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Video Description
Homer, Professor Jiang says, was the big bang of Greek civilization — and the Iliad holds a secret most modern readers miss. The real climax of that poem is not a battle but a moment of forgiveness: an old king kneels and kisses the hand that killed his sons. Jiang reads that scene as the hardest problem in human life — how to forgive others, and how to forgive ourselves. In his telling, the ancient Greeks knew something about the human heart that we have since trained ourselves to forget.
Full Video Transcript
good morning so today we do greek civilization we are focusing on homer who wrote the iliad and
the odyssey a couple years ago i taught the great books so we read the bible uh dante
paradise lost the iliad in the odyssey and believe it or not the student’s favorite book was the
iliad and this was written maybe 3 000 years ago by this greek man living in a different time
different culture even today chinese teenagers think he’s wonderful okay so homer is i believe
the big bang of greek civilization all right so let us summarize where we are okay let’s review
where we are okay so remember that in the beginning you have this city emerge in a major
trade route and it occupies a major river and over time what happened is that as the city expands
it will create colonies along the river and this will create warfare among the city states because
they’re trying to control trade okay and this leads to what we call open cooperative competition
and as i keep on saying this is a system that will lead to tremendous innovation
okay this is what happened in china in mesopotamia and in egypt but then over time
what happened is that an empire will emerge and this will create a bureaucracy okay
the bureaucracy has three major characteristics the first is centralization and because of
centralization you now have a monopoly and so you have a decrease in competition which
means that the society is no longer innovative second is you have censorship meaning that
that people are no longer free to express what they want.
All information is centralized.
The third is writing as propaganda.
So writing is a system of control
as opposed to a system of knowledge creation or self-expression.
So these are the three characteristics of an empire.
and this is true for all empires. This is true for Mycenaean Greece. So Mycenaean Greece
is the empire that ruled the Aegean Sea during the Bronze Age. What’s interesting though is
when the Bronze Age collapsed, this system allowed for massive innovation which gave us the Greeks.
okay so let me explain why first of all you don’t have centralization but you now have something
called the polis so you basically have a return to the system of open warfare the polis means
city-state in greek and it gives us the word politics why because these polices
what war with each other always and because every citizen had to risk his life in a war
every citizen had the right to speak okay so before every decision was made all the citizens
could debate and so as a citizen you were required to speak in front of others and as a result you
even though you could be a farmer you had to educate yourself you had to gain knowledge you
You have to learn the art of speaking, what we call rhetoric.
And this allowed for massive education and innovation in Greece.
The polis, because everyone had to learn, they had to change the writing system
from one of propaganda to one of knowledge seeking.
So they changed the writing system.
So during the Mycenaean Age, the writing system is called Linear B.
And Linear B is a hard system to learn.
But that’s the point.
They want the writing system to be hard to learn
because then only the elite can learn it.
And that’s what differentiates the elite from the people, right?
But now that everyone has to learn,
you need a more efficient writing system.
And so they incorporated, they created a new system called the alphabet,
which is the same system we use today because it’s so effective, okay?
So let me explain what the alphabet is.
All right, so in the beginning, when we first start to write,
we had pictograms okay so this is the sun this is the moon okay sun and moon as you can see
these are just pictures of words okay that’s a first step but then people realize you know what
we actually don’t have to write down we actually don’t have to draw down draw out the pictures we
can just use symbols okay so now you use symbols like maybe an o and this okay this is now becomes
a sun moon and then people realize you know what there are actually a lot of words we cannot draw
out but if we make the symbol representing a sound as opposed to an idea that’d be a lot more
efficient right and so now um you can create new words this is the word now for monsoon because all
you’re doing is you’re adding two sounds together okay and this is what i call a syllabary okay so
linear b was a syllabary and um the chinese system is what i call an ideogram ideogram okay so it’s
it’s not representing sounds it’s representing ideas all right and then people realize you know
what for it to be most efficient to be most flexible to be most versatile we can just have
the symbol represent a part of a sound okay so rather than a complete sound just a part of a
sound so now this becomes m this becomes s okay and so you now get the word sum and this is where
we get alphabet from what they did was they added vowels to the system okay and this is the most
efficient writing system in the world it’s really easy to learn as you know uh from english class
as opposed to chinese which is very hard to learn okay so now you have the alphabet which increases
literacy and learning throughout the greek world for entertainment what they did was they invited
bards poets to come and give recitals to talk about the legends of the past and this gave rise
the most famous poet of that time named Homer and we will discuss Homer today okay and so in
the in a centralized system Homer could not have arisen because Homer would have would have been a
propagandist but now in this decentralized system where everyone is looking for entertainment
for knowledge Homer can arise and Homer will be the greatest poet of Greek civilization and he’s
considered to be the father of Greek civilization okay so we will discuss Homer today and Homer is
famous because he wrote two books the Iliad and the Odyssey actually he didn’t write the books he
recited the poetry and then his students wrote it down because he himself was illiterate and we also
think he was blind okay so the Iliad and the Odyssey are about the Trojan War okay so let
me explain to you what the trojan war is okay so um from last class you know that uh troy was the
center of the world it was the heart and center of global trade and that’s why pirates kept on raiding
troy okay now as you also know facts become stories and stories become exaggerated over time
