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14 of 18 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Not really about the cities, November 3, 2009
This review is from: Five Cities that Ruled the World: How Jerusalem, Athens, Rome, London, and New York Shaped Global History (Paperback)
I received this book as a review copy from the publisher. "Five Cities That Ruled The World" spent about 40 pages per a culture giving a quick overview of thousands of years of history for the Jews, Greeks Romans, and British, and hundreds of years of history for America. Each section was topped off with a very brief summary of the lasting legacy of the corresponding city.
The few pages covering each city's legacy felt more like an afterthought than the focus of the book. The author didn't really build a case for his chosen legacy nor how it impacted the world. These legacies can be easily be summarized as Jerusalem gave the world a spiritual legacy; Athens left a political, philosophical, and arts legacy; Rome gave the world justice under law; London gave the world literature; and New York will leave a commerce and baseball legacy.
Partly because the author tried to summarize each culture's history from its beginning until the present, his history lacks the details and nuances of various events--even the ones he gave the most detail for--so the reader could be left with wrong impressions. He also assumes an ancient chronology that not everyone would agree with (though he does assume the Bible is accurate).
The book was definitely aimed at a Christian audience. However, he often interpreted Scripture in a non-standard way, especially Biblical prophecies. For example, he stated that Rev. 13 referred to Nero's persecution of the Christians during his reign, whereas it's traditionally interpreted as referring to a world leader during the End Times.
The book was written in a very casual tone. For example, when discussing how Herod had "all the baby boys in the area of Bethlehem" killed, he says, "That kind of action will drive your poll numbers down every time."
One nice thing about the book was that it occasionally linked together what was happening in various parts of the world at certain, critical times. However, the book was so general and imprecise that I don't think it would interest history buffs. But those with little familiarity with history who want a quick, very easy-to-read history book might enjoy this book.
Reviewed by Debbie from Different Time, Different Place (differenttimedifferentplace. blogspot. com)
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6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Inadequate History Told From A Specifically Protestant Evangelical Viewpoint, December 15, 2009
This review is from: Five Cities that Ruled the World: How Jerusalem, Athens, Rome, London, and New York Shaped Global History (Paperback)
Customer review from the Amazon Vine™ Program (What's this?)
"5 Cities that Ruled the World: How Jerusalem, Athens, Rome, London & New York Shaped Global History," is the work of theologian Douglas Wilson, who is a senior fellow of theology at New Saint Andrews College, and is author of numerous books on education, theology, and culture, including: The Case for Classical Christian Education; Recovering the Lost Tools of Learning: An Approach to Distinctively Christian Education (Turning Point Christian Worldview Series); Mother Kirk: Essays and Forays in Practical Ecclesiology, and Angels in the Architecture: A Protestant Vision for Middle Earth; as well as biographies on Anne Bradstreet and John Knox. He is editor of "Credenda/Agenda," a small cultural journal said to be distinguished by its humorous and satirical flavor, and has taught both ethics and logic elsewhere at the college level. He is evidently a highly experienced man, and writer; and it shows in the book at hand, which is easily readable, leavened with humor, and makes apparent his research.
Wilson's thesis is that:
--Jerusalem gave us spiritual liberty,
--Athens gave us democracy,
--Rome gave us law,
--London gave us literature,
-- New York gave us industry and commerce.
Wilson would be the first to say that in a book of this length, covering five separate cities, he cannot really give us complete histories of each. However, those that he does give us are far from satisfactory to me. Just for starters, he fails to mention that each of the above cities, in the time frame he looks at, tolerated slavery. The three ancient cities, of course; but both New York and London had slavery during the 17th and 18th centuries. This has certain moral implications to me.
Furthermore, in my ancient history courses at Cornell University, an outstanding institution of higher learning, I was taught that Athens followed an extremely restrictive policy in granting citizenship: neither immigrants, nor their children could gain it. Some democracy! And Athens is known for a civilization that approved, not only of male homosexuality, but, we are now learning, as its apologists lose control of its archaeological remains, of pedophilia involving young boys. Wilson does not give us even a capsule history of the foundation of Rome, choosing instead to give us that tired old myth about Romulus and Remus, the brothers who were suckled by a wolf. And I would have liked to have learned the most modern theories about this city's foundation, which I either never learned, or don't recall from my ancient history courses at Cornell University; and don't think I should have had to research myself while reading this book. But I do remember from my courses that the Romans were sadistic, bloodthirsty people who still favored human sacrifice to their gods: readers may recall they enjoyed gladiators fighting to the death, and the throwing of Jews and Christians to the lions. Their Caesars were certainly no respecters of law, either; they tended to have themselves declared gods.
In regard to Wilson's chapter on the London gift of literature to the world, he tells us that he is an expert on the works of Shakespeare, while giving us no credentials to back this claim, and insists that the works attributed to Shakespeare were written by Lord de Vere. In regard to New York, and, by extension, the United States, the writer does give us an interesting discussion of the importance of Scottish Presbyterian immigrants to the States. But he gives no mention of some ethnicities that were critical to New York's rise: the luckless black slaves who built its downtown; the Irish, Italian and Jewish immigrants who brought so much with them to the supposed "melting pot" of the city.
What we do get quite a lot of from Wilson is a specifically Evangelical Protestant view of his material. Maybe I should have known enough to expect this from this publisher, but I didn't. And there were times, frankly, that I thought he pushed his views much too far, particularly in a discussion of the building of Jerusalem's second temple in the book's Epilogue.
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6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Didn't appreciate the deception, December 9, 2009
This review is from: Five Cities that Ruled the World: How Jerusalem, Athens, Rome, London, and New York Shaped Global History (Paperback)
Customer review from the Amazon Vine™ Program (What's this?)
If I had read this book's Amazon page first, I would have known that the author is a theologian and the publisher a Christian publishing house. The blurb copy gives you no indication of this.
So, thinking this is a history book, it's disconcerting to find that it's a history book with a Christian agenda. Even though a Christian worldview is fine with me, the deception is not. If you're in business to feed the souls of a Christian audience, it seems to me that you're simply trying to snag non-Christian readers (and their dollars) by disguising your true intent. I feel bad for the author, because I'd bet my library that this wasn't his doing.
The book's message is that these five cities serve a symbolic purpose in history, a "history that teaches us to hope" as the publisher puts it. From Jerusalem, people learn spiritual liberty; from Athens, reason and democracy; from Rome, law and justice and liberty's freedoms and limitations; from London, literary imagination; and from New York, commerce and wealth.
There you have it. That IS on the back cover, and it pretty much sums up the book. The author's discussions expand on that skeleton. It is pretty dry. I got no visual pictures of these cities as places to live. They were almost interchangeable to me.
I was puzzled by some of the author's points. For example, he compares Rome's envy of Greek culture with America's envy of British culture. That might have been true at one time, but Britain today? Soccer riots, pub brawls, Benny Hill, Britain's Got Talent. They don't have any lock on high culture. And, his assessment of New York as a financial powerhouse is dated, in light of today's economic meltdown. I question his view that America is a paragon of production (and New York its financial hub)-- I believe we import more than we export.
I was troubled by the subtitle, too. The influence of non-Western cities on global history is totally ignored. The subtitle should say these five cities shaped Western history (unless you want to get into the messy business of colonizing).
The author's epilogue makes a fine sermon for a believer. He preaches that all cities will one day rejoice in the ascendancy of "the City of God." Amen, brother, preach it. Just save it for a different book.
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