Introduction to Values ofLOYALTY and THE INDIVIDUALin the Byzantin.docx

Introduction to Values ofLOYALTY and THE INDIVIDUALin
the Byzantine - Islamic - Early EuropeanCultural Matrix
divided into the Byzantine, Islamic, Feudal European, Urban
European,and Dynastic European Cultural Matrixes
from 324 to 1648 C.E.
Contents
1.
From Loyalty to The Individual
2.
Values of UNIFIED LOYALTY in the Byzantine Cultural
Matrix
3.
Values of UNIFIED LOYALTY in the Islamic Cultural Matrix
4.
The Early European Cultural Matrix (476 to 1648)
5.
Values of UNIFIED LOYALTY in the Feudal European Cultural
Matrix
6.
Values of DIVIDED LOYALTY in the Urban European Cultural
Matrix
7.
Values of THE INDIVIDUAL in the Dynastic European Cultural
Matrix
The links in the title of sections 2-7 lead you to the full
document
From Loyalty to The Individual
1. In this unit, we will consider some of the developments
within the Mediterranean Cultural Matrix from the time of the
breakup of the Roman Empire to the start of the nation-state

system in western Europe. As we trace these developments, we
detect a movement from the value of loyalty to the value of the
individual. We will see the shift represented through three
values that, at one time or another, play an integrating role in
the various societies of the Mediterranean Cultural Matrix. The
three values are:
unified loyalty
divided loyalty
the individual
As we observe how these values play out over the period
covered in this unit, we find models of unified loyalty in
the Byzantine, Islamic, and Feudal European Cultural Matrixes.
As the Feudal Cultural Matrix gave way to what we call
the Urban Cultural Matrix in Europe, we discover a process
through which loyalty divides, so that people's loyalties are
split in various ways. It seems that when the divisions finally
run deep enough, people discover that their primary loyalty is to
themselves. It no longer makes sense to use "loyalty" as a way
of describing this situation, because loyalty -- if it is to have
any meaning at all -- must be to someone or something outside
oneself. Once it makes the inward turn, we may appropriately
speak of the value of the individual. We shall see some of the
triumphs and pitfalls of this value as we examine our final
European matrix, which we call the "Dynastic" European
Cultural Matrix.
1.1. The relationship between the value of loyalty and the value
of the individual is essentially one of conflict. We gain a sense
of this conflict by considering contemporary life in the United
States, where we profess to place high value on loyalty. At the
same time, we profess to place high value on the market in
economics and freedom in politics, two values that would not
seem to easily coincide with loyalty. Isn't the actual value of
loyalty in our shared society an open question? We might
consider loyalty more of a Feudal and religious value than a
capitalist one, calling up images of knightly chivalry and codes
of honor /see Wolfe 46/, devotion to God and Christian/Islamic

religious institutions. An astonishing act of disloyalty created
the United States. Our corporations, our professional sports
teams, our universities reward those who demonstrate the least
amount of loyalty, those who are most willing to move
elsewhere. From these examples, we might conclude that values
of the individual, such as self-fulfillment and liberation,
conflict with loyalty. If our shared contemporary society rarely
values loyalty in practice (where it counts), why do we pay
homage to it in theory? And we do.
1.2. Part of the answer might come from questions we might ask
about loyalty. Consider the following:
On what is loyalty based?
How is loyalty demonstrated?
What values does loyalty integrate?
How can a person's various loyalties be blended together
without conflict?
1.3. You can probably think of many other questions we might
ask about loyalty. There is no simple, clear-cut answer to any of
these questions. We might, however, gain some leads by looking
back at our Mediterranean heritage. In observing the role of
loyalty in the Byzantine, Islamic, and Feudal European Cultural
Matrixes, we can see loyalty functioning as a value to which
other values are truly subordinate.
Values of UNIFIED LOYALTY in the Byzantine Cultural
Matrix
2. During the fourth through sixth centuries C.E., the empire
centered in Rome gradually lost its dominance over the
Mediterranean Cultural Matrix. As the slow disintegration
occurred, no political force capable of maintaining control over
the entire matrix emerged as a replacement. Rather, three
interactive branches of the Mediterranean Cultural Matrix came
into being. The fourth-century split of the Roman Empire into
the Byzantine and Roman Empires diminished Rome's influence
east of the Mediterranean Sea, which had always been limited
by the ongoing existence of the Persian
Empire. Byzantium marked a new dividing-line between an