and that’s what gave us the legend of the trojan war okay so let’s go over the um basic outline so
there are uh the gods up in mount olympus the king god of course is zeus and the three goddesses are
hera who is the queen god they are athena the goddess of wisdom and aphrodite who is the goddess
of love okay hera is the queen the mother athena and aphrodite are the daughter of zeus so it’s one
big family one day um they discovered a golden apple on mount olympus and the golden apple says
to the most beautiful in the world so of course all three believe it must be mine and so they
fight and they fight and they fight and zeus is going crazy because they won’t stop fighting
so zeus has an idea he will have a contest and and this contest the golden apple will be awarded
to one with three okay but now he needs to find someone stupid enough to be the judge and he finds
this person named Paris and Paris is a prince of Troy and so Paris meets the
three goddesses and of course each goddess is trying to bribe Paris so
Harris says Paris if you pick me I will give you a kingdom I will make you a
king and Paris like that’s a really attractive offer okay then Athena says
hey if you pick me I will give you all the wisdom in the world you will be the
wisest man in the world and paris like okay that sounds cool sure and then aphrodite says i’m gonna
give you the hottest girl in the world and paris is like yes that’s what i want man okay so he
marries helen um this this may sound strange to you like why would you give up power and wisdom
for you know sex and so i saw my wife about this because i i didn’t understand paris’s choice right
and she said of course you pick helen because what matters to guys is status face right you’re a king
but there are lots of other kings you have wisdom but like who knows you have wisdom right but hey
if you walk around the world with like the hottest girl in the world you feel good about yourself
okay so of course you pick helen so there you go my wife knows more than i do all right but anyway
so now this is a problem because now hera and athena are pissed off and they want revenge
in fact they’re so pissed off they decide they’re going to destroy not just paris but the entire
trojan people okay they’re going to wipe out troy from the face of the earth they want revenge
another problem is at this time helen is married to menelaus who is the king of sparta and his
brother is agamemnon who is the king of argos and spartan argos are the two most powerful places
in greece so agamemnon is the king of kings he is the king of mycenine greece and so they organized
this huge army to attack troy to retrieve helen okay um and this will go on for 10 years this
battle in troy and this will give rise to many legends that homer will use to entertain the greek
people after the fall of the mycenaean empire two of the most famous heroes of this time and there
are like hundreds okay are achilles and and odysseus odysseus is known for being the wisest
of the greeks the greatest strategist achilles is known for being the bravest warrior okay um
odysseus will come up with the idea of the trojan horse which is what ends the war because as you
know what will happen is the greeks will sneak inside a horse a wooden horse pretend that it’s
a gift to the trojans the trojans will take the horse inside the city the greeks will sneak out
out at night and kill everyone okay all right so that’s the um story of the trojan war what homer
will do is he will take this epic okay this legend and turn it into a great story he does not tell
the whole story he only tells a part of the story he tells a story of the battle between achilles
and they get mad on okay so let’s go over the plot of the iliad okay the iliad all right so
So the story begins like this, Agamemnon has arrived in Troy with his entire army.
But Troy is a walled city and these guys are pirates.
So they cannot destroy Troy.
So what they did, what they do is, well, they’re pirates, so they go and they go and raid other
islands that are allies of Troy.
And what they do is they capture Budi, which includes beautiful young girls, okay?
have these girls as sex slaves. Now the custom of war is that if the girl belongs to a powerful
family, that family can choose to ransom her back and you have to give her back, okay? Now it turns
out that Agamemnon likes his girl but she’s the daughter of a powerful priest and the priest says
give me back my girl and I’ll give you a lot of money and Agamemnon says no, I like her and I’m
lonely so screw off. So this priest gets angry and prays to Apollo and Apollo unleashes a plague
on the greeks and everyone’s dying okay and so achilles discovers what’s happened and he
confronts agamemnon in a war council and he says agamemnon you have to give the girl back or else
we’re all gonna die here and agamemnon says fine i will give her back but only in the condition that
i take your girl and of course achilles is pissed off he’s like that’s not fair and agamemnon’s like
too bad I’m king. And so Achilles says, fine, but I will never fight for you ever again. I’m going to
let the Trojans destroy you here. I’m going to, I’m going to war in the world. I’m going to sit back
and I’m going to let the Trojans destroy you. Okay. So after that meeting, Achilles goes to his
mother, who’s a goddess. Her name is Fetus and she’s a river goddess. And, and Achilles says to
Thaddeus, listen, mother, could you help me out? Could you tell Zeus to help the Trojans? The reason
why is I want the Greeks to lose so that they beg me to save them. I came to Troy to be a hero.
So let the Trojans win, and then I’ll come and save the Greeks, and I’ll be a great hero.
So that’s what Thaddeus does. And Hector, who is the prince of Troy, okay, he’s brother to Paris,
he discovers that achilles is absent from the battlefield so he leads the trojans against the
greeks and they’re destroying the greeks they’re at the point where sorry at the point where they’ve
almost reached the greek ships and they want to burn down the greek ships because if they do that
the greek cannot resupply themselves and they will all die in troy and so at this point odysseus and
the other Greeks say to Agamemnon, you know what? We need Achilles. Please, please get Achilles back
into the battlefield. And Agamemnon says, fine. Tell him this. Tell him I will give him my daughter
in marriage. I will give him all the treasure in the world if he comes and fights for us.
So Odysseus and the Greeks go to Achilles and says, please, please, please help us. And Achilles
says, nope. Why?
Because Agamemnon’s not here. Where’s Agamemnon
at, man? I don’t need his daughter. I don’t need
all this money in the world. I’m going to die
anyway in battle, so
screw off, okay? So
now Achilles
and Agamemnon are stuck because Achilles
wants Agamemnon to apologize,
but Agamemnon doesn’t want to lose face. So there’s
a real threat that the Trojans
will destroy the entire
Greek army, okay?
