AHC: Islamic version of the Crusades
- Thread starter MrNumbahOne
- Start date
Ottoman conquests of the Balkans, Moorish conquests of the Visigoth Kingdom up to Toulouse and Sicily, and of course the Arab expansion was a holy war.
ISIS at the moment actually have declared jihad on Europe and have a goal of expanding into the former Ottoman territories and Spain + Portugal
ISIS at the moment actually have declared jihad on Europe and have a goal of expanding into the former Ottoman territories and Spain + Portugal
Just HOW insane are those people in ISIS? Moslems are vastly outnumbered in both countries and I highly doubt that there is going to be wholesale conversions to Islam by Spaniards and Portuguese under the threat of force!
if they actually DO try to invade Europe, NATO will drop the hammer. end of.
why do people get all hyped up about the crusades as a Christian aggression when they forget to the fact that Islam had been more successful in their conquest of Christendom? I call it double standard
it's this thing we have called 'soul-crushing guilt', as well as this other thing the muslims have called 'siege mentality'.
yeah, i call bullshit on the idea of Christian over-aggression. wasn't the middle east mostly christian before the arabs? like the Maronites of Lebanon and the Copts of Egypt. now, they're persecuted minorities struggling to survive in their own countries.
it was the Jihad that inspired the Crusades, not the other way around.
though, the Crusades were mostly there to keep the warrior nobles of Europe from killing each other.
Crusades tended to be more violent than Jihad. While the latter was more ritualised and codified (it didn't prevented violence of course, but it was a more or less regulated violence), Crusades didn't had that.
Being mostly led by either nobility or royal authority, their aspect differed a lot depending on who was in charge (and the competition between nobles or kings didn't helped much)
The capture of Jerusalem, while far less bloody than generally assumed, was still really violent. I don't really have, from memory, an exemple of an outright slaughter in Islamic expeditions.
And the main difference with Jihad is the use of Crusades against Pagans, Heretics, Schismatics, Orthodoxs or even Catholics (as for Aragonese Crusade).
I don't really see a medieval equivalent of it in Jihad against Muslims or something similar to siege of Constantinople (well, apart from Azraqits, radical kharidjits, slaughtering Muslims in Kûfa, but it's probable that Umayyad and Abassids texts used it as a propaganda feature).
When it comes to treatement of Jews and Christian in Arabo-Islamic world, it was relativly okay before the Crusades. They were indeed secondary-class subjects and not seen as they were to last, but Christians were still important enough to represent the majority of countryside population and an important minority in cities.
(It's not like religious minorities were treated much favourably in western Christianity either)
Crusades mostly challenged this, not only in Europe (with the "why fight the miscreant so far when we still have much there", coupled with other features) but as well in Arabo-Islamic world where Christians were more and more seen as possible "fifth column".
Of course, it didn't happened overnight, and there was a tendency to minorize socially these populations, but the process was at least quickened there.
I would point that if Egypt have still an important Christian population, I fail to notice the Jewish Spanish or Rhodanian populations that were most probably as ancient.
Actually, it was as well the other way around. Jihad conquests were over after the Xth and the political shattering of Arabo-Islamic world : Jihad being concieved as the war led by Muslims, and as divided not only politically but religiously (different schools, caliphes and even religious branch) without one caliphe to led it (being seen as a really important condition) it couldn't be led afterwards.
It was the Crusades that led to a revival of Jihad, not only as a defensive reaction but as a whole movement whom leader (for exemple, Saladin) gained much prestige and legitimacy thanks to this.
While Crusades are the answer to Islamic conquest, it's not a systematical feature. Spanish Reconquista only gained crusade-like feature after the institutionalisation of Crusades despite having known continual attacks since the VIIIth century.
Religious pilgrimages and religious-based expedition existed before, Crusades representing indeed a counter-Jihad but with a qualitative difference from previous features.
Pulling these as only an aswer to Jihad without any consideration for inner changes and dynamics is just another way to minorize or negate the dynamics inside Medieval Europe (and eventually present it as an unchanging block for different reasons).
Critically with the already mentioned Crusades directed against These can't be understood as an answer to Jihad (while the concept of Crusade is one) or Arabo-Islamic threat.
So, yes vision of Crusades as particularly aggressive have quite enough validity (and pointed out even contemporarily) while royal Crusades tended to be really more regulated.
(Not to say "blood for the blood throne" vision is valid, of course).
Ah yes, "Dork Ages". The period where anyone was stupid, eated poop and where everything looked like Monty Python's Holy Grail. We have dismissed this claim.
