Safe Travel for Pilgrims
“How does a man love according to divine precept his neighbor as himself when, knowing that his Christian brothers in faith and in name are held by the perfidious Muslims in strict confinement and weighed down by the yoke of heaviest servitude, he does not devote himself to the task of freeing them?… Is it by chance that you do not know that many thousands of Christians are bound in slavery and imprisoned by the Muslims, tortured with innumerable torments?”
Pope Innocent III
Despite losing vast tracts of land (including the Holy Land) to its expansion over centuries, Christianity as a whole and the Church did not take action against Islam. But the recently intensified level of persecution, not only against native Christians in the East but also pilgrims from the West, especially from the Turkish Muslims, drew the attention of Western Christian powers. Professor Christopher Tyerman wrote, “Turkish invasions from the 1050s destabilized the region… causing as much if not more mayhem and destruction than the Crusaders were able to achieve.”[1] Muslims had made travel to the Holy Lands impossibly expensive as well as deadly dangerous, with a real threat of torture, being sold into slavery, and murder for attempting to travel.[2] Crusader brothers Geoffrey and Guy went “to exterminate wickedness and unrestrained rage of the pagans by which innumerable Christians have already been oppressed, made captive and killed.”[3]
For examples of some of the major incidents, in 705, Muslims assembled Armenian Christian nobles in a church and burned them to death.[4]In 1570, Muslims murdered tens of thousands of Christians in Cyprus.[5] In the 8th century, 70 pilgrims from Asia Minor were executed. Shortly after, 60 were crucified. In the late 8th century, Muslims attacked the monastery of Saint Theodosius and slaughtered the monks while destroying churches in Bethlehem. In 796, Muslims burned to death 20 monks from a monastery. In 809, mass rape and murder occurred in Jerusalem. On Palm Sunday of 923 many churches were destroyed and Christians killed. Fatimid Caliph al-Hakim had many churches burned or pillaged and that of the Holy Sepulcher destroyed and Jesus’s tomb partially destroyed. On Good Friday, March 25, 1065, a massive multitude of pilgrims, around 12,000 including women, priests, and children, were ambushed and most of them were massacred on their way to the Holy Lands.[6] Journeying to the Holy Land became increasingly perilous, with pilgrims frequently attacked and killed by Muslim tribesmen and bandits.
During his famous sermon at Clermont that ignited the crusading spirit, Pope Urban II urged his listeners to consider the suffering and, at times, brutal torture of pilgrims forced to endure the journey to the Holy Land, stating,
“They not only demanded money of them, which is not an unendurable punishment, but also examined the callouses of their heels, cutting them open and folding the skin back, lest, perchance, they had sewed something there. Their unspeakable cruelty was carried on even to the point of giving them scammony to drink until they vomited, or even burst their bowels, because they thought the wretches had swallowed gold or silver; or, horrible to say, they cut their bowels open with a sword and, spreading out the folds of the intestines, with frightful mutilation disclosed whatever nature held there in secret. Remember, I pray, the thousands who have perished vile deaths, and strive for the holy places from which the beginnings of your faith have come. Before you engage in His battles, believe without question that Christ will be your standard-bearer and inseparable forerunner.”[7]
So, help came from the West to aid both pilgrims and persecuted Eastern Christians.[8] After the First Crusade’s success and the establishment of knightly orders of monks, such as the Knights Templar, guarding the pilgrims on the roads and in the Holy Lands, the number of travelers significantly increased as they were made relatively safe again.[9]
Persecution of Eastern Christians
Even if a crusade was not yet called, the defense of persecuted Christians was on the mind of the Church hierarchy; for example, Pope Gregory VII wrote a letter to Countess Matilda of Tuscany in 1074 expressing his intense desire to assist the Christians who were “being slaughtered like sheep by pagans.”[10] Even if theological and authority disputes existed between Western Catholicism and the Orthodox of Byzantium (not to mention the various, even at times “heretical” Christian sects that existed in the East), Christians were Christians, and those of the West should aid their brothers. Catholic Archbishop William of Tyre wrote that despite being viewed as schismatic, out of communion with Rome, or even heretical, the Christians in the Holy Lands were “true Christians.”[11]
Igniting the first Crusade, Pope Urban sent a letter to Spanish nobles stating the cause of the crusade was to end the “tyranny and oppression” Christians were enduring.[12] He called all of Latin Europe to come “to the aid of your brothers living on the eastern shore.”[13] Urban informed his audience at Clermont that Eastern Christians and pilgrims were facing persecution and death, which would only escalate unless they received aid. A section is worth quoting at length to understand what motivated Western Catholics to react:
