Unification Thought
Chapter 8: Theory of History
The theory of history presented here is not a description of historical facts; rather, it is a way of viewing history, including the questions of how human history started, by what kind of laws it is guided, and in what direction it is proceeding. It is, so to speak, a philosophy of history.
Why is a theory of history necessary? It is necessary in order to establish an image of the future and to present a correct direction for the future. From such a theory, the method for resolving actual problems will be drawn. In fact, finding fundamental solutions for today's complex world problems is impossible without a solid view of history, equipped with a clear vision of the future.
Thus far, many scholars have presented various views of history, but each and every one of those views grasped only one aspect of history, unable to grasp the whole aspect. None of them has been able to present a true image of tire future, and, therefore, none of them has been able to offer appropriate solutions to actual problems. Among them, no view of history was as influential as the materialist view of history, which is the Communist view of history. The materialist view of history grasped human history as the history of class struggle. Based on that, the materialist view of history presented a vision that, when the struggle between the bourgeoisie and the proletariat intensifies in capitalist society, revolution will take place and a classless communist society inevitably will come.
The materialist view of history has been serving as the driving force of the Communists' revolutionary belief. In the Socialist countries, however, where revolution has occurred on the basis of the materialist view of history, the ideal of Communism, far from coming true, has produced societies that are contrary to the ideal. The Communist ideal has now faded away.
Still, in the free world we cannot rind any existing view of history that can cope with the materialist view of history. Hence, we need to establish a new view of history that, having a clear vision for a future society, can overcome the materialist view of history. The Unification view of history is presented as such a view of history: it reveals the falsity of Communism by means of a thought based on a new view of God, namely, Godism; it interprets history based on historical facts; and it shows that human history is directed toward the world of God's original ideal of creation.
I. The Basic Positions of the Unification View of History
The Unification View of History views history from three fundamental perspectives: first, as sinful history; second, as history of recreation; and third, as history of restoration.
A. Sinful History
Sinful history was brought about by the human fall. Because of the fall, it was not possible for human history to start as principled, normal history; instead, it came to be filled with wars, pain, misery, and the like. Accordingly, finding fundamental solutions to the various problems in history is impossible without solving the problem of the human fall.
B. History of Re-Creation
Human beings, due to the fall of the first human ancestors, fell into a state of death in the spiritual sense.
The original human beings and the original world were lost while they were still incomplete. Therefore, throughout history, God carried out the dispensation of re-creating and reconstructing the world.
Accordingly, history became history of re-creation. In this process, the laws (laws of creation) and the Word (Logos) through which God had created human beings and the universe were applied also to human history. God's creation was carried out through the Word. Therefore, recreation was also carried out through the Word. Re-creation does not mean creating the universe all over again. Since the fall involved only the human being, the only being that needs to be recreated is the human being, which must be re-created through the Word. This is why God made saints, righteous people, prophets, and other spiritual leaders appear throughout history to spread truth and guide people spiritually.
C. History of Restoration
Due to the fall of the first human ancestors, the original human beings and the original world were lost, and non-principled (non-original) human beings came to live non-principled lives-that is, lives of pain and confusion-in this non-principled world. Thus, the original human being and the original world, which were the ideal of creation, became an ideal to be recovered.
From this standpoint, God had to restore the non-principled world and human beings back to their original states, in such a way that His creation would not end in failure. Accordingly, from the dawn of human history, God has conducted the dispensation to restore sinful people and the sinful world back to their original state. Consequently, human history became the history of the providence of restoration. Since God is the God of Principle, and the human fall resulted from human beings failure to observe certain conditions, the providence of restoration, also, was carried out according to certain laws. These laws are referred to as the "laws of restoration."
D. The Law-Governed Nature of History
To date, there have been few religious leaders or scholars that could show, clearly, the law-governed nature of history. For example, the Christian providential view of history has not presented persuasive laws.
In modern times, Hegel explained historical development according to the dialectic (i.e., idealistic dialectic), and asserted that history is the process of actualizing freedom through reason, and that, in the end, a rational state would be reached in which freedom would be fully realized. In Prussia, however, which Hegel regarded as an ideal state, freedom remained unactualized, and history just continued on. The historical laws described by Hegel were unrelated to reality.
In the twentieth century, Arnold Toynbee established his "cultural view of history," which was a magnificent view of history and through which lie analyzed in detail the genesis, growth, breakdown, and disintegration of civilizations. Yet, Toynbee did not present the definite laws of history.
Under these circumstances, only Marx's materialist view of history remained as allegedly showing the laws of history, calling itself a scientific view of history. In contrast, the Christian providential view of history has been dismissed from the field of learning, rejected as unscientific because of its inability to specify the laws of history.
The Unification View of History presents the laws of creation and the laws of restoration as the true laws at work in history. When those true laws of history are pointed out, the falseness of the materialist view of history is also exposed, since it becomes clear that the laws advocated by the materialist view of history are, in reality, pseudo laws, that is, nothing more than dogmatic assertions. Furthermore, the Unification View of History, by establishing the laws of history from a theological basis, has revived the traditional providential view of history, which has been regarded as unscientific, and has made it possible to treat the providential view as social science.
E. The Origin, Direction, and Goal of History
As for the question of when and how history started, namely, the origin of history, the Unification View of History regards the creation of humankind and the human fall as the origin of history, just as does the Christian providential view of history. There is also a question concerning the origin of the human race, namely, whether the human race had a single origin (monogenism) or multiple origins (polygenism). The Unification View of History advocates monogenism and asserts that the first human ancestors were Adam and Eve. This is affirmed because there is a law based on the Principle of Creation that "creation starts from one." Then, what is the goal of history? The Unification View of History regards the goal of history as the realization of the ideal world of creation. The direction of history is the direction toward that goal.
Therefore, the origin and goal of history are determined. However, how that goal is reached is not determined. Each step in the process of history is successfully completed only when people's portion of responsibility-especially the portion of responsibility of providential central figures-is fulfilled under God's Providence. Therefore, the process that history takes -- that is, whether history proceeds in a straight line or makes a detour; whether it is shortened or prolonged depends totally oil the efforts of human beings. This means that the process of history is undetermined and is entrusted to the people's free will.
The view that the goal is determined but the process is undetermined, and that the progress of history depends on the human portion of responsibility, or free will, is referred to as the "theory of responsibility."
II. The Laws of Creation
Historical changes have taken place in accordance with certain laws. These are the "Laws of Creation" and the "Laws of Restoration." Here, I will first explain the Laws of Creation. The Laws of Creation consist of
1. The Law of Correlativity
Every created being not only forms internally a correlative relationship between the principal element and the subordinate element within itself, but also, externally, forms another correlative relationship of subject and object between itself and another individual being, whereby it exists and develops. In this case, the subject and the object form a mutual relationship, centering on common purpose. Accordingly, the first requirement for a society to develop is that correlative elements (correlatives) of subject and object must form a reciprocal relationship in every field, such as culture, politics, economy, and science. Correlative elements of subject and object refer to Sungsang and Hyungsang, yang and yin, or principal and subordinate elements (or principal and subordinate individual beings).
Examples of correlatives are spirit and body, ideology and economic conditions (material conditions), spiritual culture and material culture, government and people, managers and workers, workers and instruments of production, principal parts and subordinate parts in a machine, and so on. As these correlative elements engage in the relationship of subject and object, development is achieved in culture, politics, economy, science, and so on.
2. The Law of Give-and-Receive Action
When the correlative elements of subject and object within a thing form a correlative relationship, the action of giving and receiving certain elements or forces takes place. Through this action, things maintain their existence and develop. Such interaction between subject and object is called give-and-receive action.
