This is a world famous book written by Michel H. Hart,
"The 100" -The ranking of the Most Influential Persons in History
"The 100" -The ranking of the Most Influential Persons in History
The 100, a ranking of the Most Influential Persons in History by Michael H. Hart.
Rank Name Religious Affiliation Influence
- Muhammad - Islam - Prophet of Islam; Hart recognized that ranking Muhammad first might be controversial, but felt that, from a secular historian's perspective, this was the correct choice because Muhammad is the only man to have been both a founder of a major world religion and a major military/political leader.
- Isaac Newton - Anglican (rejected Trinitarianism, i.e., Athanasianism; believed in the Arianism of the Primitive Church) - Physicist; Theory of universal gravitation; Laws of Motion
- Jesus Christ - Judaism; Islam - Prophet of Islam; Most revered figure amongst the Christians
- Buddha - Hinduism; Buddhism - Founder of Buddhism.
- Confucius - Confucianism - Founder of Confucianism
- St. Paul - Judaism; Christianity - Founder, proselytizer of Christianity.
- Ts'ai Lun - Chinese traditional religion - Inventor of paper.
- Johann Gutenberg - Catholic - Developed movable type; printed Bibles.
- Christopher Columbus - Catholic - Explorer; Led Europe to Americas.
- Albert Einstein - Jewish - Physicist; Relativity; Einsteinian Physics.
- Louis Pasteur - Catholic - scientist; pasteurization.
- Galileo Galilei - Catholic - Astronomer; Accurately described heliocentric solar system
- Aristotle - Platonism / Greek philosophy - Influential Greek philosopher.
- Euclid - Platonism / Greek philosophy - Mathematician; Euclidian geometry.
- Moses - Judaism; Islam - Major prophet of Judaism; Christianity; Islam.
- Charles Darwin - Anglican (nominal); Unitarian - Biologist; Described Darwinian evolution, which had theological impact on many religions.
- Shih Huang Ti - Chinese traditional religion - Chinese emperor.
- Augustus Caesar - Roman state paganism - Ruler.
- Nicolaus Copernicus - Catholic (priest) - Astronomer; Taught Heliocentricity.
- Antoine Laurent Lavoisier - Catholic - Father of modern chemistry; Philosopher; Economist.
- Constantine the Great - Roman state paganism; Christianity - Roman emperor who completely legalized Christianity, leading to its status as state religion. Convened the First Council of Nicaea that produced the Nicene Creed, which rejected Arianism (one of two major strains of Christian thought) and established Athanasianism (Trinitarianism, the other strain) as "official doctrine."
- James Watt - Presbyterian (lapsed) - developed steam engine.
- Michael Faraday - Sandemanian - Physicist; Chemist; Discovery of magneto-electricity.
- James Clerk Maxwell - Presbyterian; Anglican; Baptist - Physicist; electromagnetic spectrum.
- Martin Luther - Catholic; Lutheran - founder of Protestantism and Lutheranism.
- George Washington - Episcopalian (Deist) - First president of United States.
- Karl Marx - Jewish; Lutheran; Atheist; Marxism/Communism - Founder of Marxism, Marxist Communism.
- Orville and Wilbur Wright - United Brethren - inventors of airplane.
- Genghis Khan - Mongolian shamanism - Mongol conqueror
- Adam Smith - Liberal Protestant - economist; expositor of capitalism; religious philosopher
- Edward de Vere a.k.a. William Shakespeare - Catholic; Anglican - literature; also wrote 6 volumes about philosophy and religion
- John Dalton - Quaker - chemist; physicist; atomic theory; law of partial pressures (Dalton's law).
- Alexander the Great - Greek state paganism - conqueror
- Napoleon Bonaparte - Catholic (nominal) - French conqueror.
- Thomas Edison - Congregationalist; agnostic - inventor of light bulb, phonograph, etc.
- Antony van Leeuwenhoek - Dutch Reformed - microscopes; studied microscopic life.
- William T.G. Morton - pioneer in anesthesiology
- Guglielmo Marconi - Catholic and Anglican - inventor of radio.
- Adolf Hitler - Nazism; born into but rejected Catholicism; allegedly a proponent of Germanic Neo-Paganism - conqueror; led Axis Powers in WWII.