And they’re about to reach the ships and burn
on the ships and achilles is watching this and he’s like why aren’t the greeks coming and begging
me again okay he wants to constantly beg him so he can say no and the greeks and the greeks are
like we know that so we’re not going to come so then what happens is achilles he’s so nervous
that he sends patroclus who is his lieutenant to go talk to the greeks and said hey man what’s
going on do you need achilles help and the greeks say to him patroclus we know achilles he’s got
He has this terrible temper.
He’s not going to come save us.
But maybe you can save us, Patroclus.
And Patroclus says, yes, I can be the hero now.
So he runs back to Achilles and says, Achilles, you asshole.
We’re all going to die here.
Let me go fight.
And Achilles is like, fine, you can go fight,
but only in the condition that you just save the ship
and you do not push the Trojans back to Troy.
Okay?
That’s my glory.
Do not steal my glory.
So, of course, what Patroclus does is
he tries to win all the glory for himself he forces a duel between himself and hector and
hector kills patroclus now achilles is pissed off and achilles is like screw this i’m gonna go kill
hector okay so now agamemnon and achilles are best friends because they both want to kill hector
achilles duels hector kills him and he is now the greatest warrior in the world he’s proven himself
to be the greatest hero in the world, he saved the Greeks, he’s killed Hector, he’s avenged his
friend Patroclus. He should be the happiest man in the world, right? And this is a genius Homer.
He now falls into a deep depression. He mutilates Hector’s body. He ties Hector’s body to his chariot
and rides around the city of Troy. And all the Trojans are screaming in horror. The gods are
like this is disgusting man the greeks are like no man this is a war crime we don’t want to get
involved okay achilles is going crazy he can’t sleep he can’t eat all he can do is mutilate
hector’s body all right so now so now the gods are watching this and saying you know what um
we shouldn’t allow this because this is a war crime and hector was always a good subject
so let’s broker a peace between achilles and priam who is the father of hector okay because in this
world it’s important to bury the dead because only by burying the dead can they find eternal peace
okay so prime wants about body back so prime himself cannot sleep and both achilles and prime
agree to this deal that god sent prime into achilles tent and achilles is busy okay achilles
is distracted and prime is sitting next to him and at this point what prime can do is take a dagger
and stab achilles in the neck and avenge his son right what he does instead is he kneels down
before achilles and kisses his hand he submits himself before achilles and achilles is so
so awed by this that he recognizes that Priam is the greater hero. That Priam has more courage
than he does. And now Achilles submits to Priam and the two forgive each other and
weep together. And this is how the Iliad ends. This is a story that tells us that the real
battlefield is not out there in the shores of Troy. The real battle is inside our human heart.
Why does Achilles fall into depression? Because he himself knows he’s the one guilty for killing
a Patroclus. Maybe it was Hector who killed Patroclus, but it was Achilles who made it
possible. Why? Because number one, Achilles didn’t have to get into a super fight with
okay number two is when the greeks came came to beg achilles could have could have said yes okay
and then number three is achilles did not have to send metropolis into battle so achilles know
in his heart that he was guilty and as such he could not forgive himself and so he fell into
depression and so priam by forgiving achilles allow achilles to forgive himself okay so it’s
the problem of forgiveness. And this is the hardest problem in human society. How do you forgive those
who’ve done wrong to you? And how do you forgive yourself for doing wrong unto others? This is the
hardest problem in human society. If you can solve this problem, you can now create a great
civilization. That’s what Homer did, okay? Homer showed us that this is the greatest problem in
human heart and when we forgive each other we make the world a new we rejuvenate the world
we change the world from one of the destruction into one of vitality okay priam by sacrificing
himself by having the courage to forgive achilles change the destiny of himself and his son hector
because achilles gave hector back and told priam not only will i give your son back but i will make
sure that you have enough time to ensure a proper funeral for hector achilles himself will ensure
the greeks will not attack troy during the funeral okay and that’s the beauty and power of the iliad
it is the most shocking ending ever it’s the most beautiful the most poignant the most tragic
ending ever even today we cannot match it so the question now is how is it that
home when the greeks had such wisdom and today we don’t and the answer is their minds were different
back then than they are today okay so let me explain why okay so you know from psychology
that we have two hemispheres in the brain okay a right hemisphere and a left hemisphere
the right hemisphere is a creative emotional caring hemisphere the left is the logical analytical
utilitarian hemisphere okay so right does art maybe left does math okay we know this from
simple psychology now there’s an american psychologist psychologist named julian james
and he proposes a really interesting theory his theory is actually what’s happening is the right
right hemisphere is receiving information from the universe by braces
from the universe and the left hemisphere is interpreting this
information into reality okay all right so remember we discuss Kant what does
Immanuel Kant say Immanuel Kant says that there are two realities the
phenomena the world the things in themselves and the phenomena the things
to us okay so what happens is that our brain interacts with the Nomana and then
filters it back into the phenomena okay and it uses a filter time and space in
order to perceive things okay guys Hegel says that this Nomana is the
Geist okay the universe and as we discussed the universe are just
vibrations okay vibrations and so if you apply all this to this theory what’s
happening is our right brain is receiving these vibrations and then our
left brain is just is just transforming these vibrations into everyday reality
okay the question then is how do we interpret these vibrations well for most
of human history we’ve interpret them as just gods and spirits okay and even
though it’s not factual it is truthful in that it allows us to better
understand the universe that better allows us to understand ourselves okay
By embracing this model of the brain, we have access to wisdom, okay?
The wisdom of Homer and the Greeks.
And that’s why back then, the Greeks are much more creative and wise than we are today, okay?
Does that make sense?
