History: “Seven Pillars of Wisdom” by Thomas Lawrence Essay

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Introduction

The seven pillars of wisdom were developed from the first seven out of the nine beatitudes contained in the book of Mathew in the holy bible. In summary, the beatitudes encourage people to be meek, merciful, and pure at heart. Moreover, they also motivate people to be peacemakers and act in the right way. A great reward awaits those who act by the above, which includes, above all, a ticket to the kingdom of heaven.

The pillars create a foundation for all religions and are very important for those who seek the truth. They help people to know the purpose of life, and this makes them have a focus. They also encourage us to live a more desirable life and enable people to recognize others who are important to them and understand how to acknowledge them. Values that help people interact properly are also clearly brought out in these pillars. The pillars also aid the process of decision making when a person is faced with different situations.

Arabs fight against the Turks

The seven pillars of wisdom can be associated with the revolt of the Arabs against the Turks. At that particular time, the Arabs worked alongside the British and the Germans with the Turks (Lawrence 164). In short, the British looked forward to defeating the Germans and the Arabs the Turks. Having a good knowledge of the Arabic people made the British think that it would be wise to revolt against the Turks.

This is because that would help them in their defeat against the Germans. Britain had assured the Arabs that it would help them in the battle. The Turks did all they could to defend themselves, and they posed a great challenge to the Arabs. This is because the British help promised to the Arabic people took a long to come, which disadvantaged them. However, they first chose to work on the Turks’ periphery by first relocating their base to Wejh to be able to outdo them. In response to this, their enemies stopped moving towards Mecca and took on a route to Medina and its railway (Lawrence 165). Even after making that decision, the Arabs were ready to attack.

Germans involvement

The Germans who had been an alley to the Turks had seen the danger and quickly advised Enver to evacuate all the troops in Medina through route march in mass. As Lawrence has noted, those who benefited from this were the Arabs (166). Through the able guidance and advice of Sir Archibald, they increased their effort in a quest to counter the retreating army. The medina German military was weakened as a result of a lack of animal transport. Nonetheless, they opted to use the train transport.

These are some of the Germans’ brilliant ideas in their fight against the British and the Arabs. At Wejh, novel ideas were being developed by some people who tried to pass a better ruling (Lawrence 167). They deemed it necessary to embrace their enemy and preach peace instead of fighting one another, but the people preferred the objective of Medina. Nasir and others tricked the Turks and were able to get to a place known as Akaba and capture it with ease.

This led to a close of the Hejaz war, and Nasir, with his accomplice, had to start assisting the British people in capturing Syria. Therefore, together with other Arabs, they were now part of Allenby’s army working from Sinai. In addition to that, the army that was being led by Feisal was now under Allenby’s leadership. The first step was to block the Akaba area’s accessibility from the waters and hinder the Hejaz railways.

Reason for fighting

The Hejaz war was worn, and many of the fighters were relieved because it had been a major threat. The reason that motivated Feisal to fight the Turkish was in order to remove the Turk empire from Asia.

The Turks were disliked so much, and their killing was like any other luxurious activity to their opponents. Lawrence has argued that it would have been better if Feisal and his accomplice had gone quietly or tried to drive them away peacefully, with no bloodshed involved (180). Individuals who were involved in the war possessed self-control, endurance, speed, and secrecy. Also, they also could destroy the enemies’ communication system. All this gave the army fighting against the Turks an advantage over their enemies (Lawrence 180). They worked hard knowing in the full knowledge that through their efforts, a new province would be born. They were even ready to sacrifice their lives in a bid to realize this dream.

Strategies used

Both the British and Arabs employed various strategies on the battlefield. For example, they assumed strategic positions on hillsides to enable them to have a better view of the railway (Lawrence 189). Furthermore, they had also gathered information about the daily activities of their opponents. For example, they were aware that the Turks would actively patrol their neighborhood at night. Even capturing the Akaba area was done from the ruddy mountains that hide it and the sea. They would appoint men to lie near all the blockhouses and shoot a few times in the dark. This was meant to confuse the foe that was to assume that it was a prelude attack and stand in their way overnight while their rivals were asleep.

Importance of the events

Jerusalem was eventually captured, but after that, the action of Allenby and his army were greatly undermined by the bad weather in the vicinity of the Dead Sea. This, coupled with a bad temper from the people and the division of purpose, resulted in the breaking of their force. In order to save the situation, it became necessary to send Lawrence back to Feisal so that he could assume the new duties he had been assigned to with the powers he had been given by Allenby.

The fight between the Arabs and the Turks explains the reason why we have a very small number of the latter in the Arabic world. Today, most countries of Arabic origin are mainly occupied by Arabic people. These people are known to be very violent, as seen in the recent trials of violence that were experienced in most Arabic countries in the name of revolutions. It is, therefore, true to say that violence is in their blood.

Works Cited

Lawrence, Thomas. Seven Pillars of Wisdom: A Triumph: The Complete 1922 Text. Radford VA: Wilder Publications, 2011. Print.

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IvyPanda. (2021, January 23). History: "Seven Pillars of Wisdom" by Thomas Lawrence. https://ivypanda.com/essays/history-seven-pillars-of-wisdom-by-thomas-lawrence/

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"History: "Seven Pillars of Wisdom" by Thomas Lawrence." IvyPanda, 23 Jan. 2021, ivypanda.com/essays/history-seven-pillars-of-wisdom-by-thomas-lawrence/.

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IvyPanda. (2021) 'History: "Seven Pillars of Wisdom" by Thomas Lawrence'. 23 January.

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IvyPanda. 2021. "History: "Seven Pillars of Wisdom" by Thomas Lawrence." January 23, 2021. https://ivypanda.com/essays/history-seven-pillars-of-wisdom-by-thomas-lawrence/.

1. IvyPanda. "History: "Seven Pillars of Wisdom" by Thomas Lawrence." January 23, 2021. https://ivypanda.com/essays/history-seven-pillars-of-wisdom-by-thomas-lawrence/.


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IvyPanda. "History: "Seven Pillars of Wisdom" by Thomas Lawrence." January 23, 2021. https://ivypanda.com/essays/history-seven-pillars-of-wisdom-by-thomas-lawrence/.

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