Digging Deeper
I got hold of a book from the library (end of June 2020) which has a collection of essays about J.R.R. Tolkien's Lord of the Rings saga. I like it so far, a few chapters and authors in. This book was compiled in 2004, not long after the Peter Jackson films were made and distributed featuring all the mythic characters and creatures. One essayist, W.H. Auden, breaks down his essay into five parts, talking about the Quest Hero, the reasons for the Quest, the Setting of Middle Earth (Tolkien's universe of The Hobbit and all the other Elf and Orc and Hobbit books, some carried on by his son and others), the Hero himself, Frodo, and the final analysis is about "The Fruits of Victory".
Accomplishing the heroic act, or achieving the hero's life, is acquiring the fruits of triumph, is being acknowledged as the hero, the champion, the victor, the winner in the end. Money or fame does not matter in many cases. Recognition by someone matters. There are the famous ones that we all celebrate, and the nearly forgotten heroes, but it is worth thinking about who our heroes are, and why they are considered heroic.
This particular essay got me thinking deeper, thinking about writing about and discussing the heroic pursuits of people and us mere mortals on the journeys of life and death, being heroes and at times martyrs. Arrogance is not a highly valued trait in the heroes, because like Frodo or the hero of the the Magic Flute, as I interpret Auden, the person who receives acclaim, laud, and honor does not necessarily know for himself or herself, or by those surrounding hem, if for sure that they are capable of pulling off the feat of heroism that they accomplish.
In ideating, (formulating the idea of) this post I originally had some notions and thoughts that excited me about discussing what Auden inspired in these thoughts for me. Perhaps I have to re-read his essay in order to know where those thoughts took me some few short days ago, or maybe those ideas that I had thought of this past weel will never be recovered to me. Alas, the mind and its travels and whims... However, maybe I will alight upon those thoughts again as I continue to forge ahead here.
Some famous examples:
Abraham Lincoln
Recognized as the keeper of the Union, the enterprise that we know as the United States of America, and the Emancipator of the African-American slaves of the United States, and then the quickly victimized martyr of his causes in a small theater in Washington D.C., Lincoln was an unexpected American and human phenomenon. He grew up poor, but was hard working and fortuitous, and when elected president of the this rising world power decided that he would aggressively fight to pull back the Confederacy of break away states, painful though it was from 1861 to 1865. His words and sentiments are forever recorded, embodying the ethos and struggle for virtue and justice, living free and willingness to sacrifice and die for it, as perhaps he unwittingly did.
Joseph Smith, Jr.
I spoke with highly intelligent UCLA American historians in 2002 that were unaware that this American religious leader and prophet had suggested a plan for emancipation of the slaves during his short lived presidential candidacy in 1844, also being martyred like Lincoln by an angry or aggrieved constituency, as it were. Only one of two presidential candidates to be assassinated in our 244 year national history, the other in 1968 (Robert Kennedy), Smith had ideas as an American, popular among certain elites and galvanizing some people across the U.S. and the world, I believe Joseph was heroic because he did inspire a younger Abraham Lincoln in the state of Illinois in terms of freedom and fairness for all. They were born four years apart in the early 1800s, but for me Lincoln and Smith both lived for advanced virtues and they ended up dying for them. Smith had more complicated ideas and legacies, to include polygamy and its ramifications, as well as other controversial religious and doctrinal claims and works, perhaps the foremost of them the Book of Mormon, a text that claims to be in line with the Holy Bible, which is no small assertion.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
The religious reverend and civil rights advocate died as he lived, as other martyred heroes, a permanent testator of his causes. As posited by my high school history teacher Don Beaver, Doctor King was a principled leader and champion of Christianity, passive resistance, and the United States Constitution. In death his causes have been taken up and followed by many of all colors, creeds, and nationalities. Perhaps more so than the 19th century martyrs of Smith and Lincoln, I wish that King had lived longer, and that more people would truly gravitate to his teachings and principles. Perhaps part of the reason for that sentiment is that I almost was born in the time that he would have been alive, and I would have loved to have lived to see and hear him via television or even in person. Had Lincoln and Smith lived out their days in the 1800s I still would not have lived to see them as live exemplars of their ideas and movements, or political and military legacies.
Unknown or Forgotten Heroes, Including the Masses
Each of the above Americans depended on hundreds, thousands, and eventually millions of people to heed their causes in order for their lives and the meanings of them to signify a greater transcendent truth as a the hero that they are known as being. Therefore, in each case of an uber hero, or "super hero", or heroic paradigm embodied in human form, like the fictitious Frodo of the Lord of the Rings or Rey or her mentor Luke Skywalker in the Star Wars saga, these quasi Messianic figures, there are lesser known people, all with names, personalities, and passions, that lived and died striving for the bigger causes for which the famed individuals more accredited and acclaimed derived their glory from.
Millions of unsung heroes deserve credit for the heroism of those that we most greatly acknowledge.
For example, my last name is Clinch, which is not that wide spread a last name. Most of us Clinches, who live in the United States or Great Britain, and perhaps a few in Australia, do not know many others beyond linked family with the same surname; we regularly meet people who have not met others with our last name before. For every Clinch there is perhaps 100 Lynches, a much more popular surname, one that I have seen traces of as far off as Chile and Argentina.
