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The impact of Jesus on human history is so obvious and so enormous that few people would question his placement near the top of this list. Indeed, the more likely question is why Jesus, who is the inspiration for the most influential religion in history, has not been placed first.

There is no question that Christianity, over the course of time, has had far more adherents than any other religion. However, it is not the relative influence of different religions that is being estimated in this book, but rather the relative influence of individual men. Christianity, unlike Islam, was not founded by a single person but by two people—Jesus and St. Paul—and the principal credit for its development must therefore be apportioned between those two figures.

Jesus formulated the basic ethical ideas of Christianity, as well as its basic spiritual outlook and its main ideas concerning human conduct. Christian theology, however, was shaped principally by the work of St. Paul. Jesus presented a spiritual message; Paul added to that the worship of Christ. Furthermore,

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St. Paul was the author of a considerable portion of the New Testament, and was the main proselytizing force for Christianity during the first century.

Jesus was still fairly young when he died (unlike Buddha or Muhammad), and he left behind a limited number of disciples. At the time of Jesus' death, his followers simply formed a small Jewish sect. It was due in considerable measure to Paul's writings, and to his tireless proselytizing efforts, that this small sect was transformed into a dynamic and much greater movement, which reached non-Jews as well as Jews, and which eventually grew into one of the great religions of the world.

For these reasons, some people even contend that it is Paul, rather than Jesus, who should really be considered the founder of Christianity. Carried to its logical conclusion, that argument would lead one to place Paul higher on this list than Jesus! However, although it is not clear what Christianity would be like without the influence of St. Paul, it is quite apparent that without Jesus, Christianity would not exist at all.

However, it does not seem reasonable to consider Jesus responsible for all the things which Christian churches or individual Christians later did in his name, particularly since he would obviously disapprove of many of those things. Some of them—for example the religious wars between various Christian sects, and the barbaric massacres and persecutions of the Jews— are in such obvious contradiction to the attitudes and teachings of Jesus that it seems entirely unreasonable to say that Jesus inspired them.

Similarly, even though modern science first arose in the Christian nations of western Europe, it seems inappropriate to think of Jesus as responsible for the rise of science. Certainly, none of the early Christians interpreted the teachings of Jesus as a call for scientific investigation of the physical world. Indeed, the conversion of the Roman world to Christianity was accompanied and followed by a drastic decline in both the general level of technology and the general degree of interest in science.

That science did eventually arise in Europe is indeed an indication that there was something in the European cultural

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heritage that was favorable to the scientific way of thinking. That something, however, was not the sayings of Jesus, but rather Greek rationalism, as typified by the works of Aristotle and Euclid. It is noteworthy that modern science developed, not during the heyday of church power and of Christian piety, but rather on the heels of the Renaissance, a period during which Europe experienced a renewal of interest in its pre-Christian heritage.

The story of Jesus' life, as it is related in the New Testament, is familiar to most readers and will not be repeated here. However, a few points are worth noting. In the first place, most of the information that we have about Jesus' life is uncertain. We are not even sure what his original name was. Most probably it was the common Jewish name, Yehoshua (Joshua in English). The year of his birth, too, is uncertain, although 6 B.C. is a likely date. Even the year of his death, which must have been well known to his followers, is not definitely known today. Jesus himself left no writings behind, and virtually all our information concerning his life comes from the accounts in the New Testament.

Unfortunately, the Gospels contradict each other on various points. For example, Matthew and Luke give completely different versions of Jesus' last words; both of these versions, incidentally, are direct quotations from the Old Testament.

It was no accident that Jesus was able to quote from the Old Testament; though the progenitor of Christianity, he was himself a devout Jew. It has been frequently pointed out that Jesus was in many ways very similar to the Hebrew prophets of the Old Testament, and was deeply influenced by them. Like the prophets, Jesus had an extraordinarily impressive personality, which made a deep and lasting impression on the people who met him. He was charismatic in the deepest and fullest sense of the word.

However, in sharp contrast to Muhammad, who exercised political as well as religious authority, Jesus had virtually no influence on political developments during his own lifetime, or during the succeeding century. (Both men, of course, have had an enormous indirect influence on long-term

political develop

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merits.) Jesus made his influence felt entirely as an ethical and spiritual leader.

If it was primarily as an ethical leader that Jesus left his mark, it is surely pertinent to ask to what extent his ethical ideas have influenced the world. One of Jesus' central precepts, certainly, was the Golden Rule. Today, the Golden Rule is accepted by most people, Christians and non-Christians alike, as a reasonable guide to moral conduct. We may not always act in accordance with it, but we usually try to do so. If Jesus had actually originated that almost universally accepted principle, he would surely have been the first man on this list.

In fact, though, the Golden Rule was an accepted precept of Judaism long before Jesus was born.

Rabbi Hillel, the leading Jewish rabbi of the first century b.c., explicitly enunciated the Golden Rule and pronounced it the foremost principle of Judaism. Nor was the notion known only to the Western world. The Chinese philosopher Confucius had proposed it in about 500 b.c, and the saying also appears in the Mahabharata, an ancient Hindu poem. In fact, the philosophy behind the Golden Rule is accepted by almost every major religious group.