- Plato - Platonism / Greek philosophy - founder of Platonism.
- Oliver Cromwell - Puritan (Protestant) - British political and military leader.
- Alexander Graham Bell - Unitarian/Universalist - inventor of telephone.
- Alexander Fleming - Catholic - penicillin; advances in bacteriology, immunology and chemotherapy.
- John Locke - raised Puritan (Anglican); Liberal Christian - philosopher and liberal theologian.
- Ludwig van Beethoven - Catholic - composer.
- Werner Heisenberg - Lutheran - a founder of quantum mechanics; discovered principle of uncertainty; head of Nazi Germany's nuclear program.
- Louis Daguerre - an inventor/pioneer of photography.
- Simon Bolivar - Catholic (nominal); Atheist - National hero of Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, and Bolivia.
- Rene Descartes - Catholic - Rationalist philosopher and mathematician.
- Michelangelo - Catholic - painter; sculptor; architect.
- Pope Urban II - Catholic - called for First Crusade.
- 'Umar ibn al-Khattab - Islam - Second Caliph; expanded Muslim empire.
- Asoka - Buddhism - king of India who converted to and spread Buddhism.
- St. Augustine - Greek state paganism; Manicheanism; Catholic - Early Christian theologian.
- William Harvey - Anglican (nominal) - described the circulation of blood; wrote Essays on the Generation of Animals, the basis for modern embryology.
- Ernest Rutherford - physicist; pioneer of subatomic physics
- John Calvin - Protestant; Calvinism - Protestant reformer; founder of Calvinism.
- Gregor Mendel - Catholic (Augustinian monk) - Mendelian genetics.
- Max Planck - Protestant - physicist; thermodynamics.
- Joseph Lister - Quaker - principal discoverer of antiseptics which greatly reduced surgical mortality.
- Nikolaus August Otto - built first four-stroke internal combustion engine.
- Francisco Pizarro - Catholic - Spanish conqueror in South America; defeated Incas
- Hernando Cortes - Catholic - conquered Mexico for Spain; through war and introduction of new diseases he largely destroyed Aztec civilization.
- Thomas Jefferson - Episcopalian; Deist - 3rd president of United States.
- Queen Isabella I - Catholic - Spanish ruler.
- Joseph Stalin - Russian Orthodox; Atheist; Marxism - revolutionary and ruler of USSR.
- Julius Caesar - Roman state paganism - Roman emperor.
- William the Conqueror - Catholic - laid foundation of modern England.
- Sigmund Freud - Jewish; atheist; Freudian psychology/psychoanalysis - founded Freudian school of psychology/psychoanalysis (i.e., the "religion of Freudianism").
- Edward Jenner - Anglican - discoverer of the vaccination for smallpox.
- Wilhelm Conrad Roentgen - discovered X-rays.
- Johann Sebastian Bach - Lutheran; Catholic - composer.
- Lao Tzu - Taoism - founder of Taoism.
- Voltaire - raised in Jansenism; later Deist - writer and philosopher; wrote Candide.
- Johannes Kepler - Lutheran - astronomer; planetary motions.
- Enrico Fermi - Catholic - initiated the atomic age; father of atom bomb.
- Leonhard Euler - Calvinist - physicist; mathematician; differential and integral calculus and algebra.
- Jean-Jacques Rousseau - born Protestant; converted as a teen to Catholic; later Deist - French deistic philosopher and author.
- Nicoli Machiavelli - Catholic - wrote The Prince (influential political treatise).
- Thomas Malthus - Anglican (cleric) - economist; wrote Essay on the Principle of Population.