Thus, in history and in all fields, development occurs when the correlative elements (correlatives) of subject and object establish a correlative standard and perform harmonious give-and-receive action, centering on common purpose. For example, in order for a nation to maintain its existence and to prosper, government and people must form a relationship of subject and object for the purpose of the nation's prosperity and must engage in harmonious give-and-receive action. In an enterprise, investors, managers, workers, engineers, and machinery must have mutual relationships of subject and object and perform harmonious give-and-receive actions for the purpose of the prosperity of the enterprise. The "Law of Correlativity" and the "Law of Give-and-Receive Action" are in the relationship of the two sides of a coin, and we can combine them together and call them the "Law of Give-and-Receive Action" in a broader sense.
Give-and-receive action is harmonious, and is never oppositional or conflictive. Yet, the materialist view of history asserts that history develops through the struggle of opposites. Struggles may become an impetus for development, but while the struggle is going on, development will come to a standstill or may even retrogress. The assertion of the materialist view of history on this point is quite erroneous: it is intended only to rationalize class struggle.
3. The Law of Repulsion
Give-and-receive action takes place between the correlative elements of subject and object. Subject and subject (or object and object), however, repel each other' We call this repelling phenomenon the "action of repulsion." The action of repulsion in the natural world is originally latent and does not surface. It plays the role of strengthening or complementing the give-and-receive action between subject and object. For example, in the natural world, positive electricity and positive electricity (or negative electricity and negative electricity) repel each other, but this is an action to strengthen or complement the give-and-receive action between subject (positive electricity) and object (negative electricity), and never surfaces as itself.
Therefore, in the natural world, order is not disturbed through the action of repulsion.
In human society, however, the action of repulsion between subject and subject appears in the form of conflict between two leaders. An instance of this is the conflict between an established leader and a new leader at the time of a revolution. During such actions of repulsion, or rivalry, the conflicting subjects engage in give-and-receive action with their respective groups of people in the object position whereby they increase their respective forces. As a result, the two forces come into conflict with each other. In this case, one of the two camps is in a position closer to the direction of God's dispensation, whereas the other is in a position farther from it. The former is referred to as the "good side"; the latter, the "evil side." Accordingly, in human society the action of repulsion between one subject and another subject becomes a struggle between good and evil. When the side of goodness achieves victory in this struggle, the direction of history is changed a little toward the direction of goodness.
Also, there have been cases where the action of repulsion demonstrated its original complementarity to give-and-receive action. An example is the case where one country and another, or the people of one country and the people of another, compete with each other in a peaceful manner. As a result, both develop culturally and economically.
4. The Law of Dominion by the Center
In the give-and-receive action between subject and object, the subject becomes the center, and the object comes to receive dominion by the subject. As a result, the object comes to perform circular motion centering on the subject. For this reason, physical circular motion in the natural world is performed. For example, the earth revolves around the sun, and electrons revolve around the nucleus. In human society, since the relationship of subject and object is that of mind and body, circular motion takes place in the sense that the object follows the orders, instructions, and requests of the subject.
In the history of restoration, God establishes central figures, and through them, leads society in a direction in accord with the providence of God, namely, in the direction of goodness. In this case, He first forms a social environment, and then inspires the central figure to lead that environment in a direction in accord with the providence of God. For that to happen, the central figure is given a portion of responsibility to fulfill. In this way, there is a law that the central figure has dominion over the environment. We call it the "Law of the Dominion by the Center." This law has been applied not only to the chosen people; it applies to all peoples and countries.
The history of the chosen people is the central history -- that is, the history of the Israelites in the Old Testament Age and the history of Western nations centered on Christianity, in the New Testament Age. In central history, God carried out His providence by establishing central figures. Examples of the central figures of different periods are Noah, Abraham, Moses, the kings, and the prophets in the Old Testament Age, Christian leaders, such as the popes, Martin Luther, and John Calvin, and political leaders, such as Charlemagne (Kingdom of the Franks), George Washington, and Abraham Lincoln in the New Testament Age.
Side by side with the work of God, the work of Satan is also going on. Satan, who seeks to oppose God's providence, has sought to establish a sphere of dominion centered on himself. By establishing a central figure on the Satanic side, Satan has sought to have dominion over the environment through that central figure. Kaiser Wilhelm II and Adolf Hitler, who sought world domination by advocating pan-Germanism, and Stalin, who aimed -it the conquest of the world through Communism, were such central figures.
Toynbee said, "The growths of civilizations are the work of creative individuals or creative minorities." 2 The masses are guided by creative individuals or creative minorities, and follow them. This assertion by Toynbee points to the law of dominion by the center.
The materialist view of history theoretically attaches greater importance to the environment (i.e., the social environment) than to leaders, and asserts that the masses play the decisive role in social development; in that view, the leaders' actions are determined by their specific social environment. This way of thinking is based oil materialism, in which spirit is generated from matter, and matter is more important than spirit. It regards the social environment as a material category, and central figures (leaders) as a spiritual category.
This is not a correct view, however. The leaders are the subject, and the masses, the object; based on their religious or political ideologies, the leaders guide the masses, or society, in a certain direction.
5. The Law of Completion through Three Stages
According to the Principle of Creation, the growth or development of all things is attained through a process of three stages, namely, Formation, Growth, and Completion. For example, plants mature and perfect themselves through the three stages of germinating, of growing stems and putting forth green leaves, and of blooming flowers and bearing fruit. This law applies in history as well; often the providence of re-creation has been carried out through a process of three stages. To elaborate, it is a law that if a certain providential event ends in failure, that providence can be prolonged up to a third time (or a third stage), but will necessarily be accomplished at the third stage.
For example, because Adam, due to the fall, failed to fulfill the purpose of creation, God sent Jesus as the Second Adam. But since Jesus was crucified and so could not fulfill the purpose of creation completely, God can send the Lord of the Second Advent as the Third Adam to fulfill the purpose of creation.
In the modem era, which is the period of preparation to receive the Lord of the Second Advent, movements for the revival of Hebraism and Hellenism have arisen, and each developed through the process of three stages. The movement for the revival of Hebraism refers to a God-centered movement, or a religious reformation. Following the First Religious Reformation, centered on Martin Luther and John Calvin, there arose the Second Religious Reformation, centered on John Wesley, George Fox, and others; and today, we are in the period of the Third Religious Reformation movement (the third God-centered movement). On the other hand, the movement for the revival of Hellenism refers to a humanistic movement. Following the Renaissance, the first humanistic movement, there arose the Enlightenment, the second humanistic movement. The Enlightenment today bore fruit in the form of the Communist ideological movement, the third humanistic movement.
A God-centered movement is a movement raised by God to counter a humanist movement. Accordingly, the Third Religious Reformation, which is the third God-centered movement, is a movement to overcome the Communist movement, which is the third humanistic movement. Thus, according to the ". w of Completion through Three Stages, the movement on God's side will actually be consummated and will prosper, whereas the movement on Satan's side will decline and perish in due time, even though the Satanic movement may also become consummated at the third stage. In the end, the movement on Satan's side will be defeated by the movement on God's side.
6. The Law of the Period of the Number Six
According to the Bible, in the creation of the universe by God it took six days to create Adam. In other words, the creation of Adam was achieved on the basis of a six-day period, as planned. That was the period of preparation for the creation of Adam.
