? The Israelites are gone now. Um 587 to 6. We don't know when, but Babylon's destroyed Jerusalem because they cannot they they they tried many techniques to try to control Jerusalem. They can't do it. The Israelites are too rebellious. Uh but it's too strategically important. So they destroy. So so they decide, you know what, screw this. We'll just destroy the city. Okay. So when this happens, okay, this is really important for understand. The Israelites are gone. Okay, the people are still around. The identity of the Israelites are now gone. 539 Cyrus the Great conquers Babylon.
3:54 Okay. And he says, "I want the Israelites to return to Jerusalem." It's called the Idict of Cyrus. All right? And this is celebrated in the Bible. What is controversial is why would he do such a thing? Okay? Because again, the Israelites are now gone. um the Israelites who go who went to Babylonia. They may still keep their religion a bit but they no longer have their land. They no longer they're they have changed as a people. Okay. So as an Israelite you pray in a temple but the temple is now destroyed. So now you um pray in a synagogue. Okay. So the people have changed a great deal. So the question now is why would Cas the great go to Babylon said you know what I want you Israelites to return to Jerusalem. I
4:41 want you to reconstitute the nation of Israel. Why would he do that? Okay. So, this is going to this is a going to be a debate that will never ever end. Okay. So, the Bible tells us that Cyrus the great did this because God told him to do that. Really simple. God says, "I love my people. The Israelites send them home." Okay? And Cy, yes, of course, you're the great God. I'll do so. Okay, guys. That's how it happened. Okay. All right. So, there are different explanations. Um maybe the idea is that Cyrus wants to show all the Persian Empire I'm religiously tolerant. You can practice your religion. You can set up your religion. That's what the Persian Empire is. An open, tolerant, generous empire. Okay, that's true. What's also true is that Cyrus thought
5:27 himself as a righteous and merciful king uh who wanted to be generous to everyone. Okay, so he saw the Israelites uh want home. He says, "Well, go home." Okay. Um he it's also possible that there's a faction within the Israelites who supported his Babylon takeover. Okay, I don't know if this is true. It's probably not true, but we consider that consider that as as a possibility that the Israelites in Babylon supported his takeover. And so to thank them, Cyrus said, "Fine, I'll give you back Jerusalem." Um, another possibility is that uh when Cyrus the great conquered Babylon, he discovered that you know what these Israelites are really good administrators. And this is true found history because remember the Israelites
6:12 have their Bible and the religion requires them to study the Bible. And as we discussed the Bible is one of debate, openness, asking questions. And so these are very literate intellectuals and they rise up very high in the Babylon administration. But this is true throughout history where where Jewish people will rise very high in all empires include including the Islamic empire including uh the American empire. Okay. Um I think the best reason for what happen is divide and rule. Okay. So the idea is that you need to control the Levant because Levant gives you access to Egypt which is historically the wealthiest part of
6:57 the world. Okay. ever controls Egypt controls the world. So what you do is you set up a group of people in the Levant that are only loyal to you. Okay? Does that make sense? Okay. You set up people in the Levant that only exist because you, the empire, allow them to exist. If you the empire did not support them, then the locals, the everyone in that region would would get rid of them right away. Okay? And that's why we have the Jews. So the Jews were invented by the Persians to control the Leavant. The Jews is actually a Persian term. Okay. So before the Jews were of course the Israelites. Now we have the Jews. All right. So
7:43 um this is Jerusalem. And as you can see what's really important to understand is that this is actually only a really small part of the Lat. But this part is specifically for the Jews. Um, and it's part of this Persian province called Beyond the River. Okay? And they call it the province of Yahoo. That's that's why we have the term Jews. Okay? Because they are part of the province of Yahoo. And and what's really important to understand is they're surrounded by enemies. The Samrians are Israelites who have stayed in the Lant. Okay? Do you understand? So most people around them are in fact ishraelites who uh adapted to local
8:30 circumstances and that means that they practice different religions. That also means that they married foreign women as well but they still consume consume as Israelites. Okay? Right? Does that make sense guys? [snorts] So what but what happens is that these exiles from Babylon, they come back and they say, "No, we're the true Israelites. You guys are the false Israelites. The reason why we're true is we have stayed loyal to um our religion." Okay? So what's going to happen over the next few decades is almost a civil war between Israelites who've stayed and Israelites who left but come back. All right? All right. And this is what the Persian Empire wants in
9:16 order to maintain stability in the Levant. Right? Because you have this small minority um of exiles from Avalon who've come back and they're in conflict with everyone else. All right? This is divine rule. So these are my three predictions. First of all, they're going to rebuild the temple of Solomon. Okay? They're going to build the third temple by destroying the eyes like moss. They're going to do that sooner or later. Okay? That's the first thing they're going to do. And and you can you know why? Because when we when we read the Bible, you can see how how happy they were, okay? Because they felt completed. They felt as though God is with us. God has forgiven us. God loves us. Okay? So building a third temple is crucial to the identity of Israel today.
