The Silk Roads: A New History of the World

Christianity is one of the world’s major religions, originating in the teachings of Jesus Christ in the first century CE. Christianity became the dominant religion of the Roman Empire in the fourth century and gradually spread across much of Asia and Europe, taking advantage of commercial networks to refine and disseminate its ideology. The expansion of Christianity often came at the expense of other religions, such as Buddhism, Judaism, and Zoroastrianism, demonstrating that among the competing religions of antiquity Christianity was “the most competitive and successful” (61).

Communism, inspired by the political theories of Karl Marx and championed in the 20th century by world powers such as the Soviet Union and China, is an ideology that aims at the creation of a classless society and the abolition of private ownership of the means of economic production. In the Soviet Union, communism was presented as “a logical reaction” to the social inequality that arose from industrial capitalism. The clash between communism and capitalism fueled a decades-long Cold War between the Soviet Union and the United States, with many other countries becoming embroiled in the conflict.