Historian Arnold J. Toynbee said, “Sooner of later, man has always had to decide whether he worships his own power or the power of God.” In regards to the Crusades, Pope Urban II chose to worship his own power – yet he got thousands of Europeans to worship the power of God. The Crusades were a series of campaigns in which Europeans tried to take the Holy Land from Muslims. Pope Urban II headed the First Crusade, which lasted from 1096 to 1099, after he received a request for military aid from Alexios I. Alexios I was the Byzantine ruler, and his empire was facing attacks from the Seljuk Turks. The Crusades soon overtook all aspects of European society as the promise of salvation and wealth was too great to pass up. While some may argue that …show more content…
Pope Urban II, just like many popes before him, was a part of the Investiture Controversy, which stemmed from a dispute between King Henry IV and Pope Gregory VII. For the duration of the 11th and 12th centuries, religious leaders like Urban faced conflict with the ruling class of Europe, and this sense of contention impacted and fueled many of Urban’s decisions, including the choice he made to so strongly encourage the Crusades. Due to the fact that there were “political forces at work… since the Crusades were also tied to the Investiture Controversy” and because Urban attempted to and succeeded at “usurp[ing] the prerogative most secular rulers had claimed traditionally to declare an enemy and muster troops for battle,” it is undeniable that he was caught up in – and winning – a political battle, which means that he must have been acting with politics in the forefront of his mind (Crawford). Furthermore, Pope Urban II used the crusades as a way of undermining the king's authority while simultaneously increasing his own – now he was the one who was calling the shots and sending the European people off to war, when usually, that job belonged to the king. While this may seem insignificant, the pope knew that if the king could not even control his own people, he would have …show more content…
During Europe in the Middle Ages, people’s lives were generally filled with poverty, the imminent possibility of death, and overall feelings of hopelessness. This translated into widespread violence and chaos, which Pope Urban II was understandably very concerned about. Thankfully, he had a solution in mind: he believed that “such energy could be focused on fighting against the Muslims in the Holy Land” and sure enough, “Soon knights and soldiers left their petty quarrels and traveled to the east to fight against the infidel,” going to prove that not only was the Pope politically driven – he was also politically adept (Runciman). Pope Urban II saw that the Europeans were a greatly divided and combative people, and he thought that the Crusades would be an effective remedy for this. Just as he had predicted, the European people, when given an alternate outlet for their everyday feelings of anger and fear besides each other, were able to truly unite. All things considered, it is evident that the Pope set the Crusades in motion more so to bring his country's people together than to fulfill any religious or economic agenda. After all, it is every leader’s responsibility to ensure the wellbeing of his or her people before pursuing outside opportunities, and Pope Urban II was no
The holy war which was not known as the crusades until the 16th century were a series of wars that were started by the pope of the Holy Catholic Church he thought that because of the “serious theological disagreement had split the Greek Church of Byzantium and the Roman Church of the West. The pope believed that a crusade would lead to strong Roman influence in Greek territories and eventually the reunion of the two churches.” (McKay 401) to help motivate the people and the upper echelon of the militaristic society Pope Urban II declared that all who participated in the crusade that all their sins would be forgiven without ever having to confess to a priest, while all at the same time declaring that the “Infidel” (which is a term both sides
A series of religious conflicts known as the Crusades were started, encouraged, and occasionally even led by the Catholic Church. The initial argument began over who had control of the holy land but was escalated by Pope Urban ii, in his Speech at council of Clermont in 1095. Urban ii’s speech was to excite his followers to be prepared for the crusades and the destruction they may cause. He stood in front of them and gave his words of encouragement to them but had secretive intentions to motivate them to fight. His followers then listened to him and fought for their beliefs as Pope Urban ii suggested and amounted to an export of violence.
THE SEVENTH CRUSADE Crusades are a series of religious wars fought between Christians from Europe and Muslims in the region around the Eastern Mediterranean sea in the 11th, 12th and 13th centuries. The purpose of the paper is to analyze and discuss the political rationale leading the European powers to engage in the seventh crusade. The research question is what is the political rationale was leading the European powers to participate in the seventh crusade. The paper will argue that the seventh crusade came to Egypt by king Louis LV to exclude Egypt from the conflict about Jerusalem and to be able to recapture Jerusalem because at that time Egypt was a great economic and military power, the main defender of the Muslim
Why did the Second and Third Crusades fail to replicate the resounding success of the First Crusade? For Latin Christians at the time, the answer was obvious: Christian immorality had led God to stop favoring them in battle against the infidels. Upon hearing of the dismal failure of the Second Crusade, one anonymous individual in Würzburg wrote, “God allowed the Western Roman Church, on account of its sins, to be cast down.” Bernard of Clairvaux, the preacher most directly linked to the messaging of the Second Crusade, noted in explaining its failure that, “the Lord, provoked by our sins, gave the appearance of having judged the world prematurely.” While it’s impossible to definitively disprove that God’s hand played a role in the failures
European Christians perceive the Crusades in a few different ways depending on what region of Europe that they were located in. For example, at the very beginning in 1095, Pope Urban gave a sermon in France urging all of his Christian brothers to fight to protect their land and faith from the Heathens. Now the term Heathens were used as a tem to define non-Christians, but at the time it was specific to Muslims. The struggle between the Christians mainly took part in the Orient, which was the Asia Minor or present day Greece and Turkey. Furthermore, the Christians in Europe perceived the Crusades differently in France than if they were in the Asia Minor, due to the fact that one group had direct contact with the war and others had more of an
Pope Urban II’s speech at Clermont in 1095 was a call to crusade given outdoors to the nobles, commoners and church leaders of the Western European Christians (the Franks). The people were moved by this speech and it changed history, launching the first crusade to capture Jerusalem from the Muslim Turks. After hearing Pope Urban II’s speech, thousands of Western European Christians were moved to embark on the dangerous journey and fight in the crusade. I believe the main reasons they were moved and persuaded to fight was; 1) they felt it was their Christian duty, 2) Pope Urban promised them absolution for their sins and 3) they felt compelled to defend Christianity, their holy land and the Eastern Christians.
