Author: CRT Admin

This past weekend, Pope Leo XIV visited Lebanon.  His remarks, to me, captured the grace of concern for others with which the Prophet Muhammad framed his covenants to respect and protect Christians and Jews.  I, myself, perceive a resonance between the Pope’s vision for humanity and of inter-religious dialogue and cooperation and the texts of those historic Islamic covenants, promises given in the name of Allah.

The Caux Round Table, for five years now, has done its best to study carefully, with leadership from our Muslim colleagues, the historicity of the Prophet’s covenants and to then bring the best scholarship on the covenants to wider audiences, especially in Lebanon and in the Vatican.

I quote for you here the relevant thoughts of Pope Leo:

It is in light of this authority that I wish to address to you the words of Jesus that have been chosen as the central theme of my journey: “Blessed are the peacemakers!” (Mt 5:9). …

Your resilience is an essential characteristic of authentic peacemakers, for the work of peace is indeed a continuous starting anew.  Moreover, the commitment and love for peace know no fear in the face of apparent defeat, are not daunted by disappointment, but look ahead, welcoming and embracing all situations with hope.  It takes tenacity to build peace; it takes perseverance to protect and nurture life. …

May you speak just one language, namely the language of hope that, by always starting afresh, draws everyone together.  May the desire to live and grow in unity as a people create a polyphonic voice out of each group. …

This brings us to a second characteristic of peacemakers.  Not only do they know how to start over, but they do so first and foremost along the arduous path of reconciliation.  Indeed, there are personal and collective wounds that take many years, sometimes entire generations, to heal.  If they are not treated, if we do not work, for example, to heal memories, to bring together those who have suffered wrongs and injustice, it is difficult to journey towards peace.  We would remain stuck, each imprisoned by our own pain and our own way of thinking.  The truth, on the other hand, can only be honored through encountering one another.  Each of us sees a part of the truth, knowing one aspect of it, but we cannot negate what only the other knows, what only the other sees.  Truth and reconciliation only ever grow together, whether in a family, between different communities and the various people of a country or between nations. …

At the same time, there can be no lasting reconciliation without a common goal or openness towards a future in which good prevails over the evils that have been suffered or inflicted in the past or the present.  A culture of reconciliation, therefore, does not arise only from below, from the willingness and courage of a few.  It also needs authorities and institutions that recognize the common good as superior to the particular.  The common good is more than the sum of many interests, for it draws together everyone’s goals as closely as possible, directing them in such a way that everyone will have more than if they were to move forward by themselves.  Indeed, peace is much more than a mere balance – which is always precarious – among those who live separately while under the same roof.  Peace is knowing how to live together, in communion, as reconciled people. …

Finally, I would like to outline a third characteristic of those who strive for peace.  Even when it requires sacrifice, peacemakers dare to persevere.

In remarks to a gathering of religious leaders of many faiths, Pope Leo said:

In his Post-Synodal Apostolic Exhortation Ecclesia in Medio Oriente, signed here in Beirut in 2012, Pope Benedict XVI emphasized that “[t]he Church’s universal nature and vocation require that she engage in dialogue with the members of other religions.  In the Middle East, this dialogue is based on the spiritual and historical bonds uniting Christians to Jews and Muslims. It is a dialogue which is not primarily dictated by pragmatic, political or social considerations, but by underlying theological concerns which have to do with faith” (n. 19).  Dear friends, your presence here today, in this remarkable place where minarets and church bell towers stand side by side, yet both reach skyward, testifies to the enduring faith of this land and the steadfast devotion of its people to the one God.  Here in this beloved land, may every bell toll, every adhān, every call to prayer blend into a single, soaring hymn – not only to glorify the merciful Creator of heaven and earth, but also to lift a heartfelt prayer for the divine gift of peace. …

Yet, in the midst of these struggles, a sense of hopefulness and encouragement can be found when we focus on what unites us: our common humanity and our belief in a God of love and mercy.  In an age when coexistence can seem like a distant dream, the people of Lebanon, while embracing different religions, stand as a powerful reminder that fear, distrust and prejudice do not have the final word and that unity, reconciliation and peace are possible.  It is a mission that remains unchanged throughout the history of this beloved land: to bear witness to the enduring truth that Christians, Muslims, Druze and countless others can live together and build a country united by respect and dialogue.

May we all be peacemakers.

Here is another thought experiment about what we can expect from our times as stimulated by Hexagram 53 in the Yijing (Book of Changes).

Free markets have a much-overlooked moral function, perhaps their most important moral function – providing retribution for hubris – unwarranted pride, arrogance and blindness.

