revision time, heres essay 1

W4745067
AA307 TMA01
To what extent can the crusades be understood as a Christian war on Islam
Due 16/03/10

From the time of the Byzantine Empire when Islam conquered one third of what was then its empire in Syria and nearby in a matter of years Christians have been aware of Islam and its effects on them and the whole world. However why it took a further 3-4 centuries before western Christendom launched the First Crusade with Jerusalem under control of the Muslims since 638AD is of note as it may show that conflict is actually a historical matter of last resort for Christendom. Further whether the era of the Crusades was a war about faith, territory or the breakdown of coexistence and war crimes as justification for purification by conflict in a papal sermon and edict at Clermont is also of note in answering this question. To do so I will attempt to adopt the Averil Cameron methodology in DVD 1 of noting political change and geography of empires as much as the Cambridge academic in Ch.2 of the DVD. My preliminary reaction was to say that delay was due to an equilibrium in the Holy Land where peaceful coexistence of different faiths had been occurring since the time of Christ with an example given of Mumra in Ch1 of DVD 1 by Professor David Chidester, something which is being striven for in the current time as a counter to the writings of Saib Qutb mentioned in Ch2 of DVD 2 (track 16), which were in many ways the inspiration for the pan islamist jihadism of Osama Bin Laden (Ch2 DVD 2 track 18).

In Fletcher (reading 7, study guide 1) this is developed further by an explanation that following the partition of the Roman Empire into East and West the East “…was more urbanized, comprising some of the Great Cities of Antiquity” such as Antioch and Constantinople and was thus more Christianised than the Germanic successor Kingdoms in the territory of the former Western Roman Empire prior to the work of Saint Augustine in France / Gaul prior to his coming to England on his second missionary period. Thus coexistence occurred prior to the Crusades and even during it, laying down the basis for much of what post Westphalia is known of as International Law and it can be seen that the crusades was about setting the balance of the Holy Land in favour of Christians and against the ‘grievances’ set out in Pope Urban’s speech at Clermont.

W4745067 TMA01 pg. 2
Turning to Appendix 1 of this essay (retyped from the Study Guide) a summarise chronology of the Crusades is given. First it is worth noting that the expansion of the original Arabian Muslim caliph under Muhammad from its beginnings in Medina and then under the eleven Immans shows success in Battle and was an inspiration for Islamic rulers from Saladin to Saddam Hussein[1] and even Osama Bin Ladens' ideas on One world (Islamic) governance by unity in a common faith umma to unite the world under a wahibbi caliphate[2]. Thus a counter argument to the paragraph above is that there is conflict inherent in Islam’s relations with the west and that the UK is in many ways a state that has because of diverging Christian traditions discussed in Study Guide Two learnt to adapt and allow those that obeys its laws to settle here while outside of the states on the Eastern Mediterranean and East Asian former Colonies of Europe Islam has sought to be the dominant religion[3]. However Fletcher also notes that in Arab Lands Jewish and Christian communities existed in Muhammad’s Time, with one Orthodox Christian community even giving Muhammad refuge from a storm; hence the Muslim Scripture the Koran teaches that the people of the book should be respected and the development of the concept of the dhimmy. Thus Islam and Christianity don’t have to be at war in many pacifist and nonconformist viewpoints.

However this does not negate from the ‘fact’ that they started it according to the papal edict. Chidester says that while the Eastern Church at the time of crusades saw Jerusalem as one of the patriarchates with holy sites and churches, the western church saw it as a key place of pilgrimage. Both were initially given freedom by the Muslim authorities prior to Clermont's edict but en route and within the Levant persecution occurred as taxes were levied and pilgrims either killed or attacked. The thought of this occurring to peace loving monks and nuns rallied support to Pope Urban’s call for a counter jihad or crusade so that there is “…salvation by a sustained act of violence”

W4745067 TMA 01 pg.3
(reading 8 study Guide 1[4]) to restore the church of the Holy Sepulchre and liberate Jerusalem. (1149 after 15/07/1099 respectively).

Further readings from the Study Guide highlight the difficulties faced by the Church and how Christianity was at war with and on Islam. Of particular note in supporting the assertion that Urban II had a war on Islam are the two versions of the sermon. The first by Robert of Rheim's shows ethno-centricism appealing “to the race of Franks…chosen and beloved by God.” Before listing the grievances and cruel tortures that pilgrims had suffered and that therefore “...incite your minds to manly achievements on the battlefield” to liberate them by declaring peace with one another first at home. Hence the crusades are not just a war on Islam but an attempt to unify control of church and state that goes back to the time of Constantine and the Council of Nicea as such things and unity “…is the will of God” (Reading 9a, pg. 129 Study Guide) and “..Be undertaken now and to be finished in victory.” (Reading 9b, pg 131 Study Guide 1).

Yet both Christianity and Islam underwent political change in and because of the Crusades. Islam that had previously been practised by Arab Nomads developed urbanisation and pilgrimage to Jerusalem after Mecca with the Dome of The Rock (Al Aqsa Mosque) being constructed on the Temple Mount. Western Christianity countered with the foundation of Christian orders and instituted taxation to pay for the liberation of Jerusalem and its defence for Christian pilgrims (the grievance given at Clermont included the allowance of attacks on Pilgrims by the Muslim authorities described above), with only the Iberian kingdoms granted exemptions as they were trying to hold the line and recapture Granada from the Muslim Moors were thus seen of as a differing case where the lessons from Jerusalem and cooperation with the knowledge and learning seeing peaceful co-operation developed particularly around medicine with teachers such as Maimonides moving between Iberia and Antioch. Also Saladin when re-conquered Jerusalem left the rebuilt Church of the Sepulchre amongst others intact as Umar had done so with the original building (Reading 14, Pg175-6 Study Guide 1), which left scope for the city to be returned by treaty in 1229
W4745067 pg.4
relatively peaceably by treaty after war, setting the principles for modern international law.

