The First Crusade
The First Crusade was launched by Pope Urban II by announcing that Muslim forces were taking over Christian nations. He further prepared the Christians to bring back the lands under the Christian by retaliate a Crusade against the Muslims. The Pope attempted to deceive the masses that they were fighting for a good cause but only a handful responded to his call whilst joined the ranks to pillage and plunder, or to escape their feudal lords. Professor of History, Joel T. Rosenthal, contributed an article at Encarta Encyclopaedia stating:
They knew little about the Byzantine Empire or its religion, Eastern Orthodox Christianity. Few Crusaders understood or had much sympathy for the Eastern Orthodox religion, which did not recognize the pope, used the Greek language rather than Latin, and had very different forms of art and architecture. They knew even less about Islam or Muslim life. For some the First Crusade became an excuse to unleash savage attacks in the name of Christianity on Jewish communities along the Rhine.[12]
But Thomas negates this significant detail and persists on praising the so-called chivalry knights which reveals his psychological mechanism, namely denial to affirm the true nature of the crusaders.
He then cites quotations of another revisionist named Jonathan Riley-Smith who is known for his islamophobic works. Riley-Smith argues that “crusading” was understood as “an act of love” but according to the ‘The Catholic Encyclopedia’, the crusading was understood as:
wars undertaken in pursuance of a vow, and directed against infidels, i.e. against Mohammedans, pagans, heretics, or those under the ban of excommunication.[13]
Thomas also concealed the speech by Pope Urban II who started the first Crusade by calling for colonization of the Muslim world:
For you must hasten to carry aid to your brethren dwelling in the East, who need your help, which they have often asked. For the Turks, a Persian people, have attacked them I exhort you with earnest prayer - not I, but God - that, as heralds of Christ, you urge men by frequent exhortation, men of all ranks, knights as well as foot soldiers, rich as well as poor, to hasten to exterminate this vile race from the lands of your brethren Christ commands it. And if those who set out thither should lose their lives on the way by land, or in crossing the sea, or in fighting the pagans, their sins shall be remitted. Oh what a disgrace, if a race so despised, base, and the instrument of demons, should so overcome a people endowed with faith in the all-powerful God, and resplendent with the name of Christ. Let those who have been accustomed to make private war against the faithful carry on to a successful issue a war against the infidels. Let those who for a long time have been robbers now become soldiers of Christ. Let those who fought against brothers and relatives now fight against these barbarians. Let them zealously undertake the journey under the guidance of the Lord.[14]
Compare this with the claim of Thomas who asserted:
It was the Crusaders’ task to defeat and defend against them. That was all. Muslims who lived in Crusader-won territories were generally allowed to retain their property and livelihood, and always their religion.
It is quite an essential detail to leave out the genocide preached by Pope Urban II. Especially if it discredits the whole argument that the Crusades were acts of righteousness. When these “righteous” Crusaders arrived at Jerusalem, they had no mercy on the inhabitants, whether Muslims, Jews or their Christian brethren. Philip Schaff writes:
The scenes of carnage which followed belong to the many dark pages of Jerusalem's history and showed how, in the quality of mercy, the crusading knight was far below the ideal of Christian perfection. The streets were choked with the bodies of the slain. The Jews were burnt with their synagogues.... As if to enhance the spectacle of pitiless barbarity, Saracen (i.e. Muslims) prisoners were forced to clear the streets of the dead bodies and blood to save the city from pestilence. "They wept and transported the dead bodies out of Jerusalem," is the heartless statement of Robert the Monk. ... "They cut down with the sword," said William [archbishop] of Tyre, "every one whom they found in Jerusalem, and spared no one. The victors were covered with blood from head to foot." In the next breath, speaking of the devotion of the Crusaders, the archbishop adds, "It was a most affecting sight which filled the heart with holy joy to see the people tread the holy places in the fervor of an excellent devotion."[15]
This horrendous description automatically refutes the claim that most Muslims were spared. They did not stop at the Muslims but advanced further by exterminating the Jews and the Orient Christians who lived peacefully under the Muslim rule. They took the Muslim women as captives and raped them. Philip Schaff further writes:
The illegitimate offspring of the Crusaders by Moslem women, called pullani, were a degenerate race, marked by avarice, faithlessness, and debauchery.[16]
In Daimbert's comments in the Official Summary of the 1st Crusade, he notes that many crusaders boasted how they rode in the blood of their enemies, whether they were children or women:
And, if you desire to know what was done about the enemy whom we found there, know that in the portico of Solomon and his Temple, our men rode in the blood of the Saracens (i.e. Muslims) up to the knees of the horses.[17]
One witness observed:
...there [in front of Solomon's temple] was such a carnage that our people were wading ankle-deep in the blood of our foes, and after that "happily and crying for joy" our people marched to our Saviour's tomb, to honour it and to pay off our debt of gratitude.
