Class 12 English Lesson 16 Essay: Humility by Yuval Noah Harari Literature Section

 

Lesson 4 Essay: Humility by Yuval Noah Harari

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The main message of this essay is: "You are not the center of the world."

About the Essayist

 

Prof. Yuval Noah Harari is a historian, philosopher, and bestselling author. He is now a lecturer in the Department of History at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Harari exemplifies the virtue of humility in that he exposes humanity’s illusions of superiority and mastery. He claims morality, art, spirituality, and creativity are universal human abilities embedded in our DNA.

Gist of the Essay

In the essay 'Humility', Harari exposes the illusions of superiority and mastery that many humans have. He believes that morality, art, spirituality, and creativity are innate abilities that all humans possess. In the essay, Harari notes that most cultures lack the quality of humility.

 Summary of the Essay

Most people boast that their culture is the foundation of human history. With this arrogant faith, they tend to stand in the center of the world. Homer (ancient Greek author and epic poet), Sophocles, and Plato are still believed to be a beginner of history by the Greeks. Athens, Sparta (unique for the social system in ancient Greece), Alexandria, and Constantinople are credited for all important ideas and inventions. Chinese boast that history began with the Yellow Emperor or Huangdi a deity in Chinese Religion, Xia (the first dynasty established by Yu the Great), and Shang (the earliest ruling dynasty of China in recorded history) dynasties. Hindu claims that even airplanes and nuclear bombs were invented by ancient sages in the Indian subcontinent long before Confucius or Plato with crediting to Albert Einstein and the Wright brothers. It is believed that the great sage Bhardwaj invented rockets and airplanes, Vishwamitra invented missiles, and Acharya Kanad invented atomic theory.

Muslims believe the Prophet Muhammad to be a pioneer of History. But Turkish, Iranian, and Egyptian nationalists argue that their nation was the source of all that was good about humanity and they are the real preserver of the purity of Islam even after the revelation of the Quran. British, French, German, American, Russian, Japanese, and other countless groups boast about their specular achievements for uplifting humankind from barbarous and immoral ignorance. Aztecs (the nomadic tribe in northern Mexico) are claimed to have sacrificed human lives to control the law of physics and save the universe.

All these claims are nothing more than a wilful or intentional ignorance of history. It is an indirect indication of racism or prejudice or discrimination or hatred. Before the colonization of the world, and the domestication of plants and animals by humans, no such religions or nations existed. First, they built cities and invented writing and money. The universal human abilities are morality, art, spirituality, and creativity originated in Stone Age Africa (African prehistory when the first stone tools were developed. It is therefore a stupid egotism to regard them as a more recent place and time (China-the Yellow Empire, Greece-Plato or Arabia-Muhammad). Harari, belonging to Jews community, is familiar with such stupid egotism. Jews also claim to be the most important thing in the world. When we talk about any human inventions or achievements, they claim credit for that.

Once Harari went to a yoga teacher in Israel and claimed that yoga was invented by Abraham and that the Hebrew alphabet was developed from basic yoga postures. It is believed that Abraham taught these positions to the son of one of his concubines. He went to India and taught yoga to Indians. The master even quoted a Biblical passage for evidence. It is not meant that Abraham was the inventor of yoga. Even Judaism claims that the cosmos exists because Jewish rabbis (Preacher) study their holy scripture. The entire universe will be destroyed if rabbis stop debating the Talmud (Religious text). Only an ignorant fool can doubt the Talmud. Even secular scholars believe Jewish people to be the central heroes of history and the ultimate wellspring of human morality, spirituality, and learning. He also suggests to the people living around the world to give up such false beliefs of their tribe.

 Understanding the text: Answer the following questions. 

a.      Describe the claim of the Chinese nationalists about human history.

Chinese nationalists claim that human history had begun with the Yellow Emperor and the Xia and Shang Dynasties. Whatever Westerners, Muslims, or Indians invented was originally developed in China. 

b.     What do pious Muslims believe about human history?

They claim that all the histories before the Prophet Muhammad were irrelevant. The entire history after the revelation of the Quran revolves around Muslim communities.

c.      What did the Aztecs firmly believe about the universe?

The Aztecs firmly believed that the entire universe would have been fragmented into several pieces if they had not sacrificed human lives each year. It is because of their sacrifice that nature is bound to its law.

d.     What, according to the essay, are universal human abilities?

The universal human abilities, according to the essay, are morality, art, spirituality, and creativity. These things are embedded in our DNA.

e.      How are the basic yoga postures derived from the shape of the letters of the Hebrew alphabet? 

Hebrew Alphabets

It is believed that the basic yoga postures taught by Abraham to one of the sons from his concubines are derived from the Hebrew alphabet. The trikonasana of yoga was derived from the letter ‘aleph’ and tuladandasana was derived from ‘daled’.

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