Hence turning to the second part of Professor Cameron’s approach Geography; was The Crusades a Christian war on Islamic territory? While it is always dangerous to place any given territory under the microcosm of modern thinking without putting such analysis in its historical context it is true that the Levant was a territory that was under Christian Byzantine rule until conquered by Muslims who were in turn superseded by Islamist Turks. As a territory that was coastal on the Mediterranean it was easier to conquer back once ships were found from the Byzantines; albeit after the pillage of Constantinople done in protest at the gates being closed and doctrinal differences caused by the East West schism. It is why to this day Israel has a navy patrolling the Mediterranean to prevent arms smugglers and deter coastal piracy and why the Gaza settlements were removed to facilitate dialogue between Israel and Palestine.

To conclude I would say that there was a war by Christians to liberate the territory of Jerusalem, Antioch, Samaria, Cilicia and Jerusalem from Muslim rule after the severe provocation documented in Readings 9 after centuries of relative peace. As such the crusades were the last resort and at their end with the fall of the crusading kingdoms, a new balance whereby religious sites regardless of faith were kept sacred and respected entered the parlance of international affairs. If only the Jewish sites were also kept in the same way in Europe then perhaps the nineteenth and twentieth centuries would have been less revolutionary and violent with the benefit of hindsight. But Christendom has always historically had a bogeyman be it England’s Bishop of Rome in the reformation, Knox’s monstrous regiment of women that angered Elizabeth 1st or any political grouping that all churches sounded out as it developed (see Chidester). As such the crusades were a war on extreme Islam and to be charitable, the warlords who let the attacks on pilgrims occur that even Saladin found offensive in his reforms that led to the rallying of his side and the crusaders eventual defeat, similar to Papal attempt’s after the event to reign in the peoples crusade documented in Reading 10.

W4745067 pg.5
Word count 1,510

Bibliography
Religion in History, Conflict, Conversion and Coexistence
Edited by John Wolffe
(2008, Manchester University Press)
Study Guide 1: Introducing Religious History: From the Romans to the crusades
CD AA307 01
Chidester, “Christianity: A Global History” (Penguin, 2000)

Appendix 1
Chronology of the Crusades (taken from Study guide 1)
C570-632 Muhammad
638 Jerusalem captured under Caliph Omar
1054 Schism between Eastern and western churches
1071 Seljuq defeat of Byzantines at Battle of Manzikert
1095 (27 November) Pope Urban II calls for crusade at council of Clermont (Ferrand)
1096-1102 First Crusade
1098 Crusaders conquer Antioch and Edessa
1099 (15 July) Jerusalem falls to Crusaders
1105 ‘Ali Ibn Tahir al Sulami produces Kitah al Jihad
1120 Foundation of Order of Knights Templar
1144 Edessa falls to Muslims
1147-9 Second Crusade
1149 New Church of the Holy Sepulchre consecrated
1174-87 Rise of Saladin
1187 (4 July) Battle of Hattin (2 October) Jerusalem falls to Saladin
1189-92 Third Crusade
1191 Richard 1 of England and Philip II of France capture Acre.
1199 Taxation of church instituted to support crusading
1202-4 Fourth Crusade
1204 Crusaders sack Constantinople
1209-29 Albiegensian Crusade against Cathars in France
1217-29 Fifth Crusade
1229 Treaty restores Jerusalem to Christians
1239-40 sixth Crusade in aid of Constantinople
1244 Jerusalem recaptured by Muslims
1248-54 Seventh crusade, led by St Louis IX of France
1265-71 Mamluks conquer Frankish possessions in Palestine
1291 (18 May) fall of Acre
1453 Constantinople falls to the Ottoman Turks
1492 Fall of Granada to the Spanish ends Muslim rule in Spain
1520-66 Reign of Suleiman the Magnificent sees Ottoman Rule at its zenith
1571 Turks defeated at Battle of Lepanto
1588 Spanish Armada defeated by English
1798 Fall of Malta to Napoleon ends territorial rule by crusading military orders.
1853-6 Crimean War
1914-18 First World War
International mandate of Palestine and Israel until 1948 partition by conflict.
[1] Figure 1, pg 63, Wollfe J (Ed) Religion in History, Conflict, conversion, coexistence 1980s propaganda picture portraying Saddam as the second Saladin at time of Iran-Iraq war.
[2]regrettably disseminated every time his forces pull off a terrorist spectacular until he's captured tried and incarcerated and left to die a natural death if not executed (either way I’d give him a Christian burial as Only Christ is the resurrection the truth and the life).
[3] The glib one line comment, how many bibles are allowed in Mecca, Medina and Mogul can be seen to ring true especially.
[4] France, John ‘Patronage and the Appeal of the first crusade.’ Taken from Phillips (Ed) (1997) the first crusade: Origins and Impact, Manchester, Manchester University Press pgs 5-20.