In the words of The Archbishop of Tyre, he wrote:
It was impossible to look upon the vast numbers of the slain without horror; everywhere lay fragments of human bodies, and the very ground was covered with the blood of the slain. It was not alone the spectacle of headless bodies and mutilated limbs strewn in all directions that roused the horror of all who looked upon them. Still more dreadful was it to gaze upon the victors themselves, dripping with blood from head to foot, an ominous sight which brought terror to all who met them. It is reported that within the Temple enclosure alone about ten thousand infidels perished.[18]
Havoc was wreaked in the city. Philip Schaff notes:
The Christian occupation of Palestine did not bring with it a reign of peace. The kingdom was torn by the bitter intrigues of barons and ecclesiastics, while it was being constantly threatened from without. The inner strife was the chief source of weakness.[19]
Encyclopaedia of Britannica states:
The great Muslim sanctuaries became Christian churches, and in 1149 the Church of the Holy Sepulchre as it exists today was consecrated. Muslims and Jews were barred from living in the city.[20]
So thus in the light of the above cited evidence, Muslims and Jews were barred from living in the city. Their intolerant policies alienated the local populace. One of the sons of Islam recaptured Jerusalem and announcing that the Jews are allowed to return and live peacefully under the rule of the Muslims. The German-Jewish historian of the Nineteenth Century, Heinrich Graetz stated that the Sultan, opened the whole kingdom to the persecuted Jews, so they came to it, seeking security and finding justice.[21] The Spanish poet Yehuda al-Harizi, who was in Jerusalem in 1207 CE, described the significance for the Jews of the recovery of Jerusalem by Saladin :
God aroused the spirit of the prince of the Ishmaelites [Saladin], a prudent and courageous man, who came with his entire army, besieged Jerusalem, took it and had it proclaimed throughout the country that he would receive and accept the entire race of Ephraim, wherever they came from. And so we came from all comers of the world to take up residence here. We now live here in the shadow of peace.[22]
The British Historian Karen Armstrong said regarding the capture of Jerusalem:
On 2 October 1187 Saladin and his army entered Jerusalem as conquerors and for the next 800 years Jerusalem would remain a Muslim city... Saladin kept his word, and conquered the city according to the highest Islamic ideals. He did not take revenge for the 1099 massacre, as the Koran advised (16:127), and now that hostilities had ceased he ended the killing (2:193-194). Not a single Christian was killed and there was no plunder. The ransoms were deliberately very low...[23]
P.H. Newby stated:
The Crusades were fascinated by a Muslim leader who possessed virtues they assumed were Christian. To them to his Muslim contemporaries and to us, it still remains remarkable that in times as harsh and bloody as these a man of great power should have been so little corrupted by it."[24]
The Second Crusade
The second crusade was initiated by Bernard of Clairvaux in direct reply to the Seljuk Muslims who liberated the the town of Edessa. Bernard of Clairvaux declared in launching the Second Crusade, “The Christian glorifies in the death of a pagan, because thereby Christ himself is glorified”. [25]
The Seljuk Muslims saved the whole Islamic domains from total extinction in regard to the wholesale slaughter propagated by the crusaders of populations in Maarat Al-Numan, Antioch and Jerusalem. When they (i.e. Crusaders) conquered the town of Tanis in the Nile delta, they literally slaughtered the inhabitants who happened to be the Coptic Christians. Even their brethren couldn’t escape their spree of murder and rapine. More atrocities were commited against the Jews in Mainz, Worms, Cologne, Speyer and Strasburg. The collapse of the second Crusade caused a deep dismay. They attempted to attack Damascus but due the lack of trust between their allies, it failed dramatically. Their wholesale atrocities continues to prove why the Crusades are noted as one of the most egregious wars
The Third Crusade
Before the advent of the third Crusade, Jerusalem was liberated by Saladin who restored peace to the Holy Land and allowing the persecuted Jews to return. Richard and Philip besieged the Muslim city Acre and the city surrendered in 1191. Richard imprisoned the Muslim soldiers alongside with their wives and children and announced a prisoner exchange. A failure of communications in the negotiations resulted in Richard ordering the executions of 3000 Muslim soldiers and their wives and children in front of Saladin and his army. This ferocious act committed by Richard reveals how below the Christian rulers were in comparison with the ideal Christian character.