Eastern branch and a Western branch of the Mediterranean
Cultural Matrix. Even the existence of Byzantium could not
prevent the emergence of a power-vacuum when the part of the
Roman Empire centered in Rome collapsed. To the east of the
Byzantine Empire, the Islamic Empire would develop in the
seventh century. West of the Byzantine Empire, a new social
entity gradually evolved. It was comprised of numerous
political segments and strongly influenced by organized
Christianity centered in Rome. "Europe" is the name that would
eventually be assumed by this area of the Mediterranean
Cultural Matrix.
2.1. The Byzantine Empire served as a partial replacement for
Rome, but Byzantium could never regain the dominance Rome
had once held over the Mediterranean Cultural Matrix.
Byzantium came to see itself as the heir of the Greeks, and it
preserved most of what we know of Greek literature. It also
developed its own distinctive style of Christianity, dividing the
Church into an "Orthodox" (Byzantine) and "Catholic" (Roman)
branch. As Byzantine power ebbed in the tenth and eleventh
centuries, a new power -- Kiev Rus -- developed to the north of
the Black Sea to spread Byzantine-style culture beyond the
bounds of the Byzantine Empire. As Kievan civilization came to
an end in the twelfth century, a further dispersal of
Mediterranean culture to the lands north and northwest of the
Black Sea occurred.
2.2. If we view the Byzantine Cultural Matrix from the vantage-
point of its emperors, we see an impersonal model of loyalty
centered around a ruler whose absolute power derives from God.
Such power implies a perspective of ethnocentrism in that it
deserves absolute loyalty, regardless of the individual who
holds the office of ruler. Values associated with the Byzantine
model of loyalty include: religious
faith, ceremony, system, efficiency, progress, sternness, uncerta
inty, violence, and unity.
Values of UNIFIED LOYALTY in the Islamic Cultural Matrix
3. The emergence of the Islamic Empire in the early seventh

century takes us to the sector of the Ancient Mediterranean
World for which there is little evidence. This is Arabia. And
Arabia provided the starting-point for the second partial
replacement for Rome.
3.1. The Islamic Empire became known for its military and
cultural achievements. Through conquest it would spread its
own version of the Mediterranean tradition throughout all the
old Mediterranean sectors east of the Aegean, and it would
extend eastward from ancient Mesopotamia as well. The
political success of Islam gave rise to the concept of the
"Middle East" in European society -- a kind of fiction, still with
us, that the dominant tendencies of the Islamic world are
"Oriental" in nature. Through the establishment of universities
in Spain, Islam established an important beachhead in Europe
and created an intellectual spark that would help point Europe
in a new direction.
3.2. In the Islamic Cultural Matrix, the root idea of unified
loyalty was "submission" to the will of the one true God (Allah)
as it was revealed word-for-word to the prophet Muhammad. We
may begin to understand the Islamic notion of loyalty-as-
submission by associating it with values such as wellbeing, one
true
God, fitra, prophets, Qur'an, shakir, pillars (shahada, tsalat, zak
at, tsawm, khajj), jihad, the group, and qadar. Described in our
categories of values-analysis, the perspective is ethnocentrism -
- there is no arguing with the revealed will of the universal, one
true God.
The Early European Cultural Matrix (476 to 1648)(this section
of the introduction exists to get rid of some terms and explain
their replacements -- if you want to skip it and move on to the
Feudal European Cultural Matrix, click here)
4. While Byzantium and Islam present for our consideration
models of unified loyalty, the situation in Europe is quite
different. Europe presents a more complex picture, both in
terms of definition and in terms of description, simply because
Europe developed in a more fragmented fashion than the

