The Contents of “Vietnam: The Springhead of Eastern Cultural Civilization”

The English and Vietnamese versions of "Vietnam: The Springhead of Eastern Cultural Civilization." English edition translated by Dr. Joseph M. Vo.

Several weeks ago I announced the publication of the book Vietnam: The Springhead of Eastern Cultural Civilation.  I then stated that the book is a comprehensive account of Vietnamese history which covers the origins of the Vietnamese people.  However, after aquiring the book, I realized that this literary work is not a comprehensive book based on Vietnamese history through various time periods.  It is actually a book dedicated entirely to the origin of the Vietnamese people.  I finished reading the book just recently and what I learned from this book is literally groundbreaking!

The Author of "Vietnam: The Springhead of Eastern Cultural Civilization," Mr. Du Mien Le Thanh Hoa.

For centuries, even up to present day, most historians believed that Vietnam was a country that found its origins in China, and that Vietnamese civilization was rooted in Chinese civilization.  This however, is a false allegation.  The findings in Vietnam: The Springhead of Eastern Cultural Civilization not only falsifies this claim but also succeeds in explaining how Vietnamese civilization preceeded Chinese civilization.  Le Thanh Hoa, the author of Vietnam, clarifies the fact that the Lac Viet (ancient Vietnamese) were agricultural people with their own civilization and culture while the Chinese at the time were nomadic tribes who lived by hunting and raiding.  The nomadic tribes simply invaded the agricultural people, captured the culture of these people and claimed it as their own.  At the same time, the conquerers also tried to eradicate the Lac Viet, killing and erasing the old histories of the agricultural people in order to maintain their control.  It is for this reason that Vietnamese history has been so fragmented and rare, and why some sections of Chinese history contain so many loop holes and are widely debated among scholars.

Confucius himself admitted that his teachings came from the Viet people.

The authors of Vietnam: The Springhead of Eastern Cultural Civilization not only derive their ideas from western and Vietnamese sources, but also take key ideas from ancient Chinese teachers such as Confucius and the famous historian Sima Qian. One of the most intriguing, not to mention shocking, discoveries made by Le Thanh Hoa’s research is that the thousand year teachings of the great Kong-tzu (Confucius) actually came from the Lac Viet (ancient Vietnamese) nation, and that Confucius actually used the teachings of the Viet people to educate the Chinese people.  Lac Viet was the first civilization of East Asia, independent from China, and older than China.

How revolutionary these findings are is yet to be determined.  For over a thousand years, the belief was that Vietnam was the offspring of China.  This however, has proven to be false.  It was actually the Viet people who gave birth to Chinese civilization.  Whether individuals decide to embrace or reject this discovery, they must respect it.  The facts exist and cannot be erased, not this time.