- John F. Kennedy - Catholic - U.S. President who led first successful effort by humans to travel to another planet
- Gregory Pincus - Jewish - endocrinologist; developed birth-control pill
- Mani - Manicheanism - founder of Manicheanism, once a world religion which rivaled Christianity in strength
- Lenin - Russian Orthodox; Atheist; Marxism/Communism - Russian ruler
- Sui Wen Ti - Chinese traditional religion - unified China
- Vasco da Gama - Catholic - navigator; discovered route from Europe to India around Cape Hood
- Cyrus the Great - Zoroastrianism - founder of Persian empire
- Peter the Great - Russian Orthodox - forged Russia into a great European nation
- Mao Zedong - Atheist; Communism; Maoism - founder of Maoism, Chinese form of Communism
- Francis Bacon - Anglican - philosopher; delineated inductive scientific method
- Henry Ford - Protestant - developed automobile; achievement in manufacturing and assembly
- Mencius - Confucianism - philosopher; founder of a school of Confucianism
- Zoroaster - Zoroastrianism - founder of Zoroastrianism
- Queen Elizabeth I - Anglican - British monarch; restored Church of England to power after Queen Mary
- Mikhail Gorbachev - Russian Orthodox - Russian premier who helped end Communism in USSR
- Menes - Egyptian paganism - unified Upper and Lower Egypt
- Charlemagne - Catholic - Holy Roman Empire created with his baptism in 800 AD
- Homer - Greek paganism - epic poet
- Justinian I - Catholic - Roman emperor; reconquered Mediterranean empire; accelerated Catholic-Monophysite schism
- Mahavira - Hinduism; Jainism - founder of Jainism
Source of list of names: Hart, Michael H. The 100: A Ranking of the Most Influential Persons in History, Revised and Updated for the Nineties. New York: Carol Publishing Group/Citadel Press; first published in 1978, reprinted with minor revisions (reflected above) in 1992.
My choice of Muhammad to lead the list of the world's most influential persons may surprise some readers and may be questioned by others, but he was the only man in history who was supremely successful on both the religious and secular levels.
Of humble origins, Muhammad founded and promulgated one of the world's great religions, and became an immensely effective political leader. Today, thirteen centuries after his death, his influence is still powerful and pervasive. The majority of the persons in this book had the advantage of being born and raised in centers of civilization, highly cultured or politically pivotal nations. Muhammad, however, was born in the year 570, in the city of Mecca, in southern Arabia, at that time a backward area of the world, far from the centers of trade, art, and learning. Orphaned at age six, he was reared in modest surroundings. Islamic tradition tells us that he was illiterate. His economic position improved when, at age twenty-five, he married a wealthy widow. Nevertheless, as he approached forty, there was little outward indication that he was a remarkable person. Most Arabs at that time were pagans, who believed in many gods. There were, however, in Mecca, a small number of Jews and Christians; it was from them no doubt that Muhammad first learned of a single, omnipotent God who ruled the entire universe.
When he was forty years old, Muhammad became convinced that this one true God (Allah) was speaking to him, and had chosen him to spread the true faith. For three years, Muhammad preached only to close friends and associates. Then, about 613, he began preaching in public. As he slowly gained converts, the Meccan authorities came to consider him a dangerous nuisance. In 622, fearing for his safety, Muhammad fled to Medina (a city some 200 miles north of Mecca), where he had been offered a position of considerable political power. This flight, called the Hegira, was the turning point of the Prophet's life. In Mecca, he had had few followers. In Medina, he had many more, and he soon acquired an influence that made him a virtual dictator. During the next few years, while Muhammad s following grew rapidly, a series of battles were fought between Medina and Mecca. This was ended in 630 with Muhammad's triumphant return to Mecca as conqueror. The remaining two and one-half years of his life witnessed the rapid conversion of the Arab tribes to the new religion. When Muhammad died, in 632, he was the effective ruler of all of southern Arabia. The Bedouin tribesmen of Arabia had a reputation as fierce warriors. But their number was small; and plagued by disunity and internecine warfare, they had been no match for the larger armies of the kingdoms in the settled agricultural areas to the north. However, unified by Muhammad for the first time in history, and inspired by their fervent belief in the one true God, these small Arab armies now embarked upon one of the most astonishing series of conquests in human history. To the northeast of Arabia lay the large Neo-Persian Empire of the Sassanids; to the northwest lay the Byzantine, or Eastern Roman Empire, centered in Constantinople. Numerically, the Arabs were no match for their opponents. On the field of battle, though, the inspired Arabs rapidly conquered all of Mesopotamia, Syria, and Palestine. By 642, Egypt had been wrested from the Byzantine Empire, while the Persian armies had been crushed at the key battles of Qadisiya in 637, and Nehavend in 642.