In Greek mythology, Nemesis stepped in to correct excessive exploitation of one’s dominion, one’s failure to align with Aristotle’s golden mean, one’s going much too far beyond the square footage of good sense and due care and concern for others.

Consider Icarus, who flew too close to the Sun and so lost his ability to fly.

Consider Narcissus, who, because of his vanity, Nemesis led to a pool where he saw his own reflection, fell in love with it, could not turn his eyes away from the floating image and eventually died alongside the water.

Free markets in crypto currency have just acted as Nemesis to investors in Bitcoin.  Here is the story from the Wall Street Journal:

The crypto market turmoil only intensified this week, with bitcoin shedding more than 10% and over $10,000 in value.  In the 24 hours leading up to Friday morning, more than $2 billion worth of leveraged crypto trades were liquidated, pushing bitcoin below $81,000, according to data from CoinGlass.  The largest cryptocurrency is now on track for its worst monthly performance since June 2022, when the collapse of crypto lender Celsius Network plunged the market into what became known as its crypto winter.

Some traders have said the drop in bitcoin may be forcing some other selling in the traditional markets, which swooned this week.

“Every group chat I’m in, everyone wants to know who blew up,” said Nic Carter, founding partner at Castle Island Ventures.  “You can’t make sense of it all now.  There’s a general malaise with no exact catalyst to say this is why.”

This was supposed to be crypto’s year.  There was a perfect storm of a crypto-loving White House, Wall Street adoption and friendly legislation that put a close to more than a decade of antagonistic U.S. regulation and prosecutions.

In a sense, it worked.  Divisions between traditional and crypto finance seemed to blur.  Portfolio managers are modeling cash flows based on the yields of stablecoins.  BlackRock and Fidelity, among many others, hoovered up bitcoins for ETFs.  Banks like Bank of New York Mellon and JPMorgan Chase wanted to put funds on the blockchain, while digital token companies like Ripple tried to become banks.

“Gateways are being opened every single day,” said President Trump’s son, Eric Trump, who has co-founded two crypto companies.  “This dam is cracking.  The two were becoming one and I think it’s very exciting.”…

“When Trump got elected, we were saying ‘gosh, finally we’re going to get all the institutions, ETF approvals, pretty much all the headlines that we dreamed of in crypto,’” said Santiago Roel Santos, a longtime crypto investor and chief executive of Inversion.  “The market just has not reacted the way that you would have thought.”

Instead, crypto continues to struggle to break free of its reputation as the deranged, foul-mouthed little sibling of Wall Street, too volatile to trust, too entertaining to look away.

Donald Trump is on YouTube saying, “I only care about one thing… will we be number one in crypto?”

Nemesis came for the Trump family too.  According to the November 19 edition of the New York Post:

Trump Media & Technology Group, the crypto and social media company controlled by members of the first family, has seen its stock price plummet to all-time lows – wiping out more than $5 billion in wealth for the Trumps as cryptocurrencies continue their slide.

Shares of Trump Media, which trades under the ticker DJT, have fallen nearly 70% this year – 34.6% of that just the past month, according to Barron’s. …

The family’s holdings, which were worth nearly $6.5 billion at their peak in mid-May 2024, have lost more than $5.3 billion in value since then, according to Barron’s.

The company’s nosedive is tied to a broader meltdown in the crypto market.

Cryptocurrencies have taken a big hit since Trump Media said in August it bought $2 billion worth of Bitcoin.

Bitcoin prices on Tuesday briefly dipped below $90,000 for the first time in months – wiping out the asset’s gains for the year.

Could even the Trumps be narcissists?

If so, Nemesis awaits.

In free markets, the “others” stand in for Nemesis.

As Sartre told us: L’enfer, c’est les autres – “Hell is others.”

Other market players are not docile subordinates waiting for instructions.  They have free will and independent power.  They decide what’s best for themselves.  They need not follow the herd or succumb to trendy delusions about what the future holds.  They set prices with their decisions to buy and sell.  They can foreswear “irrational exuberance” and cause markets to crash.

This is morality in action – consequences imposed for being out of line.

The formation of monopolies and cartels attempts to drive this free-thinking morality from markets by controlling supply or demand and so setting prices.  But such collaborations, in time, also fall prey to Nemesis.  Others – innovators, creative destroyers – find workarounds to devalue what is controlled.

Pride goeth before destruction and a haughty spirit before a fall. – Proverbs 16:18

Since the Caux Round Table begin its study of the covenants given by the Prophet Muhammad to respect and protect Christians and Jews, I have, from time to time, reported to our community insights and historical facts which have emerged in our study of those covenants and discussions of their contents and what their terms imply for our times today.

