[After some other posters made casual remarks touching on the atrocities committed by Christian crusaders.]
Then you are grossly historically ignorant.
The crusades were a military response to a broad-sweeping Muslim invasion of Christendom that had been ongoing for over a century. Christian cities and settlements were waking up each day finding themselves surrounded by a sea of scimitar-waving conquerors. They completely obliterated the Eastern Christian Empire of Constantinople. letters were sent pleading for succor from their fellow Europeans. The Crusades were the response.
59 comments
"They completely obliterated the Eastern Christian Empire of Constantinople."
O rly? Try researching the Fourth Crusade, and get back to us.
/They completely obliterated the Eastern Christian Empire of Constantinople./
Ahem, excuse me. The reason why the Turks were able to conquer Constantinople so easily is because the Catholic EUROPEANS had already done the hard work for them. Your precious Crusaders had attacked, looted, and pillaged Constantinople beforehand, and by doing so, left it wide open and defenseless to another attack, this time by the Muslim Turks. FAIL.
This guy doesn't know shit from shinola. The Crusades were not a response to any military action. However, the Muslims did invade Europe hundreds of years before the Crusades began. They were turned back in southern France by Charlemagne's grandfather Charles Martel at the Battle of Tours in 732. Tours is considered one of the most important battles in history, because if the Franks had lost Islam might very well have become the dominant religion in Europe. The Muslims occupied parts of Spain until 1492. Later, of course, Turkish Muslims invaded Eastern Europe and were stopped at Vienna. Not trying to excuse the Crusades, but when it comes to military incursions the Muslims were not so innocent themselves.
Also, in response to an earlier comment, while the Byzantine Empire did go into decline after Constantinople was sacked by the Crusaders, it regained its strength and wasn't conquered by the Turks until a couple hundred years later.
@Old Viking: I belive Poland fell in 1939.
And it doesn't matter what excuse there is, an atrocity is still an atrocity.
The Fourth Crusade, yes, it obliterated Constantinople, in a manner that the Huns, Goths, Vandals and Mongol Hordes would have found excessive.
Anyway, this post is technically correct. Muslim military conquest, starting from Arabia - not Palestine, they really did conquer that - was a very real threat to Christendom up until the seventeenth century. There really was a letter from the Byzantine emperor pleading succour against invaders. The Turks really did obliterate the Eastern Empire.
I agree with what campbunny said...
What RHJunior fails to mention is, of course, that in contrast to the wishes of the byzantine emperor who just wanted military aid against the turks, the crusaders did a disservice to the byzantine empire, by attacking muslim allies to the byzantine empire as well (not to mention the disastrous 4th crusade where constantinople itself was conquered by the crusaders).
Of course RHJunior also fails to mention, that an atrocity remains an atrocity, no matter whether a war is fought for good reasons or not (although one has to admit that these atrocities were common practice in warfare in this time and that even Saladin wasn´t free from doing things which we todaywould call atrocities)
During the First Crusade, Jerusalem was knee-high in non-Christian blood when the Crusaders conquered it.
When the Muslims conquered it three hundred years before, the Caliph entered the city alone, unarmed, and prayed with the Christian Patriarch.
There's no denying the anti-Muslim bloodlust (and anti-semitism and killing of Eastern Orthodox Christians) that accompanied the crusades. Even though the middle ages were known for their brutal warfare (heck, when is war NOT brutal) this atrocities are shameful this is not a very fundi quote.
Technically the poster is correct however....North Africa and the Middle East were Christian lands (or rather their people were by large Christian). Christians and other were the victims of systematic persecution throughout much of the Ummah: forced conversion, desecration of holy places, rape, enslavement and stifling taxation. At best Christians ended up second class citizens in their own lands, at worst they ended up dead.
There's no denying the anti-Muslim bloodlust (and anti-semitism and killing of Eastern Orthodox Christians) that accompanied the crusades. Even though the middle ages were known for their brutal warfare (heck, when is war NOT brutal) this atrocities are shameful this is not a very fundi quote.
Technically the poster is correct however....North Africa and the Middle East were Christian lands (or rather their people were by large Christian). Christians and other were the victims of systematic persecution throughout much of the Ummah: forced conversion, desecration of holy places, rape, enslavement and stifling taxation. At best Christians ended up second class citizens in their own lands, at worst they ended up dead.
"During the First Crusade, Jerusalem was knee-high in non-Christian blood when the Crusaders conquered it."
Sure....it was bloody, but 'knee high'. Come one...even if you killed every person in a city twice you wouldn't be able to flood it knee-high with their blood.
It baffles me to see people laugh at creationists and other Biblical literalists and than come up with nonsense like this.
@Pheds
That's what the medieval chroniclers said happened . . . and they were saying it in a good way. It bears repeating.
Besides, it could have happened in some sections of the city. Ancient and medieval cities were cramped with tiny streets.
Er no.
Your sequence of events is cockeyed. Go do some reading. Especially about the 4th Crusade. It weakened the Easter Roman Empire to the point where it could never recover, and this was responsible for its ultimate fall to Sultan Mehmet in 1453.
But the crusades were initiated by Pope Urban II a long time before that - half a millenium, in fact.