Byzantine or Islamic Cultural Matrixes.
4.1. Trying to come to an exact definition of the start of
"Europe" seems to be an unrewarding and hopeless task. To the
west of the Byzantine Empire, a new cultural geography
emerged from remnants of the Roman Empire, as the peoples of
the Roman territories north of the Mediterranean Sea blended
with the Germanic peoples still further north. By the eighth
century C.E., some who lived north of the Mediterranean were
starting to call this territory "Europe" /Bloch 1: xix/. Since the
name stuck, we of course use it. Despite great regional
differences, a distinctive style of culture developed, and we may
refer to the "Early European" Cultural Matrix.
4.2. As we trace the development from unified
loyalty to divided loyalty to the individual in the Early
European Cultural Matrix, we can find no clear and simple route
for our description. Consider:
"476" is a formal political date. It marks the last year a Roman
sat on the throne of the Roman Empire centered in Rome.
Evidence for what happened next across "Europe" is vague.
Many "historians" use 600 as an approximate starting-point,
even though it is not tied to any specific event -- rather, it
simply represents an "intuition" (based as much as anything on
the absence of evidence!!) that by 600 Rome was no longer in
political charge of anything
By the end of the Early European era, Europe collectively was
the dominant power in the world, and this power has done more
to shape the world than any other phenomenon of the last few
hundred years. We must find a way to account for the shifts in
values that made this happen
It is certainly possible to trace the major shifts in values that we
have mentioned, but any mode of presenting these shifts as a
simple chronological sequence runs into major difficulties,
because similar things happen at different times and there is an
incredible amount of overlap -- HOWEVER ...
... if we try to sidestep the attempt to describe Early Europe by
periods, we run into even greater difficulties because we have

no tangible pattern by which to organize our observations about
values
4.3. Commonly, "historians" divide the Early European Cultural
Matrix into two phases: the Middle Ages (or Medieval) and
the Renaissance. If you read any general "history" of Europe
written, say, over the last thirty years, you will find that "no
one" really likes this pattern. It is quite flawed in ways that are
easy to notice. So scholars continue to use the pattern, but
they tinker around with it.
4.3.1. The phrase "Middle Ages" reflects a view articulated by
Italian "humanists" during the fourteenth century. These
humanists used the concept of "Middle Ages" to devalue the
entire period between the end of Greco-Roman antiquity and
their own time. The term "Middle Ages" implies that the era had
no significant content or importance. In itself, the use of a
derogatory term to classify a cultural era is not a critical
handicap -- terms tend to lose their power over time. We reject
the term "Middle Ages" not so much because it is negative --
making the claim that the era was nothing more than a long
waste of time between two more important stages in
Mediterranean Culture -- but rather because it is misleading. It's
in the so-called "Middle Ages" that we discover the shift in
values that leads directly to the kind of world in which we live.
In standard "historical" treatments, this issue is resolved by
dividing the Middle Ages into two stages.
4.3.1.1. The first has often been called the "Dark Ages," from
around 600 to 1000. Problem is there's nothing very "dark"
about it. The general idea seems to be that "semi-civilized"
groups took over Europe during the centuries following the
collapse of the Roman Empire, and constant warfare drained
attention away from literature and art /McNeill 221, 237/. But
this doesn't work. New institutions and techniques emerged,
generated by the combination of knighthood (when the
invention of stirrups made lance-warfare possible), the heavy
(moldboard) plow which improved agriculture and expanded
possible lands for cultivation, and the development of seatrade

(which created an independent, assertive merchant class)
/McNeill 222, 234, 236-237/. In addition, the Church preserved
the Latin language, studied some Greco-Roman texts, and
maintained contacts outside of Europe. There was even a
"Renaissance"!
4.3.1.2. Then, things really got going after 1000, and historians
have to take account of the changes. So a "high" Middle
Ages (which may then be further subdivided) is born, covering
the period from about 1000 to 1350. If, as students of
humanities, we are looking at early Europe for shifts in values,
we note that all of the basic moves occur right here. In
significant ways, this era is not a continuation of the previous
era. It is a time of dramatic and surprisingly rapid change, a
time that must be explored in its own right.
4.3.2. This brings us to the Renaissance, say from about 1350 to
1600. "Rebirth," the literal meaning of the term Renaissance,
refers to the idea of some Europeans during this time-period
that they had bypassed their immediate cultural heritage and
revived Greco-Roman Culture, two claims that are generally
falsified by the actual events of the time-period. Greco-Roman
influence was not reborn because it never died, nor even been
lost. It was replaced and partly absorbed during the early
centuries of Europe (as well as Byzantium and the Islamic
world). The so-called "Renaissance" did pick up some pieces,
such as artistic styles, that had languished. Yet the Renaissance
ignored at least as much as it used -- for instance, the Greco-
Roman interest in democratic and republican forms of
government. The Renaissance revived only selected fragments
of the Greco-Roman heritage, and the immediate heritage of the
Renaissance provided an intellectual basis that was at least as
strong -- well, let's face it, stronger -- than the Greco-Roman
heritage. (The only way you can ignore this "fact" is to limit
your view of the "Renaissance" to a handful of writings and
pictures, and overlook virtually everything else that was going
on -- say in education, in science, in economics, in politics, in
religion.) Because the "Renaissance" was so limited in its