Because what we’ve done today is we’ve shut off this part by saying,
nope, all that matters is science, logic, and materialism, okay?
so we’ve shut down the right brain and we only use left brain today that’s why we are less creative
right so that’s the argument i will make to you today all right let’s continue the great big bang
the beginning of greek civilization all right so this is julian james okay and he wrote a book
called the origin of consciousness in the breakdown of the bicameral brain okay bicameral mind is just
the left and right hemisphere and these two work together the right is the receiver of the universe
the left is interpreter of the universe all right so he gives an example of this okay why is it that
in ancient times when kings died we buried them with lots and lots of gifts we buried them as
though they were still alive and the answer is from our perspective they were still alive okay
the burial of the important dead as if they still live is common to almost all these ancient
cultures whose architecture we have just looked at this practice has no clear explanation
except that their voices were still being heard by the living and were perhaps demanding such
accommodation these dead kings propped up on stones whose voices were hallucinated by the
living were the first gods okay does that make sense to you we lived in a world where we’re
using both our left and right hemispheres and as such we saw spirits deities gods all around us
okay we interacted with them and they gave us both inspiration as well as motivation okay and so
So, this is a Viking ship burial, where a king is being buried with his ship and his horses,
as though he was still alive.
Because from their perspective, he’s still alive.
He’s still able to give us his wisdom.
This is the cult of the skull, which is what we found in most Neolithic cultures,
the earliest agricultural societies.
Why? Because they practiced ancestral worship, and they believed that these skulls were living,
and they could help you access the dead in the spirit world
and draw wisdom and inspiration from them.
This is a book, The Cosmic Serpent by Jerry Narby, okay?
And he tells us that, listen, if you just do some basic research,
this understanding of the universe where our right brain receives spirits
and left brain interprets it in reality, it makes a lot of sense, okay?
because all the the entire universe is itself consciousness okay it’s all mine
and matter is just what we perceive I began my investigation with the enema of
plant communication okay plants are able to communicate with each other we know
that scientifically I went to accept the idea that hallucinations could be a
source of verifiable information okay so if you feel as though a spirit is
talking to you maybe the spirit really is talking to you and I end up with a
hypothesis suggesting that a human mind can communicate and defocalize consciousness with
the global network of dna-based life all this contradicts principles of western knowledge okay
so all the entire universe is consciousness plants have it animals have it we have it and with
therefore we open our minds we’re able to communicate with the entire universe and draw
insight all right he goes on scientists know this and our greatest discoveries came from scientists
who embraced the consciousness of the universe.
Many of science’s central ideas seem to come from beyond the limits of rationalism.
Rene Descartes dreams of an angel who explains the basic principles of materialistic rationalism
to him.
Albert Einstein daydreams in a tram approaching another and conceives the theory of relativity.
James Watson scribbles on a newspaper in a train, then rides his bicycle to reach the
conviction that DNA has the form of a double helix okay so it’s almost as
though a spirit is telling the secrets of the universe to the scientists so and
just ask yourself these questions and you will understand that maybe the
universe is consciousness right so these questions are sometimes you think of
someone and then boom that person calls you is that strange
has that ever happened to you do you feel as though you’re being watched all
the time do you feel as though you’re an actor on a stage do you sometimes feel
you’re compelled to act as though something has taken control of your body, okay? Possession.
Why do certain ideas pop in your head all of a sudden? Do you sometimes feel as though something
planted an idea into you? What if you have dreams? Where do dreams come from? What do dreams mean?
Do you sometimes feel as though you know what someone else is thinking, okay? Is it possible
you’re sitting with a friend and you know exactly what your friend is thinking, even though you’re
not talking? Do you think sometimes that you’re having a conversation with a friend inside your
head, okay? So your friend is not there, but you’re having a conversation with your friend.
do you feel as though you have a guardian angel okay i’m sure you know you’re too shy to say this
but i’m sure that you feel as though there is a spirit world right okay these were not mysteries
and questions before because everyone assumed we lived alongside spirits angels and demons okay
today we ask these questions before they didn’t ask these questions because everyone just assumed
that yeah of course we live alongside angels and demons and that’s why we are who we are
Okay, so let’s go to the Iliad, okay?
And the Iliad shows us how the brain worked at that time.
A brain that was both materialistic and spiritual.
A brain that understood that we lived in different dimensions, okay?
And the gods had more control over us.
And the gods represented our emotions and the workings of nature, okay?
The Iliad.
Now, this is a translation by Robert Fagles.