The Spanish Inquisition
Thomas once again conceals the Spanish Inquisition which primary target were the Jews and the Muslims. They were coercively, and insincerely, converted to Christianity. It does not come as a suprise since Christianity gained most of its followers through forced conversions. Compton's Concise Encyclopaedia states:
This was a quasi-ecclesiastical tribunal established in 1478 by King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella primarily to examine converted Jews, and later converted Muslims, and punish those who were insincere in the conversion.... The Spanish Inquisition was much harsher than the medieval Inquisition and the death penalty was more often exacted, sometimes in mass autos-da-fe. It judged cases of bigamy, seduction, usury, and other crimes, and was active in Spain and her colonies. Estimates of its victims vary widely, ranging from less than 4,000 to more than 30,000 during its existence...[26]
Encyclopaedia Britannica, states:
The Inquisition's secret procedures, its eagerness to accept denunciations, its use of torture, the absence of counsel for the accused, the lack of any right to confront hostile witnesses, and the practice of confiscating the property of those who were condemned and sharing it between the Inquisition, the crown, and the accusers—all this inspired great terror, as indeed it was meant to do.[27]
The only sole reason why the Muslims surrendered peacefully was due the fact that the Christian officials made a binding treaty with the Muslims which is also known as the ‘treaty of 1492’. In that treaty, the Christian officials promised religious tolerance to the Muslims and the Jews. It was an attempt to win religious tolerance for all the Muslims and Jews left in Spain. Since the Muslims were no longer the rulers of Andalusia, they hoped at least that they would be permitted to worship their Lord, The One God, in the manner presented by the Prophet (Peace and blessings of Allah be upon him). However, in 1499 CE, Ximenes initiated a campaign to coerce the Muslims of Southern Muslim Spain to Christianity. P. de Gayangos writes:
As a result of his endeavours, it is reported that on 8th December 1499 about three thousand Moors were baptized by him and a leading mosque in Granada was converted into a church. 'Converts' were encouraged to surrender their Islamic books, several thousands of which were destroyed by Ximenes in a public bonfire. A few rare books on medicine were kept aside for the University of Alcala.[28]
The Muslims were dragged through the streets of the Muslim quarter for rejecting to adopt the Christian faith. Consequently, the Muslim initiated a riot protesting that the treaty was not honoured. P. de Gayangos further writes:
Ximenes immediately denounced the uprising as a rebellion, and claimed that by this the Moors had forfeited all their rights under the terms of capitulation. They should therefore be given the choice between baptism and expulsion. The government agreed with his arguments, and Ximenes then began the mass baptism of the population of Granada, most of whom preferred this fate to the more hazardous one of deportation to Africa. The speed with which the baptisms were carried out meant that there was no time in which to instruct the Moors in the fundamentals of their new religion, so that inevitably most of the new converts became Christian only in name.[29]
Additionally, it has been estimated that at least 50,000 Muslims were forced to convert in the mass baptism of Granada by Ximenes. A small amount of Jews and Muslims were deported to North-Africa. The tolerance of the Muslims for the Jews never decreased, so they aided the Jews in the progress of the deportation. In spite of the circumstances, a new Golden Age flourished in North-Africa. In Andarax, mosques were blown up with gun-powder and at Belfique, all the Muslim men were put to the sword whilst the women were taken as slaves. The Muslim children were separated from their parents and handed over to the Church in order to be brought up as Catholics. The Arabic books including the Glorious Qur’an were collected and burnt. H. Kamen writes:
Since the majority of Muslims had been 'converted', the offer of emigration was an empty one, and the 'legal equality' granted by Ferdinand was but a mockery of the terms of the Treaty of Granada which he had so blatantly permitted to be broken. Behind the words of conciliation and peace, the general intention of the Church to eliminate the practice of Islam was unmistakable, and now that the Muslims of southern Andalusia, or the Moriscos as they were called, were within the jurisdiction of the Spanish Inquisition, the Inquisitors embarked on the task of detecting 'relapsed heretics' and secret Muslims. The communities of Muslims which had survived the suppression of the rebellion, or reformed after it, were repeatedly harassed by the Inquisitors.[30]
Thomas writes:
The ancient faith of Christianity, with its respect for women and antipathy toward slavery, not only survived but flourished.
