Who's Your Historical Hero?

[Thursday]

My historical hero is Tecumseh the Shawnee chief and leader of the Red Stick Confederacy. He was *this* close to uniting the Indians against the American settlers. This united front would have probably prevented Indian culture from being destroyed and despised. Unfortunately the warring tribes could not see ahead into the future, and the alliance was broken, then Tecumseh was betrayed by the British as well. But he is a hero. He did all he could and he got farther than anyone else did in his "line of work."

 

[Antari]

Other than Jesus, obviously, I can't think of many, all historical figures took part in some kind of violent, unecessary, greed-driven, and useless war.

 

[Barry1948]

My favorite hero is Robert E. Lee. He's gotten a lot of bad press, but he was a very devoted Chrisitian man. He is up there at the top of the list as one of the greatest strategists of all time. Even though he had a very legalist look at religion, he always wanted to do the right thing in God's eyes, and he was one of the most caring Generals in history. He played by the rules of war when his opponents refused so as to try and get the upper hand.

 

[Seraphim of Alabama]

You raise a good question. I thought that he was born in Normandy but of saxon desent. He is also known as William the Ba*tard with an 's'.

He was the first Norman (French) King. The Saxons were the Germanic people who were already there (Together with the Angles and Jutes [Anglelond= England]). Off topic but the Angle-Saxons pushed the Celtic Scots, Welsh, and Cornish into the lands that now bear their names (as well as the Bretons in France who came back with William t.b.).

 

[Seraphim of Alabama]

My favorite historical people are:

Lao Zi:
Because he wrote with great wisdom and understanding.

Qin ShiHuang Di:
First true emperor of China. Brutal, but he united the nation (see the Jet Li move Hero for details)

Sun Yat-Sen, Mao ZeDung, and Dung XiaoPing:
Modernizer, liberator, and modern liberators of China. Again, all have bad (or brutal) histories, but played important roles in what is now modern China.

Matteo Ricci:
First long term Christian missionary to China.

Guess it's obvious that my interests go toward China, but I'll name two Western:

Richard Nixon:
Began the process to open relations with China.

Ronald Reagan:
Unfortunately he is now a part of our history. He was personally a great inspiration to me, and to many others. Whatever anyone thinks of his politics, he moved the nation. He was the last of the conservatives (we're in the neo-conservative era now, in case you didn't know)

bd

 

[Paladin Dave]

I see you have a few Chinese heros. Ever read Sun Tzu? I don't know if I listed him as one of mine or not, but i should have. Guan Yu was a great man as well, and I hear they made him a taoist diety after his exploits during the war of the three kingdoms. Was Hero good? I've been wanting to see that, but wanted to hear secondary opinions first.

 

[Viola_Strange]

Historical hero?

Jesus of Nazareth, St. Joan of Arc, Queen Elizabeth I, William Shakespeare, Mary Shelley, George Bernard Shaw, Walt Disney and Mel Blanc, aka Bugs Bunny, aka Daffy Duck, aka all the heroes of my childhood.

 

[crazy4Christ007]

My favorite hero is Robert E. Lee. He's gotten a lot of bad press, but he was a very devoted Chrisitian man. He is up there at the top of the list as one of the greatest strategists of all time. Even though he had a very legalist look at religion, he always wanted to do the right thing in God's eyes, and he was one of the most caring Generals in history. He played by the rules of war when his opponents refused so as to try and get the upper hand.

YEA!

 

[Yamialpha]

I would have to say that my favorite hero from history is Albert Einstein, not only for the General & Special theories of relativity, but also because of the fact that he encouraged the American government to make an atomic bomb. He also was compassionate and spiritual.

 

[jgarden]

The Emperor Constantine may have had a greater influence on Christianity than any other individual since the 1stC. He rescued Christianity from centuries of Roman persecution and tried to save the Church from its internal theological devisiveness (Arianism). He established the first great ecumenical council which produced the Nicene Creed. It is that creed which still serves as the statement of faith when defining a Christian for this forum.

