Re: The Crusades
 

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The idea of the first crusade (according to the series) was to take back Jerusalem and kill as many muslims as possible. I don't really see how this can be called a good idea. The pope made it clear that killing the enemy would cleanse the soldiers' sins.



[/ QUOTE ] Yes, taking back Jerusalem was a large part of it; driving the Muslim aggressors out of Spain was another part of the whole scenario; there was a lot to the whole picture, more than we have written, and more than the series covered. That said, I thought the series was well produced overall, though I wish they had not neglected to include much on the greater background before the Crusades, which led up to the Crusades. The Crusades in a vacuum look simply awful, but as a belated response to centuries of Muslim conquest by the sword, and the subjugation of non-Muslims, the Crusades are at least somewhat more understandable, although undeniably barbaric in some aspects.

Re: The Crusades
 

I hate islam. Its a forced religion. Most muslims can't don't even read the Koran. If you are born in Pakistan, you are probably not going to understand Arabic so how in the hell can you read the Koran and say that you understand the religion. Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb....

Indy

Re: The Crusades
 

The same can apply to christianity, especially pre-Vatican 2.

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I hate christianity . Its a forced religion. Most christians can't don't even read the Bible. If you are a Christian anywhere, you are probably not going to understand Latin so how in the hell can you read the Bible and say that you understand the religion. Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb....

Indy

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So don't make it seem like this is something unique Islam.

MMMMMM weighs in ...on Religious Wars
 

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The Crusades were overdone.

[/ QUOTE ] Oh Jesus. [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

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The historical context ... should not be forgotten: Christian armies forcibly speading Christianity over ever-growing swathes of forcibly conquered lands. The Christians were subjugating the infidels by force in a very aggressive manner over centuries. Christianity had a long history of violent conquest and of gaining land through war, and subsequently subjugating all non-Christians in those regions.

[/ QUOTE ]Fixed your post!

And let me know if you find something wrong with my fixing, so's we can have a laugh with your argument.

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The first Crusade was, in my opinion, a good idea.

[/ QUOTE ] This only shows how ignorant you are of History. I'm sorry but there's no other way of putting it.

The First Crusade's army was populated mostly by tens of thousands of commoners who lacked any war-making experience and who were in it to get wealthy. The Pope who started the frenzy was explicitly promising that "robbers will be turned to barons" (see Urban's sermon in Clermont, France). It was a power grab with a lot of ideological (xenophobic and intolerant) propaganda thrown to the masses.

The logistics of moving 100,00 people across Europe were staggering. The Crusaders were attacked almost everywhere they passed through - and understandably too, since they wanted food and amenities which the locals were not too eager to provide for free or on the cheap! When the first wave of the peasant crusaders arrived, they were duly massacred by the organised army of Turks.

Notably, the First Crusade caused the unleashing of the first wave of anti-Semitic massacres in Christian Europe (see, inter alia, the "First Holocaust" by ...German knights), since many people chose to fight (i.e. murder) the "infidels" at home rather than travel thousands of miles to do so!

Finally, the First Crusade weakened the Christian Byzantine empire (although the Byzantines had a hand in causing it!) and antagonized further the two Christian Churches, thus enabling Constantinople's later fall from power -- and Islam's subsequent advance until the gates of Vienna!

...Yeah, a brilliant idea that Crusade, no doubt about it. [img]/images/graemlins/smirk.gif[/img]

Re: The Crusades
 

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"The historical context that led to the crusades, however, should not be forgotten: Muslim armies forcibly speading Islam over ever-growing swathes of forcibly conquered lands."

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The first crusade (1096) had nothing to do with the spread of Islam over new territories, which had been more or less halted more than 350 years prior when Christians checked the Arabs at the battles of Constantinople (718) and Tours (732).

The first crusdade was instigated by the request of the Byzantine Emperor to the Pope for assistance in checking the threat of the (only nominally Muslim) Seljuk Turks. Because the crusaders were ambivalent about the eastern church and had their own agenda, the Turks were ignored as Frankish knights undertook their own agenda of stealing land by murder in the traditional western manner, from Alexander to the current day. As for driving the victims "back from whence they came," virtually all of them came from the land where they were slaughtered.

Your unbelievable ignorance of basic historic fact, your preference for rightist propoganda organs when plenty of objective sources are available, and your appalling double standards are all indicative of your fundamentally racist mindset. I don't know how many times you've slammed affirmative action against American whites on the grounds the they had "nothing to do with" the offense for which they are being held accountable and that any such notion of collective responsibility to future generations is an example of "racism." But when it comes to non-whites, Muslims and other "others", you constantly demand punishment on the grounds of collective guilt and group vengence to justify conquest, torture and murder of indisputable innocents and their children by the millions.