“Our Christian brothers, members in Christ, are scourged, oppressed, and injured in Jerusalem, in Antioch, and the other cities of the East… they are flogged and exiled as slaves for sale in their own land… A race from the kingdom of the Persians, an accursed race, a race utterly alienated from God… has invaded the lands of those Christians and has depopulated them by the sword, pillage and fire; it has led away a part of the captives into its own country, and a part it has destroyed by cruel tortures; it has either entirely destroyed the churches of God or appropriated them for the rites of its own religion… They circumcise the Christians, and the blood of the circumcision they either spread upon the altars or pour into the vases of the baptismal font. When they wish to torture people by a base death, they perforate their navels, and dragging forth the extremity of the intestines, bind it to a stake; then with flogging they lead the victim around until the viscera having gushed forth the victim falls prostrate upon the ground. Others they bind to a post and pierce with arrows. Others they compel to extend their necks and then, attacking them with naked swords, attempt to cut through the neck with a single blow. What shall I say of the abominable rape of the women? To speak of it is worse than to be silent… Think of those who made the pilgrimage across the sea! Even if they were more wealthy, consider what taxes, what violence they underwent, since they were forced to make payments and tributes almost every mile, to purchase release at every gate of the city, at the entrance of the churches and temples, at every side journey from place to place: also, if any accusation whatsoever were made against them, they were compelled to purchase their release; but if they refused to pay money, the prefects of the Gentiles, according to their custom, urged them fiercely with blows…”[14]
Pope Eugene III announced a Crusade (the Second Crusade) on December 1, 1145. He wrote to the King of France, telling him the objective of the First Crusade had been to liberate the Eastern Church. Now that Edessa had fallen, he wanted to send aid once more, after priests had been murdered and sacred relics destroyed in its loss to Muslim forces. The aim was “to defend the oriental church… and to snatch many thousands of your captive brothers from their hands.”[15]Rallying knights for the Second Crusade, the lyrics of a famous song titled Chevalier Mult estes Guariz read, “Edessa is taken, as you know, and the Christians are sorely afflicted because of it; the churches are burnt and abandon… knights make your decisions, you who are esteemed for your skill in arms; make a gift of your bodies to him who was placed on the cross for you.”[16]
Under Islamic rule, rape, murder, torture, enslavement and forced conversions were all things Christians suffered from. No new churches or synagogues were allowed to be built. Christians were prohibited from praying out loud even in churches or houses or reading the Bible. They were not allowed weapons, had to pay a special tax, and when they did not face worse, they were treated as second-class citizens and pressured to convert. When the crusader armies came east, various Christian groups sought the aid of the crusaders in liberating their towns from Muslim rule. Often, these groups would join the crusade after their areas were freed or utilize the crusaders’ presence to throw off their Muslim rulers.
This remained perhaps the primary motivator for crusades. The call for a second crusade by Pope Eugenius III in his bull Quantum praedecessores was based on defending the Eastern Church after the fall of Edessa. Instead of abandoning the Eastern Church to Muslim rule, which would have ultimately led to its destruction, Church leaders decided to reclaim those territories, free them from oppression, and create an environment for the Church to flourish. This would ensure that the Gospel would continue to spread and not be wiped out entirely.
[1] (Tyerman 13)
[2] (Stark 2017 98, 84-85) L. PLUNKET 1922, XII THE EARLY CRUSADES)
[3] (Weidenkopf 2017 98-99)
[4] (Stark 2010 29)
[5] (Stark 2010 29)
[6] (“Annalist of Nieder-Altaich The Great German Pilgrimage of 1064-65”)
[7] (“Urban II’s Speech”)
[8] (Barber 42-43)
[9] (Riley-Smith 75)
[10] (Barber 44)
[11] (Barber 81-84)
[12] (Asbridge 2005 49)
[13] (Asbridge 2005 35)
[14] (“Medieval Sourcebook: Urban II (1088-1099): Speech at Council of Clermont, 1095 Six Versions of the Speech”-“Fulcher of Chartres Urban II’s Speech at Clermont”-“Pope Innocent III Letter of the Pope to King Philip Augustus of France”)
[15] Medieval Sourcebook, Fordham University Doeberl, Monumenta Germania Selecta, Vol 4, p. 40, trans in Ernest F. Henderson, Select Historical Documents of the Middle Ages, (London: George Bell and Sons, 1910), pp. 333-336.
[16] (Weidenkopf 2014 79)
Jeb Smith is the author of four books, the most recent being Missing Monarchy: Correcting Misconceptions About The Middle Ages, Medieval Kingship, Democracy, And Liberty. Before that, he published The Road Goes Ever On and On: A New Perspective on J. R. R. Tolkien and Middle-earth and also authored Defending Dixie’s Land: What Every American Should Know About The South And The Civil War, written under the name Isaac C. Bishop. Smith has authored dozens of articles in various publications, including History is Now Magazine, The Postil Magazine, Medieval History, Medieval Magazine, and Fellowship & Fairydust and featured on various podcasts including The Lepanto Institute.
