Thomas LashleyI am a student of Professor Steve Weidenkopf and there are several thing to keep in mind when talking about the Crusades.
1. A Crusade has 4 main ingredients that make it a crusade in the classical sense.
a.A public legal vow to take the cross (literally put on a cross on your clothes) to go on an armed pilgrimage to a specific site or goal.
b.The Crusade has to be endorsed by a Pope.
c.Given certain temporal and ecclesial privileges.
d.The crusader is promised an indulgence upon completion or death of his pilgrimage.
2. Not all crusades had the same goal. There were crusades against of what be considered pre or post Christian Heretics, the Holy Roman Emperor, pagans, and Muslims.
3. In the eyes of Medieval Catholics all Crusades including those against the Muslims were considered defensive or liberating in some sense, at least in their initial intended goal if not outcome.
In the case of the first crusade it was a response to several actions done by Muslium leader these include, but are not limited to:
a.The Mad Caliph Al-Hakim destroying the Church of the Holy Sepulcher (arguably the most important Church for all Catholics and Orthodox Christians).
b.The subjugation of Christians under Islam and being treated as second class citizens.
c.In 1055 Christians were expelled from the Holy Sepulcher compound of Jerusalem and the Pilgrim road from the port of Jaffa to Jerusalem was closed.
d.In 1065 Gunther the Bishop of Bamberg and 12,000 pilgrims were massacred by the Muslims on Good Friday only two miles from Jerusalem.
e.The historic takeover of Christian lands by Muslims in Africa, Asia, and Europe.
f.The Byzantine Emperor asked the Pope for help as Christian lands were being invaded.
Things to keep in mind:
a. Al-Hakim was considered just as mad by Muslims as well as Christians.
Muslium successors to Al-Hakim allowed Christians under the leadership of Byzantine Emperor Constantine IX Monomachos to rebuild. One of the by products between this agreement between the Fatimids and the Byzantines was that Christians who had been forced to convert to Islam under the persecution of al-Hakim were allowed to return to their Christian faith.
b. Christians often treated Muslims and Jews as second class citizens as well in more or less comparable conditions.
4. Although if you look at virtually all of the intended good goals of the Crusades in the eyes of Catholics in their age, they did not always meet their goals morally. In other words they believed they had Casus Belli (just cause) Ante Bellum (before the war), but not always In Bello (during) or Post Bellum (after the war).
As a few examples:
a. The popular crusades: These were semi or unsanctioned “crusades” not called approved by the Pope. Perhaps the most infamous was the people’s crusade which was a segments of the 1st crusade where unorganized peasants marched towards Jerusalem looting towns (both Christian and Jewish),but were quickly defeated, before the Knights’s crusade (the official part of the 1st crusade) took place.
b. The 4th crusade. It’s original goal was to liberate Jerusalem, but crusader army became indebted to Venice (for want of ships) and against the Popes orders and on pain of excommunication attacked the Catholic Italian City of Zara and later attacked the Orthodox, but Holy City of Constantinople (again on pain of excommunication).
c. There were many massacres of Muslims in these Crusades and counter Jihads as well as massacres of Christians against Muslims before, during, and after these wars.
5. This is a general Catholic understanding of the Crusades for practicing Catholics. But we must keep in mind several things as a whole.
a.There are Catholics who over apologize for these wars and do not keep in mind the goods that they did or the evil that Muslims did. There are Catholics who ignore the evil that Catholics did to Jews, Muslims, Orthodox, Pagans, and Protestants.
b. There are a lot of nuisance in the Crusades and Jihad wars.
c. Radical Musliums will use the idea of the crusades to either justify war and/or terrorism against Christians and the West.
d. Secularists or even individuals who only have a cursory understanding of the Crusades and Jihad wars also tend to over apologize as westerners for the Crusades and will decry not only Catholicism, but Christianity as a whole.
e. Individuals should no the difference between a Crusade and a Catholic War. They should also not conflate, but rather juxtapose the Crusades with the latter Imperialism of the 17, 18, and early 1900s.
Conclusion: When someone engages with either the Crusades or the Jihadists everyone should do there best to understand the various nuisances of all sides. There were in fact good and bad people on all sides of these wars. Intent and Outcome for these wars both in the general and individual levels should be brought to mind for all sides, and one should be ready to concede wrongdoings on any side of a conflict and not over demonize people on either side of the conflict broadly speaking. Keeping an open mind and meeting open minded Muslims who are familiar, but not zealous and reciprocating this attitude is key for making meaningful engagement when discussing this topic.
