former u.s. President Jimmy Carter He was given a state funeral at Washington National Cathedral, capping nearly a week of national mourning for the former politician and humanitarian leader.

President Joe Biden will deliver a eulogy Thursday morning in Washington, D.C., less than two weeks before he leaves office.

“He’s a man of great character, courage, hope and optimism,” Biden said of his fellow Democrat. a statement In memory of Carter, who died in late December.

All of Carter’s living presidential successors attended Thursday’s funeral, including President-elect Donald Trump, who paid his respects a day earlier at Carter’s casket in the Capitol Rotunda.

pay tribute has poured in Carter, who died on December 29 at the age of 100, was praised by political leaders and others for his dedication to public service and decades of humanitarian work.

Although the former peanut grower from Georgia served only one term as president, from 1977 to 1981, he left a lasting legacy in his post-presidential career.

In 2002, he received the Nobel Peace Prize for his organization, the Carter Center, for its work fighting dracunculiasis in Africa and monitoring elections around the world.

He was also actively involved in building housing for low-income people through Habitat for Humanity, earning admiration from across the political spectrum.

Thursday will conclude six days of national ceremonies that began in Plains, Georgia, where Carter was born in 1924, lived most of his life and died after 22 months in hospice care.

Services continue in Atlanta and Washington, D.C., where Carter has been laid to rest since Tuesday.

Al Jazeera’s Alan Fisher reported from outside the cathedral on Thursday morning that Carter’s legacy – like that of all US presidents – is not “black and white.”

“In 1977, he successfully negotiated the Camp David Accords, normalization of relations Between Egypt and Israel … he also wants the U.S. government to be more compassionate and considerate of ordinary people,” Fisher said.

Fisher added that other observers would note that during his presidency, Carter did not condemn apartheid in South Africa or speak out against atrocities in El Salvador, among other foreign policy stances.

“So it gets complicated. But people will point to his later work at the Carter Center, when he was trying to advance democracy, when he was negotiating solutions in some of the hottest hot spots in the world,” Fisher said.

“He declared Israel an apartheid state. He also talked about Nicolás Maduro; even though the U.S. government said his first election was fraudulent, (Carter said) he won it in a free and fair election.

“He was always willing to speak his mind, and that legacy will live on at the National Cathedral: a statesman who did so much more in the White House than he did in his four years in the White House.”

Politicians, diplomats and others from around the world will attend Thursday’s funeral, including Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates and Bernice King, the daughter of slain U.S. civil rights leader Martin Luther King.

“He set a very high standard for a president in terms of how to use his voice and his leadership to achieve a cause,” Gates said of Carter in an interview with The Associated Press this week.

Bernice King also compared the former president to her father, saying they “showed us what is possible when your faith compels you to live and lead from a place of love.”

Ted Mondale, son of Carter’s Vice President Walter Mondale, read the eulogy his father wrote for Carter before his death in 2021 at the cathedral.

Steve Ford, grandson of President Gerald Ford, read a eulogy for his grandfather, who died in 2006. Carter defeated Ford in 1976, but the two men and their first ladies became close friends, and Carter praised Ford at his funeral.

Carter’s senior White House staffer Stu Eizenstat also spoke, and mourners will also hear from Andrew Young, 92, a former Atlanta mayor during the Carter administration. ministers, members of Congress and United Nations ambassadors.

After a morning ceremony in Washington, D.C., Carter’s body, his four children and extended family will return to his native Georgia for an afternoon funeral.

He will be buried on family property, in a plot of land near Rosalynn, to whom Carter was married for more than 77 years.