Recently, the interim president of Syria, a country long burdened with brutal repression and civil war among its citizens, met with the Greek Orthodox Patriarch John X.  The patriarch showed the president a recension of a covenant given as a work of grace by the Prophet Muhammad to Christians.  The document dates to Ottoman times.

Here is a picture of the two with the recension:

Our colleague, Ahmed El-Wakil, now at Oxford, who has contributed so much to the finding of recensions of the Prophet’s covenants and to our understanding of their terms and of the circumstances in which they were given and received, has sent me the following email about the meeting, which I wish to share with you:

On Sunday, 26 October 2025, Syria’s transitional president, Aḥmad al-Sharaa, visited Greek Orthodox Patriarch John X Yazigi at the patriarchal residence in Damascus – a gesture that carried more than diplomatic weight.  It was his first official visit to a church since taking office and it unfolded as both reassurance and reminder that Syria’s plural identity, frayed by war, still had roots deep enough to hold.

During the meeting, Patriarch Yazigi presented al-Sharaa with a copy of a manuscript of the covenant of the Prophet Muhammad housed at the Monastery of St. George al-Humayra, which promises protection and freedom of worship to Christians.  This particular document was studied by Ibrahim Zein and Ahmed El-Wakil in chapter 3 of their book, The Covenants of the Prophet Muhammad: From Shared Historical Memory to Peaceful Co-existence, who identified it as a copy of the covenant the Prophet gave to the Christians of Najran, whose text was faithfully transmitted until the Ottoman period, to which the manuscript belongs.  By invoking it, Yazigi appealed to a moral memory within Islam itself – one that links faith to justice and protection, not coercion.

Al-Sharaa responded in kind, writing in the patriarchal guest book a verse from the Qur’an describing Christians as “nearest in affection to the believers” and adding in his own words that Damascus is “the cradle of the first coexistence known to humanity.”  His inscription framed coexistence not as political rhetoric, but as a duty inherited from the city’s own past.  The moment thus echoed older gestures of mutual recognition, such as the one embodied in the Najran covenant preserved at the Monastery of St. George al-Humayra before the war.

Seen together, the patriarch’s presentation and the president’s response wove history into hope. They recalled that the idea of a just order in Syria has never rested solely on conquest or power, but on an older moral claim: that peace endures only when protection is shared.

Kind regards,
Ahmed

By Dinh Hoang Thang , Fellow the Caux Round Table for Moral Capitalism

Busan — a city that smells of salt and ocean water, once defined by tides and trade — suddenly found itself at the center of a geopolitical storm. Before arriving here, Donald Trump had stopped in Kuala Lumpur and Tokyo. Five days, three capitals (October 26–30): what seemed like a restless shuttle across Asia turned out to be a cartography of power. Did the history of East Asia just quietly turn a new page? 

I. A Journey Writting a Message 

Trump’s travels were no ordinary tour. The trip implemented a strategy , scripted in three acts: beginning in Kuala Lumpur — the symbolic heart of ASEAN; moved to Tokyo — the setting of a revived alliance; and ended in Busan — where two superpowers tested each other’s resolve.

The sequence mattered. Southeast Asia is not an audience, but part of the stage. Japan is no longer just an ally, but a co-architect of global order. And Busan — that sea-wrapped arena — became host to the acting out of raw, transactional power.

In Kuala Lumpur, ASEAN — once derided as a “talking club” — suddenly looked relevant. Small nations, through the art of flexible diplomacy, managed to engage both Washington and Beijing, bargaining for space, investment, and having a voice in an age of tightening rivalry.

In Tokyo, Prime Minister Takaichi Sanae, heir to former Prime Minister Abe’s strategic realism, met Trump to discuss supply chains, defense, and technological autonomy. The U.S.–Japan alliance is no longer built only on deterrence; it now rests on industrial and technological power — an alliance of determinative capability.

And finally, in Busan, amid jet engine thrusts and the scent of the sea, Trump and Xi met in a modest room — no red carpets, no choreographed grandeur. What unfolded was a minimalist drama of power: an interim detente, not a peace; a truce defined by interests, not ideals.

II. Japan’s New Doctrine and the Shape of a Regional Order 

Shinzo Abe planted the seeds of a “Free and Open Indo-Pacific.” Takaichi Sanae is harvesting them — with less rhetoric and more resolve. Her ambition is transparent: boost defense spending, anchor security cooperation with the U.S., and weave industrial links with India, Australia, and South Korea. This is Abe 2.0 — democratic, assertive, and determined to keep East Asia’s future from being written by Beijing.