so let’s at the very beginning of the Iliad okay Homer says this rage goddess
signal rage of Peleus son Achilles murderers doomed that caused Achaeans
countless losses hurling down to the house of death so many sturdy souls
great fighters souls but made their bodies carrion feast for the dogs and
birds and the will of Zeus was moving toward its end begin muse when the two
first broke in clash Agamemnon Lord of the Men and good Achilles okay so the
first thing that a kid homer says is please inspire me muse okay so what he’s doing is not
creating what he’s doing is channeling he’s drawing inspiration from the gods okay when
he’s speaking to people he’s saying i am here as a messenger of the gods this information is from the
gods themselves all right so this is the fatal meeting oh sorry not the failure the clash between
Agamemnon and Achilles the first meeting that starts off the Iliad. So Agamemnon says to Achilles
give me your slave girl and get out of here okay and Achilles is screw you I’m not gonna fight for
you again and but now Achilles is pissed off he wants to kill Agamemnon okay. Agamemnon broke off
and anguish gripped Achilles the heart in his rugged chest was pounding torn should he draw the
long sharp sword slung at his hip thrust through the ranks and kill Agamemnon now or check his
rage and beat his fury down okay so he can’t control himself okay rage has overtaken him
he wants to like step forward and just kill agamemnon as his raging spirit veered back and
forth just as he drew his huge blade from his sheath down from the vaulting heaven swept athena
athena’s here now okay before achilles the white arm goddess hera sped her down hera loved both
men and cared for both alike rearing behind him palace sees his fury here only achilles saw her
none of the other fighters struck with wonder he spun around he knew her at once okay so achilles
is a hallucinating athena no one else can see her okay palace athena the terrible blazing of those
eyes and his winged words went flying why why now child zeus with a shield of thunder why come now
to witness the outrage agamemnon just commit committed i tell you this and so help me it’s
the truth i’ll he’ll soon pay for his arrogance with his life so he really wants to kill agamemnon
her gray eyes clear the goddess athena answered down from the skies i come to check your rage
if only you will yield the white armed goddess hero spread me down she loves you both she cares
for you both alike stop this fighting now don’t lay hand to sword lash him with threats of the
price that he will face i tell you this i know it it is the truth one day glittering gifts will lie
before you three times over to pay for all his outrage hold back now obey us both okay so achilles
wants to kill Agamemnon but now he’s being possessed by Athena okay and Athena says stop
so he she urged and the swift runner complied at once I must when the two of you had down
commands goddess a man submits though his heart breaks with fury better for him by far the man
obeys the gods they’re quick to hear his prayers and with that Achilles stayed his burly hand on
the silver hilt and slid the huge blade back in his sheath he would not fight the orders of Athena
Okay. So again, this is not factual. Athena doesn’t really exist, but it’s truthful in that
it gives us insight into how the human brain and the human emotions work. Okay. Now what I’m going
to do now is I want to write this again in modern prose to show you the difference. Okay. Okay. So
this is what I wrote myself. Okay. It’s bad writing. It’s modern prose, but you’re able to
compare and contrast. Okay. I don’t need you. Get out of my sight. Wrote Agamemnon. He spat on the
ground. Achilles’ blood boiled and he reached for the hilt of his sword. He saw all eyes stare at
him and he stayed focused on Agamemnon. He counted the seconds and the steps it would take for him
to sprint forward and strike him down. His feet grew heavy and his legs grew wobbly. He could not
move. He felt the thumping of his heart. Achilles snapped around and walked out of the room. He saw
all eyes focused on him. So this is factual, but it’s not truthful. Do you understand? It doesn’t
us insight into why this is happening so the iliad is truthful but not factual modern prose is
factual but not truthful so now as i said achilles refused to fight the greeks are losing the war
and so the greeks beg achilles to come fight achilles says no and he sends patroclus to
um figure out what’s going on and patroclus comes and says let me fight achilles okay and at this
point Achilles should just be like we’ll fight together or don’t go if Patroclus is too dangerous
instead he says this so he pleaded losses in his own great innocence condemned to beg for his own
death and brutal doom okay he is Patroclus and move now to his deaths the famous runner cried
no no my prince Patroclus what are you saying prophecies none that touch me none I know of
no do my noble mother revealed to me from Zeus just this terrible pain that wounds me to look
quick when one man attempts to plunder a man is equal to commandeer a prize exalting soul in his
own power but that’s a pain that wounds me suffering such humiliation that girl the sons
of akia picked her as my prize and i sacked the wall city one of my spear but right from my grasp
he tears her money again on that son of a trust treating me like some vagabond some outcast strip
of all my rights so the greek army is about to destroy and achilles is concerned about his own
pride okay he’s a very selfish person argument stole his girlfriend and he’s pissed enough let
bygones be bygones now done is done how on earth can a man rage on forever still by god i said i
will not relax my anger not till the cries and carnage reach my own ships so you you shot my
my splendid armor on your back you lead our butter hungry meridians into action and now in fact the
black cloud of the trojans blast down on the ships with full gale force our backs the breaking surf
but clinging still to a cramped strip of land the Argives lost. The whole city of Troy comes
trampling down on us, daring, wild. Why? They cannot see the brow of my helmet flash before
their eyes. Oh, they’ll soon run for their lives and choke the torn beds of the field with all
their corpse if only the mighty Agamemnon met me with respect.” Okay, so the Trojans are attacking
them because he’s not in the battlefield, but if he were in the battlefield the Trojans would just
run away. Okay, now as it is they’re fighting around our camp. No spear ragers now in the hand
of Diomedes, keen to save the Argives from disaster. I can’t even hear the battle cry of
Agamemnon. Break from his hated skull, but it’s man-killing Hector. Calling his Trojans on, his
war cries crashing around me. Savage cries of his Trojans sweeping the whole plain. Victors bring
the Argive armies to their knees. Even so, Patroclus, fight disaster off the ships. Flee
yourself at the Trojans’ full force before they gut our host with leaping fire and tear away the
beloved day of our return. But take this command to heart. Obey to the end. You can win great
honor great glory for me in the eyes of all the argive ranks and they they’ll send her back my
live and lovely girl and top it off with trolls of glittering gifts once you have whipped the enemy
from the fleet you must come back for chocolates even if zeus the funding lord of hera lets you
seize your glory you must not burn for war against these trojans mad men lusting for battle now about
me you will only make my glory that much less okay me me me all achilles cares about is me
Patroclus you can go into battle but don’t win too much glory do not outshine me okay
and because he says this what does Patroclus do he tries to win all the glory for himself
he engages in the duel of hector and he and it cost him his life okay so it’s Achilles fault
this is happening and he knows it all right so the psychology here is just so insightful
so deep so striking so let’s use an analogy to understand the psychology okay let’s pretend
John and Jill are boyfriend girlfriend but they have a fight like boyfriend and girlfriend do
and they break up okay but they want they long for each other but they don’t want to apologize
to each other okay so Jill tells her best friend Jane to talk to John to try to get him to apologize
all right and then Jane goes talks to John and John says you know what I’ve had it with Jill
I’d much rather date you because you’re more beautiful and you’re more you know reasonable
and then james is really excited because jill is prettier than she is right so she runs back to
jill and says hey john asked me to go on a date maybe i can use this opportunity to convince him
to apologize and then jill says okay go date him but what do you do don’t kiss him so what does
jill do right so this is reverse psychology right okay so jill knows that if she says this jane’s
James is going to kiss John and Achilles knows that if he tells Patroclus don’t win too much
glory Patroclus is going to win a lot of glory, right?