But even these enormous conquests-which were made under the leadership of Muhammad's close friends and immediate successors, Abu Bakr and 'Umar ibn al-Khattab -did not mark the end of the Arab advance. By 711, the Arab armies had swept completely across North Africa to the Atlantic Ocean There they turned north and, crossing the Strait of Gibraltar, overwhelmed the Visigothic kingdom in Spain. For a while, it must have seemed that the Moslems would overwhelm all of Christian Europe. However, in 732, at the famous Battle of Tours, a Moslem army, which had advanced into the center of France, was at last defeated by the Franks. Nevertheless, in a scant century of fighting, these Bedouin tribesmen, inspired by the word of the Prophet, had carved out an empire stretching from the borders of India to the Atlantic Ocean-the largest empire that the world had yet seen. And everywhere that the armies conquered, large-scale conversion to the new faith eventually followed. Now, not all of these conquests proved permanent. The Persians, though they have remained faithful to the religion of the Prophet, have since regained their independence from the Arabs. And in Spain, more than seven centuries of warfare finally resulted in the Christians reconquering the entire peninsula. However, Mesopotamia and Egypt, the two cradles of ancient civilization, have remained Arab, as has the entire coast of North Africa. The new religion, of course, continued to spread, in the intervening centuries, far beyond the borders of the original Moslem conquests. Currently it has tens of millions of adherents in Africa and Central Asia and even more in Pakistan and northern India, and in Indonesia. In Indonesia, the new faith has been a unifying factor. In the Indian subcontinent, however, the conflict between Moslems and Hindus is still a major obstacle to unity.
How, then, is one to assess the overall impact of Muhammad on human history? Like all religions, Islam exerts an enormous influence upon the lives of its followers. It is for this reason that the founders of the world's great religions all figure prominently in this book . Since there are roughly twice as many Christians as Moslems in the world, it may initially seem strange that Muhammad has been ranked higher than Jesus. There are two principal reasons for that decision. First, Muhammad played a far more important role in the development of Islam than Jesus did in the development of Christianity. Although Jesus was responsible for the main ethical and moral precepts of Christianity (insofar as these differed from Judaism), St. Paul was the main developer of Christian theology, its principal proselytizer, and the author of a large portion of the New Testament. Muhammad, however, was responsible for both the theology of Islam and its main ethical and moral principles. In addition, he played the key role in proselytizing the new faith, and in establishing the religious practices of Islam. Moreover, he is the author of the Moslem holy scriptures, the Koran, a collection of certain of Muhammad's insights that he believed had been directly revealed to him by Allah. Most of these utterances were copied more or less faithfully during Muhammad's lifetime and were collected together in authoritative form not long after his death. The Koran therefore, closely represents Muhammad's ideas and teachings and to a considerable extent his exact words. No such detailed compilation of the teachings of Christ has survived. Since the Koran is at least as important to Moslems as the Bible is to Christians, the influence of Muhammed through the medium of the Koran has been enormous It is probable that the relative influence of Muhammad on Islam has been larger than the combined influence of Jesus Christ and St. Paul on Christianity. On the purely religious level, then, it seems likely that Muhammad has been as influential in human history as Jesus. Furthermore, Muhammad (unlike Jesus) was a secular as well as a religious leader. In fact, as the driving force behind the Arab conquests, he may well rank as the most influential political leader of all time. Of many important historical events, one might say that they were inevitable and would have occurred even without the particular political leader who guided them. For example, the South American colonies would probably have won their independence from Spain even if Simon Bolivar had never lived. But this cannot be said of the Arab conquests. Nothing similar had occurred before Muhammad, and there is no reason to believe that the conquests would have been achieved without him. The only comparable conquests in human history are those of the Mongols in the thirteenth century, which were primarily due to the influence of Genghis Khan. These conquests, however, though more extensive than those of the Arabs, did not prove permanent, and today the only areas occupied by the Mongols are those that they held prior to the time of Genghis Khan. It is far different with the conquests of the Arabs. From Iraq to Morocco, there extends a whole chain of Arab nations united not merely by their faith in Islam, but also by their Arabic language, history, and culture. The centrality of the Koran in the Moslem religion and the fact that it is written in Arabic have probably prevented the Arab language from breaking up into mutually unintelligible dialects, which might otherwise have occurred in the intervening thirteen centuries. Differences and divisions between these Arab states exist, of course, and they are considerable, but the partial disunity should not blind us to the important elements of unity that have continued to exist. For instance, neither Iran nor Indonesia, both oil-producing states and both Islamic in religion, joined in the oil embargo of the winter of 1973-74. It is no coincidence that all of the Arab states, and only the Arab states, participated in the embargo. We see, then, that the Arab conquests of the seventh century have continued to play an important role in human history, down to the present day. It is this unparalleled combination of secular and religious influence which I feel entitles Muhammad to be considered the most influential single figure in human history. (http://www.thetruecall.com/)