scope, scholars often speak of two periods here (as they do of
the "Middle Ages.")
4.3.2.1. First, there is the Renaissance proper. We might
consider this a movement associated primarily with southern
Europe. In rejecting -- as we do -- the use of the term
"Renaissance," we don't mean at all to overlook the marvelous
innovations that are usually located in this "matrix." Just to give
one example from the realm of art, we have movies as we know
them because "Renaissance" artists worked out the techniques
of "illusionism" -- techniques that "fool" the willing viewer into
believing that a two-dimensional image has three dimensions.
These techniques would have a profound effect on
cinematography. That these techniques depended on a sense of
Greco-Roman heritage is, to say the very least, doubtful. They
were invented by highly creative minds seeking new directions,
not merely seeking to recapture the past. We can better
appreciate the art, the writings, the music, and every other
cultural development if we abandon a limited and misleading
label. By freeing ourselves from a "Renaissance" prejudice, we
can explore real connections, real meanings, real values!
4.3.2.2. Here's the short, short story of the term "Renaissance."
To Giovanni Boccaccio in the fourteenth century, the concept
applied to contemporary Italian efforts to imitate the poetic
style of the ancient Romans. In 1550 the art historian Giorgio
Vasari used the word rinascita (rebirth) to describe the return to
the ancient Roman manner of painting by Giotto di Bondone at
the beginning of the fourteenth century. It was only later that
the word Renaissance acquired a broader meaning. Voltaire in
the eighteenth century classified the Renaissance in Italy as one
of the great ages of human cultural achievement. In the
nineteenth century, Jules Michlet and Jakob Burckhardt (1818-
1897) popularized the idea of the Renaissance as a distinct
historical period heralding the modern age, characterized by the
rise of the individual, scientific inquiry and geographical
exploration, and the growth of secular values.
4.3.2.2.1. Swiss historian Jakob Burckhardt's 1860 book, The

Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy, would prove to be
extremely influential. In it, he argued that the fourteenth and
fifteenth centuries witnessed a true revolution in values in that
country. People allegedly shook off the religious illusions and
institutional restrictions of their society and rediscovered both
the visible world and their own true selves. The essential
novelty of Renaissance culture was the accent it placed on the
individual and the delight it took in the beauties and
satisfactions of life. The humanistic heritage of Greece and
Rome, which stressed similar values, appealed to the people of
this age, and the revived interest in Greece and Rome
constituted the Renaissance. Moreover, according to
Burckhardt, the Italy of this period deserves to be considered
the birthplace of the modern world.
4.3.2.2.2. In the twentieth century the term Renaissance was
broadened to include other revivals of Greco-Roman culture,
such as the Carolingian Renaissance of the ninth century or the
Renaissance of the twelfth Century. Se we end up with at least
three Renaissances in the Early European Cultural Matrix!!
There seems to be a general consensus that the Italian
Renaissance is lacking in unique and distinctive qualities (apart
from innovations that are particular to it), yet few students of
science, technology and economy deny the validity of the term,
much less students of art and literature. (Music critics seem to
vary -- many of them are more interested in the twelfth century,
rather than the fourteenth, as the era of great innovations.)
4.3.2.3. That the Renaissance began in the fourteenth century
rather than the twelfth proved to be a handy notion for
supporting two kinds of agendas. The first agenda is explicit.
The further the Renaissance can be moved from the "Middle
Ages," the easier it becomes to devalue the "Middle Ages." But
there is also a hidden agenda tied to a late dating of the
Renaissance: "trashing" Islam and Christianity. The later the
dating, the easier it is to minimize the contribution of Islam in
passing on the Greco-Roman heritage and its own knowledge.
Here the dating finds geographical support. We should look for