In the history of re-creation as well, God began the preparation to receive the Messiah at the start of a period of the number six before the coming of the Messiah, the Second Adam Jesus). That period began from the sixth century BC As part of that preparation, God sent prophets, such as Jeremiah and Malachi, to the Jewish people from about the sixth century BC, and allowed the Jewish people be taken captives to Babylon that they might repent and turn away from their faithlessness. Around the sixth century BC, Confucius (ca. 551-479 BC) appeared in China and established Confucianism. Subsequent to Confucius, toward the third century BC, many philosophers appeared in China, and the golden age of Chinese thought was established. In India, Gautama Buddha (ca. 563-483 BC) appeared in the sixth century BC and established Buddhism. Around the sixth century BC as well, the ancient Indian philosophical books called the Upanishads were formed. And in Greece, philosophy and science developed greatly from the sixth century BC All of those were preparations to receive the Messiah. God made preparations in this way by guiding the various peoples on earth in the direction of goodness through the methods appropriate to the people in each region.
Karl Jaspers noticed the fact that spiritual leaders (philosophers and founders of religions) appeared at about the same time in different regions of the world, such as China, India, Iran, Palestine, and Greece. He called that period the "Axial Period." Why did it happen? Jaspers had no explanation, and lie held it to be a mystery and a riddle in history. 4 Today, however, this can be clarified for the first time, through the law of the period of the number six.
Furthermore, in order to send the Lord of the Second Coming, who is the Third Adam, God also made preparations at the start of a period of the number six. Good examples are the Reformation and tire Renaissance, 5 which started around the fourteenth century and blossomed in the sixteenth century. The Industrial Revolution (tire late eighteenth century) and the subsequent sudden development of science and economy also were preparations for tire coming of the Messiah. In this providential work, God's intention is to send the Lord of the Second Coming in the twentieth century.
The religious leaders and philosophers who appeared six centuries before the birth of Jesus were in the positions of archangels, whose mission was to pave the way for the Messiah. Accordingly, the truth they brought was not the complete truth, but a partial truth. The Messiah, who is the Son of God, was to come later to preach the complete, absolute truth and to settle the unresolved questions of religions and thoughts.
That is to say, in the Last Days, he was to revive and strengthen, with the absolute truth, the traditional religions and thoughts, which were incapacitated, and to realize the unified world through the unification of religions and thoughts.
Since, however, Jesus died on the cross, the realization of the unified world did not take place, and the mission of Jesus was entrusted to the Lord of the Second Coming. Further, Confucianism, Buddhism, Greek philosophy, and other thoughts have remained un-unified until the time of the Second Coming. A dispensation will be carried out at the time of the Second Coming similar to that planned for Jesus' time.
That is to say, the Lord of the Second Coming will settle the unresolved questions of traditional religions and thoughts by means of the absolute truth he will bring. He will unify religions and thoughts, and will realize the unified world. It should be noted that it is not necessary to establish totally new religions and philosophies six centuries before the Lord of the Second Coming, as it happened six centuries before Jesus.
We need only to revive the already existing religions and philosophies.
7. The Law of Responsibility
The first human ancestors, Adam and Eve, were given a portion of responsibility to fulfill; with that responsibility no one could interfere, not even God. The purpose of it was to enable them to attain the qualification for dominion over the universe. Adam and Eve were to become perfected only when the human portion of responsibility, in addition to the portion of responsibility accomplished by God, was fulfilled. Yet, they failed to fulfill that portion of responsibility and fell.
The providence of re-creation is to be accomplished in the same way, that is, when the human portion of responsibility (especially that of providential central persons) is fulfilled in addition to God's portion of responsibility. Here, to fulfill the human portion of responsibility means to accomplish a mission that one has been given, through taking responsibility for that mission out of one's own free will.
Accordingly, if the providential persons fulfill their portions of responsibility, through their own wisdom and effort, in accordance with God's will, the providence moves to a new stage. If, however, those persons do not fulfill their portions of responsibility, the providence centered on them ends in failure and comes to be prolonged. After a certain numerological period of time, a new person is called to carry out the same providence.
The reason why human history has been prolonged as sinful history until today is that the providential persons have continually failed in fulfilling their portions of responsibility. Jesus was crucified and was unable to realize the unified world because the leaders of his time, including John the Baptist, the priests, and the lawyers, failed to fulfill their portions of responsibility. After World War 11 until today, Communism has caused conflicts all over the world, and confusion has occurred constantly due to the collapse of values in capitalist nations. All this has occurred because leaders of the Christian nations have failed to fulfill their portions of responsibility. 6
III. The Laws of Restoration
Human history is a history of re-creation, and at the same time a history of restoration, that is, the process to recover the original ideal world, which was lost due to the human fall. Accordingly, a series of laws, different from the Laws of Creation, are also at work in history.
These are the Laws of Restoration. These laws include
1. The Law of Indemnity
The human fall refers to the fact that human beings lost their original position and state. Restoration is the process of regaining the lost position and state. Yet, in order to regain the original position and state, certain conditions have to be established. The conditions for this purpose are called "conditions of indemnity." The conditions of indemnity that human beings establish are the foundation of faith and the foundation of substance.
To establish the foundation of faith means that the people must meet a leader (central figure) chosen by God and must fulfill a certain conditional object, centering on that leader, during a specified numerological period of indemnity for faith. Establishing the foundation of substance means that the people obediently follows the leader chosen by God.
When we examine history, however, we see that people in sinful societies very seldom obeyed the leaders chosen by God; instead, most of the time they persecuted them. Accordingly, the paths of righteous people, sages, and saints continually turned into courses of hardship.
Yet, the hardships undergone by those righteous leaders became the sacrificial indemnity conditions that made the people of the sinful world be subjugated and restored to the side of God. In other words, with the hardships of righteous leaders as a condition, Cod made the people repent. This is the Law of Indemnity. The representative example is Jesus' crucifixion. Because of Jesus' crucifixion, many people in the sinful world were awakened to their sinfulness and repented.
Up to the present, dictators have persecuted and killed numerous religious people, righteous people, and good people, during the revolutions and in the power struggles after the revolution. Taking the suffering of the righteous people as a condition, however, God finally made the dictatorial regimes surrender, and liberated the people. Communist dictators, especially, have killed tens of millions of people and put numerous people in prison during Communist revolutions and in the power struggles after the revolutions. Taking the suffering of the people as a condition, God made the Communist regimes fall and liberated the people under Communist rule.
2. The Law of Separation
Since the Creator is the one and only God, the originally created man and woman were supposed always to be related to God only. Due to the fall, however, Adam came to be related to Satan also. For that reason, when God tried to relate to Adam, Satan was in a position to compete with God in relating to Adam as well. Therefore, God was unable to conduct any kind of providence through Adam as long as he continued in that kind of position. Accordingly, God separated Adam's children to the side to which God could relate, and to the side to which Satan could relate. The one separated to God's side was Abel, the younger brother, and the one separated to Satan's side was Cain, the elder brother. 7 God intended to restore both Cain and Abel to His side by having Cain obey Abel. The fall had occurred when the human being (Adam), who was on God's side, was subjugated by Satan's temptation. To achieve restoration through indemnity, God intended for Cain, who was on Satan's side, to obey Abel, who was on God's side. Thus, when Cain and Abel made offerings, God wanted Cain to make offering to God not directly, but rather through Abel. Instead, however, Cain hated Abel, and even killed Abel. Consequently, human history came to start as sinful history. 8 But there still existed the foundation of heart with which Abel, who had been separated to God's side, remained loyal to the end. So, with that foundation as a condition, God was able, throughout history, to separate people to God's side out from the Satanic world. 9 Starting with an individual on God's side (the good side), God has gradually expanded the sphere of the good side by establishing a family on the good side, then a tribe, a people, a nation, and a world on the good side. Yet, Satan, who was working in opposition to God's providence, has preceded God's side by starting with an individual on Satan's side (the evil side), and expanding the sphere of evil by establishing a family, a tribe, a people, a nation, and a world on the evil side. By so doing, Satan has been obstructing God's providence.
