Crusade Propaganda: The abuse of Christianity’s holy wars.

National Review ^ | November 2, 2001 | Thomas F. Madden

[quidnunc]

There is considerable misunderstanding about the nature of the Crusades evident here on FR.

I hope this article by an undoubted expert helps to correct prior misinformation.

[jrherreid]

Bump for Professor Madden.

You can get his book on the crusades here.

[Cruising Speed]

bttt

[quidnunc]

Here's some useful information on the Crusades.

[Pete]

In the past, I have made the point on FR that the Crusades were a response to Islamic expansion. However, those freepers who are inclined to bash Christians have continued to toss out the Crusades as an indictment of Christianity. It seems that these same people never quite make it to threads like this one that expose the truth. I am waiting for one of the bashers to show up here and say, "Oh, I see. I was totally wrong due to my ignorance of historical events and my cultural bias. Sorry."

still waiting...

[ventana]

Well, Hello! Love Monty Python, but the article's got it all right and so does this guy: Hillaire Belloc's discourse on Mohammedism and The Crusades.

[ventana]

Should have tagged post, V's wife. (he gave up posting for lent, lol).

[hcmama]

However, those freepers who are inclined to bash Christians have continued to toss out the Crusades as an indictment of Christianity.

It would be nice to think the jihadi apologists here on FR are simply victims of a Cliff Notes History Curriculum, but I doubt that is the case. To defend the indefensible, they are forced to resort to tired old cliches and all the usual anti-Western, anti-imperialist claptrap.

[Redbob]

No misunderstanding here. The Crusaders knew the danger to civilization that was Islam; we'd be wise to do the same.

[Gophack]

I read the article at NR Online and realized how much I DIDN'T know! And, it was a short article! Boy, was my education sorely lacking.

Good read, though. Thanks.

[Redbob]

Great stuff in the article, including: "In short, they (Muslims) live in a dream world, a desert cloister where the last thousand years only partially happened."

[Billthedrill]

A belated welcome back, quid'!

What the author says is correct but not complete - his reference to "Crusades" seems to end with the Fourth Crusade, wherein the Franks and Venetians plundered their Greek buddies in Constantinople. There were more, including the infamous Children's Crusade (which populated the Muslim slave markets nicely) and a number of "Crusades" that never left Europe and weren't pointed at the Holy Land or even the Muslims anyhow. A Crusade in this sense is simply the Church offering holy dispensation to its members in exchange for military activities on the Church's behalf - they "take up the Cross," hence "Crusade."

Furthermore, while the Muslims "won" the Crusades, the Arabs did not. It was during this period that political control of the Islamic peoples was wrested from the Arabs by first the Seljuk Turks, then the Ottomans. This control didn't leave Turkish hands until the secularization of Turkey and the fall of the Ottoman empire in 1917, at which time the Arabs marched into the Holy Land behind a fellow named Lawrence. Part of the Arabic grudge against the Christians and the Crusades is that the latter helped the Turks in this regard. It's a grudge half a millennium old, but it doesn't seem to have faded much. To us they're all Muslims, but they don't see it quite that monolithically.

There used to be caliphs (religious leaders) and sultans (political/military leaders); the former remained Arabic much longer than the latter, which term was actually invented to disguise Turkish suzerainty. Now the sultans are gone, and the return of total control to the religious wing in the form of mullahs and ayatollahs (a fairly new term) hearkens back to the earlier, bloodier era of Islam.

[Publius6961]

There is considerable misunderstanding about the nature of the Crusades evident here on FR.

Only by the Mass Murder Muslim/Arabprop Tag Team (MMMATT) and their useful idiots.

[scooby321]

good read

[Richard Kimball]

Bump

[NormsRevenge]

Islam = Evil ... Western Civilization= Good

Simple enuf for me :-)

[independentmind]

bump for later

[gfactor]

When President Bush used the term "crusade" as it is commonly used, to denote a grand enterprise with a moral dimension, the media pelted him for insensitivity to Muslims

just call it jihad.

[Mr. Thorne]

THAT is a fascinating dissertation...

[aristeides]

Whether the Crusades were right or wrong, I've never understood what right any Moslems who believe in jihad have to condemn them.