And so what happens of course is that Patroclus dies and Achilles can now enter the battlefield
and win all the glory for himself.
And that’s what happens, okay?
He kills Hector.
He saves the Greeks.
But then he goes crazy.
What he does is he ties Hector to his chariot and he starts riding around the walls of Troy.
It is a war crime.
disgusting it’s hideous the trojans are going crazy but the greeks are like we don’t want this
man the gods are like what the hell is going on okay so this is just shocking it’s it’s it’s
just a mutilation it’s torture all right so now we move to the end of the iliad and at this point
priam the king cannot sleep because his son hector is being mutilated by achilles achilles can’t
sleep because he cannot forgive himself for the death of patroclus and so he takes it out on
hector and the gods are watching this and they’re kind of disgusted the games were over now the
gala army scattered each meant to his fast ship and fighters churned their minds of thoughts of
food and the sweet warm grip of sleep but achilles kept on grieving for his friend the memory burning
on and all opposite doing sleep could not take him but not now he turned and twisted side to side he
long for protocol’s manhood his gallant heart what rough campaigns they fought to an end together
what hardships they had suffered cleaving their way through wars of men and pounding waves at sea
the memories flooded over him live tears flowing and now he lied on his side now flat on his back
now face down again at least at last he left to his feet one in anguish endless along the surf
and dawn on donald he cannot sleep he’s depressed okay he is wrapped with self-guilt he cannot
forgive himself for what has happened flaming over the sea and shore would find him pacing
then he yoked his racing team to the chariot harness last the corpse of hector behind the
car for dragging and haul him three times around the dead photographer’s tomb and then he rests
again in his tents and leave the body sprawled face down in the dust but a poorly pity hector
dead man though he was and warded all corruption off from hector’s corpse and around him head to
foot the great god wrapped the golden shield of storm so his skin would never rip as achilles
dragged him on and so he kept on raging shaming noble hector but the gods in bliss looked down
and pitied prime’s son they kept on urging the sharp-eyed giant killer hermes to go and steal
the body a plan that pleased them all but not hera poseidon or the girl with blazing eyes they clung
to their deathless hate of sacred troy prime and prime’s people just as they had at first when
Paris in all his madness launched the war. He offended Athena and Hera, both goddesses.
But Zeus, who marshalled the storm clouds, warned his queen,
Now, Hera, don’t fly into such a rage at fellow gods.
These two can never attain the same degree of honor.
Still the immortals love Prince Hector dearly, best of all the mortals born in Troy.
So I loved him at least. He never sinned with gifts to please my heart.
Never once did my altar lacken its share of victims.
Winecaps tipped and the deep-smokey savior. These are the gifts we claim. These are our rights.
but as for stealing courageous hector’s body we must abandon the idea not a chance in the world
behind achilles back for fetus is always there his mother always hovering near him night and day
so would one of you gods call fetus to my presence so i can declare to her my solemn sound decree
achilles must receive a ransom from queen priam achilles must give hector’s body back okay does
that make sense so the gods are fighting over what to do and then zeus says you know what let’s just
spoke of peace between achilles and priam okay so prime agrees to ransom back hector’s body
and achilles agrees okay so again we can write this in modern prose and we can eliminate the
gods but what you’ll see is that it’s not as powerful it’s not as intriguing not as truthful
prime cannot sleep and toss in his bed his wife and his children come one by one to console the
weeping king but to no avail his servants try different sleeping potions and one by one they
fail. In the middle of the night he screams at the moon and tears at his graying hair.
Priam aches for Hector and feels guilt and remorse for failing his son.
Trojan spies watch Achilles drag Hector’s body day and night. They take turns spying and they
know that Achilles cannot sleep. They report this news to Priam and this gives him hope.
He sends an emissary to the Greek camp and Agamemnon agrees that it is Priam’s right to
ransom back his son as is the custom of war. Even after the rage of Achilles, Agamemnon
sends a servant to talk of Achilles. Achilles does not hear Priam’s offer, but
he nods his head anyway, okay? So it’s less powerful, it’s less truthful, it’s
less interesting, okay? Alright, now comes the most powerful part of the Iliad, okay?
