Question in the subject... Thanks!

I have seen most all of them up to what was put out within this last year, I LOVE ancient history. but I may have missed a few documentaries, suggestions please, and links would be nice. even lectures I would find entertaining. I am 52 years old and have watched most everything I have come across over the years.

Have there ever been any great presidents from a time of Congressional gridlock? How have past presidents handled Congressional gridlock? Which ones were successful and which ones weren't?

Right now, the Quran is organized to be read from the longest chapters (or suras) to the shortest. Is there any reason for why this organization was chosen? Was there perhaps a committee of scholars who debated how the Quran should be written? As I understand, the Quran was passed down orally by those who memorized it (or hafiz) and was not written down until some time after Muhammad's death.

Note: If you're citing information post-Schism, I'd prefer the Orthodox side of things.

• Canonizing officially recognized "Saints"

• Adopting patron saints

• Using icons in Church and prayer at home

• Praying to saints (either the apostles, their patron saint, or others)

• The high level of regard that Mary has - praying to her, venerating her, the various beliefs surrounding her (perpetual virginity, immaculate conception, etc.), etc.

To further clarify, here's a fictional scenario putting these practices in a modern context. If that's not okay for this sub, I'll delete it:

Nikolai is born to Russian parents on December 6th and baptized into the Russian Orthodox Church (or the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia, depending). For these reasons, his patron saint is Saint Nicholas, whom he commemorates on his birthday. Over the years Nikolai gets icons of Jesus, Saint Nicholas, Mary, and the Apostles. These icons sit in a "prayer corner" of his home where he lights candles and prays to them. In addition to God and St. Nicholas, he venerates Mary very much with various prayers at home and at Church.

Hopefully this is all okay. I've tried asking this question (and related ones) before, but either due to the format, nature of the question, or whatever else it never got answered. So I just keep deleting it and trying again :)

My history professor mentioned a book today: The Vikings by Ferguson

He said Ferguson argued that the Vikings organized raids that focused on churches for revenge for Charlemagne conversion of Saxony.

I am wondering what you guys think about this.

Proper historians whose work doesn't end in "Code" or feature on the History Channel, is there anything of value in the apocryphal texts with regards to the historical figure of Jesus (or even the theology of the first Christians around Jesus)?

As I understand it (and feel free to correct me if I'm wrong) laissez-faire economics means that the government is almost completely hands-off with matters of business. But if that's the case, didn't the Gilded Age prove that business owners will try to squeeze every penny they can out of their workers?

I've been thinking a lot about daesh recently, and how they recruit most of their internationals through Facebook. It seems like it must have been harder during the Spanish Civil War to organize people who wanted to fight. How did they get people to Spain back then?

Or did public attention on them decline? Were they all televised for example?

I've just seen "Das Boot" for the third time and I'm really wondring if they had a shower onboard of the type VIIC u-boats? If no, how did they keep their bodies clean? I mean a "Feindfahrt" would sometimes last weeks/months.

EDIT: Thank you so much for your interesting answers :) I've got another question regarding u-boats. When submerged, the crew is practically blind. Assuming they didn't dive too deep and the weather was good: Did the Kaleun ever use the periscope to check out the surroundings under water? I mean like leaving the periscope below surface and e.g. checking for mines or depth charges (and then steering away from them)...

I'm open to anything. I want to start more books on politics. I just picked up "The Prince" by Machiavelli.

Anything works. I'm open.

This would be after the events of 1857 in India and the scramble for Africa was going on.

I've seen it argued that Judaism was probably polytheistic before they were conquered by the Babylonians. How aware were Jews of this by the time Jesus lived and studied?

I know that the proximity to the Atlantic Sea played a role in this for the NW countries due to the New World (Age of Exploration and such), but the rest of the factors seem widely debated.

For example: Julius Caesar was assassinated on the 15th of March, 44 BC. Is this a date in the Gregorian or Julian calendar?

It must be really confusing with all these different systems. When one source for a date concerning an event is in the Jewish calendar, another in the Arabic calendar and another in the Gregorian.

Or is this generally not so important?

Time capsuls? Write about my life and current events as they happen? Nothing because this age is already so incredibly well documented?