EclecticLip

I was reading a book on the Crusades, that jihadist period of European Christendom, to learn more about the events that doomed Asian Christianity.

Basically, Christianity had more adherents across Asia and Africa than in Europe until about the time of the Crusades — meaning that the heretical Jacobites and Nestorians  outnumbered the followers of the orthodox Catholic and Orthodox churches.  Jenkins suggested that the fall of Asian Christianity was due to the emergence of hardline Muslim leaders across Asia who weren’t as tolerant of the other Peoples of the Book (Christians, Jews) as prior leaders had been.  These leaders emerged at a time when the Islamic world was troubled by repeated Christian invasions from the West, and existentially threatened by Mongol invasions from the East.  It appears that when the Khans converted to Islam, they became the most intolerant rulers of all.

But back to the Crusades.  Professor Tyerman’s description of crusade recruiters made me think immediately of modern motivational speakers.  Only, instead of motivating their audiences to sign up for a follow-up course, they were trying to motivate them to pick up arms and travel for several months so that if they survived the trip, they could engage an enemy, on said enemy’s territory, surrounded by said enemy’s allies. 

A couple passages of note (my emphasis):

At Clermont, Urban II was careful to ensure that, once he had finished speaking, Adhemar, bishop of Le Puy, immediately came forward to show the rest of the congregatino how to take the cross, while a cardinal in the back row set up the chant of ‘God wills it!’ as a means of inspiring a sense of group involvement.   (p129)

James of Vitry observed that to encourage others it helped to have a member of the audience come forward promptly to take the cross at the end of the sermon, to break the ice, and, like Adhemar of Le Puy at Clermont, show how it was done.  (p131)

Clever fellows, those guys. 

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Tyerman also recorded the exploits of the not-so-clever Franks of Outremer.  (Outremer — French for overseas — was the collective name by which Crusader-captured territories were known.)  Again, my emphasis:

Franks learnt Arabic, a process accelerated by commerce, lordship, and the unfortunately frequent habit of their leaders getting captured and spending long years in Muslim custody.  (p162)

“Cheese-eating surrender monkeys” indeed…