This is actually when Priam and Achilles meet for the first time. And so what
happens is that Priam is snuck into the tent by Hermes, and the majestic king of
troy slipped past the rest and kneeling down beside achilles claps his knees and kiss his hands those
terrible men killing hands that have slaughtered prime’s many sons in battle so the king has
opportunity to kill achilles but chooses instead to kiss his hand and submit before achilles and
this submission destroys the pride of achilles okay it’s an emotional battle duel between prime
and achilles and the prime has won awesome as when the group of madness seizes one who murders a man
in his own fatherland and flees abroad to foreign shores to a wealthy noble host and a sense of
marvel runs through all who see him so achilles marvel beholding majestic priam okay that’s what
prime has done prime is like a fugitive who’s wanted for murder he escaped and he should be
a slave but somehow he’s become wealthy okay so by submitting himself before achilles prime has
change the destiny of the world his men marveled too training startled glances but prime prayed his
heart out to achilles remember your own father great god like achilles as old as i am past the
threshold of deadly old age now doubt the countrymen round about him plague him now with no one there
to defend him beat away disaster no one but at least he hears you’re still alive and his old
heart rejoices hopes rising day by day to see his beloved son come sending home from troy those
words stirred within Achilles a deep desire to grieve for his own father taking the old man’s
hand he gently moved him back and overpowered by memory both men gave way to grieve prime wept
freely for man killing Hector probably encroaching before Achilles feet as Achilles wept for himself
this is the first time Achilles can now cry okay he cannot cry before now for his father now for
Patroclus once again and they’re sobbing rose and fell through out the house they’ve forgiven each
other why because they love their people okay so prime saw hector in the face of achilles achilles
saw his father in the face of priam and because of their love for others they found love for each
other so love is the unifying force of the universe love is what allows us to forgive
ourselves and forgive others okay and this is the tremendous insight of the iliad okay and to
demonstrate to you how powerful this insight is let’s run a scenario okay let’s do a thought
experiment let’s just say you’re driving a car with your wife and your child home from restaurant
okay and you’ve had too much to drink and then you hit a car and your wife and your child died
okay that’s the first scenario second scenario is you’re driving home and then a drunk driver hits
you killing your wife and your child it’s not your fault it’s drunk driver’s fault okay the
third scenario you’re arguing with your wife and you’re not really watching the road okay
then a drunk driver hits you and kills your wife and your child okay these are three different
scenarios right let me ask you a question in which scenario are you less likely to forgive
the drunk driver one two or three one it’s your fault two is it’s his fault three is it’s his
fault but it’s also your fault which one it’s number three guys okay why because you cannot
forgive yourself first all right if you can’t forgive yourself you can’t forgive others and
guess what guys in real life it’s always number three it’s almost never number one or number two
so forgiveness is something that we encounter every day all right every day we make mistakes
and because we can’t forgive ourselves we can make even more and more mistakes
okay that’s a problem forgiveness this is the deepest problem in human society and so what
the idea tells us is that the real struggle is not for power the real struggle is within our heart
the real struggle is between ourselves if we forgive ourselves we can change the world right
if we forgive others we make the world a better place because priam forgave achilles achilles
it would forgive himself and they made the world a better place okay that’s the power of the human
heart and this is what gave rise to quick civilization okay the greeks engaged in an
oral tradition and in the old tradition they were constantly trying to figure out the mysteries of
the human heart all right so this is this is uh pericles giving his famous funeral oration so
every day people are speaking because that’s what a person does speaks before others all right um
the greeks were known for their theater this is the amphitheater in athens you can see it seats
about 10 000 people and this is what they do for fun they stage this theater everyone watches it
and the theater plays uh plays by euripides israelis sophocles are about the human heart
the mysteries of the human heart so every day people are thinking about what it means to be
human and that’s and that’s why they have the greatest civilization in the world this is the
the agora the marketplace where people come together and just debate they talk
so Socrates was famous for being in the agora the marketplace and just finding
people to debate this is the symposia the symposia is a gathering of wealthy
people what they do is they drink wine and they talk about philosophy love death
what’s the meaning of life okay now the wine is interesting because the water down
the wine so it’s not as strong okay and they’ll do this like for like the entire
night this is socrates engaging in a symposium on love that’s what they do for fun guys this is a
trial socrates um so if there’s if if you’re charged with a crime you face a trial there’s
500 people and you have to convince those 500 jurors why you’re guilty or why you’re not guilty
okay all right so this is an oral culture where every day people are talking with each other and
that’s the source of their creativity and what they’re talking about is the ilia the odyssey
they’re trying to figure out what homer meant what homer was trying to tell the world in his poetry
um this is herodotus so even if you write the first thing you do is when you write you will
recite your writings to everyone so you understand what the reaction is okay writing comes from
community it comes from understanding the feelings of others okay today we just write by ourselves
and that’s why our writing is crap all right so um this is anna karina nina consider the greatest
novel of the modern period it’s written by leo toy story and um it’s a really fun novel i highly
recommend it it’s a great book okay and it starts off by saying happy families are all alike every
unhappy family is unhappy in its own way everything was in confusion in the oblonsky’s house the wife
had discovered that the husband was carrying on an intrigue with a french girl okay so it starts
off with an affair what happened is that the husband’s um um sister anna karina will come
from st. Petersburg to try to resolve the issue but then she’ll fall in love
with another man count Vronsky who and they have an affair together okay this
affair destroys their families and it ends with Anna Karina’s suicide okay
because what’s happening is that she’s demanding more and more count Vronsky and he
can’t keep up he’s he’s exhausted by the demands of anna karina so this is what she says before
she kills herself my love keeps growing more passionate and egoistic while his is waning
and waning and that’s why we’re drifting apart she went on musing and there’s no hope for it
he has everything for me and i want him more and more to give himself up to me entirely he wants
more and more to get away from me we walk to meet each other up to the time of our love and then we
have been irresistibly drifting in different directions there’s no altering that he tells
me i’m insanely jealous and i’ve told myself that i am insanely jealous but it’s not true i’m not
jealous but i am unsatisfied i don’t have any meaning in my life and i want this love to give
me meaning okay so it’s almost like she’s looking for god we’ve killed god and now she’s looking for