Usually, the good side conveyed God's Word to the evil side, but the evil side refused to accept that Word, and instead waged an attack with armed forces. Thus, struggles were carried out as the good side responded to those attacks. Therefore, struggles on different levels have taken place throughout history between an individual on the good side and an individual on the evil side, between a family on the good side and a family on the evil side, between a tribe on the good side and a tribe on the evil side, between a people on the good side and a people on the evil side, between a nation on the good side and a nation on the evil side, and finally, between the world on the good side and the world on the evil side. Thus, history has become a history of struggles between good and evil. In the process of the history of restoration, however, the good side and the evil side are not good and evil in the absolute sense. The side relatively closer to God's providence was separated to the good side, and the side relatively farther from God's providence was separated to the evil side.
After World War II, the world became separated into two large blocs, namely, the bloc on the side of good and the bloc on the side of evil.
Those were the free world and the Communist world. More precisely, they were the group of countries that respected religion (especially Christianity) and the group of countries that denied religion.
The purpose for which God separated the world into the good side and the evil side was to restore both sides by having the evil side be subjugated by the good side. In the end, the entire world will be restored to God when the good side wins complete victory in the struggle between the two blocs. The unification of the free world and the Communist world will be accomplished, ultimately, when the Messiah is received. Since good and evil came into being because of the faithlessness of Adam, unification can be accomplished through the Messiah, who comes in the position of Adam.
3. The Law of the Restoration of the Number Four
God's purpose of creation was to realize His love through the family four-position base. That is to say, if Adam and Eve had grown according to God's Word and had perfected themselves, they would have become husband and wife centering on God, and would have given birth to children. Then, the family four-position base, consisting of God, Adam (Husband), Eve (Wife), and their children, would have been formed, and God's love would have been actualized there. Due to the fall of Adam and Eve, however, such a family four-position base centered on God could not be formed; instead, a family four-position base centered on Satan was formed, and the entire world was put under the dominion of Satan. After that, it became the central purpose of history to restore the family four-position base centered on God.
In order to restore the four-position base, God first conducted a symbolic, conditional providence, the goal of which was to establish a period with a duration signified by the number four. This is called the Law of the Restoration of the Number Four. The restoration of the number four was a condition of indemnity to restore the family four-position base numerologically. The period of the number four is realized through periods of forty days, forty years, four hundred years, and so on, during which confusion is brought about by Satan and the people on God's side undergoes hardships. Examples are Noah's forty-day flood, Moses' forty years in the wilderness, four hundred years of persecution of Christians under the Roman Empire, and so on. When such periods of indemnity were over, confusion was brought under control, in the sense that the four-position base was restored conditionally, and God's providence was able to proceed to a new stage.
The Law of the Restoration of the Number Four applied not only to the history of the Israelites, but also to the history of other peoples and countries.
Arnold Toynbee noted that there were many cases in history where unification was accomplished after a period of four centuries of confusion (period of turmoil). We can cite many examples: the four centuries in the Hellenic World from the Peloponnesian War to the unification by the Roman Empire (431-31 BC); about four centuries (634-221 BC) from the period of the "Contending States" to the unification by the Ch'in and Han Empires in Chinese history; and about four centuries (1185-1597) of feudalistic anarchy from the Kamakura-Ashikaga period to the unification of all of Japan by Toyotomi Hideyoshi and the establishment of the Tokugawa Shogunate in Japanese history. Toynbee did not clarify, however, the reason why such periods of four centuries appeared in history. 10 A similar case is the forty-year rule of Korea by the Japanese, starting with the Eul-sa Treaty of Protection in 1905 and ending with the liberation of Korea in 1945.
4. The Law of Conditioning Providence
The Law of Conditioning Providence refers to the fact that, in certain cases, if a central person fulfills, or fails to fulfill, the human portion of responsibility in accordance with God's Will in one providential event, that will condition a specific providential event of a later period.
This means that a providential event not only has an important significance in itself, but also may determine and condition providential events that will occur later.
For example, we know of the case in which Moses struck the rock twice in the wilderness (Deuteronomy, Ch. 20). Moses' act had, in itself, an actual necessity due to circumstances of that time, namely, to enable the thirsty Israelites in the wilderness to drink water. At the same time, however, it also had the significance of symbolizing and conditioning God's providence at Jesus' coming, at a later date.
About this matter, Divine Principle tells us the following: The rock symbolized Adam. Specifically, the rock as not bringing forth water, prior to being struck by Moses, symbolized the first Adam; in contrast, the rock as bringing forth water, after being struck once by Moses, symbolized Jesus, the Second Adam. Since water symbolizes life, the first Adam, who was in the state of spiritual death due to the human fall, could be symbolized as a rock that does not bring forth water; and Jesus, the second Adam, who would come in order to give life to dead people, could be symbolized as a rock that brings forth water. Yet, Moses, impelled by anger at the faithlessness of the Israelites, struck the rock twice; and in so doing, lie struck the rock bringing forth water, which symbolized Jesus. Through that act, the condition was established whereby, if later, when Jesus came, the Israelites were to fall into disbelief, Satan would be able to strike Jesus, who was the reality symbolized by the rock. Thus, the double striking of the rock by Moses became, in fact, the remote cause for Jesus' crucifixion due to the disbelief of the Israelites. 11 This is one example from history as recorded in the Old Testament. The Law of Conditioning Providence was at work not only in this incident, but also in other historical events that were significant in God's providence. This means that providential events did riot.just happen at that time, for no particular reason, but rather, they were conditioned, to a certain degree, by various factors prior to them, and how a particular event developed, in turn, has influenced later historical events.
5. The Law of the False Preceding the True
This is a law under which the false appears before the true one appears. Satan dominated the world, which had been created by God, by inducing the first human ancestors to fall away from God. Therefore, when Satan tried to create a non-principled world of a pseudo-principle type, in advance of, and imitating God's providence, God could not but allow it. So, God has had to carry forward His providence to build the principled world by following the footsteps of Satan. The non-principled world created by Satan is false; thus, even though it may prosper, its prosperity is only temporary. As God's providence progresses, Satan's non-principled world cannot but eventually collapse.
The ultimate goal of the Providence of Restoration is to actualize, on earth, a world in which the ideal of creation centered on God is realized, that is, one state in which the entire world is united. That is the kingdom of God, or the Kingdom of Heaven on earth, where God is the supreme sovereign. That world was supposed to be realized only through the coming of the Messiah. Satan, however, knew God's plan, and he stole the contents of the providence in advance, established Messianic persons on the Satanic side before the coming (and before the second coming) of the Messiah, and attempted to create an ideal state on the Satanic side. That is why a false Messiah and a false unified world appeared first.
A good example of this is the appearance of the Roman Empire prior to the coming of Jesus. Julius Caesar appeared in the Roman Empire, conquered all of Gaul, incorporated it into the Roman Empire, and accomplished the unification of the Roman Empire (45 BC). After lie was assassinated, Augustus (Octavian) brought the civil war under control (31 BC), and unified the entire Mediterranean area, building what was virtually a world empire. The peaceful and happy period of the Roman Empire was called the Pax Romana and lasted for about two centuries. Julius Caesar and Augustus were messianic figures on the Satanic side. They created a false unified world of peace and happiness in advance of the great unified world of everlasting love, peace, and happiness that was to be built through the coming of the true Messiah (Jesus). As it turned out, Jesus was crucified with his mission uncompleted, and therefore the true unified world, or true ideal world, did not appear at that time.
