History is the past, which for the most part can not be scientificately proven. The real; goal of History is to rediscover past. A dramatic error happens when past is rediscovered from our own bias that is from the way we see it. Even certain artifacts and works pf literature that we have left from earlier civilizations can be interpreted in several different ways, or misinterpreted to a certain extend or entirely. Usually interpretation or even misinterpretation is affected bu the concept of ethnocentrism, where different communities have an already set up establishment of certain norms based on their own believes, traditions, social, legislative, and personal values and ethics from which they judge other foreign communities. When considering other societies, it is usually a difficult task to view other world without any observer prejudices.
Each world, our and their can evoke its own realities that are more or less comparable from one period to another, or from one culture to another. One of the obvious misinterpretations, discussed in this paper, took place considering historical document written by king of Mesopotamia. Our textbook, Arts and Culture,(p 98) presents Hammurabis Code as a Law Code of king Hammurabi. It was, in turn something quite different from a Code of Laws existing in our judicial and legislative structure of government and society. Hammurabis Code- A law Code or a set of royal decisions??? As written in Mesopotamia: The Mighty Kings, (p26), the code consists if 282 laws that are branched at the beginning and end by a prologue and epilogue. The Code touches almost every aspect of everyday life in Babylonya.
The Essay on Unjust Law Thoreau King Government
... strong ideas of the minority. King states that An unjust law is a code inflicted upon a minority which ... do I advocate evading or defying the law... King respects the law to a morally right stance. As long ... in reality expressing the very highest respect for law. King believes that if you go against your ... movements. Both Thoreau and King had an influence over society in the past and continue to do ...
As the prologue states, the laws were supposedly written to promote the welfare of the people,to cause just to prevail in the land, to destroy the wicked and the evil, that the strong might not oppress the weak ( The Human Record, p 12).
Furthermore, just like a real Law Code, each law is written in the form of conditional sentence: in which the phrase is introduced by a certain condition, if and the consequence follows then. Another fact makes Hammurabis Code so similar to the U.S. Constitutional Law Code is that it follows specific order, consisting of separate chapters associated with similar issues. For instance; The Administration of Justice chapter is followed by Felons and Victums, which is in turn followed by chapter that talks about Property issues. Thus from a point of view of an ordinary contemporary American,theHammurabis Code is an ancient set of detailed legal codes of Mesopotamia. As mentioned above, the code is composed of 282 law codes which are started in conditional sentences, typical to a legislative document, and broken down in sets of chapters which are associated with particular issue considered and in addition follow a certain order.
Therefore keeping in mind such a definition of Hammurabis Code, Americans can look at it as primitive, and even savage prototype of contemporary set of laws. From the American bias and American communitys perspective, Hammurabis code is a violent, non-ethic judicial document based on a cruel and unacceptable to American society eye-for-an-eye and tooth-for-a-tooth concept. This cruelty is depicted in a law that states that an amputation was demanded for any surgeon whose malpractice resulted in a patients death. The other such situation occurs when a contractor whose slapdash s=work led to the collapse of a home and the death of owner could expect to be put to death himself. Another, even more savage condition takes place when a woman who happen to neglect her house and family and humiliate her husband, would be forced to undergo trial-by-water (Mesopotamia, p134).
Such primitive ideas seem totally radical and astonishing to American ideology based on Thomas Jeffersons ideas of certain unalienable RightsLife, Liberty, and Pursuit of Happiness (United States History and Government, p13).
The Essay on Sparta Government Code Law
Greece consisted of many city-states, two of which were Athens and Sparta. Although they were both part of Greece, they had many differences in the types of people and systems of government for each region. Sparta, descendants of the Dorians, were a very war-like city-state. They obtained an over-populated region of Greece, and needed room for agriculture. This is the cause for their war-like ...
However, sticking to the original goal of History (to rediscover, and learn the original past), and setting aside our ethnocentric motives, we should attempt to look at this famous and impressive work with the eyes of those who wrote it and who lived in its time, no matter how far away it is removed from our own categories. In the reality, Code of Hammurabi is not a Law Code, and after close and precise study we will understand that it was never even intended to be one. The Code of Hammurabi is a self-glorification of the king. It is at the same time a treatise, with examples on exercise of judicial power which meant to be practical and didactic by Hammurabi himself. It was also meant to be referred to by his successors. However its goal was to suggest for his successors to associate with the code in order to rule justly and fairly, not dictate upon them.