A note from the Holy Quran:
Of humble origins, Muhammad founded and promulgated one of the world's great religions, and became an immensely effective political leader. Today, thirteen centuries after his death, his influence is still powerful and pervasive. The majority of the persons in this book had the advantage of being born and raised in centers of civilization, highly cultured or politically pivotal nations. Muhammad, however, was born in the year 570, in the city of Mecca, in southern Arabia, at that time a backward area of the world, far from the centers of trade, art, and learning. Orphaned at age six, he was reared in modest surroundings. Islamic tradition tells us that he was illiterate. His economic position improved when, at age twenty-five, he married a wealthy widow. Nevertheless, as he approached forty, there was little outward indication that he was a remarkable person. Most Arabs at that time were pagans, who believed in many gods. There were, however, in Mecca, a small number of Jews and Christians; it was from them no doubt that Muhammad first learned of a single, omnipotent God who ruled the entire universe.
When he was forty years old, Muhammad became convinced that this one true God (Allah) was speaking to him, and had chosen him to spread the true faith. For three years, Muhammad preached only to close friends and associates. Then, about 613, he began preaching in public. As he slowly gained converts, the Meccan authorities came to consider him a dangerous nuisance. In 622, fearing for his safety, Muhammad fled to Medina (a city some 200 miles north of Mecca), where he had been offered a position of considerable political power. This flight, called the Hegira, was the turning point of the Prophet's life. In Mecca, he had had few followers. In Medina, he had many more, and he soon acquired an influence that made him a virtual dictator. During the next few years, while Muhammad s following grew rapidly, a series of battles were fought between Medina and Mecca. This was ended in 630 with Muhammad's triumphant return to Mecca as conqueror. The remaining two and one-half years of his life witnessed the rapid conversion of the Arab tribes to the new religion. When Muhammad died, in 632, he was the effective ruler of all of southern Arabia. The Bedouin tribesmen of Arabia had a reputation as fierce warriors. But their number was small; and plagued by disunity and internecine warfare, they had been no match for the larger armies of the kingdoms in the settled agricultural areas to the north. However, unified by Muhammad for the first time in history, and inspired by their fervent belief in the one true God, these small Arab armies now embarked upon one of the most astonishing series of conquests in human history. To the northeast of Arabia lay the large Neo-Persian Empire of the Sassanids; to the northwest lay the Byzantine, or Eastern Roman Empire, centered in Constantinople. Numerically, the Arabs were no match for their opponents. On the field of battle, though, the inspired Arabs rapidly conquered all of Mesopotamia, Syria, and Palestine. By 642, Egypt had been wrested from the Byzantine Empire, while the Persian armies had been crushed at the key battles of Qadisiya in 637, and Nehavend in 642.
But even these enormous conquests-which were made under the leadership of Muhammad's close friends and immediate successors, Abu Bakr and 'Umar ibn al-Khattab -did not mark the end of the Arab advance. By 711, the Arab armies had swept completely across North Africa to the Atlantic Ocean There they turned north and, crossing the Strait of Gibraltar, overwhelmed the Visigothic kingdom in Spain. For a while, it must have seemed that the Moslems would overwhelm all of Christian Europe. However, in 732, at the famous Battle of Tours, a Moslem army, which had advanced into the center of France, was at last defeated by the Franks. Nevertheless, in a scant century of fighting, these Bedouin tribesmen, inspired by the word of the Prophet, had carved out an empire stretching from the borders of India to the Atlantic Ocean-the largest empire that the world had yet seen. And everywhere that the armies conquered, large-scale conversion to the new faith eventually followed. Now, not all of these conquests proved permanent. The Persians, though they have remained faithful to the religion of the Prophet, have since regained their independence from the Arabs. And in Spain, more than seven centuries of warfare finally resulted in the Christians reconquering the entire peninsula. However, Mesopotamia and Egypt, the two cradles of ancient civilization, have remained Arab, as has the entire coast of North Africa. The new religion, of course, continued to spread, in the intervening centuries, far beyond the borders of the original Moslem conquests. Currently it has tens of millions of adherents in Africa and Central Asia and even more in Pakistan and northern India, and in Indonesia. In Indonesia, the new faith has been a unifying factor. In the Indian subcontinent, however, the conflict between Moslems and Hindus is still a major obstacle to unity.