At the time of the Second Coming as well, a false Lord of the Second Advent (a false Messiah) and a false ideal world appear in advance of the providence of the Second Coming. That false Messiah was Stalin, and the false ideal world was the Communist World. Stalin, in fact, was revered as "the sun of humankind," like a Messiah, and aimed to unify the world through Communism. Stalin died in 1953, but from a providential viewpoint, that was the time when the official course of the providence of the Second Coming was to start. The subsequent division of international Communism was a foreshadowing of the collapse of the false unified world and the start of the true unified world.
6. The Law of the Horizontal Reappearance of the Vertical
According to the Law of the Horizontal Reappearance of the Vertical, the vertical reappears as horizontal at the time of the consummation of the history of restoration. "Vertical" refers to the passage of time, and "horizontal" refers to spatial expansion.
In other words, the vertical refers to history, and the horizontal refers to the present-time world. Accordingly, the horizontal reappearance of the vertical means that God conducts His providence in a way that all the providential events and persons of history reappear symbolically, on the worldwide level, at the consummation of history. In this manner, God has sought to resolve, at one time, all the various problems (events) that ended unresolved due to failures of providential figures at various times in history up to that particular time, and to complete the history of the providence of restoration.
For example, in the two-thousand-year period of the providence of restoration from Adam to Abraham, the vertical indemnity conditions that had been invaded by Satan were restored through indemnity by the three generations of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. At the time of Jesus, the providential events that had ended in failure due to the invasion of Satan during the four thousand years from Adam to Jesus were made to reappear by God horizontally so that they might be restored through indemnity at one time. Accordingly, at the time of the providence of the Second Coming, all the events invaded by Satan in the six-thousand-year history from Adam must reappear horizontally and be restored through indemnity, centering on the Lord of the Second Coming.
Rarely in history was a providential event completely resolved before the next providence began. History passed with almost all of the providential events unresolved, having been concluded only conditionally. As long as these historical events remain unresolved, there can be no true peace on earth. The problems of today's society can be resolved completely by resolving all those historical events.
For example, there are conflicts between Israel and the Arab nations today. This is the reappearance of the struggles between the Israelites and their surrounding peoples in the Old Testament days. Accordingly, it is difficult to resolve the present-day conflict between Israel and the Arabs merely as a political problem. When it comes to the consummation of history in the last days, various unexpected events happen one after another, and the world is thrown into confusion. This is so because the various unresolved problems from past history reappear in the present period through the work of the Law of the Horizontal Reappearance of the Vertical. Such confusion and conflicts will come to be fundamentally resolved only through receiving the Lord of the Second Coming and reconciling, through God's love, people in conflicting relationships.
The reason why God causes the events of history to reappear in the Last Days, whereby they become fundamentally resolved, is that God wishes to achieve two purposes: first, to recondition the six thousand year history as though it had been developing all along without the fall, thus sweeping away the memories of the numerous miserable events in history once and for all; and second, to subjugate Satan completely by eliminating all conditions for accusation by Satan.
7. The Law of Synchronous Providence
The Law of Synchronous Providence is a law under which a providence conducted in a certain period in the past is repeated at a later period. Such two providential periods, which are in the relationship of time-identity, display similar aspects in terms of central figures, main events, numerological time periods, etc. This is because, in case a certain providential central figure did not fulfill his or her portion of responsibility, the providential period centered on that particular person would come to an end, and after a certain period of time, another person would be established to restore through indemnity the historical course of the previous period. In such cases, since conditions of indemnity are gradually compounded together with the prolongation of the providence of restoration, the previous period would not be repeated precisely as before, but rather would be repeated on a higher dimension. Consequently, history has come to develop in a spiral.
Then, how did the Law of Synchronous Providence work in history? In the providence of restoration centered on the family level, during the two-thousand-year period from Adam to Abraham (the Providential Age for the Foundation of Restoration), the Messiah was unable to come due to the non-completion of the providence. As a result, the two-thousand-year period of the providence of restoration centered oil the Israelites from Abraham to Jesus (tile Providential Age of Restoration) appeared as the synchronous providence. Since the two-thousand-year period from Abraham to Jesus for the providence of restoration centered on the Israelites also ended in non-completion due to tile crucifixion of Jesus, the two-thousand-year period of the providence of restoration (Providential Age of the Prolongation of Restoration) centered on Christianity from Jesus until today appeared as its synchronous providence. Arranging the characteristics of synchronism of the two periods of the two thousand years from Abraham to Jesus and the two thousand years from Jesus until today, we have a diagram as in Fig. 8-1.
Fig. 8-1: The Providential Synchronism of the Period of the Providence of Restoration and the Period of Prolongation of the Providence of Restoration.
Synchronism in history was discovered by Oswald Spengler. He said that all cultures develop according to the same formula, and therefore, similar events appear in any two cultures of the world. He described these corresponding events as "synchronous.'" Arnold Toynbee discovered synchronism in history at about the same time as Spengler. While lecturing on Thucydides, Toynbee explained how he had realized that the history of ancient Greece and modern Western history are synchronous: The year 1914 caught me at the University of Oxford, teaching the history of classical Greece. In August 1914, it flashed in my mind that the fifth-century BC historian Thucydides had already tile experience that was now overtaking me. He, like me, had been overtaken by a fratricidal great war between the states into which his world had been divided politically. Thucydides had foreseen that his generation's great war would be epoch making for his world, and the sequel had proved him right. I now saw that classical Greek history and modern Western history were, in terms of experience, contemporary with each other. Their courses ran parallel. They could be studied comparatively. 13 (italics added) Toynbee dealt with ancient Greek history and modern Western history as synchronous. In the Unification view of history, ancient Greek history was the period of the preparation for the coming of the Messiah, and modern Western history is the period of' the preparation for the Second Coming of tile Messiah. These two periods have synchronism, and the essential significance of their synchronism is that each is a preparation period for receiving the Messiah.
IV. Changes In History
The laws of creation and the laws of restoration discussed above were all at work in history, but the most important ones are the Law of Give-and-Receive, the Law of Repulsion, the Law of Indemnity, and the Law of Separation. Among them, the Law of Give-and-Receive becomes the "Law of Development" in changes in history, and the other three together become the "Law of Turning." (The Law of Turning is also called the "Law of the Struggle between Good and Evil.") It has already been explained that history has been developing through give-and-receive action; that is, development in the political, economic, cultural, and all other fields takes place through harmonious give-and-receive action between various pairs of subject and object, such as spirit and matter, people and the environment (society and nature), government and people, organization and organization, individual and individual, people and machinery, and so on.
Development refers to growth, progress, improvement, and the appearance of a new quality-all of which are irreversible types of forward motion. These phenomena appear when the correlative elements of subject and object engage in give-and-receive action centering on a common purpose. On the other hand, struggle occurs between a subject and a subject that have different purposes and different interests. When struggle takes place, development or progress will be either suspended or reversed. Accordingly, any kind of development or progress appearing in history took place, without exception, through give-and-receive action.
Subject and subject oppose and struggle with each other according to the Law of Repulsion. In human history the repulsion between one subject and another refers to the conflict between one leader and another. One example is the struggle between the leaders of the bourgeoisie and the royalist aristocrats centered around Louis XVI, namely, the struggle between new leaders and old leaders at the time of the French Revolution.
