——从文明结构、制度演化到信仰根基的反思
文 / HuSir

　　我们今天从一个侧面，重新审视文明古国在现代世界中的发展差异。这是一个深刻、却极易被情绪化处理的问题。如果仅以“民族性”或“文化劣根性”来解释，容易陷入偏见；如果只归因于现实政治，又难以解释其深层与长期性。本文尝试从文明史与制度演化的角度，讨论一个看似刺眼却难以回避的现象：为何当今世界的多个文明古国——如埃及、伊拉克、伊朗、印度、大洋国——在整体上逐渐落后于现代文明的进程，而以色列却呈现出相对不同的轨迹？

一、“落后”并非智力或民族问题

　　首先需要澄清的是，这里的“落后”并非指这些文明缺乏智慧、文化或历史成就。恰恰相反，它们几乎都拥有辉煌而悠久的文明传统：埃及、两河流域、印度河流域和中华文明，都是人类最早建立国家形态的地区之一。这些文明长期维持高度集中的权力结构，并深度依赖传统秩序、文化传承、宗教或经典来维系政治合法性。

　　问题不在“有没有文明”，而在于：在现代文明的若干关键指标上，这些社会整体上出现了结构性滞后——例如法治是否高于权力，个人权利是否具有不可随意剥夺的地位，权力是否受到制度性制衡，真理是否独立于统治者，以及社会是否具备持续的自我纠错能力。这些要素，恰恰构成现代文明的核心。现代文明并非否定秩序，而是将社会赖以运行的基本原则抽离出个人意志，并通过制度加以保障，从而压缩特权生长的空间。

二、文明过早成熟，反而形成“路径锁定”

　　一个看似反直觉却极为重要的观察是：许多文明古国的问题，恰恰源于它们“成熟得太早”。在这些文明中，普遍存在一种结构性顺序：国家早于社会，权力早于个人，秩序早于自由。国家被视为不证自明的存在，权力被认为天然正当，而个体则往往被默认为可以为整体目标让渡的对象。其结果是：社会从未真正独立于权力运行，个人也难以成为制度上不可侵犯的主体。

　　而现代文明的形成路径恰恰相反。欧洲并非因为“文明更高”，而是由于长期处于碎片化状态：王权、贵族、教会、城市彼此制衡，使得任何一方都难以彻底垄断权力。正是在这种无法一统的张力中，法治、契约与自治被逐步发展出来。现代自由并非被精心设计，而是在现实冲突中被“逼”出来的。

三、传统被神圣化，文明失去自我否定能力

　　许多文明古国还共享一种深层心理结构：祖先被视为智慧源头，经典被奉为终极答案，权威被默认代表正确。这种结构带来的后果是，传统难以被根本反思，权力天然占据道德高地，改革往往只能停留在修补层面，而难以进行结构性的重构。久而久之，原本用于维系秩序的传统，反而成为少数权力持续传承的工具，使人人平等、人人自由的理念难以转化为推动社会进步的内在动力。

　　现代文明真正的突破，恰恰源于一句危险却必要的话：“我们的祖先，也可能是错的。”而在许多古老文明中，这句话往往难以被接受。对既有权力结构的维护，与对传统的敬畏相互叠加，使得制度纠错的空间不断收缩。

四、信仰未完成去政治化，是另一道深层障碍

　　更深层的分水岭，往往出现在信仰与权力的关系上。在伊斯兰文明中，宗教与政治长期高度交织；在印度，宗教与种姓结构对社会流动形成持续约束；在大洋国，儒家更多表现为一套服务于治理的政治伦理，而非超越性的信仰体系。

　　只有当信仰不直接为政权服务，能够对权力形成外在约束，并为个体赋予不可轻易剥夺的尊严时，社会才可能获得真正的精神独立性。一旦某种信仰被视为可能脱离权力控制的力量，其生存空间往往会迅速被压缩。

五、以色列为何成为例外

　　以色列并非因为“民族更优越”，而是在若干关键路径上呈现出不同选择。首先，在犹太信仰传统中，神被置于一切政治权力之上：国王可以被先知斥责，律法并非为统治者服务，人首先对神负责，而非对国家负责。

　　其次，犹太民族长期处于“无国家状态”，被迫发展出高度成熟的社会自组织能力：家庭、会堂、律法与教育，成为文明延续的核心纽带。第三，犹太传统中始终保留着“罪—悔改—更新”的历史观：失败不是用来遮掩的，而是需要被反思的；历史本身，是可以被审视与评判的。这种机制，使文明具备持续更新的内在动力。

六、大洋国问题并非民族问题，而是制度—信仰问题

　　将视角拉回大洋国，需要特别澄清：问题并不在民族本身，而在于长期形成的制度结构。如果放入更长的历史连续性中观察，这一结构并非凭空出现，而是多重历史逻辑的叠加结果。

　　在这一体系中，政治权力缺乏一个被普遍承认、且不可逾越的外在约束来源。超越性的存在、自然法意义上的原则以及不可侵犯的人权理念，难以在制度层面获得独立地位。其运行逻辑，一方面继承了传统的高度控制取向，另一方面又借助现代组织、宣传与技术手段加以强化。这并非真正意义上的“尊祖”，而更像是以传统作为象征装饰，将权力本身置于最高位置。

结语：真正的分水岭

　　历史反复表明，决定文明走向的，并非其是否古老或曾经辉煌，而在于是否承认：存在一种高于国家、权力与个人意志的原则。承认这一点，权力才可能受到限制；承认人按某种超越性原则而具备尊严，个体才不至于完全工具化；承认人性并非完美，权力才必须被制衡。

