medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture

V. K. Inman responds:

> > Militant Islam vs. Western civilization
> > Top religious theme for 2005 likely to continue
> >
> > Medieval warfare not the cause, U.S. historian says
> > Dec. 31, 2005. 01:00 AM
> > RICHARD OSTLING
> > ASSOCIATED PRESS
> > http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/
> > Layout/
> > Article_Type1&c=Article&cid=1135810214466&call_pageid=970599119419
> >
> > The No. 1 religious theme of 2005 — and presumably for 2006 and
> > years beyond — is the face-off between militant Islam and Western
> > civilization, with its scriptural Jewish and Christian heritage.

Opinion: This ignores that within Muslim lands there is a faceoff between
moderates and fundamentalists which is becoming more pronounced--every vote in
the Iraqi election, whatever else it was, was a vote against radical Islam
which would have no vote. It also ignores the place of Muslims within Western
Civilization. "the face-off between militant Islam and Western
civilization" is myopic.

> > "It is commonplace to claim that the Crusades scarred the
> > imagination of the Muslim world for centuries," he wrote recently
> > in Crisis, a Catholic magazine.
> >
> > Islamists and Arab nationalists regularly cite the medieval warfare
> > between Christians and Muslims as a source for today's anti-Western
> > views across the Middle East.

Opinion: Yes, but many scholars feel that the Crusades are merely being used as
an excuse--sort of like weapons of mass destruction.

> > "This is simply incorrect," Curp asserted, noting that Princeton
> > University's Bernard Lewis said Muslims actually had little
> > interest in Western Christendom for centuries following the
> > Crusades (apart from those directly involved in invading Christian
> > territory).
> >
> > Curp's key claim: "Radical Islam's protest against the West is not
> > fuelled primarily by aggrieved victimhood; it is nourished by an
> > even stronger memory of how Islam's final victory over Christendom
> > remained for so long a real possibility."

Opinion: perhaps

> > For about 1,000 years, the Muslim world experienced mostly
> > expansion and military triumph.
> > That era ended in 1683, when Muslims held vast terrain in eastern
> > Europe and 140,000 Turkish troops nearly conquered Vienna, posing a
> > significant threat for the West. But the Muslim invaders were
> > defeated.

Opinion: Exaggerated. He omits some important events in history--especially from
a medieval, Muslim perspective. The Norman conquest of Sicily in the mid-11th
century and the conquest of Toledo in 1085. (I'm working from memory here, give
me a little leeway, but I think this is right.) These were followed by the first
crusade. Look at a map. Do you think maybe Muslims felt assaulted on all sides?

> >
> > One might develop Curp's scenario this way: After numerous
> > victories, Islamic lands suffered the humiliation of European
> > colonialism, then the cultural weakness of independent Muslim
> > countries extending to the present. That has created a
> > psychological crisis for Islam.
> > Curp's retelling of the history explains the context that first
> > created widespread Muslim-Christian combat.

Opinion: It is better developed this way.

> > Islam originally took the Holy Land in 638 and quickly vanquished
> > large tracts of the former Christendom. This provoked no sweeping
> > outrage, nor did Western Christians manage any concerted military
> > counterattack until 1095, when Pope Urban II summoned the First
> > Crusade.

Opinion: Again this omits The Norman conquest of Sicily and the Christian
conquest of Toledo. Perhaps these are not big events in European history, but
we are talking about the perceptions in the Muslim world where these were
ominous and tragic.
> >
> > What caused the pope's radical step?
> >
> > During that turbulent epoch, Eastern Christianity's Byzantine
> > Empire had finally broken with Western Catholicism and its pope.
> > The Byzantines faced the greater Islamic military threat, but
> > Western Catholics, too, were agitated about increased persecution
> > of Christian pilgrims seeking to visit their holy sites in
> > Jerusalem, which required them to travel through Muslim regions.

Opinion: "increased persecution of Christian pilgrims seeking to visit their
holy sites in Jerusalem" Has this ever been documented? Christians continued to
make pilgrimages right up to the eve of the crusades.

> > Meanwhile, the 10th-century Islamic preacher Ibn Nubata al-Fariqi
> > developed a cycle of sermons calling for holy war — somewhat
> > resembling Urban's later Crusade call — that had considerable
> > influence on Muslim thinking in succeeding centuries.

Opinion: Calls for Holy War in the Muslim world are like bets on baseball games
in America--always have been there and always will and never seem to arouse
more than a few to action.   "that had considerable influence on Muslim
thinking in succeeding centuries" In view of the foregoing, this needs to be
documented.

> > Christians' situation in the East began to deteriorate militarily
> > in 903 when Muslims sacked Thessalonica, the Byzantines' second-
> > ranking city, and enslaved 30,000 inhabitants. In 931 they took
> > Ankariya (present-day Ankara) and enslaved thousands more.

Opinion: and in Sicily and Andalusia? There are horror stories on all sides.
> >
> > In 1064 the Turks seized the capital of Christian Armenia,
> > slaughtering the populace and imprisoning 30,000 people. Then, in
> > the climactic Battle of Mantzikert in 1071, the Muslims virtually
> > crushed Byzantine military power.
> >
> > In Curp's telling, it was that disaster that provoked the Crusades
> > in response.

Opinion: and in Sicily and Andalusia? There are horror stories on all sides.

> > The campaign in present-day Turkey "to expel, enslave or impoverish
> > the region's Christian inhabitants" lasted 300 years, during which
> > the population dropped by half. The once-thriving Christian area
> > "became a wasteland under the rule of its new religiously
> > intolerant and alien masters," he wrote.

Opinion: Relevance? Are We to blame all Islam for this or the Turkish government
at that time? In the latter case, this is irrelevant.
> >
> > Curp summarizes that climactic era: "The wars that Islam waged
> > against Christendom — and Christendom's counterattacks, degenerated
> > into remarkably dirty wars that often empowered the worst impulses
> > in both faiths."

Opinion: And inspired countless more, like myself and friends in the Islamic
world, to work towards improving the interface between Christianity and Islam.

V. K. Inman

**********************************************************************
To join the list, send the message: join medieval-religion YOUR NAME
to: [log in to unmask]
To send a message to the list, address it to:
[log in to unmask]
To leave the list, send the message: leave medieval-religion
to: [log in to unmask]
In order to report problems or to contact the list's owners, write to:
[log in to unmask]
For further information, visit our web site:
http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/lists/medieval-religion.html