the start of the Renaissance in fourteenth-century Italy, not
twelfth-century Spain. When the beginning of the Renaissance
is dated as closely as possible to the Reformation [see next
paragraph], it becomes easier to portray the Church as
oppressive, corrupt, and "Medieval." The Church is seen as an
institution that stands against individual freedom and open
inquiry, especially scientific and other types of scholarly
inquiry. As students of humanities, we should not pursue these
kinds of agendas. As students of the past, we should not accept
a fourteenth-century date for the start of any major new
developments in values.
4.3.2.4. In 1517, a large-scale event began in the north that
would change the face of Europe and the world. It's called
the Reformation. It set in motion a period of warfare that takes
us all the way to the treaty signed in 1648 that brings an end to
the "Early European" Cultural Matrix. At last! A useable term!!
It's about a real event, with real consequences -- not a fantasy
or a prejudice. (So if you thought we were trying to throw out
every descriptive category used for Early Europe, now you
know!) It would change religion, politics, economics, and every
other aspect of culture and values.
4.4. RECAP and PREVIEW. Here's the deal so far. Early Europe
presents us with a complex situation in which we detect a move
from from unified loyalty to divided loyalty to the individual.
We agree with previous students that the best way to get some
sense of this movement in values is to divide the matrix into
sub-matrixes, but we don't agree that "Middle Ages" and
"Renaissance" are very helpful if we want to focus on values.
What we want to do is invent "new" periods that will better
connect to the values-picture. As we look toward this, we need
to remind ourselves that we don't have an "ideal" solution.
Because of the nature of developments in Europe, there are
issues of chronology (when things happen) that we don't know
how to resolve. What we do is define three trajectories that
correspond to the three values under consideration, tie each
trajectory to specific events, and then explain the most

important thing about this scheme. Oh, you want to know right
now?! Well, the cultural motion established in the first era
doesn't really blossom until the second era. By then, of course,
it's too late because the values have changed. The same is then
true of the second era in respect to the third. So European
society tends to lag behind its own values until the third era.
Simply put, there is a lot of overlap and cultural lag. Another
major issue is that nothing happens everywhere -- so any of our
generalizations apply only to some sector of Europe, not all of
it. We try to select trends with significance for "our" lives as
well as "theirs" (which is pretty much what historians do!), and
that we find interesting for what they reveal about values. Our
description of periods aims to provide a rough guide to the
observations we will make about values. We can't put
everything in neat compartments, but we can get a realistic
sense of where Europe was going.
4.5. Now, here is our schema:
Feudal Europe -- 476-987 (Hugh Capet) -- unified
loyaltyUrban Europe -- 987-1347 (Black Plague) -- divided
loyaltyDynastic Europe (that is, new monarchies) -- 1347-1648
-- the individual
4.5.1. For Feudal Europe we have already given a rationale for
the use of 476. In 987 the great nobles of France elected as their
king Hugh Capet, whose descendants held the throne until 1792.
This event would slowly set in motion a stream of events that
brought an end to feudalism. It took a long time. The last
vestiges of feudalism in France did not disappear until the
French Revolution of 1789, and Feudal institutions are still
reflected in English constitutionalism.
4.5.2. Meanwhile, the year 987 brings us to a radical
transformation of European society and values, marked by the
re-emergence of cities, and the life that goes with them, as the
center of developments in values. Here is a real "rebirth," the
rebirth of urban life accompanied by a series of changes that
created what we might think of as "traditional" Europe -- that
is, a Europe that looked both forward and backward, a Europe

as it existed before the "Enlightenment" of the eighteenth
century. It was a time when one new event after another
occurred. It was also the time when feudalism reached the apex
of its political power, as "princes" used the system to maintain
stability in their domains. The great plague that began in 1347
would decimate the population of Europe. Conservative
estimates indicate that by 1450 all of Europe had less than one-
third the population it had had in the thirteenth century.
4.5.3. As Europe slowly recovered from the effects of the
plague, a renewed sense of confidence began to spread in the
late fifteenth century. In three leading kingdoms a new
assurance began to permeate the government as its leaders
reasserted their power and control over their domains. These
kingdoms were England, France, and Spain. The "new
monarchs" of these countries would raise their power, the power
of central authority, to previously unimagined heights --
marshaling the resources of their territories for personal gain
and glory. Meanwhile, the Germans, Italians, and Eastern
Europeans began to fall behind in this crucial respect. The
Reformation started in Germany in 1517. It would plunge
Europe into a series of wars that continued until the Peace of
Westphalia articulated a new situation. The Peace did not bring
an end to the dynasties, but it set trajectories in motion --
trajectories of the individual -- that would eventually undermine
the power of the dynastic monarchs of the last phase of the
Early European Cultural Matrix.
Values of UNIFIED LOYALTY in the Feudal European Cultural
Matrix
5. The social/economic system of Early Europe is called
"feudalism," and this system gives the name to the first phase of
the Early European Cultural Matrix. Feudalism is characterized
by links of dependence, and "vassalage" is the most general
term for these links. The links of dependence would evolve into
a complex stratification of society into classes, with group life
initially organized into self-sustaining, independent agricultural
co-ops called "manors." A "synthesis" of northern and southern