　　拒绝这一前提的文明，即便拥有深厚传统，也往往在现代世界中面临高昂的治理成本与持续的不安全感。生活在大洋国的许多普通人，并非否定自身的文明出身，而是在尝试理解：一个文明为何迟迟难以走向自由？为何其国民身份难以与现代世界顺利接轨？而这种追问本身，正是改变开始出现的地方。

Why Many Ancient Civilizations Have Slowed Down in the Modern World

—–Reflections on Civilizational Structure, Institutional Evolution, and the Foundations of Belief

By HuSir

From one particular angle, we may reflect on the contrasting trajectories of ancient civilizations in the modern era. This is a profound question—yet one easily reduced to emotional or polemical debate. Explaining it through notions of “national character” or “cultural inferiority” leads to prejudice; attributing it solely to contemporary politics ignores deeper historical structures. This essay instead approaches a difficult but unavoidable phenomenon through the lens of civilizational history and institutional evolution: why have many ancient civilizations—such as Egypt, Iraq, Iran, India, and Oceania—gradually fallen behind the pace of modern civilization, while Israel appears to follow a markedly different path?

I. “Lagging Behind” Is Neither an Intellectual Nor an Ethnic Issue

First, it must be clarified that “lagging behind” does not imply a lack of intelligence, culture, or historical achievement. On the contrary, these civilizations possess some of humanity’s most brilliant and enduring legacies. Egypt, Mesopotamia, the Indus Valley, and Chinese civilization were among the earliest regions to form organized states. For long periods, they maintained highly centralized power structures and relied deeply on inherited traditions, religious frameworks, or classical canons to sustain political legitimacy.

The issue is not the absence of civilization, but rather a systemic lag in key dimensions of modern civilization—such as whether the rule of law stands above power, whether individual rights are inviolable, whether authority is effectively constrained, whether truth is independent of rulers, and whether society retains the capacity for self-correction. These elements constitute the core of modern civilization. Modernity extracts the conditions necessary for individual dignity and limits the emergence of privilege through law and enforcement.

II. Early Civilizational Maturity and the Trap of Path Dependence

A counterintuitive yet crucial observation is that many ancient civilizations suffer precisely because they matured too early. Their structural sequence often follows the same pattern: the state precedes society, power precedes the individual, and order precedes freedom. The state is viewed as self-evident, authority as inherently legitimate, and the individual as an expendable unit for collective ends. As a result, society never fully operates independently of power, and the individual never becomes an inviolable subject.

Modern civilization, however, developed along the opposite path. Europe’s transformation was not the product of inherent superiority but of prolonged fragmentation. Competing forces—monarchs, nobility, churches, and cities—checked one another, forcing legal systems, contracts, and local autonomy to emerge within the gaps of uncentralized power. Modern freedom was not designed deliberately; it was compelled into existence.

III. The Sacralization of Tradition and the Loss of Self-Negation

Many ancient civilizations also share a deep psychological structure: ancestors are treated as ultimate sources of wisdom, classical texts as final answers, and authority as synonymous with correctness. This structure has severe consequences. Tradition becomes resistant to fundamental critique; power occupies moral high ground by default; reform is limited to surface repairs rather than structural reconstruction. In fact, it is often these untouchable traditions that preserve elite privilege and prevent ideals of equality and freedom from becoming engines of social progress.

The true breakthrough of modern civilization begins with a dangerous yet indispensable sentence: “Our ancestors may have been wrong.” In many ancient societies, this statement remains almost unbearable. The preservation of inherited authority often outweighs the pursuit of truth, regardless of consequences.

IV. The Failure to Depoliticize Faith as a Deeper Barrier

A deeper dividing line lies in the relationship between faith and power. In Islamic civilizations, religion and politics remain deeply intertwined; in India, religion and the caste system have long restricted social mobility; in Oceania, Confucianism functions less as a transcendent faith than as a political-ethical instrument of governance. Only when faith does not serve political authority—when it restrains power and affirms the inherent dignity of individuals—can a society achieve true spiritual independence. Once belief systems become perceived as threats independent of power, they are inevitably suppressed.

V. Why Israel Became an Exception

Israel is not an exception due to ethnic superiority, but because it followed a fundamentally different path at critical junctures. In Jewish belief, God stands above all political authority: kings may be rebuked by prophets, the law does not exist for rulers’ convenience, and individuals are accountable first to God, not to the state. Second, centuries without a state compelled Jewish communities to cultivate strong social self-organization through families, synagogues, law, and education. Third, Jewish historical consciousness emphasizes sin, repentance, and renewal. Failure is not concealed but examined; history itself is subject to judgment. This grants civilization an internal mechanism for renewal.

VI. The Issue Is Not Ethnicity, but Institutional Faith

Returning to Oceania, one clarification is essential: the problem is not ethnic, but structural. At its core lies a single principle—power is supreme, and no authority higher than power is acknowledged. This results from the fusion of institutional atheism, imperial legacy, and modern authoritarian technologies. It denies God, denies natural law, and denies inalienable human rights. It inherits a Legalist logic of control while reinforcing dominance through propaganda, organization, and technology. This is not genuine reverence for ancestors, but the decoration of power with tradition—and the enthronement of power as god.

Conclusion: The True Civilizational Divide

History repeatedly demonstrates that the fate of civilizations is not determined by antiquity, but by whether they recognize a reality higher than the state, power, or rulers. When such recognition exists, power can be restrained; when humans are understood as created in the image of God, dignity becomes inherent; when human fallibility is acknowledged, authority must be checked. Civilizations that reject this foundation—regardless of their splendor—eventually appear cumbersome, fearful, violent, and stagnant in the modern world.

Many ordinary people living in Oceania do not reject their civilizational heritage, yet increasingly struggle to understand why their society remains distant from freedom and global integration. This very act of questioning marks the moment when light begins to work.