At last, it has been scientifically proved that Jesus Christ is better than Muhammad. We’d always known that our lad with the beard and the holes in his hands was far superior to that arriviste Arabian chap who hung around in caves. But tell that to a Muslim and they become unaccountably frosty and defensive. Now, though, a couple of scientists have used algorithms and quantitative analysis to prove that Jesus Christ was the most significant and important human being ever to have lived, while poor old Muhammad managed to slink in at number four: Champions League spot, sure, but no cigar. The Prophet was beaten by both Napoleon Bonaparte — a surprise second place for the diminutive Corsican outsider — and our own doughty contender, legendary Midlands wordsmith William Shakespeare.
There are consolations for Muslims, mind — no Buddha in the top ten, nor room for any of those rather baleful emissaries the Hindus like: Shiva, for example, or that one with four arms, Vishnu. Also, Muhammad easily beat Hitler, who came only a lowly seventh, and Alexander the Great. Ninth place, my good Macedonian mate — not so Great after all. I am not absolutely certain how Professors Steven Skiena and Charles Ward compiled their table: it seems to have been an exhausting process of counting who gets mentioned most on the internet. It’s a miracle, then, that first place did not go to some improbably flexible Ukrainian pornobabe, or Simon Cowell, or George Monbiot.
But at the very least it will have helped the BBC Today programme presenter Evan Davies to answer his own question — possibly the most penetrating and intelligent question ever asked anywhere, by anyone — about whether or not the late Nelson Mandela ranked alongside Jesus Christ in the great pantheon of virtue.
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