10:04 Okay? So they're going to do this and it's going to cause a lot of problems because again the mosque is the third holiest site in the Islamic world and it's going to create a lot of conflict between Israel and the Islamic world. Okay, do they care? Not really. Okay. Number two, you can see how um when the Jews returned, they were convinced that they were forced out of Jerusalem because they offended God. Okay? So in other words, if Jews want to maintain control over Israel, they need to obey the laws of God, which means that they become a theocracy. Okay? Now, now I'm not sure if you've been to Israel. I've been to Israel. And if you go to place like Tel Aviv, it's a very open, liberal cosmopolitan forward-looking
10:52 place. Okay? I think that um Tel Aviv has um one of the world's highest concentrations of gays in the world. Okay. Guess what? That's that's gone. Okay. As Israel develops over time, it's become more and more of a theocracy where the Bible is the law. Okay. And the third thing is that we we can expect that as the past past Judeaic expands, more and more Jews will return to Israel. Look, the reality is this. If you look at the Middle East, Israel is the greatest power in the Middle East. There's no force in the Middle East that can prevent Israel from expanding and expanding including the pacts Judeica which is their ambition. Okay. So um
11:37 this is just an introduction but the thing I want you guys to remember is that first of all the Jewish identity it is uh fluid. It's flexible. It's open. It was created by empire for the purpose of maintaining empire. Okay? And we're going to see this throughout history as well. All right. So, um, is was this clear to you guys? Are there any questions about today? Okay. Yeah. So, how does the the Persian state control like Persian control of uh of Jerusalem transfer to modern day society? Like, how does it still work? because I think we're seeing like a a trend that
12:23 is Israel's going kind of more back to to like depending on the Bible and everything. So, how does it like transfer to modern day society and all the conflicts that's happening? >> Okay, so Persia wanted to divide and conquer the Lavant. Okay. They're afraid that if one if the LA becomes too stable, the vant might settle with Egypt or another power and they lose control of the Levant um which directly impacts your capacity to trade and control um the world. Okay. So the way you control the Levant is you create this entity um that has conflict with everyone else. And now what happens is that both this
13:08 entity um um Jerusalem and the its enemies rely on you Persia to manage a conflict. Okay? And this what's happening today in Israel because who's the empire? America's the empire, right? Israel has all these conflicts with nations in the Middle East, right? They have conflicts with Turkey. They have conflicts with Egypt. They have conflicts with uh the Gulf nations. They have conflicts with basically everyone. Okay. So, who does everyone require need to manage this conflict? America, right? Saudi Arabia, Israel, Turkey, Egypt, they all require the United States to come in and say, "Hey guys, let's just get along. We're just one big family." Okay? This is all
13:54 intentional in order for America to maintain dominance over the Middle East. Who's very unhappy about this? Which nation is very unhappy about this? Israel. Okay. Right. Israel is going to piss about this. So we can expect that over time what's going to happen is a major major conflict between America and Israel. There's going to be a divorce basically. And my argument to you is that um Israel will win this conflict and as a result Israel will become the dominant power in the Middle East because the Jews know their own history. The Jews read the Bible every day. They know what the Persians did. They know what the British did. They know what the Americans are doing today. They don't like they don't they don't want this. They don't they don't want to become a servant a slave
14:40 to empire. They are ser servant and slave to their god but they don't become a servant and slave to the empire. So they need to get rid of the empire and establish a sovereignty. >> Okay? And that's why there's so much conflict in the Middle East today because Israel needs to figure out how to get rid of the American Empire so that they can be independent and um fully achieve their sovereignty. Okay. Does that make sense? >> Yeah. I think one question I have is about like I think currently the Jews stop attacking Palestines. >> Okay guys, guys. Okay, this is really important. Okay, don't say the Jews. Okay, there are different groups. There's the Israelites. The Israelites
15:25 are the time of King David. They're gone. Okay, let's forget the Israelites. There are the Jews and the Jews are people who practice Judaism. Okay, then there are the Israelis. Israelis are citizens of the nation of Israel. It's the Israelis that are doing this, not the Jews. There's a difference, okay? The Jews are spread out throughout the world, okay? What we call the Jewish diaspora. And there are a lot of Jews in the world who oppose the nation of Israel because well, what nation nation is is doing they believe goes against the will of God. Okay. So, Israelis not Jews. Okay. >> Okay. So the Israelis is I think like the news just disappears about how Israelis attacks Palestine.
16:11 It's just because previously is it was like all on those host searches but recently we can just it's just just gone the newses. >> Okay. Um look the reality is that if you read the Bible it's clear what's going to happen. Uh, Israel is going to clear the West Bank and Gaza of Palestinians to re to establish their theocratic state. Okay? They can't have Palestinians and Arabs around. It has to be completely Jewish. Um, and these Palestinians can be moved elsewhere to Jordan, to Egypt. They don't really care. Okay? But but this process process will take time. Okay. Okay. All right. Any more questions guys?