More seriously : no. The church's role in the Xith was to regulate violence, giving institutional limits to it (trough Peace of God and Truce of God movements) at its own benefit and more generally the whole population, not really between milites (that half-ritualistic practices, as ransom, did helped to not "kill each other").
It's interesting to note the more violent regions are generally the ones without real powerful authority : Ottonian HRE, Normandy (where some adventurers even have to left the region), Norman Britain, Catalonia, etc. These regions being still touched by Crusades movements, I've to go again with no.
Derek Pullem
Donor
By your viewpoint.
But the word crusade is used to describe other actions that may or may not include violence.
Jihad can describe an internal "stuggle" with oneself as I understand. Equally other people use it to describe the blood letting they are carrying out (mostly) on their co-religionists in Syria and Iraq.
In common usage the word jihad and crusade do convey similar meanings and I would argue are misused to label a war carried out for pseudo-religous purposes
Morty Vicar
Banned
I think Greece would be a definite possibility. Some Greeks converted to Judaism and Christianity, it's not inconceivable that Greeks also later brought back Islam, built a mosque, and suffered a violent backlash (akin to the alleged persecution of Roman Christians). From there it's a fairly simple matter for the Ottomans to invade Greece, backed up by other muslim nations for religious but also economic reasons.
Deimos
Banned
I think LSCatilina makes the important distinction between Crusades that were focused on the Holy Land and the Crusades as an institution of inner-European politics. It would certainly be beneficial to the discussion if the OP could provide clarification whether both "types" of Crusades are meant to be replicated in an Islamic fashion.
The latter type especially would need a more centralised Islamic clergy in order to exert the influence the Catholic Church had in Europe.
Theologically speaking, the first Crusades lack a definite endorsement from the Catholic doctrines to be classified as "Holy War" - absolution from sins were often granted retroactively and only towards the misdeeds carried out while participating in said Crusade.
Nevetheless, the eventual blurrying of lines between pilgrimage and waging war is an important aspect of the Crusades that an Islamic counterpart would have to include.
The latter type especially would need a more centralised Islamic clergy in order to exert the influence the Catholic Church had in Europe.
Theologically speaking, the first Crusades lack a definite endorsement from the Catholic doctrines to be classified as "Holy War" - absolution from sins were often granted retroactively and only towards the misdeeds carried out while participating in said Crusade.
Nevetheless, the eventual blurrying of lines between pilgrimage and waging war is an important aspect of the Crusades that an Islamic counterpart would have to include.
^I had only meant the Holy War aspect of the Crusades. A unified effort by the Caliphates to conquer the land of the infidels who had been persecuting their brethren and thus were enemies of Islam.
However, now I do recognize the need for authority of religious leaders. Perhaps Muhammad leaves a way of choosing successors? This would lead to a RCC-esque authority of Islam. If it doesn't cause too many butterflies, that is. And it could also lead to attempts to gain converts without having to conquer it first, which is what could lead to the scenario in the OP in the first place.
However, now I do recognize the need for authority of religious leaders. Perhaps Muhammad leaves a way of choosing successors? This would lead to a RCC-esque authority of Islam. If it doesn't cause too many butterflies, that is. And it could also lead to attempts to gain converts without having to conquer it first, which is what could lead to the scenario in the OP in the first place.
There's not a clear distinction between these crusades, safe historiographical. Institutionally, they're in the same continuity. The Wendish Crusade or Baltic Crusades, for exemples, owe their very existance to the development of "Palestinian Crusades".
Their presence was seen as complementary not only as "Why fight miscreants in Palestine when there are many there as well" but at the likeness of a pilgrimage (The spiritual awards weren't only the same, but often textually said to be equivalent to a Yerosolemite pilgrimage).
Opposing them seems, at least to me, quite artificial and severing what makes the originality of Crusades as a Holy War compared to Jihad.
That's normally the role of the Caliphate. Muslims scholars defended widely the opinion that while military Jihad was totally legit, only the Caliph (or at the leatest, the communauty of Muslims as a whole, especially after the Crusades) could lead such. Like only the pope could truly call an Crusade.
Thing is, the mix of religious, social and political feature doomed the Caliphate as an unifying force relativly quickly. It made any political rival weakening the caliphal legitimacy (a medieval christian equivalent would be antipopes, for rival caliphates, to concordate king).
Jihad warring tended as well to be awarded if not sacralized. It have been compared as such
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abu_Hurairah said:
While not being equivalent (of course), there's as well a similarity there that must be pointed out.
Not only that, but the idea of both Crusades and Jihad as a defense and expansion of an instutionalized religion are really similar (both lacking a conversion drive).