The two parties were separated according to the Law of Separation, with one party on tile relatively good side (the position that was relatively closer to God's providence) and the other party on the relatively evil side (the position that was obstructed God's providence). The subjects formed their good and evil camps, respectively, by attracting people, who were in the object position, to their respective sides (separating the people into two parts), and fought with each other. The question of which leader is good and which is evil is a matter to be decided on the basis of the extent to which a leader is in accordance with God's providence. In many cases, however, the leaders in an existing society were carrying out tyrannical rule, leaning toward self centered desire, and so God would often establish new leaders on the good side and would work a providence through them.
In the struggle between good and evil, if the good side wins, history turns to a better direction. Subsequently, when history reaches yet another new stage, another leader, who is even better, will appear. Then the old leader will come to stand in a relatively evil position, and a new struggle between good and evil will start.
Again, if the good side wins, history will turn once more to an even better direction. Finally, through this process, history will reach the stage of perfect goodness, that is, the stage of the ideal of creation. Only then will the struggle between good and evil come to an end. Accordingly, struggle does not bring development, but it does change the direction of history.
In the struggle between a good subject and evil subject, when the evil side was stronger, God would attempt to bring the evil side to surrender by using the Law of Indemnity. To explain, God would guide die leaders on the good side to sacrifice and walk the path of persecution. With that as a condition, He would influence the people on the evil side to come to a natural surrender to Him, would isolate the leader of the evil side, and would finally lead the good side to victory. It has been through this Law of Indemnity that religions have been propagated throughout the world until today, even through persecution.
In the struggle between good and evil, when the good side does not fully accomplish its responsibility and the evil side wins a victory, then naturally history does not turn to a better direction but is prolonged in its existing direction, remaining as it is. After a specified length of time, God again establishes a good leader and works to win victory over the evil side. This is the way God has been guiding history toward a better direction.
Therefore, human history, has not been the history of class struggle, but rather the history of the struggle between good and evil.
In this way, history develops through the give-and-receive action between the subject and object, and when it comes to a certain point of time, its direction is turned through the struggle between good and evil, and after the turn, history once again develops through the give-and-receive action between the subject and object.
History has undergone changes by repeating this process. The process of historical changes can be illustrated in Fig. 8-2.
From what was said above, we see that history has undergone changes in two directions, namely, the direction of development (progress), and the direction of restoration (turning). Development here refers to the development of science, economy, and culture; and restoration refers to the recovery of the lost ideal world originally intended-a world of love and peace. The reason why these two directions have occurred in history is that human history is the history of re-creation and at the same time the history of restoration. The future world will be a world of highly developed science and technology, and at the same time a highly ethical society. The world of science and technology is attained through development, while ethical society is attained through restoration. Restoration is achieved through the struggle between good and evil, but this does not necessarily refer to military conflict involving armed forces. If the evil side obediently surrenders to the good side, then it is possible for peaceful social change to be accomplished. In this way, history has been changing, following the two directions of development and restoration. Development will continue forever, whereas restoration will come to an end when the original ideal world is restored, after which the ideal world will come to continue forever.
V. Traditional Views of History
Next I will present an overview of the representative traditional view of history, discuss various weak points in each of them, and attempt to clarify the historical significance of the Unification View of History.
A. The Cyclical View of History (Fatalist View of History)
The ancient Greeks considered that just as the four seasons of spring, summer, autumn, and winter repeat themselves year after year, so does history follow a cyclical course. For them, history was just a repetition of destined events, which could not be affected by human power, so that history had no meaning or goal.
This view of history is called "cyclical view of history," or fatalist view of history. Representative historians of this view were Herodotus (ca. 484-425 BC), who is called the father of history and wrote History, and Thucydides (ca. 460-400 BC), who wrote History of the Peloponnesian War. Herodotus depicted the Persian war in the epic manner, whereas Thucyclides depicted the Pelponnesian War from beginning to end in a manner that was faithful to the historical facts. What these two men had in common, though, was the idea that history repeats itself. 14 The cyclical view of history does not admit that the development of history depends on human effort, because it accepts the development of circumstances as necessary. Also, it cannot offer a future image of the world, because it sees no goal in history.
B. The Providential View of History
In contrast to the Greek view of history, which asserts that history has no beginning or end or goal but only repeats itself in circular motion, Christianity presented a fundamentally different view of history, which asserted that history has a beginning and advances in a straight line toward a definite goal.
That is to say, its assertions were that history started with the creation and tile human fall, that it is a salvation history leading to tile Last judgment, and that what drives history is God's providence. Such a view of history is called "providential view of history," or "Christian view of history." It was St. Augustine (354-430) who systematized tile Christian view of history. Augustine depicted history as a history of struggle between the City of God (Civilas Dei), where God-loving people live, and the City of tile World (Civilas Ierrena), where the people who have yielded to the temptation of Satan live, and asserted that tile City of God would finally win victory in the end and would establish eternal peace. This course of history occurred according to a plan predestined by God, according to this view.
Human history, from the fall to consummation, is divided into six periods:
How long the sixth period would last was left unstated.
Through this Christian view of history, history became meaningful in the sense that it pursues a certain goal; still, the human being was no more than an instrument moved by God. The content of this view is so mysterious that it is regarded as unacceptable as a social science today.
C. The Spiritual View of History (Progressive View of History)
During the Renaissance Age, the theological views of history gradually faded away, and in the Enlightenment Age of the eighteenth century, a new view of history came to appear. According to that new view of history, it was the human being, rather than God's providence, that drove history. The view considered that history was progressing in a straight line and necessarily according to the progress of the human spirit. This view of history is called "spiritual view of history," or "progressive view of history." Giambattista Vico (1668-1744) recognized God's providence in history, but lie considered that tire secular world was formed by human beings, and asserted that history should not be explained by God's will alone.
In his understanding of history, God was pushed to the background, and human beings were put to the fore.
Voltaire (1694-1778) excluded God's power working upon history. He asserted that it wits not God, but rather the people with higher education, who had mastered science, namely, enlightened people, that drove history.
Marquis de Condorcet (1743-94) asserted that, if human reason were awakened, history would progress with harmony between science and ethics.
Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) said that tile purpose of history is to develop all human capacities in an international society consisting of a league of nations and advocated "universal history from a cosmopolitan point of view." The romanticist philosopher I. G. Herder (1744-1803) asserted that the development of human nature is the goal of history.
Hegel (1770-1831) grasped history as the "self-realization of the spirit," or the "self-realization of the Idea." It was his view that reason rules the world, and that world history progresses rationally. This reason that rules the world was called "tile world spirit." He thought that reason manipulates human beings, and called this "the trick of reason." Hegel's view of history is called "spiritual view of history," or "idealistic view of history." Hegel thought that a rational state, where the Idea of freedom would be realized, was to come into being in Prussia; in reality, however, that did not take place, and social problems such as exploitation and human alienation became more serious. Thus, as a revolt against Hegel's philosophy of history, historical materialism appeared.
D. Historical Materialism
In contrast to Hegel, who advocated a spiritual view of history and asserted that it is Idea that drives history, Marx asserted that it is material forces that drive history, and presented "the materialist conception of history," namely, "historical materialism" (also called "revolutionary view of history").
According to the materialist conception of history, what drives history is the development of the productive forces, rather than the development of the spirit. Corresponding to the development of productive forces, certain relations of production are established. While the productive forces developed steadily, the relations of production, once established, became fixed and eventually turned into fetters against the development of the productive forces. Therefore, class struggle took place between the class that sought to maintain the old relations of production (ruling class) and the class that was the bearer of the productive forces and sought new relations of production (ruled class). Accordingly, history has been a history of class struggle. In capitalist society, this class struggle reaches its peak and revolution occurs. The proletariat, which is the ruled class, overthrows the bourgeoisie, which is the ruling class. As a result, Communist society, which is the "kingdom of freedom" without classes, is realized.