Re: The Crusades
 

Your diatribe aside, Chris, it is a fact that Mohammad and his armies, and later Muslim armies, spread Islam BY THE SWORD, and took entire regions under their totalitarian control via sheer military conquest coupled with institutionalized politico-religio-fascisim.

Do you think that is "OK", or that the Westerners had no business eventually driving back the Muslim conquistadores, and their totalitarian system? Northern Africa, parts of Spain, and other regions, including the area around Jerusalem, had been systematically put to the sword and conquered by Mohammad's armies and followers. Mohammed promised his warriors booty in this world and paradise in the next. Well, at least they got the booty. Quite a religion, eh?--and quite the way to raise and maintain an army.

Non-Muslims living under Islamic rule, if they would not convert to Islam, were either forced into subservience and second-class status under Islam or put to the sword.

By the way, I'm not demanding "punishment" of anyone--I don't know where you got that from; I don't even really believe in the concept of "punishment"--I'm simply against all forms of totalitarianism (WHICH ISLAM IS) and against all forms of fascism--especially those spread by force. Islam fit both bills, and in my view it was correct for the West to try to push back the invading relio-fascism, and its armies, to from whence they came.

I don't care WHOSE religion it is, or WHAT color anyone's skin is: I'm JUST AGAINST FASCIST TOTALITARIANISM. And that is precisely what Islam is, blended with a strong religious component. And the West was right in trying to push back against the speading religio-fascism of Islam. That doesn't mean they always went about it ideally; but in principle, FASCISM, RELIGIOUS OR OTHERWISE, SHOULD ALWAYS BE RESISTED. PERIOD.

Re: MMMMMM weighs in ...on Religious Wars
 

Cyrus, many Christians did bad things and especially in war, HOWEVER, Jesus did not call for making slaughter on the enemy and forcibly subjugating them: Mohammed did. Jesus did not advocate forced conversion or death of infidels: Mohammed did. Jesus did not resist even his own tormentors and executioners, and called for forgiveness and turning the other cheek: Mohammed led many military campaigns of conquest; took slaves; killed the enemy and forcibly took their wives as his slave-concubines; and encouraged his soldiers with rights of booty and plunder. Which do you think is the more aggressive and totalitarian religion, at heart? Which do you think is the warlike religion, in itself (irrespective of the perverse acts of its followers)?

Mohammad oversaw the slaughter of 600 helpless Jews at Medina, after accepting their surrender. Most of the Middle East was forcibly taken by the followers of the warrior-prophet, and fascistic regulations were thereafter decreed. The loathsome laws of Islam continue to this day in many countries: laws which deny non-Muslims equal civil rights; laws which make a non-Muslim's word in court legally equal to only a fraction of a Muslim's word in court; and laws which grossly deny women anything even approaching equal rights. Yes, Christians have done evil things too; but why do you stick up for the side of greater evil, of greater fascism, of greater totalitarianism?

If you love freedom and hate totalitarianism, you must despise the utter authority of Islamic totalitarianism, which seeks to regulate every aspect of mankind's existence on this globe.

Many of the Christians did not understand that Jesus preached non-violence. Hence, they, too, did much evil in the name of religion. But the founder of their religion did not advocate and lead them on in such violent and evil conquests, whereas the founder and leader of Islam most definitely did lead Muslims in such manner.

Re: The Crusades
 

It is almost always a mistake to judge characters and events in history using modern standards of morality. I will let others elaborate.

Re: The Crusades
 

I take your refusal to address my proof of your racism as tacit agreement with my position.

The rest is all silly fantasy and hypocrisy. Of course I've never said anything suggesting that it's "OK" to advance religion by arms -- you are the one explicitly defending that, or have you forgotten what you just wrote? The only clash I see with anything I've said is your silly quibble about whether killing people amounts to "punishment."

The rest of your post is more of the same unvelievable ignorance. At the time of the Crusdades, Islamic Spain was the most cosmopolitan, educated, and ethnically tolerant society in Europe. Your libel of this monument of Western civilization on the spurious grounds of opposing to "fascist totalitarianism . . . precisely what Islam is" is further proof of your unrepentant bigotry.

Re: MMMMMM weighs in ...on Religious Wars
 

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This only shows how ignorant you are...

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Ever worry about falling off that perch you sit upon?