god in affairs in sex in lust and that’s why she can’t find it okay all right so what i’m going to
do is i’m going to take this and translate it into homoic prose okay let’s see how homo rate
this i’m not homer okay but like this is how he might have written it okay anna karina went to
the train station and sat on the bench waiting for the train to come her thoughts are empty and her
her head low where do you plan to go someone asked from the corner that snapped Anna from her trance
and to her horror she saw herself but it was not herself she was older with graying hair and drooping
eyes and Anna looked as though she had seen a ghost okay so she’s hallucinating herself 20 years
from now all right who are you Anna shouted in horror what do you want where you go the older
Anna asked where’s Wansky Anna shouted she looked around the train station was empty you know where
he is the older Anna said with a look of pity on her wrinkled face Anna got up and walked away she
was being followed so she knows that in time she’ll just all be alone okay she sees her own future
Anna where are you going the older Anna asked stop following me Anna shouted back picking up the pace
I am going to a place where you can’t find me don’t do anything rash the older Anna said chasing
after her leave me alone Anna shouted and she ran and ran screaming and screaming she tripped and
fell into the tracks right in front of the train so and then she died okay so
if you do it this way it gives you more insight into the human mind the human
psyche right and that’s what we’ve forgotten so what happens we stop
believing in the spiritual what happens when we disconnect from the right
hemisphere of brain we clutter our brains with insignificant concerns
pursuits and details in search of significance when we kill God and they
can be gone okay so as I said Anna Karina with her fear she’s looking for
god she’s looking for meaning and before when we hallucinated when we talked with the gods
we had meaning we had wisdom we had significance and now we’ve lost it and the result is what we
call modern literature which is complete another crap by the way okay and we know because this is
virginia wolf to lighthouse okay it’s considered the greatest one of the greatest novels
of the 20th century it’s not very good all right so this is um a woman talking to herself it’s
what we call stream of consciousness there were the eternal problems suffering death the poor
there was always a woman dying of cancer even here and yet she had said to all these children
you shall go through of it to eight people she had said relentlessly that and the bill for the
greenhouse would be 50 pounds for that reason knowing what was before then love and ambition
and being wretched alone in dreary places she had often the feeling why must they grow up and lose
lose it all okay so her mind is wandering and wandering and she’s concerned about the grocery
bills she’s concerned about the future she’s concerned about the past there’s no discipline
there’s no focus to any of her ideas okay and this is what we call stream of consciousness and it’s
the way we think today okay the reality is that we live in a world in which god is dead in which
we’re not allowed to imagine a spiritual world um in a world in which we only focus on the here and
now, and as such, we live meaningless, insignificant lives, and as such, our brains are just focused
on things that don’t matter, okay, and our brains become schizophrenic, all right?
Okay, does that make sense, guys?
Yeah?
Any questions?
All right.
Yeah.
I have a question about the concept about forgiveness that you just mentioned, that
if you can’t forgive yourself, you can’t forgive others.
I think the example of this is China and Japan,
because China hates Japan because of the Japan invasion war.
And after hearing this call,
I think China hates Japan so much, even until now,
it is because that China cannot forgive himself
because he’s too weak.
And also just like the third situation that you just showed,
Japan invades and China is too weak to fight back.
So China cannot forgive his weakness.
so he cannot forgive Japan.
Yeah, yeah, that’s a great analogy.
I completely agree, yeah.
Because if you’re really strong and confident,
you just focus on improving yourself.
You don’t think about other people.
Yeah, okay.
Any more questions, guys?
But thank you for the comment, okay?
All right, so last thing I’m gonna do is
I’m gonna read some YouTube comments.
So I don’t have time to read YouTube comments,
but my wife loves reading YouTube comments.
And she sends me YouTube comments,
and it’s basically my homework, okay?
so if my wife sends it to me i’d respond all right so let’s look at some youtube comments from the
last video um western qatar says hey man what about africa what about egypt and african civilization
and you know i’m sure that africa egypt sudan are really really interesting i don’t know enough
about it to comment on it okay so what i want to do is later on i want to focus more on africa okay
i want to go to africa and i want to learn more about content so i can comment um more about
africa like for me teaching is a learning journey okay i teach to learn okay um so this uh youtuber
says bad bentham says um i under represent livestock in the economic system and this is
absolutely true okay if you look at the steps the currency is actually livestock cattle sheep are
the main currency of the step people and it’s what allows the set people to fight great wars because
when they go off in wars they can bring the laptop with them and therefore they don’t have any
logistical issues okay so this comment is absolutely right um question so capital changes
ultra signature to utarian when hardware motivation gets saturated why are we only going in one
direction that’s getting saturated um yeah so this is interesting so um we have two natures
an altruistic and utilitarian nature and what we’ve discovered is that um if you break the
balance and you become too utilitarian it’s almost impossible to move it back okay and that’s why
societies collapse how similar is this series to civilization series okay so the comment is
that i’m using a lot of content that i used before in civilization and yeah that that is
to fear criticism and the reason why is that um what i’m trying to do is i’m trying to better
understand history so what i’m doing is i’m trying to analyze history from different angles so last
year when i taught civilization i was trying to just figure out how civilization work and this
year what i’m trying to do is trying to apply the idea of secret societies to the better understanding
of civilization so i know some of the content is repeating itself but the angle the slant the over
thesis has changed okay and i’m and i’m going over a lot of this information in order to build a case
of why we have secret societies all right um how do we manage to produce during these horrible times
same question i asked myself yesterday okay so so the question is what if children when things
are getting worse and worse and the answer is because children is what gives us hope children
is what gives us purpose when you see that the world has collapsed or you see the world is in
chaos you have children because children give you the energy the motivation inspiration to fight for
a better world okay so i am probably the most pessimistic person on planet earth okay i think
the entire world is going to hell i have three kids i have three young kids and the reason why
is well first of all i love my kids i love having children but also my children fill me with hope
and energy and power to fight for a better world i’m only doing this i’m only teaching this class
i’m only putting this on youtube to build a legacy for my children if it were not for my children i
would honestly not be doing this it’s really hard work okay all right so that is it for today
Thank you guys. We’ll continue next week, okay?
Source: Predictive History