It is obvious by now that the materialist conception of history, also, is erroneous. When one examines the laws of the materialist conception of history, all of them are found to be merely dogmatic assertions. For example, the development of productive forces is regarded as material development, but no materialistic dialectical explanation is given concerning how the productive forces develop. Also, the Communist societies that have come into being through revolution, like the Soviet Union, are not the kingdom of freedom, but on the contrary are dictatorial suites that trample down human nature, and also the societies in which productivity is extremely stagnant. These facts prove the errors of the materialist conception of history more eloquently than anything else.
E. The Philosophy-of-Life View of History
W. Dilthey (1833-1911) and G. Simmel (1858-1918) asserted that history grows with the growth of life.
According to Dilthey, life is a human experience, and the experience is always expressed and manifests in the external world. The manifestation of experience is the world of history and culture. Therefore, the cultural system, including religion, philosophy, art, science, politics, and law, is the objectifications of life.
Simmel asserted similarly that history is the expression of life. Life is a stream that continues infinitely.
And life's "stream of becoming" makes history. 16 According to the philosophy-of-life view of history, the pain and unhappiness of humankind, as recorded in history, are regarded as inevitable phenomena that accompany the growth of life. Accordingly, the question of how people could be liberated from pain and unhappiness remained unsolved in philosophy of life.
F. The Cultural View of History
In Europe before World War 1, trust in the progress and development of history was not shaken. In addition, it was believed that history was developing centering around Europe. It was Oswald Spengler (1880-1936) who crushed this linear, Eurocentric image of history.
Spengler advocated a cultural view of history, asserting that the foundation of history is culture. He regarded culture as an organism, and considered that, a culture is born, grows, and dies, and therefore its death is inevitable. In Western civilization, lie found symptoms of impending decline, which correspond to the decline of Greece and Rome, and predicted the decline of the West. He advocated that, knowing in advance of the decline of the West, one should live by accepting the inevitable destiny without falling into pessimism. There was a strong tie with Nietzsche on this point. Spengler's view of history was deterministic.
Under a strong influence of Spengler, Arnold, Toynbee (1889-1975) established his unique cultural view of history. According to Toynbee, the essential entity that constitutes world history is not a region, an ethnic people, or a nation, but a civilization. He said that each civilization passes through the stages of genesis, growth, breakdown, disintegration, and dissolution.
The cause of the genesis of a civilization is found in the human response to challenges from the natural environment or the social environment. Creative minorities foster new civilization while guiding the mass of people, but when the creative minorities eventually lose creativity, the civilization breaks down. The creative minorities turn into ruling minorities, and the "internal proletariat" within the civilization and the "external proletariat" surrounding it are born and separate themselves from the ruling minorities. Society falls into confusion, but eventually a "universal state" is established by the strongest among the ruling minorities, bringing an end to the period of turmoil. Under the oppressive rule of the world state, the internal proletariat nurtures a "higher religion" and the external proletariat forms "the barbarian war-bands." Thus, the universal state, the higher religion and the war-bands constitute the three fractions. Eventually the higher religion becomes a "universal church" by converting the ruling classes, but the universal state soon collapses, and together with it, the civilization meets its death.
Thus, after the first civilization has disappeared, the external proletariat invades and becomes converted to the higher religion, giving birth to a civilization of the new generation. The relationship of such old and new civilizations is called "apparentation-and-afliliation." The fully grown civilizations in world history were twenty-one civilizations. All of the present civilizations are in the third generation, and are separated into the four lineages of Christian civilization (the West, Greek orthodoxy), Islamic civilization, Hindu civilization, and the Far East civilization. This succession of civilization through three generations, as advocated by Toynbee, correspond to the providential synchronism in three generations in the Unification View of History (the Providential Age for the Foundation of Restoration, the Providential Age of Restoration, and the Providential Age of the Prolongation of Restoration).
It is characteristic of Toynbee's view of history that it excludes determinism and asserts non-determinism and the theory of free will. In other words, how human beings respond to challenges depends on their free will. Therefore, the way in which history proceeds is never predetermined, but people can choose their future.
Toynbee clearly envisions the City of God (Civilas Dei) as the future image of human history. Yet, from his non-deterministic position, he said that the choice of the Kingdom of God, or the kingdom of night for the future depends on people's free will. He said as follows: Under the law of love, which is the law of God's own being, God's self-sacrifice challenges Man by setting before him the ideal of spiritual perfection; and Man has perfect freedom to accept or reject this. The law of love leaves Man as free to be a sinner as to be a saint; it leaves him free to choose whether his personal and his social life shall be a progress towards the Kingdom of God or the kingdom of night. 17 Another characteristic of Toynbee's view of history is his introduction of God, which modern society appears to have forgotten, into his view of history. He says, What do we mean by History? And the writer ... would reply that lie meant by History a vision -- dim and partial, yet (he believed) true to reality as far as it went-of God revealing Himself in action to souls that were sincerely seeking Him. 18
G. Traditional Views of History Seen From The Unification View of History
Having presented outlines of traditional views of history, I will now compare them with the Unification view of history, and will attempt to show that the Unification view of history unities the traditional views of history.
First, there is the question whether history should be seen as circular movement or linear movement. The Greek cyclical view of history and Spengler's cultural view of history grasped history as circular movement, whereas the Christian view, the progressive view, and the materialist view regard history as linear movement. The philosophy-of-life view held that history develops along with the growth of a stream of life. That view could be seen as a modification of the progressive view.
If history is grasped as linear movement, we can have hope in the development of history, but we are left without a good understanding of the breakdowns and revivals in human history. On the other hand, when we regard history as a circular movement, nations and cultures become destined to perish, and we are left without any hope.
The Unification view of history grasps history from the two aspects of re-creation and restoration and understands its development as a movement that has the two aspects, namely, linear forward movement and circular movement, or therefore, as a spiral movement. That is, it views history as a spiral movement that has both the forward-moving nature of developing toward a goal (realization of the original ideal world of creation) and the circular movement nature of restoring the lost original ideal world through the law of indemnity by establishing providential figures.
Second, there is the question of determinism and non-determinism. Such views of history as the Greek fatalist view, which holds that history moves inevitably according to a given destiny, and Spengler's cultural view, were deterministic. The providential view, which holds that history proceeds according to God's providence, can also be regarded as deterministic. Hegel's view, which holds that reason, or the world spirit, drives history, and the materialist view, which holds that history inevitably reaches the Communist society according to the development of productive forces, also are deterministic. All of these views assert that some super-human power drives history. Under such types of determinism, the human being is no more than a being dragged along by history, and it is impossible to change history through efforts based on people's free will.
On the other hand, Toynbee advocated non-determinism from his position of the theory of free will. That is, he asserted that the way in which history proceeds is chosen by people's free will. In Toynbee's non-deterministic position, however, the future image of history remains ambiguous, and therefore we are left without any real hope for the future. In contrast, the Unification view of history takes the position that the goal of history is determined, but that the process of history is non-deterministic because the accomplishment of providential events requires the fulfillment of the human portion of responsibility in addition to God's portion of responsibility. In other words, the Unification view of history has both aspects of determinism and non-determinism; this is called "theory of responsibility." When we compare the traditional views of history with the Unification view of history in this way, we find that the traditional views have each emphasized a portion of the Unification view, and that the Unification view is a comprehensive, unifying view of history. Also, Toynbee's view of history is similar in many ways to the Unification View of History. From a providential viewpoint, Toynbee's view of history can be regarded as having the preparation for the appearance of the Unification view of history. That is to say, Toynbee's view had the mission of linking traditional views of history with the Unification view of history.