According to Websters Encyclopedic Unabridged Dictionary of the English Language (p833), a law is an imperative rule of social conduct, laid down and enforced by the legitimate authorities. Therefore we can say that a law is something general, something universal. Therefore we can make a conclusion, that the law is something general, something universal. However when we look at the Code closely, what we find most often are very specific and particular situations, complete opposites of a general ideas that describe a concept of a law. For instance, in the article about blows given by children to their parents, we find only an expressis verbis mention of a son who has beaten his father: If a son has struck his father, they shall cut off his hand.(Mesopotamia, p162).
Another example is seen in a following passage:(Human Record, p15) If a man has knocked out teeth of a man of the same rank, his own teeth have to be knocked out. Therefore these articles can not be laws intended to control totally and uniformly the matters involved, but are verdicts, describing particular situations and decisions made upon particular cases. The use of exact events and the consequences following them introduced by if-then, which makes them conditional sentences used in Law Codes, in fact are not so special and unique to the Code.
This conditional scheme was very popular in Mesopotamia at that time, and was considered as a common rational thought. Mesopotamians would put forward a hypothesis and then, by a judgement based upon the element of that hypothesis, they draw a conclusion that they have found in it.(Mesopotamia, p170) This was the acceptable and expected norm of writing any document in Mesopotamian society. Thus, Hammurabi formulated his code in such way that he gave logical form of thought, that consisted of hypothesis and conclusions. The ordering principle of chapters in Hammurabis Code can also be understood, once looking at it from Mesopotamian bias. Even though each chapter is associated with a particular issue, ad chapters are arranged in a specific order, which is a clear feature of a legislative code, it is not. To Mesopotamians it was very common to arrange their written items in a linear sequence, where each point raises the next one. Technique used in cuneiform writing system developed earlier and being popular structure of script(Arts and Culture, ).
The Essay on Hammurabi S Code People Law Laws
HAmmurabi s code The Code of Hammurabi is a series of 282 laws decreed by Hammurabi, the ruler of the city of Babylon at about 1750 BC. It was written so that people would have a consistent set of rules to follow in settling disputes and imposing penalties. The code regulated economic, social and moral life. Hammurabi s code of laws provided people with a orderly system of government. The Code of ...
That justifies the technique where Hammurabi placed the chapter on assault followed by chapter on free professions. This is because latter begins with physicians. When interpreting history, in order to correctly revive the past, it is very important to look at it from the others point of view, referring to the degree possible tour own believes, views, ethnic issues and social behavior. It is very important not to make dramatic prejudices,(a cleat sign of ethnocentrism), as it happened with American interpretation of Hammurabis code. 1. The Human Record, Sources of Global History. Third Edition. Volume I. By Andrea/Overfield.
Copyright 1998 by Houghton Miffin Company. 2. Mesopotamia: The Mighty Kings. Time-Life Books, Alexandria, Virginia.1997. 1. Arts and Culture, An Introduction To The Humanities.
Volume I. By Janetta Rebold Benton and Robert DiYanni. Prentice Hall, Inc. 1998. 2. Mesopotamia The University of Chicago Press.
Chicago and London. 3. United States History and Government. N&N Publishing Company, Inc. By Paul Stitch, Susan F. Pingel, and John Farrel.
1996. 4. Websters Encyclopedic Unabridged Dictionary of the English Language. Published by: Gramery Books, New York/ Avenel, New Jersey. 1989.
Bibliography:
BIBLIOGRAPHY PRIMARILY SOURCES: 1. The Human Record, Sources of Global History.
Third Edition. Volume I. By Andrea/Overfield. Copyright 1998 by Houghton Miffin Company. 2. Mesopotamia: The Mighty Kings. Time-Life Books, Alexandria, Virginia.1997. SECONDARY SOURCES: 1.
The Essay on Charlie Company Book Massacre Gis
History: Viet Cong On March 16, 1968, "Charlie Company" was sent into a small Viet Cong village called (by the U. S. ) My Lai 4. Their instructions by commanding officers were: .".. kill every man, woman, child and animal in the village. Burn all the homes... nothing should be walking, growing or crawling." Orders were followed, and as I read the first 65 pages of this book, I was exposed to the ...
Arts and Culture, An Introduction To The Humanities. Volume I. By Janetta Rebold Benton and Robert DiYanni. Prentice Hall, Inc. 1998. 2.
Mesopotamia The University of Chicago Press. Chicago and London. By jean Bottero, 1987. 3. United States History and Government. N&N Publishing Company, Inc.
By Paul Stitch, Susan F. Pingel, and John Farrel. 1996. 4. Websters Encyclopedic Unabridged Dictionary of the English Language. Published by: Gramery Books, New York/ Avenel, New Jersey. 1989..