Death. Massacre. Execution. Words to describe what happened in the “Holy” city of Jerusalem in 1099. The Crusaders with one and only plan... to kill/push out the Muslims from the Holy City.
Over the course of two centuries, the Crusaders and the Muslim Turks battled over the control of the Holy Land. In the end, the Muslims secured control over Jerusalem, ending the episodic changes of the control of this land until the twentieth century. From this crucial event, Europe’s interest in trade grew as a result of the new goods that the crusaders brought back from Middle East. New trading markets were created, and new ideas were brought up among Europeans. In addition to these changes, the crusades spread Christianity and increased the power of the Roman Catholic Church.
The Crusades What were the crusades? The crusades were a series of wars between the Catholics and the Saracens which surprisingly we call Muslims now. The crusades started in 1095 when Pope Clermont preached the first crusade. In this exciting paper I will be talking about the different crusades and the effect they had in the middle ages.
Pope Innocent III initiated numerous technical innovations in the organization of the crusades specifically concerning raising funds, universal recruitment, and preaching the cross. Innocent III’s crusading bulls forcefully reclaimed the authority of the crusade for the papacy. For the first time under Innocent III, the Church led the crusade movement in all its entirety. Reinvented by Innocent III and further developed by his successors, the crusade movement capitalized on the concept of Christendom to define and further extend the religious and political boundaries of papal power.
Pope Urban II launched the First Crusade at the Clermont in 1095. The crusaders were influenced by religious piety, their familial and feudal obligations, and their desire for material gain. The first crusade was seen as the early example of colonialism. But Pope mentioned that this crusade was just a pilgrimage but an armed pilgrimage. The crusaders were motivated because of their desire for material gain.
These individuals knew that in order to conquer Jerusalem, there needs to be a new method to arrive there each time they went out for battle whether they succeeded or failed the times before. The religion adventuring to conquer the holy land needed new plans each time incase the same religion defending was there from the previous attempt. “Some were interested only in fighting for Christianity, but others were looking for adventure, for estates, or for commercial opportunities. This led to results very different from those expected by their organizers” (Doc. 3). More individual motivations for the Crusades include the pope’s offering of a “ticket to heaven”, a chance of better living, and primogeniture.
“Historians have viewed the Crusades as a mixture of benefits and horrors” (History World). From 1095 to the 1500 's, crusading littered Eastern Europe. Muslim forces had occupied over two-thirds of the ancient Christian holy land, and the Christians of Western Europe were ready to fight to take it back (Britannica). Everyone, from the poorest serf to the richest noble, wanted to take a piece of the fame and fortune that crusading brought. Mix that desire with widespread religious zealotry, and one has a recipe for four centuries of total war.
At the Council of Clermont, Pope Urban II gave his famous sermon beckoning the Christians to join together with the Byzantines and recapture Jerusalem, from the Muslims control. Exaggerating the anti-Christian acts of the Muslims, Urban exhorted Christendom to go to war for the Sepulcher, promising that the journey would count as full penance and that the homes of the absent ones would be protected by a truce.i Pope Urban II sermon spurred many people ranging from the ordinary citizens to the elite military, to join and fight for the Holy Land. In 1096, the People 's Crusade also known as the Popular Crusade took place. Feeling inspired Pope Urban 's sermon, a French man called Peter the Hermit became a leader for the Crusades.
The Crusades were a series of battles that, from the beginning, had religious undertones. At the beginning of the 11th century, the Byzantine emperor Alexios I called for Pope Urban II to help with the growing threat of Turkish presence. Pope Urban II responded immediately by convincing Catholic soldiers to gain access to and protect the Holy Land and holy sites that were under Muslim rule. This was the first of several Crusades that took place over a 200-year period. Historians disagree on the number of Crusades being seven or eight, but the last one in this 200-year span was started by King Louis IX of France.