Some forums on this website are provided for Christian discussion only as indicated in the Category Title. If we're going to have Christian-only forums, then we need to define who can post there. For that to happen, we need to define who we consider is a Christian for the purposes of posting in the Christian-only forums. This is not for any other reason. We make no aspersions on the person's salvation, faith or beliefs. It's only to ensure that posts in the Christian-only forums are of a particular type that conform to the contents of the Nicene Creed, which we use as it has been used for millenia by the church to define the boundaries of orthodoxy within Christianity. The contents of the Nicene Creed conveniently summarizes the main doctrines held by Evangelical Protestant & Catholic Christianity since the beginning of church history to battle heresy. It summarizes issues like the Trinitarian nature of God, the Divinity of Christ and other basic doctrines of orthodox Christianity that are agreed upon by all major Christian denominations and churches. We do not expect Christian members to accept the actual Creed - we expect them to agree to its contents only. These doctrines are listed below:

As the Emperor, Constantine was also considered the be the symbolic head of Rome's traditional pagan religions. Ironically, there is some question as to whether Constantine was ever a true Christian.

 

[Andy Broadley]

Sir Winston Churchill, without whom I would now be speaking German.

Alaxander Bell and Thomas Edison - probably created the first building blocks towards us being online today.

That Russian linesman in the 1966 world cup final

 

[Moros]

Jan Kubis, Josef Gabcik, and Vaclav Havel.

 

[Nessie]

Recently I did a project outside of class for one of my history teachers, concerning the 95 theses--I wrote my own--about the school--and ever since that experience (which, by the way turned out EXTREMELY WELL) I have had a great admiration for Martin Luther.

 

[Gilbert Switzer]

In no order...



Jesus Christ

Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche

Buddha

Goethe

Shakespeare

Iggy Pop



writers can count, right?

 

[lismore]

You raise a good question. I thought that he was born in Normandy but of saxon desent. He is also known as William the Ba*tard with an 's'.

Hi

Im also descended from him. His ancestor was Rolf Hrothgar (AKA Rollo the Viking) who came from the Scandanavian city of Vyborg via the Scottish islands. He got lands in normandy by kidnapping and holding a bishop to ransom.
You can check him out here:
http://www.milsom100.freeserve.co.uk/rollo/rollo1.htm

 

[Saruman]

Joan of Arc is my heroine. Her story is so inspiring and sad. Everyone should know of her deeds...

How did everyone find out they're ancestors are these famous people?

 

[HunterJon]

I posted in this thread a few months ago, and since then I've come up with another historical figure that I believe is a hero.

Sir Ernest Shackleton, he was an Antarctic explorer who led the failed expedition on the ship Endurance. The ship was destroyed and his crew was forced to row their lifeboats to Elephant Island. Shackleton and a few of his crew then took one of the lifeboats, and modified it so they could make a voyage of several hundred miles across the storm ridden South Atlantic to South Georgia Island.

Miraculously they made it but landed on the wrong side of the island, and were then forced to climb over the uncharted, rugged, glacier covered, interior to get to the whaling station of Grytviken. They then made the voyage to Elephant Island to rescue the crew. Throughtout this entire ordeal of several years not a single crewman died. He was one of the greatest leader of all time and one of the bravest men that ever lived.

 

[Paladin Dave]

Is it true that Joan of Arc wielded the sword of Emperor Charlemagne in battle? I just heard it somwhere, cant remember where, but I figured I'd ask someone who knew her a bit better.

 

[Saruman]

I am pretty sure that it was St. Catherine's sword she wielded. She found it by an alter in an abandoned church she passed on the way to Chinon. God supposedly told her that the sword she was to use could be found there. No one believed her, of course, but sure enough, the sword was there. I have heard that she wielded Charlemagne's sword, but only from a computer game.

 

[Grl4Christ987]

Besides Jesus probably Paul of Tarsus. He's just so awesome.