Posted on 03/19/2006 6:44:46 PM PST by prairiebreeze
THE Vatican has begun moves to rehabilitate the Crusaders by sponsoring a conference at the weekend that portrays the Crusades as wars fought with the “noble aim” of regaining the Holy Land for Christianity.
The Crusades are seen by many Muslims as acts of violence that have underpinned Western aggression towards the Arab world ever since. Followers of Osama bin Laden claim to be taking part in a latter-day “jihad against the Jews and Crusaders”.
The late Pope John Paul II sought to achieve Muslim- Christian reconciliation by asking “pardon” for the Crusades during the 2000 Millennium celebrations. But John Paul’s apologies for the past “errors of the Church” — including the Inquisition and anti-Semitism — irritated some Vatican conservatives. According to Vatican insiders, the dissenters included Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict XVI.
Pope Benedict reached out to Muslims and Jews after his election and called for dialogue. However, the Pope, who is due to visit Turkey in November, has in the past suggested that Turkey’s Muslim culture is at variance with Europe’s Christian roots.
At the conference, held at the Regina Apostolorum Pontifical University, Roberto De Mattei, an Italian historian, recalled that the Crusades were “a response to the Muslim invasion of Christian lands and the Muslim devastation of the Holy Places”.
“The debate has been reopened,” La Stampa said. Professor De Mattei noted that the desecration of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem by Muslim forces in 1009 had helped to provoke the First Crusade at the end of the 11th century, called by Pope Urban II.
He said that the Crusaders were “martyrs” who had “sacrificed their lives for the faith”. He was backed by Jonathan Riley-Smith, Dixie Professor of Ecclesiastical History at Cambridge University, who said that those who sought forgiveness for the Crusades “do not know their history”. Professor Riley-Smith has attacked Sir Ridley Scott’s recent film Kingdom of Heaven, starring Orlando Bloom, as “utter nonsense”.
Professor Riley-Smith said that the script, like much writing on the Crusades, was “historically inaccurate. It depicts the Muslims as civilised and the Crusaders as barbarians. It has nothing to do with reality.” It fuels Islamic fundamentalism by propagating “Osama bin Laden’s version of history”.
He said that the Crusaders were sometimes undisciplined and capable of acts of great cruelty. But the same was true of Muslims and of troops in “all ideological wars”. Some of the Crusaders’ worst excesses were against Orthodox Christians or heretics — as in the sack of Constantinople in 1204.
The American writer Robert Spencer, author of A Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam, told the conference that the mistaken view had taken hold in the West as well as the Arab world that the Crusades were “an unprovoked attack by Europe on the Islamic world”. In reality, however, Christians had been persecuted after the Muslim conquest of Jerusalem.
CONFLICT OVER THE HOLY LAND
Historians count eight Crusades, although dates are disputed: 1095-1101, called by Pope Urban II; 1145-47, led by Louis VII; 1188-92, led by Richard I; 1204, which included the sack of Constantinople; 1217, which included the conquest of Damietta; 1228-29 led by Frederick II; 1249-52, led by King Louis IX of France; and 1270, also under Louis IX
Until the early 11th century, Christians, Jews and Muslims coexisted under Muslim rule in the Holy Land. After growing friction, the first Crusade was sparked by ambushes of Christian pilgrims going to Jerusalem. The Byzantine Emperor Alexius appealed to Pope Urban II, who in 1095 called on Christendom to take up arms to free the Holy Land from the “Muslim infidel”
According to you, it is more than one story. One for you, one for me, one for Luther, one for the road...
The point being that your interpretation of the Bible has no special authority.
..... Judaism are in large measure backwards religions.
Thank God Christ came and freed of us of all that sh*t, no?
327 posted on 03/30/2006 10:51:07 PM MST by Tevin
One day, at the White Throne judgement, you will be judged by YHvH for this belief.
Blessed are you, O L-rd Our G-d, King of the Universe !
It is always a good thing for the Church to define, strictly, carefully, and publicly, the criteria for a Just War (as contrasted to "just a war"); and an honest discussion of the Crusades is one way to do it.
