I would pick St. Paul for number 2.
If bigger is based on weight, wouldn’t Elvis be #1?
Elvis by at least 80 lbs.
Nobody topples Jesus. Nobody had a larger impact on human history.
Some of these are certainly questionable. Is Aristotle more significant than Plato? Is Shakespeare more significant than Confucius or Shih Huang Ti? Is Napoleon more significant than Bismarck?
I would agree that Jesus has had the greatest impact for the last 2000 years.
However, the article didn’t mention Gutenberg. Wikipedia says Gutenberg’s invention “is widely regarded as the most important event of the modern period.” And a program on the History Channel ranks him as the #1 historical figure (leaving out religious figures).
For better or worse, the three people who had the greatest influence on the 20th Century were: Einstein, Freud, and Marx.
I don’t know, I’m all shook up!
My blood pressure's just fine, thanks. Why wouldn't it be?
I’ve been testing Hitler vs. Elvis via Google News Alerts for the last 6 weeks or so. Hitler wins by far, but sometimes Elvis tops him. I think a data driven approach like this is better than subjective approaches.
Elvis Presley is at #69. He outranks William the Conqueror (70), John F. Kennedy (71), Augustine of Hippo (72), Nicolaus Copernicus (74), Robert E. Lee (76), Marcus Cicero (79), Thomas Aquinas (90), John Calvin (99) and John Locke (100).
Fred Waring, Paul Whiteman, Kate Smith and Jenny Lind, whose contributions to popular music far outranked those of Elvis Presley didn’t even make the list.
Where is Leonardo da Vinci?
Where are the scientists, mathematicians, explorers and industrialists? Einstein, Newton, Euclid, Boole, Pythagoras, Galileo, Crick, Ford, Rockefeller, Carnegie, Columbus, etc.?
Where was Buddy Holly on the list?
John Lennon said the Beatles were bigger than Jesus. However, I am pretty sure he said that sarcastically in response to the silliness of Beatlemania.
On a hot, smoggy summer afternoon driving the freeway though the dregs, the low ebb back desert of south-eastern Southern Californian metropolis of more than 10 million souls ... grim, dry shack-like homesteads amid an ongoing litter of industrial complexes, railroad yards and junkyards ... an abandoned railroad container with the words "Jesus Saves" painted on the side, like a beacon, visible to millions. More than 2,000 years in the future from His sacrifice.
Elvis Presley once publicly berated fans who compared him to Jesus, more or less saying it was blasphemy. Elvis was deeply reverent of Christ.