October 14, 2005
THE CRUSADES
Haven't we all heard how awful and evil and bad the Crusades were? Haven't all us Christians been beaten so thoroughly with what bad bastards Christians are for what the crusaders did almost a 1000 years ago? Aren't we all constantly reminded that the Crusades were EVIL and wrong?
Well? Haven't we?
Of course we have. Christians have been apologizing to the world for the Crusades since, oh, about the 1970s. We all understand now that the Crusades were bad, evil, wrong, immoral, filthy, and that the crusaders were dirty rotten murderers who killed, raped children and burned women all across the Holy Lands.
BUT IS IT THE TRUTH?
Well, you ought to know me by now, I believe in the truth and I don't care WHO I piss off by telling it. I could care less if the entire world disagrees with me. When the historical facts say one thing but the world denies it and says another, then I guess I'm the lone voice still declaring the historical truth. I'm not here to fit in. I'm not here to get my back patted because I can spew LIES to replace history.
So, in my usual method of detailing the known facts of both sides, let me elaborate on what this politically movtivated historical revisionism is all about.
Go to any self-respecting website that claims to "expose" the Crusades, and you get the same thing - it all sounds taken from an encyclopedia-brief and embellished with muslim claims of foul deeds:
The First Crusade was 1096 (no mention of the preceding years).
It was called by Pope Urban II who lied to Christians by telling them their salvation was at stake (using one source fabricated in the 1900s and ignoring the earlier sources that say NOTHING about automatic remission of sins!)
It was called in the name of "Christian Imperialism." (Dunno what that means, the term is just thrown around like it means something. Pope Urban II did not benefit a penny from the Crusades.)
It was called to convert muslims by force to Christianity. (No, it wasn't, and there's not one historical record that supports this.)
The Crusades were an "unprovoked act." (No mention is made of the muslim agression starting in 638 accompanied by the brutal subordination of Jews and Christians under muslim rule, nor of the spreading muslim conquerors that were gobbling up massive numbers of formerly christian enclaves and kingdoms.)
The Crusades were fought for greedy white European males who were "bored." (No mention that the people of the time considered this an act of sacrifice rather than profit.)
The evil bad bastard Crusaders slaughtered the inhabitants of Jerusalem, both muslims and JEWS. (No mention of the fact that this killing of JEWS was mentioned by someone who was referring to the Christian Crusader account of the taking of Jerusalem where no mention is made of jews.)
Ech. Enough! I could go on and on and on with all the historical revisionism, but they're LIES and LIES make me sick. How about I get to the meat of the factual historical record that is unvarnished by political correctness? In other words, how about the TRUTH?
Let's look at the real history.
Near the end of Muhammad's life ("prophet" of Islam), after conquering most of the Arabic tribes, the "prophet" attempted to move beyond the lands of Arabia. His target? The Christian Byzantines at Tabuk, 630A.D.
Well, gosh, isn't that 400 YEARS before the evil Christian Crusades?
Yup.
Muhammad demanded that the Christian Byzantine empire embrace Islam or die. The Byzantines rejected this demand. Muhammad died before he could see the end of the war against Byzantium, but the war went on. In 635, Christian Damascus fell to the rampaging muslims. In 636, the Christian enclave at Basra was conquered. In 637, Christian Antioch was conquered. In 638, Jerusalem (at that time a predominantly Christian city) fell to the muslims. In 639, the muslims began the conquest of Egypt, also predominantly Christian (Coptic Christians, of which there is a minuscule fraction remaining today). Muslim war against Christianity in Egypt was complete by 642.
"But but but... the muslims were all hailed as liberators and they sang KUMBAYA!" Pure fabrication. One Egyptian noted the following that was described as the pattern of conquest in ALL of Egypt: "Then the muslims arrived in Nikiou. There was not one single soldier to resist them. They seized the town and slaughtered everyone they met in the street and in the churches - men, women, and children, sparing nobody. Then they went to other places, pillaged and killed all the inhabitants thay found... But let us say no more, for it is impossible to describe the horrors the muslims committed..." (Bat Ye'or)
Those who weren't killed were enslaved.
Christian Armenia fell after Egypt amidst similar muslim butcheries. The regions of Caesarea and Cilicia were also conquered in 650 and their inhabitants slaughtered - men, women, and yes, even children.
The PC myth is that muslims were "responding" to aggressive neighbors. The truth? Most of these peaceful regions had never really heard of muslims and were conquered without much fight.
Christian Spain was next. Starting in 711 and ending in 715, muslims murdered their way across the once Christian land. The muslims then invaded France (didn't know that, did you?) Charles "the Hammer" stopped the muslims (finally) at the Battle of Tours in 732. Muslims had conquered a THIRD of France by that time - look it up on a map. You won't hear this stuff in current talks about the crusades - but this all happened before the crusades.
I'll continue.
In 827, the muslims invaded Italy. By 846, they had murdered their way to Rome. The last of the muslims were driven out of Sicily in 1091! In Spain, the reconquest took over seven hundred years!
The "straw" that broke the camel's back was the muslim victory at Manzikert in 1071 that led the way to the conquest of almost all of the Byzantine Empire - all Christian lands. Note: the Byzantines fought back, finally, in the 960s and 970s under a particularly astute general, Nicephorus Phocus. He recaptured Antioch, Crete, Cyprus, and parts of Syria. These were all lost again by 1001. You see, once a land is conquered by muslims, it is considered forever theirs and they must wage war to regain control.
During these conquests, the caliphs were ordering the destruction of churches and church property and the burning of crosses. In the period 1000 to 1009, over thirty thousand churches were burned to the ground. The majority of the Christians converted to Islam in that time under the threat of beheading. I really (REALLY) doubt that Christians in these conquered countries hugged the blood-soaked muslims who had just slaughtered their relatives and sang kumbaya.
