Socrates, Jesus, and Confucius didn’t leave any writing?!
(Perhaps they did, anonymously, and their notes just disintegrated in the drawer...
Or their shared words were signed "Billie Bob," and were consequently barely read...
Or Perhaps their shadows rose and set, but their figures never really lived at all..?)
Ideas evolve over time. Written collections are added to; revised. Statures of persons described grow or fall... But always there is a start, a point of departure. What if there were only a Gospel according to John? Would it have the same clout, with nothing else against which to corroborate the Life of Jesus on? Surely not. But should that stop a person from writing if he/she is moved by what was witnessed? No surely not. Yet it's better for the preservation of the story (history) if it be reiterated by many mouths... and certainly better by someone else other than the main character involved.
Authorship a funny thing... the question of purpose always being paramount. Every content requires its own convention of narration. And we might stop to ask ourselves, as critics, the very same question a conscientious writer would have to pose and decide no matter how subconsciously: What would be most convincing to the reader? ...Here are a set of principles that I would like to convey... should I, an individual maybe of little or no standing, presume to advance some philosophical propositions myself as if some self-proclaimed guru? Or is that not exactly the kind of thing that people instinctively poo-pooh regardless of the merits of the idea? Is it not better to attempt to share as if second-hand? or better yet to begin to build up the reputation of one such other Maestro through a chorus of probable eye-witnesses?
...Mystification it was called in my studies. While the dictionary defines this quite pejoratively as a "hoax," in application mystification comes across as more of a philosophical suspense. (The stunts of Houdini, for instance, are not a farce, but a subtle art... Intended not that we be deceived, but that we come to see the gaps in our perception, i.e. how easily the mind can be deceived). So it is in writing... historical or not there is always a story, and the story at the end of the day is an allegory.
The "many voices" of the Bible lend a historical credence, which may or may not be contrived. Just as we do not know who wrote the texts, we have no way of verifying that Jesus lived as a man, or only as a well fleshed out educational Ideal. (Believers please forgive any impression of blasphemy—we simply do not know—we believe!) It has long been rumored that Socrates was a literary device of Plato; and suggested that even if there was an actual Socrates, his reputation was inflated by the writings that were built around his person. Confucius equally in his grandfatherly, wiseman mold, could as well have been the friendly face to a set of noble rules to be propagated— a familial code of honor.
If they existed (I mean them no slight! and hope they did) then great orators do not need necessarily to write... there will likely be someone prompted to put pen to paper to preserve their ideas... in part. Though these will be interpretations, subject to fault, and incompleteness of thought. However, a compelling idea is a compelling idea, and it will persevere through the ages and be a "driving force in the world," picked up on, reevaluated and elaborated upon...
Peripherally, I'll note that I have come across two (minor by comparison!) instances where someone posed the question: "Why do you not write?!" discussions being so richly descriptive, thought-provoking and simply Original that the question was naturally put forth... The answer in the first instance was of course "I don't know;" the man being very much a wanderer in Life (shuffling constantly across continents) —and though loyal to his friends he was criticized as being self-absorbed and noncommittal— so it seems almost understandable that locking anything to paper would constitute a sort of personal prison. The second, yielded a more decisive royal kind of "I don't know," because as he said (to my horror) it was I who was going to write it down... I thought he must be joking at the moment, and still haven't sorted it out. But in concluding this write, I'll add that perhaps Thinkers gifted as speakers seek, or draw to themselves, scribes who will help them maximize their life times...