African Athena Controversy Ancient History

African Athena Controversy

Ancient History

The notion of competitive plausibility is essential to the research and theorizing propagated in Martin Bernal's Black Athena series. This concept that events of history -- and in particular events of antiquity -- cannot be rediscovered in contemporary times with a degree of certainty, but rather only in terms of their competitive plausibility, is integral to the way the author is able to critique the Aryan Model of accounting for the cultural (and racial) influences in ancient Greece. Moreover, Bernal's emphasis on competitive plausibility for his work on both of the aforementioned books is examined in works of literature propounded by other authors, most notably Mary Lefkowitz and Jacques Berlinerblau, the former of whom produced "Ancient History, Modern Myths" and the latter of whom wrote Heresy in the University: The Black Athena Controversy and the Responsibilities of American Professionals. This particular viewpoint of Bernal's, that of competitive plausibility, is fairly central to the author's successful discrediting of the Aryan Model and his rather convincing arguments behind the Revised Ancient Model, which professes that ancient Greek civilization actually had a significant amount of contact with both Egyptian and Phoenician cultures.

Although virtues such as clarity, precision, and accuracy are oftentimes sought after in the contemporary world, when one is attempting to reconstruct events that occurred thousands of years in the past, and which reflects cultures, peoples and incidents of which there are sparse if not absolutely no records existent, such virtues do not always apply. Historians attempting to reconfigure events and facts in antiquity, especially those which have a profound impact upon posterity and contemporary society as a whole, must come to terms with the fact that such a degree of certainty is not always possible. Bernal definitely supports this viewpoint in attempting to decipher the extent of the influence that other races and cultures had upon Greece, as does Berlinerblau, which the following quotation certainly indicates.

It is my belief, however, that the notion of competitive plausibility ranks as one of Black Athena's most timely theoretical contributions to the study of the ancient world…Martin Bernal opposes any type of historical research which presumes that an absolute, definitive understanding of events occurring in deep antiquity can be achieved (Berlinerblau 16-17).

This quotation not only underscores the rectitude that characterizes Bernal's work in attempting to examine notions regarding the Aryan and the Revised Ancient Models through the concept of competitive plausibility, but it also alludes to the reason why. The author continues this passage in underscoring how vast the "void" of historical facts surrounding the Black Athena controversy actually is. Therefore, it becomes completely understandable that in the absence of absolutely certainties, such as are found in terms of evidence for a link between Egyptian, Phoenician, and Greek cultures in the antiquity, one chooses to pursue the model or path of research that appears the most convincing.

In light of this fact, it is highly noteworthy to mention the length of time that the Revised Ancient Model (which is really just a more mutable reworking of the Ancient Model) and the Aryan Model have been professed, particularly in the context of the length of time that exists since the period of antiquity that the controversy surrounding Black Athena is based upon to the present moment. The Aryan Model was initially propagated in the beginning part of the 19th century, and dates from no earlier than approximately 1820. This model, which encompasses the vast majority of modern scholastic thinking about Greece's ancient influence from Egyptians and Phoenicians, posits that there was little relationship between these cultures, and certainly not a significant impact of these non-Western civilizations upon Greece, and has only been circulated among academics and virtually anyone else for less than 200 years. In direct contrast with this view and the relatively brief amount of time that it has circulated, is that of the Ancient Model (which again is intrinsically linked to the Revised Ancient model), which was perpetuated throughout the world for "nearly 2,500 years." It is highly important to understand that this view of history contends that ancient Greece was heavily influenced by Phoenicians and Egyptians, and that the culture that was fomented in Greece was not distinctly Caucasian in nature. When one gives no more consideration of these two models other than the length of time in which they were believed, it becomes readily apparent that an introduction of some startling new evidence would need to arise for the belief of the Aryan Model (that has existed for less than 200 years) to displace the notions of the Ancient Model (that kept many of its central tenets and was refined into the Revised Ancient Model) that was popular for the better part of three thousand years.

Another convincing aspect of the Ancient Model is that the theories contained within it were recorded and disseminated to posterity by some of the more better known writers and speakers of the Classical epoch. Furthermore, many of these men were actually Greek and both lived in this country and had family lineages that had populated Greece for a substantial amount of time. The following quotation alludes to the veracity of this fact.

The Ancient model, which is very different, was referred to by the playwrights Aeschylus and Euripides, the historians Herodotus and Diodorus Siculus, the orator Isocrates, the guidebook writer Pausanias, and the mythographers Apollodorus, Palaiphatos, and Konon. Plutarch admitted Greece.'s deep cultural debts to Egypt; he took it as axiomatic, for instance, that Greek religion came from Egypt (Bernal 6).

Although the occupations and work of some of these people, such as the "mythographers" may present some amount of dubiousness, others referenced in this passage, such as "Plutarch," "Herodotus," and "Diodorus Siculus" are rather well-known. Moreover, these sources have written some authoritative accounts of other aspects of Greek history and culture. Therefore, it does not seem logical to scrutinize their authority on the subject of the influence of Egyptian and Greek cultures -- particularly when such authority was never questioned and widely championed for several years.

What is most noteworthy about this fact is that the very basis for the propagation of the Aryan Model hinges upon scrutinizing, and even implicating an inherent ineptness on the part of chroniclers of Greek historians, in erroneously recording the history of their country. For the Aryan Model to surface and attempt to displace the claims of the aforementioned disseminators of Greek cultural history, there must have existed some problem with the information related by Herodotus and the others. The two models in question in the Black Athena controversy contradict one another; there is no way that both of them can possess an equal rectitude, which the following quotation patently explains.

The very Greeks who are credited with having produced the most sublime civilization of antiquity are simultaneously held to have been shoddy historians suffering from some sort of collective Orientalmaniacal delusion. Bernal maintains that for Aryanists the Greeks were "superior in every other aspect of their culture except their writing of ancient history and their understanding of Greece's relationship s with other cultures" (Berlinerblau 14).

The glaring incongruence in the logic of those who hold to the Aryan Model is readily apparent in the preceding passage. If Greek culture is so worthy of reverence and deference, then how could the chroniclers of that culture err in their preservation of the historical significance of Egyptians and Phoenicians upon Greek culture? It is also important to recall that this passage, although featuring a quotation from Bernal, is written by Berlinerblau; the conviction of the former's stance appears to resonate with the latter author. Subsequently, the resolution of the contradiction between the Aryan and Ancient Model seems to best present itself by adhering to the veracity of the Ancient Model, which revamped into the Revised Ancient Model by Bernal to include the perspective that Greece may have also influence Egyptian and Phoenician cultures as well as have been influenced by them, and other cultures as well.

Even a complete synthesis of the three sources utilized for this paper, which includes the work of Lefkowitz in addition to that of Bernal and Berlinerblau, indicates that the exchange of cultural ideas and norms that Bernal's Revised Ancient Model attests to is in all likelihood competitively plausible. Lefkowitz's "Ancient History, Modern Myths" is a fairly curious piece of work; appears to attempt to polarize Bernal and his work as some sort of racist, Afrocentric influenced zealot who is blind in her ambition. Therefore, it is highly significant that what she concedes may have been most plausible in terms of the cultural relationship between Egyptians and Greeks in antiquity, is actually strikingly similar to Bernal's Revised Ancient Model. The following quotation demonstrates this fact.