Posted on 10/18/2003 1:02:52 PM PDT by nwrep
THE GREAT HERESIES
by Hilaire Belloc
Chapter Four
The Great and Enduring Heresy of Mohammed
It might have appeared to any man watching affairs in the earlier years of the seventh century_say from 600 to 630_that only one great main assault having been made against the Church, Arianism and its derivatives, that assault having been repelled and the Faith having won its victory, it was now secure for an indefinite time.
Christendom would have to fight for its life, of course, against outward unchristian things, that is, against Paganism. The nature worshippers of the high Persian civilization to the east would attack us in arms and try to overwhelm us. The savage paganism of barbaric tribes, Scandinavian, German, Slav and Mongol, in the north and centre of Europe would also attack Christendom and try to destroy it. The populations subject to Byzantium would continue to parade heretical views as a label for their grievances. But the main effort of heresy, at least, had failed_so it seemed. Its object, the undoing of a united Catholic civilization, had been missed. The rise of no major heresy need henceforth be feared, still less the consequent disruption of Christendom.
By A.D. 630 all Gaul had long been Catholic. The last of the Arian generals and their garrisons in Italy and Spain had become orthodox. The Arian generals and garrisons of Northern Africa had been conquered by the orthodox armies of the Emperor.
It was just at this moment, a moment of apparently universal and permanent Catholicism, that there fell an unexpected blow of overwhelming magnitude and force. Islam arose_quite suddenly. It came out of the desert and overwhelmed half our civilization.
Islam_the teaching of Mohammed_conquered immediately in arms. Mohammed's Arabian converts charged into Syria and won there two great battles, the first upon the Yarmuk to the east of Palestine in the highlands above the Jordan, the second in Mesopotamia. They went on to overrun Egypt; they pushed further and further into the heart of our Christian civilization with all its grandeur of Rome. They established themselves all over Northern Africa; they raided into Asia Minor, though they did not establish themselves there as yet. They could even occasionally threaten Constantinople itself. At last, a long lifetime after their first victories in Syria, they crossed the Straits of Gibraltar into Western Europe and began to flood Spain. They even got as far as the very heart of Northern France, between Poitiers and Tours, less than a hundred years after their first victories in Syria_in A.D. 732.
They were ultimately thrust back to the Pyrenees, but they continued to hold all Spain except the mountainous north-western corner. They held all Roman Africa, including Egypt, and all Syria. They dominated the whole Mediterranean west and east: held its islands, raided and left armed settlements even on the shores of Gaul and Italy. They spread mightily throughout Hither Asia, overwhelming the Persian realm. They were an increasing menace to Constantinople. Within a hundred years, a main part of the Roman world had fallen under the power of this new and strange force from the Desert.
Such a revolution had never been. No earlier attack had been so sudden, so violent or so permanently successful. Within a score of years from the first assault in 634 the Christian Levant had gone: Syria, the cradle of the Faith, and Egypt with Alexandria, the mighty Christian See. Within a lifetime half the wealth and nearly half the territory of the Christian Roman Empire was in the hands of Mohammedan masters and officials, and the mass of the population was becoming affected more and more by this new thing.
Mohammedan government and influence had taken the place of Christian government and influence, and were on the way to making the bulk of the Mediterranean on the east and the south Mohammedan.
We are about to follow the fortunes of this extraordinary thing which still calls itself Islam, that is, "The Acceptation" of the morals and simple doctrines which Mohammed had preached.
I shall later describe the historical origin of the thing, giving the dates of its progress and the stages of its original success. I shall describe the consolidation of it, its increasing power and the threat which it remained to our civilization. It very nearly destroyed us. It kept up the battle against Christendom actively for a thousand years, and the story is by no means over; the power of Islam may at any moment re-arise.
(Excerpt) Read more at ewtn.com ...
Matilda told such Dreadful Lies,
It made one Gasp and Stretch one's Eyes;
Her Aunt, who, from her Earliest Youth,
Had kept a Strict Regard for Truth,
Attempted to Believe Matilda:
The effort very nearly killed her,
And would have done so, had not She
Discovered this Infirmity.
For once, towards the Close of Day,
Matilda, growing tired of play,
And finding she was left alone,
Went tiptoe to the Telephone
And summoned the Immediate Aid
Of London's Noble Fire-Brigade.
Within an hour the Gallant Band
Were pouring in on every hand,
From Putney, Hackney Downs, and Bow
With Courage high and Hearts aglow
They galloped, roaring through the Town,
'Matilda's House is Burning Down!'