On the contrary, Christianity advocated the support of slavery. The Encyclopaedia of Britannica states:
Judaic and Islamic canonical texts refer frequently to slavery and treat it as a natural condition that might befall anyone. But they view it as a condition that should be gotten over quickly. Islamic practice was based on the assumption that the outsider rapidly became an insider and consequently had to be manumitted after six years. New Testament Christianity, on the other hand, had no prescriptions that slaves be manumitted. Canon law sanctioned slavery. This was attributable at least partially to Christianity's primary focus on spiritual values and salvation after death rather than on temporal conditions and the present life. Under such a regime it mattered little whether someone was a slave or a free person while living on earth.[31]
In regard to how women are viewed in the Christian tradition, Dr. Sherif Abdel Azeem produced
an authentic comparison of the treatment of women between the Christian and Islamic tradition.
Conclusions
It is quite clear that the nature of this article is based on wishful thinking rather than concrete evidence. A thorough analysis of every evidence pertained to the Crusades would conclude that the Crusades were a colonial venture motivated by greed, lack of opportunity in Frankish Europe and territorial expansion. Thomas attempts to justify the wholesale slaughter of millions of innocent people during the Crusades by basing his opinions on fictitious evidence. It is time for the Christian revisionist historians to step out of denial and acknowledge that Christians are not on a moral high ground. And Allah knows best!
References
[1] James Michener in ‘Islam: The Misunderstood Religion,’ Reader’s Digest, May 1955, p. 68-70.
[2] Mohammed the Prophet of Islam, Riyadh 1989-p.4
[3] Lawrence W. Browne, The Prospects of Islam, London, 1944, p.14
[4] T.W. Arnold, The Spread of Islam in the World, p.34
[5] John McManners (Ed.), The Oxford Illustrated History of Christianity, Oxford University Press, 1992, p.174
[6] Ira Zepp Jr., A Muslim Primer (1992), Wakefield Editions, US, p. 134
[7] Edward Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire
[8] Dr. Gustav LeBon, Civilization of the Arabs, p.30
[9]
Ibid, p.30
[10] Count de Castri, Islam: Impressions and Studies
[11] T.W. Arnold, The Spread of Islam in the World, p.52
[12] Joel T. Rosenthal,
Encarta
[13]
Catholic Encyclopaedia
[14] August C. Krey, The First Crusade: The Accounts of Eye Witnesses and Participants, (Gloucester, Massachusetts: Peter Smith, 1958)
[15] History of the Christian Church, by Philip Schaff, Volume V, Chapter 7
[16]
Ibid
[17] In Krey, op. cit., 275.
[18] F. Turner, Beyond Geography (New York, 1980)
[19] History of the Christian Church, by Philip Schaff, Volume V, Chapter 7
[20]
Encyclopaedia of Britannica
[21] Graetz in his Geschichte der Juden [History of the Jews], vol. 11, published in 1853
[22] F. E. Peters, Jerusalem, p. 363.
[23] Karen Armstrong, Holy War, p. 185
[24] Newby, P. H. Saladin in his Time, 1992. Dorset Press, New York.
[25] Haught, Holy Horrors: p26
[26] Compton's Concise Encyclopedia, Inquisition
[27] Encyclopædia Britannica
[28] P de Gayangos, "Muhammadan Dynasties in Spain," Vol. II.
[29]
Ibid
[30] H. Kamen, "The Spanish Inquisition."
[31]
Encyclopaedia Britannica