With Trump’s pragmatic America back in play, Tokyo understands that autonomy is the new loyalty. Instead of sheltering under Washington’s security umbrella, Japan needs its own raincoat — rebuilding semiconductor industries, advancing clean energy, and reimagining its role in regional supply chains. The Abe–Takaichi doctrine turns ideals into instruments: from “rules-based order” to “capabilities-based alliances.”

III. Busan: When Two Worlds Talk in Calculus 

After months of tariff battles, tech bans, and rare-earth restrictions, both Trump and Xi needed a breather. The outcome was a temporary armistice: Washington eased some tariffs; Beijing resumed U.S. soybean imports and pledged to rein in fentanyl exports. But beneath the smiles, the calculation was cold-hearted.

Trump needed stability heading into an election year. Xi needed calm to sustain his authority at home and preserve his face internationally. Each leader stepped back a few inches — without abandoning a single trenchline.

The U.S.–China rivalry has entered a new phase: managed competition. The conflict has evolved from a trade war to a war of standards — over chips, AI, finance, and energy. Two gravitational systems now coexist: not colliding, not converging, but circling in uneasy proximity. Like twin planets in an imperfect orbit, they offset the pull of — and so limit — each other’s orbit.

IV. ASEAN Awakens: From Playing Field to Power Hub 

One quiet happening during Trump’s journey was the awakening of ASEAN. As Air Force One touched down in Kuala Lumpur, Southeast Asia ceased to be a corridor between superpowers and began to act as a hinge of strategic consequence.

ASEAN’s new realism lies in “neutral pragmatism.” Its members — Indonesia, Vietnam, the Philippines, among others — are mastering the art of balance: welcoming investment, keeping dialogue open, and leveraging great-power rivalry to augment  self-reliant autonomy.

Neutrality no longer means passivity. It’s an art of motion, not a state of immobility — the ability to maneuver between forces without being crushed. If sustained, that agility could transform ASEAN from a passive zone into a dynamic geoeconomic contributor to a multi-polar world.

V. Vietnam: From Insecure Wariness to Self-Reliant Confidence 

Vietnam stands at the confluence of two currents: commerce and security strategy. The temporary U.S.–China détente offers a breathing space — stable trade, redirected investment, supply-chain realignment — but of uncertain duration. A single tariff tweak in Washington or a military move by Beijing in the South China Sea could upend it overnight.

Vietnam’s survival strategy must therefore be double-tracked: pragmatic in action, visionary in thought.

Pragmatism means infrastructure reform, institutional modernization, human-capital investment, and advances in logistics and semiconductors — the bloodstream feeding the new global economy.

Vision means redefining “self-reliance” not through isolation, but through innovation; not by avoiding conflict, but by shaping cooperation.

“Self-reliance” today is not a slogan but a system — the ability to shift from low-cost manufacturing to high-value creation, from export dependency to endogenous value chains.

As global powers race to secure chips and critical minerals, Vietnam must secure and refine its most precious resource: people — their education, creativity, and freedom – to shape the counry’s future.

Vietnam’s strength has never been about size. It lies in self-definition — the capacity to carve a very purposeful identity and design an innovative strategy amid flux.

VI. East Asia: A Quiet Reshaping of Order 

Trump’s five-day tour did not shake the earth with thunder.  But it did trigger some quiet tectonic movements. The regional order is morphing from black-and-white confrontation to a spectrum of pragmatic competition. Japan grows firmer, South Korea more adaptive, ASEAN more flexible, and China more cautious.

This is not the collapse of an old order but the reconfiguration of one — an emerging, networked, interdependent Indo-Pacific, built less on declarations and more on interlocking actions.

The new order cannot yet neutralize Beijing’s ambitions, but it has birthed a chain reaction: middle powers linking up, industrial alliances forming, technology partnerships expanding, preventive diplomacy taking root. A soft multipolarity is emerging — not of rival empires, but of complementary capabilities.

VII. Busan: Mirror or Gateway? 

From the salty winds of Busan rises an image of contemporary East Asia — a mirror in which every nation can see itself: its possibilities, its limits. Trump’s five-day voyage did not redraw borders, but it stirred currents that may erode the old shorelines of certainty.

East Asia is entering a new phase — one of mid-sized powers asserting agency, of profitable alignments replacing rigid blocs, of competition measured not in ideology but in competence.

Vietnam, poised in the storm’s eye, has a choice: to shrink and dodge — or to reach and redefine.

In an age when power resides less in missiles or money than in ideas and intellect, any meaningful rise of Vietnam to take advantage of the new order will begin not with muscle power, but with heart/mind power – the freedom to think and the courage to create.

Trump’s five-day odyssey was but a moment. Yet history often turns on such moments — quietly, but profoundly.