@ campbunny
What you say is technically correct, but you gloss over many facts that lend significance to the real events and show them in a completely different light to what you imply. Note especially that by the time of the Turkish attack in 1453, the 'Empire' had been reduced to a depopulated city, Constantinople. It didn't have the population to defent itself, and the Turks introduced canon against the 'God-Defended City'. Also the Venetians played and important part in the city's defence. But when Mehmet II got his ships around the harbour chains (by portage), the city's doom was certain. Note also that the fall of the Empire is still a casus belli between the Greeks and Turks. The Greeks were within an ace of retaking the city in the 1920s (I think it was) but the western powers warned them off. But Greek/Turkish relations remain venemous to this day.
"The crusades were a military response to a broad-sweeping Muslim invasion of Christendom that had been ongoing for over a century"
Yeah. And the Spanish Inquisition was a P.R. exercise, amirite?
So what about the ones where they attacked Slavs, Mongols, Prussians, Jews, Eastern Orthodox and other Christians? Were they Muslims in disguise?
Because OUR god is better than THEIR god.
And wasn't it Jesus who said that those who live by the sword will sooner die by it? And what about all that "turn the other cheek" talk? He very clearly said to be passive & submissive. So even if your version is historically correct, it goes against what Jesus said to do.
That doesn't change the reports made by Christian soldiers praising God for allowing them to fill the streets of Jerusalem, Constantinople, and Damascus with the blood of non-combatant men, women, and children.
@Pheds and ozznova:
Worse. The quote I've seen describes blood "up to our horses' knees--nay, up to the very bridle. " I can certainly see this happening in a walled medieval city with narrow streets and crowded buildings. However, this would require thousands of deaths, a prospect that is nauseatingly cruel.
Then you are grossly historically ignorant.
Blind, deaf and tragically stupid pot meet blind, deaf and *equally* tragically stupid kettle.
Crack open a history book then get back to me, rube.
And I don't mean the bible, either. Use like, an actual history book filled with events that actually happened.
NO amount of aggression excuses what we in civilized societies call 'war crimes'. There is never, ever a valid excuse to target civilians or to use torture or sexual violence against your enemies. Not under any conditions, ever.
I know, us silly atheists have such strict standards of morality. Its madness.
While no crime excuse other crimes, the Fundie is mostly correct. Still a Fundie, but correct.
As for Constantinople, if memory serves, it went from 500 000 inhabitants to 50 000 due to the fourth crusade, but had regained most of its population during the Paleologue era - until early 1400 (first (failed) sieges by the Turks).
Taz: you're right saying that the Byzantine empire recovered (when the Lascaris family and Nicene empire retook Constantinople from the Latins) but it never again got to the level of the Comnene empire. For one thing, it definitely lost in 1204 the Egean islands (to Venice) including Crete, one half of modern Greece (the duchy of Athens, though it managed to retake Morea = the Peloponnesus and even hold to it until several years *after* the fall of Constantinople) (to the French and Italians), Epirus (= modern-day Albania) (to the Slavs), and even parts of Anatolia (to the Turks) while they were busy fighting on the western side.
Moreover, the brutality of the 1204 sack left the city largely depopulated and poor. It was only maintained as a useful trading post by the Genoese (and to a smaller degree, by the Venitians).
Constantinople fell in 1453 to the invading Turks, the first Crusades happened in 1095. The last true Crusades in the Middle East ended in 1272.
Around 182 years before Constantinople fell.
Besides,for example the atrocity of the massacre in Jerusalem in 1099 is atrocious. Some sources list all or most of the Muslim population was dead (including unarmed men, women, and children) and Ibn al-Qalanisi states that the Jewish defenders had burned a Jewish synagogue killing all it's defenders inside.
Trying to paint either side as the aggressor or the defender is pointless and shows a complete lack of understanding of the history of the region.
Both Islam and Christianity were alien invaders to the entire disputed region, from Spain to Palestine to the Balkans; Christianity spread by Imperial decree and slaughter of heathens and Islam almost entirely by open warfare and harsh taxes on unbelievers.
They see-sawed back and forwards attacking each other for over a thousand years. Trying to claim the moral high ground out of that mess for either side is stupid beyond belief.
Hey Junior. That crusader thing didnt quite go as well as you had planned. In your attempts to try to downplay the atrocities of xians, care to take a gander about another medieval practice? Perhaps....witches and the inquisitions? Yep, xians were just all around good guys that got bad press......
@ campbunny
"Anyway, this post is technically correct. Muslim military conquest, starting from Arabia - not Palestine, they really did conquer that - was a very real threat to Christendom up until the seventeenth century. There really was a letter from the Byzantine emperor pleading succour against invaders. The Turks really did obliterate the Eastern Empire."
"During the First Crusade, Jerusalem was knee-high in non-Christian blood when the Crusaders conquered it. "
Now, (without looking it up - I just want to see if I've still got this bit straight...)
My memory tells me that the First Crusade never even reached Jerusalem, having run out of steam en route. (Which would not be surprising, since it was less an army and more an angry lynch mob with no idea of how big the world was.)
Ah, whatever. Crusade, Jihad: the only difference is the shape of the swords.
TMBG FTW
Confused?
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