Inspired by British Cheers and Loud
Proceeding from the Frenzied Crowd,
They ran their ladders through a score
Of windows on the Ball Room Floor;
And took Peculiar Pains to Souse
The Pictures up and down the House,
Until Matilda's Aunt succeeded
In showing them they were not needed;
And even then she had to pay
To get the Men to go away! . . . .
It happened that a few Weeks later
Her Aunt was off to the Theatre
To see that Interesting Play
The Second Mrs Tanqueray.
She had refused to take her
Niece To hear this entertaining Piece:
A Deprivation Just and Wise
To Punish her for Telling Lies.
That Night a Fire did break out -
You should have heard Matilda Shout!
You should have heard her Scream and Bawl,
And throw the window up and call
To People passing in the Street -
(The rapidly increasing Heat
Encouraging her to obtain
Their confidence) - but all in vain!
For every time She shouted 'Fire!'
They only answered 'Little Liar'!
And therefore when her Aunt returned,
Matilda, and the House, were Burned.
Other great poems and illustrations in Belloc's Cautionary Tales for Children.
Vindication for General Boykin! Amen General Boykin never be afraid to speak the truth; however, it will get you censored by the American media and the Arab Amercian Council.
NOT TRUE! You sure fell for heresy genefromjersey!
Belloc was just a
proto-tin foil wearing nut
who viewed the world in
conspiracy terms.
Today, probably, he'd be
working for LaRouche:
"Now almost forgotten, Distributism was a composite of several social and moral theories first articulated by Gilbert Keith Chesterton (1874-1936) and Hilaire Belloc (1870-1953) in the pages of volume 2 of The New Age. The initial concepts arose from the four-way (and more) argument among H.G.Wells, George Bernard Shaw, Belloc and Chesterton over modernity ... That discussion, now known as "the Chesterbelloc" contoversy, helped Belloc and Chesterton develop a rationale for equitable distribution of property and restoration of worker control in commerce, agriculture, and industry. This cluster of ideas, soon called "Distributism," was based on the two men’s look back, to European history, as well as their concerns about the present and the future of mass industrial society. ... As Distributism looked to the past for a model of a simpler, kinder, gentler world, it began to focus on what it saw as the abuses of international finance in causing wars, famine, and disruption in social relations. Steeped in European cultural and religious attitudes as they were, it was not a big step for some Distributists to believe in a conspiracy of international Jewish finance responsible for the social chaos caused by both capitalism and socialism. Chesterton, Belloc, Eliot and Ezra Pound were among those who succumbed to this viewpoint at various times."
[Distributism, by Carol DeBoer-Langworthy]
However, I take exception to the following comment.
"No fragment of Islam ever abandons its sacred book, its code of morals, its organized system of prayer, its simple doctrine."
I think this is not true. It's just that when a Muslim converts, he is not very vocal about it, because the Islamists will kill him if they can. And my guess is that there are a lot of Muslim's questioning the bloodthirstyness of their religion these days.
So, in a world were
we are fighting nut Muslims
who've had their beliefs
perverted for war,
you support the perversion
of Christ for the same?!
Written in 1938! I agree, General Boykin is speaking TRUTH and the Arab American Council is out to stop truth!
My prayer is that General Boykin will "keep his composure though a whole world rages...cherishes his well reasoned convictions though a whole world persecutes...speaks the truth though all others prevaricate...such a one is, of all adventurers, the bravest and the noblest." (Hebrew Prayer Book)
"for we need a mighty faith to praise HIM (The LORD of Lords, KING of Kings, Ruler of the Universe in Great Majesty - Melech in Hebrew - THE LIVING LORD GOD OF ISRAEL)when we walk among men who mock at HIS WORD; we need endless trust to be patient in the vale of tears and we must find the strength to answer HIM when HE calls us to HIS work." IT MATTERS!
The Soviets and
Khmer Rouge believed such stuff.
Civilized to you?!
We might note that the "Arian Heresy" is known as a heresy only on the word of it's opposition which won the "war".
Then, along comes Mohammed, who failed to conduct universal conquest, so his gnostic tradition became known as a different religion rather than just another Christian heresy, which it was.
And if anybody missed it, all of these guys used armed conquest to advance the cause of their respective religions, or heresies, or orthodoxies.
It's truly incredible that we will be joined later on by folks who believe that only Islam has ever used armed might to force conversions.
There has ALWAYS BEEN a physical Symbol of "Islamic Faith" in Mecca--the STONE!
Remove "The Stone," & Let's see "What's Left!!!"
Doc
The Dark Ages begin about 538 AD. It had absolutely nothing to do with the Ottoman Empire which didn't come around for another 800+ years!