European values marked the formative stage of the Feudal
Cultural Matrix. A later synthesis of European and Islamic ideas
transformed Feudalism and initiated its extremely slow decline.
5.1. For Feudal Europeans, loyalty signified allegiance based on
obligation, and this unified, personal type of loyalty integrated
other values such as violence, security, justice, support, and
wellbeing. The strongest symbol for the loyalty-as-allegiance-
based-on-obligation value-system is the Feudal oath, or vow,
which establishes loyalty by affirming mutual support between
two people. The genius of Feudal loyalty is that it is personal in
nature, sealed with a vow made before God. It may be that in
our time and place, such a personal notion as a vow has become
outmoded. Our connection to our Feudal heritage exists in the
fact that we still place high value on personal treatment, even
though our situation today makes the idea of "personal" about as
outmoded as the idea of "vow." We live in a huge, bureaucratic
society governed by law (and all the stereotypes that accompany
such governance), in which most of us function as
interchangeable parts in systems beyond our control, or even
our understanding. (Remember the great line from the song
"Secret Agent Man": "They've given me a number and taken
away my name.") Yet do we not feel somehow betrayed when
our systems fail on the surface to treat us as personal human
beings, and don't our systems expend vast amounts of energy
trying to help us feel that our personal contributions are
important?
5.2. The largest-scale effort in Feudal Europe to unify loyalty
centered around the idea of "Christendom," with its vision of
uniting political and religious sovereignty in Europe under the
authority of the Church. The practical implementation of
Christendom centered around the concept of a "Holy Roman
Empire." On Christmas day of 800, Charlemagne, King of the
Franks, established the first actual "Holy Roman Empire" and
initiated a "CarolingianRenaissance" which attempted to renew
Greco-Roman cultural and artistic ideals. After the death of
Charlemagne, the Treaty of Verdun in 843 divided his empire

into units that would evolve into France, Germany and Italy. It
would take a long time for the consequences to be fully
realized, but a new Europe -- a Europe of states rather than
empires -- began to form. Europeans didn't know it, but the
feudal and Christian ideal of unified loyalty had just come to an
end.
5.3. The final development that sealed the fate of unified
loyalty occurred when the nobles of France elected as their
king Hugh Capet in 987. The Capetians established a long-lived
dynasty that replaced the idea of personal negotiations as the
path to kingship with the idea of heredity. This move also
anticipated the removal of the Church from its political role as
the keeper of unified loyalty. Although various parties would
not admit it for hundreds of years, the ability of unified loyalty
to integrate Feudal values had died.
5.4. The perspective of Feudal Christianity is the same as that
of Byzantine Christianity and Islam: one truth, revealed by God
for all people, produces ethnocentrism. However, in the Feudal
ideal of allegiance based on obligation, we find at least the
seeds of tolerance. In making deals for their mutual good people
had to listen to each other, to find a common ground.
Values of DIVIDED LOYALTY in the Urban European Cultural
Matrix
6. A surge of human energy generated major and rapid changes
in Europe as the millennium turned over. In the two centuries
from 1000 to 1200, with their booming growth in population, we
find the origins of "traditional" -- that is, pre-"modern" as
defined by developments in the eighteenth century -- European
civilization.
6.1. The Urban European Cultural Matrix inherited from its
Frankish precursors a view of loyalty that emphasized the
importance of institutions, and therefore law, over personal
relationships with their ethical and emotional ties. The new
emphasis moved loyalty on a line from personal to impersonal.
In so doing it led to the division, or fragmentation, of loyalties
for individuals. As an example, consider this question: If you