In 1076, the muslims were forced to reconquer Jerusalem (the city did not like Muslim rule). The muslim emir promised not to harm the inhabitants of the city but once inside they murdered three thousand men, women, and children.
The once grand and peaceful Byzantine Empire that had once ruled from southern Italy to North Africa and the Middle East, Asia Minor (Turkey) and Arabia was reduced to ruling Greece. It was at this point that the Byzantine Emporer asked the Pope for help.
Not until 1095 did Pope Urban II issue the call for a war against the rampaging muslims.
Seems a lot different than the "history" that's being pedaled to us, doesn't it? Leaving out the centuries that lead up to Urban's call for the First Crusade makes the crusades seem like some spiteful thing that bored white European males did. But that is far from the truth.
The Pope realized the need and responded. Remember that Europe in those days was a divided conglomeration of petty kingdoms. There was no Germany, or France as we know it. There were hundreds of little kingdoms that were more concerned with warring amongst themselves than being evil white bastards. But Christians answered the call. There are a few versions of the text of Urban's call. They can be found HERE. Note that the first one is concocted in the 1900s with little similarity to the earlier versions. By reading it and comparing to the others, it seems clear that the first one was fabricated. Note that in the earlier versions is no mention of "go or burn in hell" like seen in the first one.
Those were the beginnings of the Crusades. They were called as a response to CENTURIES of muslim murder, rape, pillage, and conversion to Islam via the sword. The Crusades were a response to muslim aggression. Remember that because everyone else is spewing the politically correct version that Bush only called the crusades over oil and Halliburton.
.... oops.
You get the picture. Pope Urban didn't call the crusades because their were bored french nobles who were greedy for land. Hell, that doesn't even make sense. What would the Roman Pope care if there were bored frenchmen? How ridiculously silly.
"But but but! The Crusaders killed JEWS in Jerusalem! The evil white bastards!" More silliness based on lies. The idea that crusaders killed Jews is taken from ONE account and extrapolated to include jews, although no jews are mentioned! Let me quote the account:
"One of our knights, Letholdus by name, climbed on to the wall of the city. When he reached the top, all the defenders of the city quickly fled along the walls and through the city. Our men followed and pursued them, killing and hacking, as far as the Temple of Solomon...There, the Saracens assembled and resisted fiercely all day, so that the whole temple flowed with their blood (up to the crusaders ankles). Then the crusaders scattered throughout the city, seizing gold and silver, horses and mules..."
Note that there is not a single mention of killing jews - only SARACENS (muslims). Yet this is the account quoted by those who claim the evil white bastard crusaders killed billions of jews. It makes me sick, don't the lies make you sick? The worst that can be said is that the crusaders looted Jerusalem. Yeah, well, every army does it and has always done it. That doesn't make it right, but it wasn't some unique atrocity that only the evil white bastard crusaders did.
The numbers of muslim defenders slaughtered in the battle of Jerusalem is put at 20,000 to 30,000 which was claimed in the 12th century by a Jerusalem historian and likely exaggerated. But the muslims exaggerate further and as time has passed, the number has grown impressively. A crusader army of less than 25,000 (by best historic estimates) killed an almost equal number of defenders who were firmly ensconced on high walls? Uh huh, but we'll take that number. Muslims, however, loving to demagogue anything, claim the crusaders killed 70,000 muslims. Wow, we killed three times our number?
Impressive.
But that's only the start. By the 15th century, muslims claim that we killed 100,000 muslims. This is just too stupid....
And finally, even Bill Clinton fell for the exaggeration of the muslims by padding his numbers for good television effect when he claimed we killed not only the muslim warriors, but also muslim women and children on the Temple Mount (Dems gotta throw the children in there...) and that the blood ran up to their knees (not ankles). Of course, can we bother to believe anything Clinton says?
The muslims claimed later (almost 100 years after the event) that the crusaders surrounded a synagogue containing Jews and burned it down over their heads. These muslims were not alive at the time to give an eyewitness account (shown above) and this is the only place where the killing of Jews is mentioned for almost 100 years afterwards. Smells fishy to me.
When Christian Constantinople fell to the rampaging muslims in 1453, eyewitness accounts note the following: The muslim soldiers "slew everyone in the streets, men, women, and children, without discrimination. The blood ran in rivers down the steep streets... But soon the lust for slaughter was assuaged. The soldiers realized that captives ...would bring them greater profit."
Oh... you mean the profit that the evil white bastard crusaders were supposedly after? Leave it to the politically correct revisionists to blame the innocent side for what the guilty do.
And Saladin? Don't believe the politically correct romanticism that Hollywood gives you about that bastard, either. However, my purpose was to write about the factual historical basis for the crusades and I've done that. Any time you sniff the cliche liberal line that a particular people were "tolerant," "merciful," and "peaceful," and they were "VICTIMS," no matter what the topic, get out your wading boots because the bull-sh.. is going to get deep.
The Crusaders weren't evil, greedy, bored nobles. Many commoners answered the call and sacrificed their lives to free the Holy Lands. These men were HEROES.
WOULD YOU HAVE ANSWERED THE POPE'S CALL? I would have.
THE MUSLIMS HAVE NEVER STOPPED THEIR JIHAD AGAINST CHRISTIANITY. Go HERE for the latest repeat of the muslim calls against the "christian crusaders." Note the date, September 2005.
Also note the price we pay for the ACLU suing to allow enemies to learn in the US by reading the bit about muslims publishing DETAILS of how to make a nuclear bomb to strike at the US.
Know what we need? Another Crusade.