How, then, is one to assess the overall impact of Muhammad on human history? Like all religions, Islam exerts an enormous influence upon the lives of its followers. It is for this reason that the founders of the world's great religions all figure prominently in this book . Since there are roughly twice as many Christians as Moslems in the world, it may initially seem strange that Muhammad has been ranked higher than Jesus. There are two principal reasons for that decision. First, Muhammad played a far more important role in the development of Islam than Jesus did in the development of Christianity. Although Jesus was responsible for the main ethical and moral precepts of Christianity (insofar as these differed from Judaism), St. Paul was the main developer of Christian theology, its principal proselytizer, and the author of a large portion of the New Testament. Muhammad, however, was responsible for both the theology of Islam and its main ethical and moral principles. In addition, he played the key role in proselytizing the new faith, and in establishing the religious practices of Islam. Moreover, he is the author of the Moslem holy scriptures, the Koran, a collection of certain of Muhammad's insights that he believed had been directly revealed to him by Allah. Most of these utterances were copied more or less faithfully during Muhammad's lifetime and were collected together in authoritative form not long after his death. The Koran therefore, closely represents Muhammad's ideas and teachings and to a considerable extent his exact words. No such detailed compilation of the teachings of Christ has survived. Since the Koran is at least as important to Moslems as the Bible is to Christians, the influence of Muhammed through the medium of the Koran has been enormous It is probable that the relative influence of Muhammad on Islam has been larger than the combined influence of Jesus Christ and St. Paul on Christianity. On the purely religious level, then, it seems likely that Muhammad has been as influential in human history as Jesus. Furthermore, Muhammad (unlike Jesus) was a secular as well as a religious leader. In fact, as the driving force behind the Arab conquests, he may well rank as the most influential political leader of all time. Of many important historical events, one might say that they were inevitable and would have occurred even without the particular political leader who guided them. For example, the South American colonies would probably have won their independence from Spain even if Simon Bolivar had never lived. But this cannot be said of the Arab conquests. Nothing similar had occurred before Muhammad, and there is no reason to believe that the conquests would have been achieved without him. The only comparable conquests in human history are those of the Mongols in the thirteenth century, which were primarily due to the influence of Genghis Khan. These conquests, however, though more extensive than those of the Arabs, did not prove permanent, and today the only areas occupied by the Mongols are those that they held prior to the time of Genghis Khan. It is far different with the conquests of the Arabs. From Iraq to Morocco, there extends a whole chain of Arab nations united not merely by their faith in Islam, but also by their Arabic language, history, and culture. The centrality of the Koran in the Moslem religion and the fact that it is written in Arabic have probably prevented the Arab language from breaking up into mutually unintelligible dialects, which might otherwise have occurred in the intervening thirteen centuries. Differences and divisions between these Arab states exist, of course, and they are considerable, but the partial disunity should not blind us to the important elements of unity that have continued to exist. For instance, neither Iran nor Indonesia, both oil-producing states and both Islamic in religion, joined in the oil embargo of the winter of 1973-74. It is no coincidence that all of the Arab states, and only the Arab states, participated in the embargo. We see, then, that the Arab conquests of the seventh century have continued to play an important role in human history, down to the present day. It is this unparalleled combination of secular and religious influence which I feel entitles Muhammad to be considered the most influential single figure in human history. (http://www.thetruecall.com/)
A note from the Holy Quran:
We have not sent thee but as a universal (Messenger) to men, giving them glad tidings, and warning them (against sin), but most men understand not. (Holy Quran 34:28)
www.thetruecall.com www.irf.net http://www.nicheoftruth.org/
www.thetruecall.com www.irf.net http://www.nicheoftruth.org/
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