Does this mean that Jesus had no original ethical ideas? Not at all! A highly distinctive viewpoint is presented in Matthew 5:43-44:

Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbor, and hate thine enemy. But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them whicli despitejully use you, and persecute you.

And a few lines earlier: "...resist not evil: but whosoever shall smite thee on the right cheek, turn to him the other also."

Now, these ideas—which were not a part of the Judaism of Jesus' day, nor of most other religions—

are surely among the most remarkable and original ethical ideas ever presented. If they were widely followed, I would have had no hesitation in placing Jesus first in this book.

But the truth is that they are not widely followed. In fact,

Rembrandt's "Hundred Guilder Print" of Christ preaching.

they are not even generally accepted. Most Christians consider the injunction to "Love your enemy" as—at most—an ideal which might be realized in some perfect world, but one which is not a reasonable guide to conduct in the actual world we live in. We do not normally practice it, do not expect others to practice it, and do not teach our children to practice it. Jesus' most distinctive teaching, therefore, remains an intriguing but basically untried suggestion.

BUDDHA ^{5 6 3 b.c. - 4 8 3 b.c.}

Gautama Buddha, whose original name was Prince Siddhartha, was the founder of Buddhism, one of the world's great religions. Siddhartha was the son of a king ruling in Kapilavastu, a city in northeast India, near the borders of Nepal. Siddhartha himself (of the clan of Gautama and the tribe of Sakya) was purportedly born in 563 B.C., in Lumbini, within the present borders of Nepal. He was married at sixteen to a cousin of the same age. Brought up in the luxurious royal palace, Prince Siddhartha did not want for material comforts. Nevertheless, he was profoundly dissatisfied. He observed that most human beings were poor and continually suffered from want. Even those who were wealthy were frequently frustrated and unhappy, and all men were subject to disease and ultimately succumbed to death. Surely, Sid

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dhartha thought, there must be more to life than transitory pleasures, which were all too soon obliterated by suffering and death.

When he was twenty-nine, just after the birth of his first son, Gautama decided that he must abandon the life he was living and devote himself wholeheartedly to the search for truth. He departed from the palace, leaving behind his wife, his infant son, and all his worldly possessions, and became a penniless wanderer. For a while he studied with some of the famed holy men of the day, but after mastering their teachings, he found their solutions to the problems of the human situation unsatisfactory. It was widely believed that extreme asceticism was the pathway to true wisdom, Gautama therefore attempted to become an ascetic, for several years engaging in extreme fasts and self-mortification.

Eventually, however, he realized that tormenting his body only clouded his brain, without leading him any closer to true wisdom. He therefore resumed eating normally, and abandoned asceticism.

In solitude, he grappled with the problems of human existence. Finally, one evening, as he sat beneath a giant fig tree, all the pieces of the puzzle seemed to fall into place.

Siddhartha spent the whole night in deep reflection, and when the morning came, he was convinced that he had found the solution and that he was now a Buddha, an "enlightened one."

At this time, he was thirty-five years old. For the remaining forty-five years of his life, he traveled throughout northern India, preaching his new philosophy to all who were willing to listen. By the time he died, in 483 b.c. , he had made thousands of converts.

Though his words had not been written down, his disciples had memorized many of his teachings, and they were passed to succeeding generations by word of mouth.

The principal teachings of the Buddha can be summarized in what Buddhists call the

"Four Noble Truths": first, that human life is intrinsically unhappy; second, that the cause of this unhappiness is human selfishness and desire; third, that individual selfishness and desire can be brought to an end—the resulting state, when all desires and cravings have been

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eliminated, is termed nirvana (literally "blowing out" or "extinction"); fourth, that the method of escape from selfishness and desire is what is called the "Eightfold Path": right views, right thought, right speech, right action, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness, and right meditation. It might be added that Buddhism is open to all, regardless of race, and that (unlike Hinduism) it recognizes no distinctions of caste.

For some time after Gautama's death the new religion spread slowly. In the third century

B.C., the great Indian emperor Asoka became converted to Buddhism. His support brought about the rapid expansion of Buddhist influence and teachings in India and the spread of Buddhism to neighboring countries. Buddhism spread south into Ceylon, and eastward into Burma. From there it spread into all of southeast Asia, and down into Malaya, and into what is now Indonesia.

Buddhism also spread north, directly into Tibet, and to the northwest, into Afghanistan and Central Asia. It spread into China, where it won a large following, and from there into Korea and Japan.

Within India itself, the new faith started to decline after about 500, and almost vanished after about 1200. In China and Japan, on the other hand, Buddhism remained a major religion. In Tibet and in southeast Asia, it has been the principal religion for many centuries.

Buddha's teachings were not written down until several centuries after his death, and, understandably, his movement has split into various sects. The two principal divisions of Buddhism are the Theravada branch, dominant in southern Asia, and considered by most Western scholars as the one closer to the Buddha's original teachings, and the Mahayana branch, dominant in Tibet, China, and northern Asia generally.

