Holy War: The Year the Muslims Took Rome

Chiesa.com ^ | January 5, 2005 | Sandro Magister

[NYer]

ROMA, January 5, 2006 – A book published recently in the United States lifts the veil on a crucial aspect of Islam, one which too many understand poorly and know too little about: jihad, the holy war.

It is an aspect that meets with widespread silence, as if it were a taboo. Even among Christians, there are wide gaps on this topic in the general awareness of Church history.

An example? Many recall what happened in Rome, at St. Peter’s Basilica, the night of Christmas Day of the year 800. After the Mass, pope Leo III solemnly placed upon the head of Charlemagne the crown of the Holy Roman Empire.

That night, the basilica of St. Peter gleamed with breathtaking brilliance. A few years earlier, Leo III’s predecessor, pope Hadrian I, had covered the entire floor of the sanctuary with plates of silver; he had covered the walls with gold plates and enclosed it all with a balustrade of gold weighing 1,328 pounds. He had remade the sanctuary gates with silver, and had placed on the iconostasis six images also made of silver, representing Christ, Mary, the archangels Gabriel and Michael, and saints Andrew and John. Finally, in order to make this splendor visible to all, he had ordered the assembly of a candelabrum in the form of a huge cross, on which 1,365 candles burned.

But less than half a century later, none of this remained. And what happened remains generally unknown among Christians today.

What happened is that in 846 some Muslim Arabs arrived in a fleet at the mouth of the Tiber, made their way to Rome, sacked the city, and carried away from the basilica of St. Peter all of the gold and silver it contained.

And this was not just an incidental attack. In 827 the Arabs had conquered Sicily, which they kept under their dominion for two and a half centuries. Rome was under serious threat from nearby. In 847, the year after the assault, the newly elected pope Leo IV began the construction of walls around the entire perimeter of the Vatican, 12 meters high and equipped with 44 towers. He completed the project in six years. These are the “Leonine” walls, and significant traces of them still remain. But very few today know that these walls were erected to defend the see of Peter from an Islamic jihad. And many of those who do know this remain silent out of discretion. “Bridges, not walls” is the fashionable slogan today.

* * *
The book that lifts the veil on the Islamic holy war is entitled “The Legacy of Jihad,” and is edited by Andrew G. Bostom.

The book is essentially made up of documents, many of which have been translated for the first time from Arabic or Farsi, or have been reproduced from books of oriental studies that would be difficult for the general public to find.

The documents range from Mohammed in the seventh century, to the twentieth century. And they include the classic texts on the topic of jihad by Muslim theologians and jurists, accounts of war from ancient and modern witnesses, and analyses of jihad by scholars of varying outlooks.

The book also contains islamic miniatures depicting moments of jihad throughout history, and maps that document the military expansion of Islam century after century, from the seventh to the eleventh century. Each map is accompanied by a summary listing the acts of war in each region.

For example, in the ninth century, during which Rome was assaulted and Sicily was conquered, the Muslim armies occupied Bari and Brindisi in Italy for thirty years; Taranto for forty; Benevento for ten; they attacked Naples, Capua, Calabria, and Sardinia several times; they put the abbey of Montecassino to fire and the sword; they even made skirmishes in northern Italy, arriving from Spain and crossing over the Alps.

One fact emerges clearly from the documentation compiled by Bostom: jihad is not just one of the forms by which the expansion of Islam took place in particular places and times, but it is an institution inherent to the Islamic system itself; it is a permanent religious obligation.

One astonishing thing is that it was not a specialist who published this documentation in the West. Bostom is an epidemiologist living in Providence, Rhode Island. But perhaps this very distance from the academic world of the oriental and Islamic studies scholars leaves him more free from the taboos that gag many of these.

Biting criticisms of the pro-Islamic sentiment of much of Western culture have been written by, among others, Jacques Ellul, Oriana Fallaci, and Bat Ye’or. The latter of these is a leading specialist in the condition of subordination systematically imposed by Islam upon the non-Muslim subjects of conquered countries. She is also the author of an essay published in 2005, carrying the eloquent title “Eurabia: The Euro-Arab Axis.”

One of the central theses of the three authors cited is that Islam is an organic whole and cannot be reformed in its essential elements, and that personal freedom and rights cannot be incorporated into it.

But even another author who does not share this thesis, and is indeed one of the most decisive proponents of the idea that Islam and democracy are compatible – Bernard Lewis, one of the most authoritative Islamic studies experts alive, professor at Princeton University – has severely criticized the pro-Islamic tendencies in vogue among Western intellectuals and politicians, even among Jewish ones.

In an essay entitled “The Pro-Islamic Jews,” Lewis explains how the idea of an early Islamic Spain tolerant of Christians and Jews – evoked by many today as a golden age – is a romantic myth of the nineteenth century, created by Jews themselves in their intellectual conflict with Christians.

And modern Turkey’s aligning itself with the Western world and its support for the state of Israel have also induced a widespread unwillingness to speak about the massacres it carried out last century against the Armenian Christians.

Other factors encouraging the general silence over the holy wars of yesterday and today – and also over slavery, which is still practiced by Muslims in some regions, over assaults on churches and the killing of Christians – are the effort to establish a good relationship with the increasing numbers of Muslim immigrants in Europe, fear of terrorist attacks, and the desire to create distance from the outlook of the “clash of civilizations.”