Besides, as John Steinbeck said, "The past isn't dead--- it isn't even past. Vocal Islamic academic activists are taking the initiative to push a version of history that demonizes Christians and valorizes Muslims, with the intent of solidifying and justifying the fruits of Islamic jihad.
It's not just a matter of thousands of madrassas arming millions of Muslim students with a militant irredentist view of history (and geography!); it extends to the rewriting of American textbooks to show Christianity as shameful in every one of its historic efforts and achievements.
This islamization of the struggles of the past is an example of the political and psychological use of history: partial, partisan, polemical and propagandistic; or, as the feminist historical revisionists put it, "History in the service of our destiny."
I wouldn't want the Catholic Church to invest itself in this sort of self-serving propagandistic effort. But we live in a world where the European Union contemptuously suppresses its historic-cultural Christian roots, and in which Islamic activists destroy Christian monuments and documents so as to leave no trace of the "infidel." (Bat Ye'or's writings on the lost history of the dhimmi was a real eye-opener to me.) Re-balancing the historical perspective is a kind of intellectual Work of Mercy in defense of truth, and I daresay in defense of peace.
You wrote: "Some of these guys were in it for the money, and this was just a convenient vehicle to pursue it."
This is true as far as it goes; but it is not the whole story, nor even the main story. Historian Thomas Madden, examining documents from the time (including birth/baptismal records, transfers of lands and estates, inheritances) has found convincing evidence that most Crusaders did not expect to gain plunder and power, and in fact gave up everything that they owned in order to sacrificially defend their faith and their fellow Christians of the East.
See:
www.crisismagazine.com/april2002/cover.htm
Yes, there were shameful massacres and betrayals carried out by Crusaders. We must, and have, repented this. But the most egregious examples are, upon closer study, seen to be exceptions to the Crusader pattern.
For instance, the Fourth Crusade --- the sack of Constantinople --- was a bizarre episode which can hardly be listed with the Crusades, if you define the Crusades as ecclesiastically-sponsored military expeditions to rescue the beleaguered Christians of the East and secure the Holy Land.
The spurious Fourth "Crusade" was basically a bunch of plunder-seeking Venetians who found it expedient to attack and sack Christian cities along the way. First, Zara, (now Zadar, Croatia) a Catholic city on the coast of the Adriatic, as well as nearby Trieste, were attacked, even though Zara had placed itself under the dual protection of the Papacy and King Emeric of Hungary.
This led to the condemnation, in writing, of the Venetian "Crusaders" by Pope Innocent III. This did not deter them from joining in an intrigue to restore a contender to the throne in Constantinople; and when that didn't pan out as planned, they brutally sacked the city, which was the greatest and most beautiful city of Christendom. As soon as the news of the Venetians' bloody plundering reached Rome, an infuriated Pope Innocent III excommunicated them.
The fact that the Venetians were first condemned, and then excommunicated, shows that their conduct was not considered legitimate "Crusading," even at the time. Then and now, the Fourth "Crusade" is considered a criminal enterprise.
Thanks for the note. I appreciate it. I don't claim to be an authority on any of this. I got my info from the History Channel, which reenacted the First Crusade. It was quite fascinating. What I don't thing would be wise, would be for the Church to whitewash matters. That just feeds the flames, and in this day and age, would backfire, and won't work. The modern method is to try to persuade, and sheath the sword.
You wrote: "The modern method is to try to persuade, and sheath the sword."
"Modern" method? The modern method is to blow people up. Persuasion is the ancient method. Traditional method. Christ's method.
For he himself is our peace, who has made the two one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility, by abolishing in his flesh the law with its commandments and regulations.
You are way over your head sonny boy, and I don't have the time to play with you.
LOL. Open a book sometime if you want to discuss history.
The fourth Crusade was a poorly managed affair from the start, if memory serves me. After many false starts and lengthy delays in Europe they finally managed to reach Constantiople where they found the great city an incredibly rich and hollow shell. It proved far to tempting to the mercenaries and adventurers that had stuck w/ the enterprise long after any serious chance of regaining lands lost to the Turks had gone up in smoke.
The advanced corruption and decay of that old city was the greatest reason for its sacking, although the thought of Christian attacking Christian is still unpleasant.
It proved far to tempting to the mercenaries and adventurers...
Ping.
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