Think of hereditary hostilities, the multi-generational conflicts, and centuries-long feuds. One of the most prominent and long-lived examples of this phenomenon is the perennial animosity between Jews and Muslims with its current iteration in Gaza. Here, blind hatred for or mistrust of “the other”—the permanent historical enemy—stretches back over a thousand years.
Millions of children have been raised to hate all those who belong to the other group. They are taught that those others are mortal foes, guilty of the alleged sin of having been born into (and in rarer cases, converted to) the religion of “the other.” They are taught that it is good and right to try to annihilate “the other”—that a noble goal in life is to kill people whom they have never met, people with whom they might share common goals in life, such as living in peace, worshiping God in the manner of their choosing, raising families, and leading a productive life. Why should such strangers be killed? Because history says so. History says that A’s grandfather killed B’s aunt and uncle, and earlier generations perpetrated similar deeds, so that’s the way it is supposed to be. That kind of history amounts to fatalistic resignation. The past is prologue; history is destiny.
Countering the grim mindset that holds violence and conflict to be inevitable, an observer can take heart in the example of Jewish and Muslim individuals in countries around the world who, even while hostilities are ongoing, are striving to break the long chain of hereditary hatred and historical habits. These are often noble individuals who have suffered personal losses from this ancient rivalry—brave people daring to defy groupthink and ask the vital question: Do we really want our children to live in the same toxic atmosphere of hatred and violence that have caused the tragic death of so many of our relatives, both recent and ancient?
There is another lesson that history offers to teach us—what I would call a “mega-lesson”: That peace is better than war for human well-being and societal flourishing. Look at it from an economic point of view: If one surveys the entire span of human history, there is one overriding economic megatrend that stands out above all others: the expansion of the division of labor.
Early human families and clans learned that they could have more wealth (i.e., food, shelter, clothing) if each member of the society specialized in supplying what they were relatively skilled at providing. They then shared or traded their surplus with each other rather than trying to provide for all their needs by themselves. As humans gradually learned that a more extensive social division of labor raised their standard of living, clans formed tribes, tribes formed villages, villages developed into cities, etc. Along the way, enterprising individuals further expanded the division of labor by trading with strangers across town, across valleys and plains, across continents, and eventually across oceans.
The more people who are included in the social division of labor, the greater the resulting productivity and the higher the standard of living. The division of labor performs its wealth-creating wonders to the degree that peace and freedom prevail. War is a great crippler of the division of labor. War destroys wealth (various forms of property) and wealth-producers (i.e., human beings).
Ask the Germans and French today if they prefer living and trading in peace rather than trying to conquer or destroy each other like their predecessors did. Those peoples warred for generations. Eventually, though, they grew to understand that life would be far better for far more Germans and French through peaceful cooperation rather than war and destruction. How long will it take the combatants in the Middle East to arrive at this understanding? Who knows? Hopefully the wisdom of those now working for peaceful coexistence will someday lead to an end of heretofore-endless wars.
Shifting gears, there is another important mega-lesson that history can teach us if we are willing to learn it. This is particularly timely during Black History Month. I am thinking of the “1619 Project”—the effort to slant the history of the United States to see everything in racialist terms by asserting that the driving force for the settlement of North America by Europeans was to establish slavery. Here is a simple fact of history that is beyond dispute: The past was dreadful—and not just for Africans brought to the New World as slaves, as abominable as that was. If Americans of European descent were interested, willing, and able to go back in time and observe their ancestors, I’m sure that almost all of them would find abuses, injustices, and a long list of grievances. too.
The wretchedness of human history is no revelation or radical theory. The plain fact is that for most of human history, up until just a few centuries ago, human life was, in the memorable phraseology of Thomas Hobbes, “nasty, brutish and short.” The vast majority of the human population suffered from chronic poverty, precarious health, and various forms of injustice and oppression. The vile institution of slavery was practiced on every inhabited continent. You don’t have to dig hard at all to find historical examples of how awful human life was and how horribly some people treated their fellow human beings.
The past was grim and harsh. The good news is, the past is past. Rather than dredge up ugly historical practices to make us miserable today, let’s be glad that we live today. Let’s be grateful that we are free to strive for additional progress. What a great opportunity we have! Let’s not squander that opportunity by dragging the sufferings of bygone generations into the present. That is an egregious abuse of history. Let’s keep our minds fixed on two of the most important lessons of history: peace is far better than war, and the present is far better than the past.
