People are touchy about the topic of history these days. They get worked up about statues in public places, history education in middle and high school classrooms, and whether America was or was not founded as a Christian nation. Academic historians are famous for disparaging beloved authors like Barbara Tuchman and David McCullough for writing nothing more than “popular” history, and for them, anyone who casts himself as a historian must be able to produce a doctorate in history from an acceptable institution.
Most recently, Tucker Carlson interviewed a podcaster named Darryl Cooper on a range of topics including World War II. Carlson introduced Cooper, host of the Martyr Made Podcast, as “the most important popular historian working in the United States today.” It turns out that Cooper, the most important popular historian today (if we accept Carlson’s endorsement), believes that Winston Churchill was the “chief villain of the Second World War.”
Carlson’s interview with Cooper exploded with controversy. As of this writing, the interview on YouTube has close to 1 million views in a week and a half. That is an enviable statistic. To put that into perspective, leading Civil War historian Allen C. Guelzo struggled to get just a little more than 150,000 views of his lecture titled “Did Robert E. Lee commit treason?” at Washington and Lee University. And that was six years ago.
Why are people so sensitive about the topic of history and historical issues? And on a related note, what purpose does history serve? Why do we read, study, argue, and care about what podcasters think about it?
In short, history is important to us because we are created in the image of God. As image-bearers, we have what historian John Lukacs called a “historical consciousness.” No other created thing has any awareness of history, much less any thought of the significance of it. We reflect on the past, and the past informs us of who we were, who we are, and what we aspire to be. The fact that we are sensitive about history demonstrates that we have profound dignity because our Creator gave us something that reflects His nature—that is, a knowledge of time and eternity.
Click Here To Read More (Originally Published at World Magazine)