But the Muslim victims of this reticence and silence on the part of the West are precisely those who are courageously fighting to reform the Islamic faith and reconcile it with democracy and modernity.

It’s a good thing that, with books like the one by Andrew G. Bostom, they aren’t being left entirely alone.

[rjp2005]

The Vatican will be attacked early in the next decade. Both Pope Pius X and Pope Pius IX saw a vision of it, in addition to prophecies of some saints.

[montag813]

MORE ISLAMOPHOBIC BIAS AND LIES!

"Jihad" means doing something nice. Like adopting a cute little puppy dog and keeping him warm. Or buying a lollypop for a child. Or helping a Jew cut his head off. Do not believe all the lies about Jihad being violent!

[livius]

Heck, the newer books make it sound as if Spain was lucky the Muslims conquered it. Spain, contrary to popular thinking, was the intellectual heir of the Roman Empire and a seat of learning and culture at the beginning of what are referred to as the Dark Ages. Just prior to the Muslim invasion, St. Isidore of Sevilla published a compendium of ¨all human knowledge¨ at that time, including Classical writings. The first Muslims who took over were only recently ¨converted¨ themselves, from fairly advanced pagan and Christian cultures (present day Iraq and Iran), and Islam was at any point so new that it was not that doctrinally consolidated at that time. They did what their pre-Islamic, Roman influenced cultures had always done, which was extract taxes and let life go on as usual. They even became rather syncretist and let Spanish learning continue for awhile - until they themselves were overrun by more ¨orthodox¨ Arab Muslims, who promptly initiated persecutions of Christians and Jews, a process that was repeated several times.

But instead our history books go on about the glories that the Muslims ¨brought to¨ Spain. It ain´t true.

[livius]

For some bizarre, inscructable reason, they see Islam as less threatening than Christianity. Christianity has become so divided and fragmented, it fails to provided a united front and has its bizarre elements and sects. They want to be rid of Christianity in any form because it is their perception that Christians block scientific and their version of social progress. They have blinders on. All their social experimentation will come to a screeching halt once Islam suceeds in reaching critical mass in various countries.

I´m copying this because I think it´s a brilliant point. I agree with your analysis 100%.

[livius]

They hated Barbara Erenreich (A Distant Mirror) and the author (whose name I don´t remember) who wrote A Midwife´s Tale, a brilliant piece of research into women´s lives in the early US because these writers were not part of the annointed elite. Furthermore - gasp! - these writers wrote books that were interesting and were actually bought by somebody other than the university libraries that have to purchase this kind of thing.

[livius]

Sorry - I meant Barbara Tuchman!

[HowlinglyMind-BendingAbsurdity]

Western liberals are unable to arrive at an intellectually coherent and morally honest condemnation of the genocidal ideology of jihad because, enmired in secular humanism and moral relativism, they are not clear in their own minds what they stand for. Indeed, Western liberals already are imposing a suicidal genocide of depopulation on themselves.

You have to be for something in a metaphysical sense in order to understand why mass murder is wrong. Western liberals categorically refuse to come clean here. Having abandoned Christian civilization, they are confused even as the barbarians are piercing the gates...

[CheyennePress]

Well, you do have the Tatar Muslims in Russia... definitely from the Khanate. But youa re correct.

[StAnDeliver]

"there are a significant number of people who are weary of religion"

Only in the NYT newspit.

Self-Described Religious Identification of U.S. Adult Population: 2001

Total Christian 88.3%

• Catholic 79.8%
  
• Baptist 25.9%
  
• Methodist 17.2%

No Religion/Atheist/Agnostic 15.0%
Muslim 0.6%

[redgolum]

I have A Distan Mirror. Good book, and one that kind of opens up the Middle Ages a bit.

[redgolum]

The Vatican will be attacked early in the next decade. Both Pope Pius X and Pope Pius IX saw a vision of it, in addition to prophecies of some saints.

Not a prophet, but I think that it will be attacked very soon. Like in a few years. Italy has a growing problem with islam, and refuses to do much about it.

[the invisib1e hand]

That soulless building really captures the beauty of islam.

it's not really a great picture. But, yeah, good observation.

[Flying Circus]

"What was curious about this one is that catholics don't talk much about the end times"

For anyone one of us today could be our last day. We have work to do- we are commissioned to make disciples of all nations. Why look for signs of the end of the world? If we concern ourselves with wondering too much about when the world will end then we probably aren't doing the work we are supposed to. We just need do our best to follow God's will until the end of our time in this world and leave it to Him to decide when that comes.

[nopardons]

bttt

[rjp2005]

Next decade, not sooner. Benedict's successor.

[redgolum]

Out of curiosity, why?

[rjp2005]

See PR.

[rochester_veteran]

You have to be for something in a metaphysical sense in order to understand why mass murder is wrong. Western liberals categorically refuse to come clean here. Having abandoned Christian civilization, they are confused even as the barbarians are piercing the gates...

...which is why I came back home to being a Catholic. You stated this well! Secular humanism and moral relativism tends to confuse its adherents on what is right and what is wrong. Everything is in the gray area, rather than black or white. Secular humanism and moral relativism is the Church of What's Happenin' Now! :-) Will they be able to stand up and resist the jihadists? I doubt it!