ZH: Hero, Peacemaker & God (Zheng He in Indonesia)

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GHOST FLEET: THE EPIC VOYAGE OF ZHENG HE - THE GREATEST EXPLORER YOU NEVER HEARD OF.

A Muslim castrated as a young boy in China, this man would still serve his nation with total loyalty. Zheng He:
China's Greatest Admiral who may have discovered America even before Columbus.
A man of peace whose fleet had half the world in his grasp and the other half within easy reach. And a leader whose giant Treasure Fleet suddenly vanished because of a colossal mistake.

600 years ago, China emerges from an age of darkness - with the biggest naval fleet ever assembled. It will forge a new path across unknown oceans, led by a towering Admiral -- 100 years before Columbus. And China will stand as the world's undisputed superpower. But in time, this supreme leader would be brought to an end by a catastrophic decision. What happened?

Join National Geographic photographer Mike Yamashita as he retraces Admiral Zheng He's epic journeys and discover how China's internal struggles turned this Admiral's forces into a ghost fleet, and setback this great nation for hundreds of years.

From the breathtaking opening shots of the African Swahili coast, this film is cinematic celebration of timeless beauty. Medieval Yemeni hilltop towns, ancient martial arts portrayed with balletic artistry, brutal religious piercings and the incomparable majesty of Perahera, all contribute to a pallet of rarely equaled cultural diversity.

From the eerie castration of the young hero to his final faltering steps in the Forbidden City as his enemies close in like vultures around carrion, the historical recreations about the life of Zheng He are executed with the grandeur and distance of a renaissance painting.

In tracing the voyages of the great fleet and its enigmatic leader, 'Ghost Fleet' brings the past alive through its observant narrator Mike Yamashita, and brings the documentary film into the realm of the epic feature.

This 2-hour documentary was shot on 16 mm film. Its initial airing: Dec 2005 on National Geographic Channel Asia.

Winner at the Asian TV Awards 2006: Best Cinematography, Best Original Music Score

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Education

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[Britishfever456]

@RoniCMaster I don't think its for me to say if Zheng He was a Muslim or not. Only God knows who he worshipped. If he called himself a Muslim, and people call him a Muslim than that should be sufficient, age. To me, someone who went to pilgrimage to Mecca and witnessed, first hand, who and what Muslim worship, is enough evidence that he can't have gone that far off Islam. Chinese culture is rife with mysticism and obscure practices so its easy to label someone a worshipper of those deities.

[RoniCMaster]

@Britishfever456 Then, in that case, Zheng He was not a Muslim. At least not after 9 years of age. Considering that his Islamic education ended at the age of 9, upon which he had little contact with the Islamic world (since he served the Chinese Prince, Zu Di who went on the reconquest of China). It is a well documented fact that he offers prayers and offerings to a number of Chinese gods and deities. If, by your definition that a Muslim can have only one God, then Zheng He cannot be one.

[Britishfever456]

@RoniCMaster As Muslims we believe in One God. Not a God of the seas or the oceans. All Muslims believe in One God, without which belief they are not Muslim. Zheng He is well known as a Muslim.

[RoniCMaster]

@Britishfever456 Indeed, but he is a pretty unorthodox Muslim himself. He prayed to the Goddess of the Sea on his voyages, the statue of which he kept in his quarters. And there is another Chinese god he prayed to but I can't remember what it's name.

[Britishfever456]

I don't think the Muslim Zheng He would have liked to see himself as god. Zheng He even did his Hajj (pilgrimage) to Mecca where people prostrate to the almighty true God. This video just goes to show the nature of people, and how they would start worshiping anything. 

[ischixoch]

I am fan de Indoniean´s cultura and Zheng He. The peoples de Indonesia (sasak, toradia, bugis, etc.), they are fascinants and interesants cultures, Zheng He was travel to Indonesia, where exist a interesant chinese comunity