Xavius

Vatican change of heart over 'barbaric' Crusades
From Richard Owen in Rome



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”

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/articl...2093921,00.html
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What do history buffs here have to say about it?

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mechagouki

When the crusaders couldn't find any Muslims, Jews or, well actually, anyone who got in their way to rape, they used to **** each other.

Welll that's what I heard.....

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"Kick out the jams, motherfuckers!"

MrSnuggles

as soon as islam apologizes for invading europe and subjugating spain, then and only then should anybody apologize for the crusades.

mechagouki

Who gives a fuck anyway?

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"Kick out the jams, motherfuckers!"

Iris

I really don't see why anyone living today should be apologizing for something that happened hundreds of years ago.

What do you mean, if "Islam" apologizes? Which country or organization specifically?

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comatose

It was the caliphate empire that invaded spain, the caliphates were the son and grandson of muhhamed himself, so I guess it's fair to say all of islam. Mostly it was north african muslims, but there were certainly plenty of arabs(whom the north african muslims even tried to rebel against a few times, islam was very much arab supremacy back then, with other muslims as lower classes).


I think the crusades were very much a defensive action, the christians did no expanding into new territory, merely tried to rescue the recently invaded territories, and in many cases defending land that was always theirs from attack. Only a zealoted anti-christian or naturally a supremacist muslim, could condemn the the crusades en masse, although some notable incidents even I condemn, such as the foolish attacking of christian byzantium.

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Iris

Asking for an apology for the actions of an empire that no longer exists would be evn more pointless (although not by much) than asking the Vatican to apologize for something they did hundreds of years ago.

(on a side note, I don't know much about this part of history- did the Vatican as we know it today, or some version thereof, exist at this time either, and how involve were they in organizing the crusades? If I'm way off on the above paragraph, please correct me)

When you say "all of Islam" what do you actually mean? Who or what, specifically, should apologize in representation of Islam?

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kinopio

Do you have any idea of what you're talking about?

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comatose

Yeah, I misinterpereted the religious rhetoric of being "the successor to the prophet" as something literal.
Here is the full story; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caliphate

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Gorosaurus

Yeah, what's been said here; there is no need for apology. For one, no one still lives who had any part of any of these actions - even putting down actions of the distant past isn't something I consider honorable. At that point it is just words, and has nothing to do with actual pardoning or forgiveness; it's just using the past for some personal gain in one form or another.

Furthermore, the idea of the Crusaders being the 'bad guys' during that period is as disgusting a distortion of views as considering all heathens today 'bad guys.' I have read enough into these events that the Crusades do seem to be more of a defensive action, while Muslim expansion across Africa and through Europe (Even touching into the Alps) are obviously expansionist and were deliberately fashioned to disrupt European trade. The Byzantines before them were similar in size, but not in motive. The Romans had historically been fairly lenient invaders. So yes, I think it would be fair to call the Crusades a reaction, and not a wholly deliberate massacre.


To sum up, there is no need for Christianity to be the forced apoligizer, although it wouldn't be a bad thing - very inkeeping with their beliefs, and also, the warranty on heartfelt apologizes and repentance is long over.

Find a better, more relevant mean of diplomacy, Vatican.

Caster13

The Crusades saw Christian armies moving against more than just Muslims. Such as Jews, non-Christian Eastern Europeans, Eastern Orthodox Christians (Greeks), and many more.

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Knight of Cydonia

Well, like most of the time, religion is but a mere excuse for war, even the crusades weren't just about saving the "Holy Land" from "infidels", they were just as much about conquering more land and riches...
Compare it to the Iraq-thing, it may have been a pre-emptive strike to protect America from those dangerous Iraqi WMD's or to bring freedom and democracy to the Iraqi people and trial Saddam for his warcrime's, but at the same time, American and allied enterprises are making profit be it from the Iraqi oil, or from the "rebuilding" of Iraq...

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MrSnuggles

well i figure since humiliating one muslim is the same as humiliated ALL muslims, they might as well just all apologize.

Robjomak

Well, with Shiites there's no problem. The Ayatollah.

Sunnis it gets less definite though.

unkwon

The thing was while the crusades were sad society benifited from it as whole, sure many of lives here lost there, but think about what we have gained with knowalge technology and also gave us all a opened mind in general.

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Iris

You want them to shout "we're sorry, christianity" at the same time? Maybe they'll hear it in Spain if we give them all loud speakers.

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Pandas_UNITE

wait...so kingdom of heaven actually happened?

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LastAlliance

yes. yes it did pandas

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Wow...just wow.

Caster13

Could you be more specific by how you mean society benefited from the Crusades?

If we're simply talking in terms of Christianity vs. Islam--which I'm guessing, and correct me if I'm wrong, is what you were alluding to--I really don't think it would matter who would have won.

Generally speaking, all societies tend to become more "progressive" as they become more "prosperous". One of the main reasons the Enlightenment, the Renaissance, the French, American, and Industrial revolution occured is because of a growing middle-class that came to hold more power and influence financially and politically. Nations simply couldn't maintain tyrannical dictatorships/theocratic monarchies with a majority of the population that could spend money, were becoming more educated, becoming more familiar with mass media, and specifically, demanded popular politics.

I imagine if Christianity "lost" the conflict that centered around the Crusades and Islam became more prominent, the same pattern would occur. The differences, I would imagine, wouldn't be that big of a deal. Instead of latin becoming the scholarly language, I imagine, since the Muslims had easier access to Greece, Greek would become the more popular Classics and scholarly language. Instead of the nations in the western hemisphere becoming more important, it would be the easterns such as India, China, and maybe the eastern Slavic nations and Russia (due to easy access, a lot of people say the reason Russia was always behind Europe in terms of technology and sociology is because of how remote it is from Europe). But I would fully expect, that given enough time, tyrannical Islamic theo/monarchies would be overthrown or reformed just as it happened to Christian nations in Europe.

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