Of course, “greatness” is a relative term and needs some description and context, which I will attempt later in this article. The Left hates Columbus for a number of reasons: his belief in Christianity, because it condemns their sexual promiscuity and barbarism, is perhaps the main motive. But Columbus is also anathema to them because of his supposed “genocide” of the “peaceful” natives. This is, naturally, totally unfair. The Italian explorer was not guilty of genocide, which is the deliberate attempt to remove a certain race from human existence (Uyghurs, LeBron?). Tragically, smallpox and other European diseases did kill huge numbers of the inhabitants of the New World because they had no immunity to those diseases. But that isn’t the same thing as genocide and not Columbus’s fault at all. Or anyone else’s, for that matter.
The problem with the Left is that they judge everyone who lived “in the past” by their current standards of morality. That is a wholly bigoted thing to do. I seriously doubt they are going to want people 500 years from now judging them by the standards of that future age, and we should not be guilty of that offense, either.
There are, indeed, certain timeless moral virtues which all men, at all times, can and should be evaluated by. Murder, theft, rape, adultery, among other things, have generally been considered sins among all cultures in human history (there are exceptions to this, but they are few and minor). Many beliefs today that the Left judges previous generations by (race, slavery, “exploitation”, etc.) were not viewed in the same light by the peoples of their times, people who had not reached our (supposed) level of sophistication and civilization. Our culture condemns slavery; almost no culture, prior to the 19th century, did. Thus, to denounce previous generations by moral ideas that have only gained widespread acceptance in the last 200 years or so is a gross injustice to those people. I wonder what the 500-years-in-the-future civilizations are going to think of our current abortion and child mutilation practices. Neither George Washington nor Christopher Columbus live in the 21st century and cannot be assessed by our standards, except in those matters where eternal principles of right or wrong are in view, things they, too, knew were wrong.
Columbus is not perfect in our eyes (obviously) nor was he perfect in his own age; all humans are fallible. What made Columbus great was, well, he changed history. There is no more important date in the past millennium than 1492. It is obviously the watershed year from which all of subsequent history, to our current time, flows. Of course, 1492 did not happen in a vacuum; but Columbus did do something nobody else had done and which changed the entire world forever. Even the people who hate him are a product of what he did. What made Columbus different was his daring, his boldness, his desire to excel, great qualities all.
When Marco Polo returned from his famous trip to China in the late 13th century, Europe was ready. The “Dark Ages” (historians hate that term) were over, and a new age of trade and commerce was unsealing. Marco Polo came along at just the right time. He brought back tales of the Orient, the riches to be found there, and European merchants drooled. “How can we get to the Indies (China and the Orient)?”
Marco Polo had gone by land, a dangerous, expensive, and time-consuming trek. The Europeans thought it best to try to find an all-water route, around Africa, to the Orient, so they began sailing down the African coast.
At the time, Europe had no clue how big Africa was. It wasn’t until 200 years after Marco Polo, in 1497 to be exact, that Portuguese explorer Vasco da Gama was able to make it all the way around Africa and land in India. An all-water route had been found!
But notice the date—1497. In 1492, that route still hadn’t been discovered. So, Columbus thought, “We haven’t found the Indies yet by going east, what say we try by going—the other way? West!” It was a brilliant, daring, courageous ploy. You wouldn’t have thought of it….
The old idea we were all taught in grade school that everybody in the 15th century thought the world was flat, and they would fall off the edge if they sailed too far, is simply untrue. Columbus knew the world was round. The ancient Hebrews and Greeks knew the world was round. The problem in Columbus’s day was that because navigation techniques were still primitive, ships didn’t like to sail out of sight of land. Hence, they sailed down the coast of Africa, keeping land in view the whole way. Da Gama’s dash from the coast of Africa to India was a challenge. Columbus’s voyage across the Atlantic was…incredible.
Columbus, of course, didn’t find what he was looking for. He thought he had discovered the “Indies,” so he named the dark-skinned people who met him “Indians.” Cleveland and Leftists are insulted by that, but that tells you more about Cleveland and Leftists than it does about Columbus. What he did, despite the mistakes he made, was bold, audacious, and, as noted before, changed the world. We are all the offspring of Christopher Columbus. I’m not ashamed of that. He was, in my view, a far greater man than Joe Biden has ever thought about being.
No, Columbus wasn’t perfect. But he found a “New World.” And everyone living in that New World now can be thankful for him opening a door that has led to the greatest civilization the world has ever known—the United States of America.
Love it or get your carcass out.
Mark Lewis is a native Texan currently living in Thailand. His first book, Whitewater, a western novel, is available at Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and Eliva.com. His second book, River Bend, will be out soon. And check out his new blog at thailandlewis.blogspot.com.