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| ON THE OTHER HAND |
| The Crusades and Islam By Antonio C. Abaya Written May 18, 2005 For the Philippines Free Press, May 28 issue George W. Bush and Osama bin Laden had at least one common perception, namely that the American incursions into Afghanistan and, later, Iraq were part of a �crusade.� Bush, in all innocence born out of a total ignorance of world history that kept him oblivious to the nuances of the word to Muslim ears, when he announced his �crusade� against terrorism, while his more literate lieutenants squirmed in their seats. Osama, out of a bristling hatred for the same word that has percolated in his culture for almost a thousand years, when he declared jihad, even before 9/11, against �the Crusaders and the Zionists.� What exactly was it about the Crusades that compelled the late Pope John Paul II to apologize for it in a landmark nostra culpa to the Islamic world in the 1990s? With the release of the film Kingdom of Heaven, by the director Ridley Scott, this is as good a time as any for Christians - devout, nominal or former - to educate themselves on the story of the Crusades. Although I have yet to see the film, I understand from several reviews and comments that it is not only �politically correct,� it is, more importantly, also historically accurate. I have the good fortune of acquiring from amazon.com, more than two years ago, a 2-disc DVD production from the BBC titled Crusades, written and hosted by the British actor Terry Jones, one the leading lights in the Monty Python Flying Circus, a wacko comedic troupe that turned out such irreverent satires as Monty Python�s Life of Brian (1979) and Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1974). While being part of a madcap (albeit intellectual) mafia does not inspire confidence in his academic credentials, I did check out Jones� historical tale with that in Will Durant�s 11-volume The Story of Civilization, which devotes 29 pages to the Crusades. As far as I can tell, Jones� account is substantially accurate, though very much compressed. The First Crusade (there were eight crusades in all) began in the year 1095. At that time, practically the entire expanse of the once mighty Byzantine Empire, formerly the eastern half of the Roman Empire, which under Constantine the Great had once spread Christianity to what are now Turkey, Syria, Lebanon, Palestine, Egypt, Israel, Jordan, Iraq, the Caucasus and southern Russia, had been reduced by the advances of Islam to a narrow sliver of land on the western shores of the Bosporus, anchored by Constantine�s magnificent capital Constantinople (now known as Istanbul). In 1095, Emperor Alexius I of Byzantium, fearing invasion from nomadic Seljuk Turkish tribes from Central Asia who had converted to Islam, sent an urgent letter to Pope Urban II in Rome, appealing for help against the advancing Muslim armies. Urban II, seeing this as an opportunity to reassert the dominance of Rome over the once breakaway, though now much-reduced, Eastern empire, responded positively to the SOS from Alexius. An alarm was sounded by Urban II himself who traveled for nine months throughout Europe, rousing the faithful to arms against �an accursed race, a race wholly alienated from God,� and promising the remission of sins and �imperishable glory in the Kingdom of Heaven� for those who joined the expedition to rescue Constantinople and liberate Jerusalem.. Never before was Christian Europe so united. Even before a trained army of knights and footmen could be assembled, a rabble rouser named Peter the Hermit, aided by a vagabond named Walter the Penniless, attracted a ragtag mob of true believers, who had no military training, few arms and even fewer supplies, who wound their way through France and Germany into the Balkans, 12,000 strong and living off the land, to the utter dismay of the inhabitants. When this undisciplined mob passed through the cities of Mainz, Worms and Cologne in Germany, the would-be crusaders for Christ against Muslims turned their rage against the Jews and slaughtered them for being �Christ killers.� To this day, as Jones shows, the Jewish cemeteries in those cities still bear mute reminders of the passage of this motley swarm of two-legged locusts in 1096. In the meantime, a. real Crusader army, wearing distinctive red crosses on their brows and breasts, made up mostly of French counts, dukes, knights, footmen and cavalry and some Germans, finally caught up with Peter the Hermit�s ragtag horde and, together, they attacked and defeated the Turks at Nicaea (in present day Turkey), cutting infant babies to pieces and impaling prisoners on spits to roast them as they bled to death. The victorious Crusaders, known to the locals as �Franks� because they were mostly French, marched on to Antioch (in present day Syria) which they captured after an eight-month siege and which they almost abandoned when another Muslim army approached. But Christian courage was restored when the spear that was allegedly used to pierce the side of the crucified Jesus was claimed to be found and was used as a sacred standard to rally the Crusaders to another victory. At last, on July 15, 1099, after a campaign of three years that reduced their numbers from a high of 60,000 to only 12,000, the Crusaders enjoyed �the ecstasy of a high purpose accomplished after heroic suffering.� They entered the Holy City of Jerusalem and celebrated their victory, according to a priestly eyewitness, Raymond of Agiles, quoted by Durant: �Wonderful things were to be seen. Numbers of the Saracens were beheaded�others were shot with arrows, or forced to jumped from the towers; others were tortured for several days and then burned in flames. In the streets were seen piles of heads and hands and feet�.� Other accounts cited by Durant told of women stabbed to death, suckling babies snatched by the leg from their mothers� breasts and flung over the walls, or their necks broken by being dashed against posts. All 70,000 Muslim survivors of the siege were slaughtered, some after Friday prayers at the (still existing) Al Aqsa mosque. All Jews, innocent bystanders in this religious war, were herded into a synagogue and burned alive. The Crusaders established the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem, a sovereign state that had no allegiance to Emperor Alexius� impotent Byzantine Empire. Other Latin enclaves were organized in Antioch, Tripolis and Edessa (in present-day Syria, Lebanon and Iraq). The Greek patriarch of Jerusalem was expelled and the parishes of the new kingdom accepted the Latin liturgy, an Italian primate and papal rule from Rome. The Crusader rule of Jerusalem saw the birth of military orders, the Knights Hospitalers, the Knights Templars, and the (German) Teutonic Knights, who combined charitable works with military adventurism, and often fought with each other to defend or enhance their feudal enclaves. But most of the Crusaders went home to Europe after the liberation of Jerusalem, depleting the manpower left to preserve Christian European hegemony. Muslims sought revenge for the Crusader atrocities in Jerusalem and to recover their lost land. Aleppo (in present-day Syria) was the first major Christian city to revert to Saracen hands, followed by Edessa (in present-day Iraq). The resurgence of Muslim militancy awakened calls in Europe for another crusade, the Second Crusade, this time led by heavyweights King Louis VII of France and Emperor Conrad III of Germany in 1146. But it turned out to be a disastrous undertaking. Both French and German contingents were routed by the Saracens. Louis finally reached Jerusalem in 1148 but without his army. The defeated Conrad sailed back to Germany in disgrace. The collapse of the Second Crusade stunned Europe and led to questioning by Church elders on why God allowed His defenders to be humiliated and defeated. Durant benchmarks this period of collective doubt as the end of the Age of Faith.***** (To be concluded) Reactions to [email protected] or fax 824-7642. Other articles in www.tapatt.org OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO Reactions to �The Crusades and Islam� To Mr. Abaya Very interesting. Salamat and all the best. Oscar R. Landicho, [email protected] Sydney, Australia, May 22, 2005 wwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww Great history lesson, Tony! Something we never took up in detail while studying in convent schools...and I can see why. I wouldn't blame the nuns, since they were probably taught that way too. We gals skimmed through the bloody details of battles and wars...still do. Looking forward to your continuation, Lolita Delgado Fansler, [email protected] May 22, 2005 OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO |