Muhammad Ali wasn’t a teacher. Or a lecturer. He wasn’t a politician or an ambassador either. He wasn’t an envoy of peace for the U.N. He wasn’t a magician or a professional entertainer. He wasn’t a minister of any faith. He never got a degree from a university. In fact, he didn’t have much education, in the accepted sense – apparently he finished close to last in his graduating class and was later found to be dyslexic – but he was too busy living life to the full and solving real world problems to bother with imaginary ones. And if he ever took an IQ test he probably wouldn’t have scored very highly. Although on second thoughts, with his obvious flair for language and poetry, maybe I’ve got that completely wrong.

But anyway, that tells us nothing about the man. He was extraordinary. He didn’t need to get a degree or become a bona fide teacher. He taught us all, the entire world, and without being encumbered with any of the traditional teaching baggage. He was a natural performer and a born entertainer, without ever having spent a day at drama school. He had the verbal skills that a language professor would have given his right arm for. And his influence on politics and world affairs was way above anything most politicians could ever dream of.

Muhammad Ali transcended everything

When I wrote that tribute to Muhammad Ali just yesterday, I had no idea he would be dead within 24 hours, although he was clearly well into the last round, and still fighting. And now that he’s gone the full distance the whole world is in mourning. It’s not what usually happens when a boxer dies. Or an actor, or a politician, or a world leader, for that matter. He transcended boxing, like he transcended everything else.

He was unique in all kinds of ways, including in that he was admired and liked, and yes, even loved, by countless millions in virtually every country on Earth. And yes, without any formal training and without any qualifications, he did indeed teach the whole world. It started out with him catching the whole world’s attention, with his unique boxing skills and his brashness and over-the-top confidence. But before too long he was making use of the attention he had achieved by showing that he was never going to be just another boxer.

He took the bold decision to refuse to be drafted in to fight and kill, as he put it, other brown people who had never done him or his country any harm. He simply wouldn’t be any part of shooting them and bombing them, just because the politicians wanted him to. Imagine for a moment if everyone took that stand! And not just in one country, but everywhere across the world. War would be a thing of the past. It would become a historical anomaly overnight. Okay, we know that’s not going to happen, but he showed us the way. And in doing so he risked everything. He lost his titles, his boxing licence, and his ability to make a living, and at the height of his career.

By refusing the draft he risked everything

He lost three long years of opportunity, and he also risked being hit with a lengthy prison sentence. But he did the right thing. That’s the way he always acted. It was simple for him, in a way. Not easy, of course, but simple. There was just no way he was going to do anything but the right thing. And teaching by example is the finest way to teach anything, so just imagine how many people he influenced to live more honest and more genuine lives, just with that one act of true selflessness.

He went on to battle against racism and segregation and to encourage people to be more accepting of each others’ differences, whether they be in terms of nationality, skin colour, political or religious beliefs, or anything else. He kept on boxing, partly so that he could stay in the spotlight and reach more people with his message, And he carried on boxing way too long, partly for the same reason and partly because lots of his earnings somehow magically disappeared thanks to the leeches and parasites that always hang round successful boxers.

Even in death Muhammed Ali is showing his humanity

Even so, nothing could sour his idealism. He spent his time helping people and building up their confidence, and even his bitterest opponents in the ring became his true friends. Now his funeral is to be in his home town of Louisville, and it’s to be open to people of all faiths, and none. It was Ali’s wish. Even in death he is showing that inclusion and acceptance is the way forward, not exclusion and segregation.

Muhammad Ali was way more than a teacher or a politician. His influence on the world is incalculable. People will speak his name with reverence for generations to come, maybe for hundreds of years to come, and his name will be mentioned in the honourable company of the likes of Dr. Martin Luther King, Nelson Mandela and Mahatma Gandhi. There was never a man quite like him and there never will be again.

Here’s a few of his quotes, which is really all I intended to do when I started this today. But with a man like Ali, how can you try to define him or memorialise him by just listing quotes. He deserves way more than that.

 

“I am an ordinary man who worked hard to develop the talent I was given. I believed in myself, and I believe in the goodness of others.”

“Inside of a ring or out, ain’t nothing wrong with going down. It’s staying down that’s wrong.”

“I am America. I am the part you won’t recognize. But get used to me. Black, confident, cocky; my name, not yours; my religion, not yours; my goals, my own; get used to me.”

“Go to College, stay in school, if they can make penicillin out of mouldy bread they can sure make something out of you.”

 

“I am the astronaut of boxing. Joe Louis and Dempsey were just jet pilots. I’m in a world of my own.”

“Anywhere I go, there is always an incredible crowd that follows me. In Rome, as I land at the airport, even the men kiss me. I love Rome.” 

“I wanted to use my fame and this face that everyone knows so well to help uplift and inspire people around the world.”

“I’ll beat him so bad he’ll need a shoehorn to put his hat on.”

 

“A man who views the world the same at fifty as he did at twenty has wasted thirty years of his life.”

“To be able to give away riches is mandatory if you wish to possess them. This is the only way that you will be truly rich.”

“All of us are so mixed. My great-grandfather was white.”

“My toughest fight was with my first wife.”

 

“It will be a killer, and a chiller, and a thriller, when I get the gorilla in Manila.”

“My principles are more important than the money or my title.”

“I didn’t want to submit to the army and then, on the day of judgment, have God say to me, ‘Why did you do that?’ This life is a trial, and you realize that what you do is going to be written down for Judgment Day.”

“My only fault is that I don’t realize how great I really am.”

 

“I hated every minute of training, but I said, ‘Don’t quit. Suffer now and live the rest of your life as a champion.”

“I wish people would love everybody else the way they love me. It would be a better world.”

“Friendship… is not something you learn in school. But if you haven’t learned the meaning of friendship, you really haven’t learned anything.”

“He who is not courageous enough to take risks will accomplish nothing in life.”

 

“I done wrestled with an alligator, I done tussled with a whale; handcuffed lightning, thrown thunder in jail; only last week, I murdered a rock, injured a stone, hospitalised a brick; I’m so mean I make medicine sick.”

“No one knows what to say in the loser’s locker room.” 

“I figured that if I said it enough, I would convince the world that I really was the greatest.”

“The man who has no imagination has no wings.” 

 

“Only a man who knows what it is like to be defeated can reach down to the bottom of his soul and come up with the extra ounce of power it takes to win when the match is even.” 

 “Wars of nations are fought to change maps. But wars of poverty are fought to map change.”

“I’ve made my share of mistakes along the way, but if I have changed even one life for the better, I haven’t lived in vain.”

“I don’t have to be what you want me to be.”

 

“It isn’t the mountains ahead to climb that wear you out; it’s the pebble in your shoe.” 

“I’m so fast that last night I turned off the light switch in my hotel room and was in bed before the room was dark.”

“The fight is won or lost far away from witnesses – behind the lines, in the gym, and out there on the road, long before I dance under those lights.”

“Service to others is the rent you pay for your room here on earth.”