In fact, the Dark Ages are so dark that we know about their "early years" from few sources. One source are ancient Irish royal annals (from which we derive our "King Arthur" stories). Another source are tree rings. The suggestion is that the weather turned very nasty for about a decade. This resulted in the death of almost everybody in Northern and Western Europe as well as the loss of all ancient knowlege. Southern Europe fared better, but "better" does not mean "well", just "better". There was general economic collapse throughout the Mediterranean, Central Asia, Western Europe (to the extent there was any economy at all), China and so on.
Some folks came out of the Dark Ages sooner than others. The Chinese, for example, survived through total collapse for a mere 300 years. Byzentium (the city itself) seems to have had total collapse for only 84 years ~ of course they ended up fairly alone in the world for a long while.
The Western Arabian peninsula seems to have begun recovery within just a few decades! We know they recovered because they had this interesting story about Mohammad and messages from God when they conquered Damascus and kicked out the decadent Persian regime. They then went on to recover as much ancient knowlege as they could, and once contact with India was made, they expanded the scope of the Indian knowledge base (which is, among other things, the number system we now use).
The Ottoman Empire did not yet exist while this recovery was going on.
Finally, about 1000 AD Western Europe recovered economically, but not socially. That's when the Age of Jihad began! Europeans had armed knights who lived under monastic orders (for a start), wore crosses into all battles, etc., etc., etc. It was truly horrible. In the end they conquered just about the whole world. Until oil was discovered in the Middle East most Western Europeans didn't care one way or the other about Islam.
You might try cruising through some of their websites concerning the matter.
They can quite readily trace their origins to Jerusalem itself, right into the Temple!
Say what??
For example, when the Britons began relocating to Brittany (to escape Anglo-Saxon barbarians then invading their homeland) they discovered that there were no people living there although this had been one of the most populated, progressive and productive regions in the Western Roman Empire.
This was a common situation throughout Northern and Western Europe. Note that the Dark Ages begin about 538! Some claim they began precisely that year, or in 535. We really don't know because they lost track of their calender at that time!
There was massive loss of records. In fact, there was massive loss of everything. Life was never the same after that time.
Did you imagine that people just forgot how to do stuff and retreated to a neolithic lifestyle?
People died in large numbers. The survivors faced a far less populated world. It took Europe half a millenium to begin to recover!
The Mohammedan temper was not tolerant. It was, on the contrary, fanatical and bloodthirsty. It felt no respect for, nor even curiosity about, those from whom it differed. It was absurdly vain of itself, regarding with contempt the high Christian culture about it. It still so regards it even today.
snip
Millions of modern people of the white civilization_that is, the civilization of Europe and America_have forgotten all about Islam. They have never come in contact with it. they take for granted that it is decaying, and that, anyway, it is just a foreign religion which will not concern them. It is, as a fact, the most formidable and persistent enemy which our civilization has had, and may at any moment become as large a menace in the future as it has been in the past.
Still, you don't believe any of them do you? Frankly, I have my own doubts about the Rome business.
The bad work begun at the Reformation is bearing its final fruit in the dissolution of our ancestral doctrines the very structure of our society is dissolving.Like Adolf Hitler did, he ascribes communism to Jews as though it were something in their blood that would bring on conspiratorial evils to Christendom:
In the place of the old Christian enthusiasms of Europe there came, for a time, the enthusiasm for nationality, the religion of patriotism. But self-worship is not enough, and the forces which are making for the destruction of our culture, notably the Jewish Communist propaganda from Moscow, have a likelier future before them than our old-fashioned patriotism.And an early enemy of Jewish settlement in their old homelands:
There has been bloodshed under the French mandate more than once and it will be renewed[2]; while under the English mandate the forcing of an alien Jewish colony upon Palestine has raised the animosity of the native Arab population to white heat. Meanwhile a ubiquitous underground Bolshevist propaganda is working throughout Syria and North Africa continually, against the domination of Europeans over the original Mohammedan population.
I'm not sure it's all that useful. To me it seems more like an argument that some forms of tyranny need to be continued because there's an outside threat. And there were people who knew better about the Jews in the 1930s. I don't claim to understand anti-semitism, but I think it's a confluence of misunderstanding Christianity's origins in Judaism, raw xenophobia, and simple scapegoatism. It never had any merit. FDR should never have turned away the St. Louis, and it's an embarassing mark on our history that he did.
By the way, the Japanese were preaching anti-semitism (i.e. blaming "the international Jew") before and during WWII, as well.
In any case, the Belloc clearly doesn't get why the west has been so successful: it's because we've abandoned irrationalism. He blames our supposedly impending downfall (in 1939 this would have been easy) on the abandonment of tradition. This is a very anti-American, anti-modern, and superstitious. How familiar, as we hear that sort of thing today.
The west will survive the current Islamic threat without this guy's alarmist advice.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.