are a loyal vassal but have more than one lord, how do you
make a choice when two of your lords have competing or
conflicting demands?
6.2. Part of the essential formation of the Urban European
Cultural Matrix was a great synthesis between Feudal European
culture and Islamic culture. The synthesis introduced new goods
and new knowledge into Europe. Even more, it opened the
vision of Europeans to the "outside" world. A new materialism,
new ideas, a new horizon ... you can see the division of
loyalties increasing.
6.4. In assessing the value-system that was integrated by
divided loyalty, we notice the following as prominent values:
expansion and the mentality of colonialism
social changes that shifted the balance between the free and
unfree classes, and led to the emergence of a vital rural life in
towns and villages, accompanied by the Christianization of the
countryside
commerce in the form of trade, both within Europe and with the
other parts of the Mediterranean Cultural Matrix, accompanied
by the value of exchange
the rebirth of urban life, which enhanced the values
of administration and commercial services, promoted the rise of
a new merchant class as well as a new laboring class, revived
a money-economy which, in turn, would lead to new demands
for and forms of liberty and self-government,
a new emphasis on the value of talent, with its corollaries
of observation and reason
6.5. In the Urban European Cultural Matrix we may observe a
budding perspective of relativism. The preceding cluster of
values reveals that some important distinction between sacred
and secular was developing. The Church maintained
its ethnocentric view -- contributing to the evolution of a matrix
in which serious conflict must occur.
Values of THE INDIVIDUAL in the Dynastic European Cultural
Matrix
7. The plague that began in the mid-fourteenth century erased

the population explosion of the eleventh century, created a
massive disruption in economic production, and altered
Christian religious practice. In regrouping from the crisis
generated by the Plague, Europeans found a center in the value
of the individual that had started to become prominent in the
twelfth century. In five broad areas --
metallurgy, firearms, printing, navigation, and business
institutions -- European society began to move once more.
7.1. The increase in social and economic unrest after the Plague
led to political changes centered around the value of the
individual. By drawing on an ancient value in Mediterranean
tradition -- the leader principle -- "new monarchs" established
great dynasties, each appealing in its own way to some theory
of the "divine right" of kings to rule, in England, France, and
Spain. The new monarchs aimed to use the resources of their
territories to win prominence in the larger world. In their
ambition to control the resources of the entire world, the new
monarchs developed Urban European economic ideas into a
system called mercantilism, the forerunner of capitalism.
7.2. Another striking application of the value of the
individual was the Protestant Reformation. The Reformation
began in 1517 with the statement of an individual -- Martin
Luther -- about the nature of the Catholic Church and its
teachings. The Reformation marks the second phase of the
Dynastic European Cultural Matrix. It fractured Latin
Christianity and sparked a long period of warfare that
culminated in the Thirty Years' War of 1618-1648. In this war
the Dynastic European Cultural Matrix came to an end.
7.3. In the mid-sixteenth century, the Catholic Church itself
began a process of renewal that would re-invigorate its spiritual
and social force, and lead to a remarkable burst of creativity in
art, music, and writing. Here again, the value of the
individual would provide the focus. Drawing on the spirit
of humanism that had arisen in fourteenth-century Italy, the
Church resisted the urge toward "secularism" often associated
with humanism, and took advantage of humanist qualities such

as personal independence and individual expression. By giving
a new emphasis to the beauty of its places of worship and the
richness of its ceremony, the Church also put its own effective
spin on the humanist value of appreciation for the pleasures of
this world.
The humanist emphasis on the individual spurred an outburst of
creativity and revolutionary ideas. With this came a dramatic
rise in the level of conflict in society. By attaching the idea of
the individual to the notion of virtu, humanist values -- within
and without the Church -- produced an ethnocentric "me-first"
attitude that would continue to grow stronger as the Dynastic
European Matrix developed. The story of Galileo's conflict with
the Church, a story that has continued into our own time,
illustrates both the potential and the danger of the value of the
individual.
NAME:
DATE: 8/9/2019
VALUE ANALYZED: Efficiency
DEFINITION:
Efficiency is the means in which something is convenient and
able to do its purpose,
especially when it comes to older versions. Another key term
that points toward efficiency is
progress, does one event or version make this one superior or