VI. A Comparative Analysis of Histories
The Providential View of History, the Materialist Conception of History, and the Unification View of History
In this section, the providential view and the materialist view, which are representatives of the traditional views of history, together with the Unification view will be compared from various perspectives (see Fig. 8-3). This will help us deepen our understanding of the characteristics of each of these views of history.
1. The Beginning of History
The providential view of history sees history as having started with the Creation and fall of humankind.
Accordingly, human history started as sinful history. In contrast, the materialist view of history holds that human history started when human beings separated from the animal kingdom, and that the first society was a primitive community. The Unification view of history, like the providential view of history, holds that history started with the Creation and fall of humankind, and that human history started as sinful history.
2. The Characteristics of History
The providential view regards history as history of salvation by God. The materialist view regards history as history of class struggle. In contrast, the Unification view grasps history from the two aspects of re-creation and restoration.
3. The Driving Force for the Development of History
According to the providential view, history is moved by God's providence. According to the materialist view, the development of the productive forces, which are material forces, is the driving force of history. In contrast, the Unification view of history holds that it was both God's providence and the human portion of responsibility that has moved history. According to the providential view, God moves history, and therefore it follows that every tragic event in history was allowed by God. From the standpoint of the Unification view of history, however, things did not turn out in accordance with God's Will because human beings did not fulfill their portion of responsibility.
Thus, humankind is responsible for the tragic events in history.
4. The Laws of Change in History
The providential view merely asserts that the kingdom of God, of those who believe in God, and the kingdom of the world, of those who obey Satan, fight with each other, but in the end the Kingdom of God wins. It offers no laws of history. On die other hand, the materialist view of history applies materialistic dialectic to history and presents its laws of history, such as, "Human beings in their social life enter into certain relations of production, which are independent of their will;" "The relations of production correspond to a given stage in the development of the productive forces," "The relations of production are the basis, and the forms of consciousness are the superstructure," "People's social existence determines their consciousness," "When the relations of production become fetters on the development of productive forces, revolution takes place," and so on. In contrast, the Unification view of history presents the Laws of Creation and the Laws of Restoration as the laws that have been at work in history.
5. The Struggle to Take Place at the Consummation of History
The providential view holds that the final struggle will take place between the "Kingdom of God" and the "Kingdom of the World." The Bible says that an angel (Michael), who serves God, and Satan will fight in Heaven.
The materialist conception holds that a fierce struggle between the bourgeoisie and the proletariat takes place in capitalist society, which is the last stage of class society. The Unification view holds that history is the struggle of good and evil, and that the struggle between good and evil at the consummation of history is the struggle between the democratic world and the Communist world, which will take place on a worldwide scale. The Communist world stands on the satanic side (the side of evil) because it denies God. 6. Phenomena of the Last Days The providential view holds that extraordinary natural phenomena will take place in the last days, that is, at the consummation of human history. About such phenomena, the Bible says, "Immediately after tire tribulation of those days the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light, and the stars will fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken" (Matthew 24:29). The materialist view holds that in capitalist society such phenomena as misery, oppression, slavery, degradation, and exploitation will increase and economic collapse and social confusion will arise. The Unification view of history holds that at the consummation of history the existing values will lose their persuasiveness and will collapse, and that great social confusion will take place.
7. Events at the Consummation of History
The providential view of history holds that the Last Judgment will take place in the last days. According to the Bible, the sheep will be placed at the right hand of Christ and the goats at the left, and those on the side of the sheep, namely, those who obeyed God, will be given blessings, whereas those on the side of the goats, namely, those who followed Satan, will be thrown into the eternal fire (Matthew, ch. 25). The materialist view of history asserts that the prehistory of humankind conies to an end as the proletariat, the ruled class, overthrows the bourgeoisie, the ruling class, through violent revolution. The Unification view of history asserts that in the last days the good side and evil side will be separated on a worldwide scale, and that the good side will convey God's truth and love to the evil side and naturally subjugate the evil side.
8. The History That Comes to an End
The providential view asserts that sinful history will come to an end when the Kingdom of God wins victory over the Kingdom of the World. The materialist view asserts the history of class struggle comes to an end when the proletariat overthrows the bourgeoisie. The Unification view of history asserts that sinful history and the history of the struggle between good and evil will come to an end when the good side brings about the natural subjugation of the evil side.
9. The Ideal World To Come
The providential view of history asserts that in the last days the millennium will come, in which Christ and die saints will reign over the earth. After the millennium, Satan will be liberated to lead the sinners, but the Last Judgment will take place and the eternal Kingdom of God will be realized. The materialist view asserts that after the revolution, Communist society, which is the classless kingdom of freedom, will be realized. The Unification view of history asserts that die original ideal world of creation, that is, the Kingdom of I leaven on earth, where all humankind will become one family, will be realized by receiving the Messiah, the parents of humankind.
When we compare the three views of history in this way, we find that the Christian view of history is indeed mysterious and can hardly have any persuasive power today. It asserts that God promotes His providence in history.
Since laws are not presented, however, it is not clear how He conducts His providence. It is also hard to understand that in the last days those people represented by the goats on the left side will receive eternal punishment. Further, the theory that Christ and the saints will reign over the earth for one thousand years and after that Satan will be liberated has no persuasive power.
The materialist view of history, compared with the Christian view of history, has more reality and therefore more persuasiveness. Consequently, it has captivated many young people until today. About half of the world had become Communist in its heyday. Nevertheless, Communist society has proved itself to be, not the kingdom of freedom nor an affluent society, but rather the opposite. Communism appeared as an accusation or a prosecution from Satan's side, because Christianity failed to fulfill its mission and fell into degeneration. Karl Marx with stated as follows: What explains the idealistic foundation of historical materialism is ... old Jewish messianism, prophetism, and the untiring Jewish persistence to absolute righteousness. The Communist Manifesto clearly has a feature of faith, the firm belief in "what one hopes for" in a reversed form of scientific prophesy. Thus, it is not at all accidental that the final hostility between the bourgeoisie and the proletariat corresponds to the faith in the ultimate conflict between Christ and the anti-Christ in the last period of history, and that the task of the proletariat resembles the world historic mission of the chosen people. The role of the oppressed class for global salvation corresponds to the religious dialectic of the crucifixion and resurrection, and the transformation of the kingdom of necessity into the kingdom of freedom corresponds to the transformation of an old aeon into a new aeon. The process of history as described in The Communist Manifesto, reflects the well-known Judeo-Christian pattern of interpreting history as the events of salvation through the providence toward a significant final goal. The historical materialism is die salvation history in terms of political economy.
19 Fig. 8-3: A Comparative Overview of the Providential View, the Materialist Conception, and the Unification View of History
The Unification view of history came into being as an elaboration of the Christian view of history; yet it is presented as a view that overcomes the mysteriousness of the Christian view of history and overcomes the accusation by Communism against Christianity. The Christian view of history asserts that the people in the kingdom of the world who obeyed Satan will receive eternal punishment. The materialist view of history asserts that the proletariat will overthrow the bourgeoisie by violent means. Yet, the Unification view of history asserts that the good side will induce the evil side naturally to surrender and will restore the evil side to the good side, and eventually will save all humankind. In the true ideal world all humankind must be happy. Through the Unification view of history, that is guaranteed. The materialist view of history attacks the Christian view of history as mythological, and boasts, on the other hand, that it itself is a scientific view of history, with laws. Nevertheless, tile laws presented by the materialist view of history have turned out to be nothing but arbitrary, pseudo laws, put forward for the purpose of rationalizing revolution. In contrast, the Unification view of history presents true laws, supported by historical facts.
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