September 10, 2023 • 58 mins
Crusades = Bad. It's that simple, isn't it? Join us for a deep dive as we explore the Crusades from multiple angles from three historians. First, Larry Marvin explores how the Crusades were not primarily an attempt to convert Muslims. Next, Kelsey Rice discusses the Crusades from the vantage point of medieval Muslims. Finally, Christy Snider discusses the ways that Crusade rhetoric is used in more recent history, especially in the wake of 9/11.
Later in the podcast during our "Leftovers" segment, we discuss the motivations behind those embarking on the Crusades, and we also discuss the motivations of modern-day historians. There's a lot of meat at this church potluck, so put on your thinking caps* and get ready to dig in!
*Feel free to disregard the custom of removing one's hat when at the dining table.
The views expressed on Church Potluck are solely those of the participants and do not represent any organization.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:08):
So do you feel like you are fully enmeshed in the
semester now?
Have we started enough, or didthe Labor Day break throw you
off already?
Speaker 2 (00:16):
It's nared.
It's nared.
Yeah, I don't match that?
Speaker 3 (00:18):
Yeah, I was exhausted yesterday.
It was the first time I taughtsince Labor Day and, for some
reason, you felt it.
Speaker 1 (00:25):
You felt it Well.
Welcome everyone to ChurchPotluck, where we are serving up
a smorgasbord of ChristianCuriosity.
I'm your host, dale McConkey,sociology professor and United
Methodist pastor, and I'mturning this next section over
to Kristi Snyder, who has been arecurring guest and she's an
avid listener, so let's see ifshe can get this right.
(00:45):
Kristi, there are two keys to agood Church Potluck.
What are they?
Speaker 3 (00:50):
Good food and good conversation.
Speaker 1 (00:53):
Yes, but instead of food, it's food for thought.
Right, that's right.
So plenty of variety andengaging conversation, and that
is exactly what we try to dohere on Church Potluck Sitting
down with friends and sharingour ideas on a variety of topics
from a variety of academicdisciplines and a variety of
Christian traditions.
All right, so let us set thetable.
(01:14):
What are we talking about today?
I'm not smiling and laughing.
I've used this before, but I'dlove to approach it the Crusades
, needless bloodshed ornecessary defense?
(01:38):
Pious intolerance or religiousperseverance?
Pious fanaticism or politicalambitions?
Shameful history or pathway tointerfaith and intercultural
exchange?
Let's find out from ouresteemed Potluck guests.
First, we have the Doctor,larry Marvin no booze, no booze,
(02:07):
no boo buddhins.
Today, larry Marvin, tell usabout yourself.
Speaker 2 (02:10):
I am a professor of history at Berry College and my
scholarly specialty is theCrusades, though I did want to
ask what do I get for being onhere the third time?
Speaker 1 (02:20):
No, it's the fifth time SNL, the fifth time jacket,
so you have to be the fifthtime host.
Speaker 2 (02:24):
All right, so I'm working towards the jacket,
that's right, you know what?
Speaker 1 (02:28):
But what we do have for you is I have decided, you
know, because I use that musicfor you last previously, so this
is now your walk in music.
Ladies and gentlemen, DoctorLarry Marvin, I'm going to sit
outside your classrooms when youwalk into the class.
This is your walk up music.
Speaker 2 (02:46):
Please, please, please, please.
Speaker 1 (02:47):
You don't have to do it, because I won't be able to
that has much more Crusadefeeling, at least from movies,
than this is actually an albumthat I found called the Music of
the Crusades.
This is what was the first oneon that album.
It doesn't feel veryCrusade-like.
Speaker 3 (03:07):
Maybe more historically after it, I don't
know, maybe Crusade, maybe Allright, anyway.
Speaker 1 (03:13):
So that's a little finish that up, but thank you
very much.
And our next guest, afirst-timer, so she gets no
jacket yet we have Dr KelseyRice.
Kelsey, tell us about yourself.
Speaker 4 (03:27):
Hi, I'm an assistant professor of history at Berry
College, where I teach MiddleEastern and Soviet history.
Speaker 1 (03:33):
All right, and I know you've leased of all of our
panelists and our paths have notcrossed a whole lot in the
short time that you've been hereat Berry.
So tell us a little bit moreSomething none of us at this
table might not know about youthat you're comfortable telling
you that was a very nervouslaugh there.
Speaker 3 (03:51):
Kelsey doesn't have tenure yet.
Speaker 4 (03:52):
Dale.
Speaker 3 (03:53):
Maybe not everything.
Speaker 4 (03:55):
I am a proud native of the great state of Washington
.
All right, I came here from,not from Washington.
I was living in New York when Icame down here, but I've come
from the north.
Speaker 1 (04:05):
My brother and sister ended up fleeing for the great
northwest and lived in Tacoma.
My sister still lives in Tacomaand my brother lived there for
a long time.
Anyway, thank you very much.
You get another applause.
Yay, kelsey, for joining ustoday and, like I said earlier,
we have a recurring guest, morethan three times so, outpacing
Larry.
(04:26):
She's wearing the jacket,that's right.
We have Dr Christy Snyder.
Speaker 3 (04:32):
Oh great, I'm delighted to be here again, and
I also teach in the Departmentof History.
I teach US history and, perhapsmost importantly for this class
, us art class for this podcastUS diplomacy and my faith
tradition is Roman Catholic.
