People with shitty behavior more often than not get their way because people will bend the knee to avoid confrontation. Sometimes it's really fun to treat an asshole like an asshole, though.
Madness string 95603
Most of his disciples were common laborers and likely would have had little to no formal education. So who exactly would have taught them to read and write? I think people can't grasp the fact that throughout history most people were illiterate, and that simply because much of the world has decent literacy rates that the same situation existed in the past.