inferior? Efficiency is all about
what makes things faster and better.
NARRATIVE:
When I played hockey in high school, I started with an old
department store wooden stick
that was heavy and was unable keep up with the speed of the
game. However, as I improved my
game and became older in the years, I bought a newer stick
from a proshop and it costs me close
to three hundred dollars. This stick was much more efficient and
improved. I was able to carry it
around as it was lighter and it had holes near the bottom of the
stick so that it was able to move
through the air for a quicker shot. Also, it was more durable
when other players slashed their
stick against mine, and overall hold up longer and be more
efficient. In conclusion, the progress
of the two sticks brought forth values of efficiency,
improvement, and durability.
VALUES RELATIONSHIPS:
The value of efficiency and improvement are complementary to
each other as the
definitions in which they possess are very similar and they both

seem to follow each other. the
value of improvement is complementary with the value of
durability as well, once again, they
work together to achieve that same goal. Finally, the value of
improvement is utilitarian to the
value of efficiency as improvement focuses on making an item
better in order so that it may
become more efficient to the consumer.
VALUES PERSPECTIVE:
Through my experience, my attitude was that of
ethnocentricism. I was focused on
making myself a better player and I did not care to think about
what anyone else thought would
make me better. I was set on a specific stick because I knew
that it would make my playing life
easier and I went with what I knew would make me better.
PERSONAL VALUES ANALYSIS FORMAT
1. For each portfolio, choose one value from the list provided
for the cultural matrix under consideration and analyze
how that value has been exemplified in some event in your life.

The point of this analysis will be to explore how (a) value(s)
from a given cultural matrix remain(s) relevant within our
contemporary context.
2. The analysis should contain the following sections:
a. Definition (2 points): Clearly name the value and tell what
this value meant in the context of the cultural matrix from
which it is drawn. Do not simply supply a dictionary definition.
b. Narrative (8 points): Write a narrative that demonstrates how
you acted on the value you have chosen to discuss. You should
choose a particular incident in your own experience and tell
how the value was evidenced in your actions (not just in your
thoughts or rhetoric). In addition to reflecting on this main
value, you should name any other values present in this
scenario, either in your own behavior or in that of someone else.
c. Values Relationships (6 points): Discuss how the values
exemplified in your narrative relate to one another, using the
values relationship taxonomy from the “Values Analysis
Guide.” Besides naming the relationship between the two
values, give a sense of why you think this term accurately
captures how the two values are related in this scenario.
d. Values Perspective (4 points): Name the perspective
(ethnocentrism, relativism, or tolerance) from which you were
acting in the scenario under consideration and describe how or
why you adopted this perspective in that particular instance.
3. Format: Use subheads at the beginning of each section as
below. The text of the analysis should be double spaced. Each
section may be of any length, but the analysis should be a total
of 1½ to 2 pages.
NAME:

DATE:
VALUE ANALYZED:
DEFINITION:
NARRATIVE:
VALUES RELATIONSHIPS:
VALUES PERSPECTIVE:
II. Personal Values Analysis
You are to write one personal values analysis, as per the general
“Portfolio Specifications” handed out previously, on a value
chosen from one of the following lists. Since these lists are
derived from the “Values” overviews for the Byzantine-Islamic-
Early European Cultural Matrix, you may want to consult those
articles for background information. (If you do so, you should
cite them properly). Then analyze the value as it is enacted in
some story from your own life. This analysis should be 1½ to 2
pages in length. As with the primary source analyses, be sure to
follow the prescribed format closely. Most importantly, be sure
to relate the value you have chosen to its appropriate integrating
value.
[Byzantine (Unified Loyalty)].
[Islamic (Unified Loyalty)] Religious Faith (5.1.1)
Submission (3.1)
Ceremony (5.1.2)
Gratitude (shakir) (3.3.1)
Sternness (5.1.3)

Almsgiving (zakat) (3.3.2)
Impersonal Loyalty (7-7.1)
Importance of Group over Individual (3.4)
[Feudal European (Unified Loyalty)][Urban European (Divided
Loyalty)] Security (1.2.1)
Impersonal Loyalty (2-2.3.3)
Reciprocal Advantage (3)
Freedom (4.2) Interdependence
(3.1) Self-Government
(4.4.1) Homage/Fealty (4, 4.1)
Talent (4.5)
[Dynastic European (The Individual)]
Leadership (4.2-4.4)
Utility (4.5.2.2)
Secularism (6.1)
Worldly Pleasure (6.1)
Individual Expression (6.1)
Virtu (6.2)

Introduction to Values ofLOYALTY and THE INDIVIDUALin the Byzantin.docx

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