Buddha, as the founder of one of the world's major religions, clearly deserved a place near the head of this list. Since there are only about 200 million Buddhists in the world, compared with over 500 million Moslems and about one billion Christians, it would seem evident that Buddha has

influenced fewer people than either Muhammad or Jesus. However, the dif

ference in numbers can be misleading. One reason that Buddhism died out in India is that Hinduism absorbed many of its ideas and principles. In China, too, large numbers of persons who do not call themselves Buddhists have been strongly influenced by Buddhist philosophy.

Buddhism, far more than Christianity or Islam, has a very strong pacifist element.

The orientation toward nonviolence has played a significant role in the political history of Buddhist countries.

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It has often been said that if Christ were to return to earth, he would be shocked at many of the things which have been done in his name, and horrified at the bloody fights between different sects of persons who call themselves his followers. Buddha, too, would doubtless be amazed at many of the doctrines that have been presented as Buddhist. But while there are many sects of Buddhism, and large differences between those sects, there is nothing in Buddhist history that remotely compares with the bloody religious wars that took place in Christian Europe. In this respect, at least, Buddha's teachings seem to have had far greater influence on his followers than Christ's teachings had on his.

Buddha and Confucius have had an approximately equal influence upon the world. Both lived at about the same time, and the number of their adherents has not been too different. I have chosen to place Buddha before Confucius for two reasons: first, the advent of Communism in China seems to have greatly diminished Confucian influence; and second, the failure of Confucianism to spread widely outside of China indicates how closely the ideas of Confucius were grounded in pre-existing Chinese attitudes. Buddhist teachings, on the other hand, are in no sense a restatement of previous Indian philosophy, and Buddhism has spread far beyond the boundaries of India due to the originality of Gautama Buddha's concept, and the wide appeal of his philosophy.

'Buddha's Return from Heaven," by Nanda Lai Bose.

The great Chinese philosopher Confucius was the first man to develop a system of beliefs synthesizing the basic ideas of the Chinese people. His philosophy, based on personal morality and on the concept of a government that served its people and ruled by moral example, permeated Chinese life and culture for well over two thousand years, and has greatly influenced a substantial portion of the world's population.

Confucius was born about 551 B.C., in the small state of Lu, which is in the present province of Shantung, in northeastern China. His father died when he was quite young, and Confucius and his mother lived in poverty. As a young man, the future philosopher served as a minor government official, but after several years he resigned his post. He spent the next sixteen years teaching, attracting a considerable number of disciples to his philosophy. When he was about fifty years old, he was awarded a high position in the government of Lu; however, after about four years, enemies at court brought about his dismissal, and, indeed, his exile from the state. He spent the next thirteen years as

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an itinerant teacher, and then returned to his home state for the last five years of his life. He died in 479 b.c.

Confucius is often credited as the founder of a religion, but this description is inaccurate. He very rarely referred to the Deity, refused to discuss the afterlife, and avoided all forms of metaphysical speculation. He was basically a secular philosopher, interested in personal and political morality and conduct.

The two most important virtues, according to Confucius, are jen and li, and the superior man guides his conduct by them. Jen has sometimes been translated as "love," but it might better be defined as "benevolent concern for one's fellow men." Li describes a combination of manners, ritual, custom, etiquette, and propriety.

Ancestor worship, the basic Chinese religion even before Confucius, was reinforced by the strong emphasis that he placed on family loyalty and respect for one's parents. Confucius also taught that respect and obedience were owed by wives to their husbands and by subjects to their rulers. But the Chinese sage did not approve of tyranny. He believed that the state exists for the benefit of the people, not vice versa, and he repeatedly stressed that a ruler should govern primarily by moral example rather than by force. Another of his tenets was a slight variant of the Golden Rule: "What you do not want done to yourself, do not do to others."

Confucius's basic outlook was highly conservative. He believed that the Golden Age was in the past, and he urged both rulers and people to return to the good old moral standards. In fact, however, the Confucian ideal of government by moral example had not been the prevailing practice in earlier times, and Confucius was therefore a more innovative reformer than he claimed to be.

Confucius lived during the Chou dynasty, a period of great intellectual ferment in China.

Contemporary rulers did not accept his program, but after his death his ideas spread widely throughout his country. However, with the advent of the Ch'in

The legendary meeting of Confucius (left) with Lao Tzu.

dynasty, in 221 b.c., Confucianism fell upon evil days. The first emperor of the Ch'in dynasty, Shih Huang Ti, was determined to eradicate Confucius's influence, and to make a clean break with the past. He ordered the suppression of Confucian teachings and the burning of all

dynasty, in 221 b.c., Confucianism fell upon evil days. The first emperor of the Ch'in dynasty, Shih Huang Ti, was determined to eradicate Confucius's influence, and to make a clean break with the past. He ordered the suppression of Confucian teachings and the burning of all