At least one man named Clinch who added to the greatness of Abraham Lincoln, we can assess in clearer retrospect, was a somewhat anonymous John Clinch who died east of Richmond in the battles the Civil War around 1864, as the Union forces advanced on the Confederate capital of the South. John may have never had children, therefore he was a son and and likely uncle and cousin, but possibly not a husband or a father, so he is a distant memory to those of us these many years later rather than a man who might receive more homage for being a lifelong servant and worker in his particular trade, a father and grandfather, and more likely having a literal lineage of descendants that exist now in the 21st century.
I saw the grave of this John Clinch and by coincidence of my name was taken aback; I took a picture and made a mental note of it perhaps in 2016 or so, trying to make place for another hero whose tale goes untold to the vast majority of us, until perhaps you are reading of it now. That John, sharing my last name, again, probably with no direct posterity and no signs or historical placards commemorating him individually, was a hero that helped make Lincoln and the causes of others in the United States a bigger name. In the Army and other federal services those in command glean the notoriety, such as the victorious (and vanquished) generals and other military commanders that lead their thousands and hundreds, as well as honored emancipated slaves or fighters like Harriet Tubman, these that receive more attention and acclaim for their more notable exploits and known sacrifices. All these famed and lauded heroes depend on the consequences of many that will more or less will be forever unnamed and unheralded.
Thus are the majority of us, those living now and the billions who already lived, the followers and the adherents of the causes of the larger heroes of whom we speak. It is amazing to think that many made up, imagined fictitious heroes garner more real world honor and glory than so many other millions who actually lived, existed, contributed, and died. And they were heroes. We are now in our good and bad conditions because of the untold millions who lived before us.
Also, if we take the three hero examples above, each of them would readily admit and credit the thousands and millions who came before them. Lincoln would cite George Washington and the large group of American forefathers before him, as well as likely forbears from nascent democracies England and France, the European Reformation before them, the thinkers and philosophers of the Middle Ages, from Europe through the Middle East, the ancient records and triumphs of thought from the Romans, before them the Greeks, the Chinese or the Indian born Siddhartha Gautama, and others that one can conceive that young Abe an later the matured President Lincoln appreciated in his studies and discoveries as a reader and recalcitrant frontier intellectual.
Smith would point to the religious Reformers of his later platform of religious thought and freedom in the early 1820s in post Colonial America, going back to the Biblical prophets and heroes, to include the Divine, as well as the Book of Mormon figures which he brought to life in his efforts, and other great and small people of faith, to include personal family members or local leaders and servants who sacrificed for larger causes than themselves, or those who lived to embrace truth and virtue.
King would credit Mahatma Gandhi in his day for the practice of boycott and peaceful protest, but of course he would hearken to all the heroes of the ancient times and spiritual journeys who would inspire, ennoble, and embolden his vision and path, as all men and women (and children!) of great causes do. I am not positive when I make this claim, but I would guess that Martin's parents, other family, and a few pastors in rural Connecticut, among others from his native South, would have made formidable impressions on his conscience and soul, among the thousands of other heroes he only learned of through study and the media of his day.
Jesus Christ of Nazareth
Much has been written of Him, and much more will be. Can we the believers and followers, or even the detractors and naysayers over do it? Some think yes. A believer like me says no, we cannot overstate His position and impact, His doings and legacy. Yet, we know that part of the greatness and supremacy of Jesus, to those who believe, are the millions or billions who accept Him as who He claims to be and try their best to follow His commandments and precepts. The experiment of the multi-varied faith continues. And, as we know, to be continued...
Abraham of Ur
A figure of the distant past, with his immediate family in tow, so ancient that he seems somewhat mythic, even more so than David to the Jews (3,000 years), or Paul to the Christians (2,000 years), or Mohammad to the Muslims (1400 years), Abraham is a paradigm and father of faith to the majority of the Middle East based faiths, which influences and practices cover the entire globe in the present. His greatness unfolds by day and by century as the billions of his progeny claim his blessings and seek the external faith of which he and his wives and children lived in their ancient times, he living closer to Adam and Eve than we to him. Universally, as it were, Abraham is seen as a seminal figure of faith and good forbearance.
Karl Marx
Millions, even billions, have considered this German economist as a hero, for developing theories and plans to overcome poverty of the masses, the working class, the proletariat. As every "hero" has those who proclaim or decry him or her, Marx is not without dispute as someone whose ideas should be emulated and followed. There are some who believe that Marxism still has its strong course to be observed in human history and the make up of our planet.
Mao Zedong
It is hard to know how many of the current 1.3 billion people of China look to Mao, the original Communist founder of the current People's Republic, as their hero. Nevertheless, his legacy, while woefully dreadful to many, like me, is a figure of tribute and glory to millions and millions, to perhaps a few outside of China as well.
Charles Darwin
Scientists and nuanced atheists or other non-religious people look to Darwin as a pioneering symbol of rational thought and purposeful human discovery. I consider myself rational, scientifically based along with my less empirical beliefs in the supernatural and divine, but I definitely agree Darwin was an amazing hero for his time and the after affects are even more pronounced and profound today, based on his trailblazing work and studies.
Bill Gates, Oprah Winfrey, Elon Musk, , Barach Obama
I count these four personalities as present paradigms and symbols of those we admire as heroes of our time. Millions and even billions of us represent their successes and hero-dom in the present age, they are each pioneers and heroes in their own realms...
We see in them heroic personas, and most likely they see in us higher principles and ideals, aspirations and hopes to overcome, learn, grow, prosper, succeed.
How do we see our heroes as making us strive to go further, try harder, hope for better outcomes, achieve greater results?
Who are the heroes? At the end of the day, it is the person who works to be the best person by the end of the day, by the end of their life. Some are better known than others, but it takes all of us to create the biggest and the smallest.