Speaker 1 (04:51):
Great, we are so glad to have you on the episode and
I'm glad to get you this morningbecause I know I would not be
able to talk to you this evening.
Speaker 3 (04:58):
Oh yeah, no chiefs.
Speaker 1 (04:59):
Yes, that's right.
Christy is a big time KansasCity cheese fan and having a
she's in the golden age of herfootball fandom.
Speaker 3 (05:06):
Yeah, I really.
I have never lived through sucha successful fandom before, Not
just successful.
Speaker 1 (05:13):
But you got Patrick Mahomes, which just lights up,
you know the, the anything, andI was fortunate enough that I
got both.
Maybe not fortunate now, but Iwas fortunate enough to get both
Patrick Mahomes and TravisKelsey on my fantasy football
team.
So that may not be good fortonight.
Speaker 3 (05:28):
We'll see if you tell me, is Kelsey gonna play?
Speaker 1 (05:30):
I don't know, all right, thank you for your that
that definitive statement there.
Let's go ahead and let's let'sdig in here, let's dig in.
Let's start off with with agame show, all right.
So this game show.
It's a bad name, but I couldn'tthink of anything better.
This is crusader or crew nader.
(05:53):
Nay, as in that statement, iswrong.
So crusader or crew nader, allright.
So here we go around.
Larry, we'll start with you.
We'll just work our way aroundleft to right.
For this first couple of ones,the crusades were more about
politics than religion.
Speaker 2 (06:07):
Crusader or crew nader, crew nader.
The original genesis of themhad really had very little to do
with politics Cool.
Speaker 1 (06:14):
All right, thank you.
Not cool, but okay, but thankyou for that.
So all right, kelsey crusaderor crew nader, same question.
Speaker 4 (06:21):
Oh, I will go with crew nader.
Speaker 1 (06:23):
Also.
Speaker 4 (06:24):
So really think that you can easily separate politics
and religion in the era we'retalking?
Speaker 1 (06:29):
about.
That's a very good point.
Unfortunately, and Christy.
Speaker 3 (06:32):
Yeah, I'm just going to steal my colleagues' answers
and go it's crew nader as well,there you go.
Speaker 1 (06:36):
That's how we put you in the third seat for this part
, thank you.
So there you go.
All right, larry, we'll startwith you on this one again.
Crusader or crew nader.
Do crusades get a bum rap andunfairly characterized in modern
society?
Speaker 2 (06:49):
Crew nader, I guess.
Yeah, I mean they get a bum rap.
I mean I think it's amisunderstanding of what they
were trying to do and the resultof them.
Speaker 1 (06:58):
All right, we'll learn more about that, I am sure
, here in a second, and Kelsey.
Speaker 4 (07:03):
I'll just go with crusader.
One doesn't need to glorifyviolent periods of war, although
people do generallymisunderstand the crusades today
.
Speaker 1 (07:11):
Okay, great, thank you, and Christy, you don't know
where to go because they spinit.
Speaker 3 (07:16):
I know exactly, I think I am going to go with if
you're a crew, nader, I saidit's misunderstood.
Speaker 1 (07:22):
No crusader.
Is this misunderstood All?
Speaker 3 (07:24):
right, crusader, all right, I think it's
misunderstood.
Yeah, I agree, it'smisunderstood.
So.
Speaker 1 (07:29):
Larry's changing his answer.
That was kind of confusing.
Not a very well thought outgame show on my dad.
All right, let's see who we'regoing to.
Actually, we're going to turnthe table.
We're going to start off you,christy, because of the story I
just heard right before westarted here.
High schools and universitiesshould stop using crusaders as
their mascots.
Speaker 3 (07:45):
I would say yeah, crusader, they should stop using
.
Because, Because I think thereis a negative connotation that
if you're trying to bring awhole community together, that's
not a great way to do it.
Speaker 1 (07:58):
Thank you for that and go ahead and tell your story
.
Speaker 3 (08:01):
My son is going to Valparaiso University and I
don't know when they switched,but he started last year and
they are no longer the crusaders, they are now the beacons,
which is a lighthouse motif.
But he does go to the thriftstore in town and he is very
(08:21):
fond when he finds some of theold crusader gear or that.
So I think it was a coolermascot perhaps then.
Speaker 1 (08:28):
Although they've gone complete 180, different from
crusader, they've got two dogsright Like a chocolate lab and a
golden retriever, beacon andblaze as their mascots.
Now we can't get much moreopposite.
Speaker 3 (08:41):
It is very family friendly now.
Speaker 1 (08:43):
All right, All right, Kelsey crusader, crusader.
We should get rid of themascots.
Speaker 4 (08:49):
Crusader.
I don't think we need peoplemascots just to find a cool
animal.
Speaker 1 (08:52):
There you go.
And they did two cool animals,so Valparaiso and Larry.
Speaker 2 (08:57):
Yeah, sure, get rid of them, get rid of all of them.
Speaker 3 (09:01):
Who even needs sports right, larry?
Exactly, get rid of them, getrid of them all.
Speaker 1 (09:06):
That's another topic for another day.
We'll talk about Larry.
20 colleges this is the datamight be a little bit outdated,
but about 20 colleges still usecrusader as their mascot in
about 100 high schools.
Speaker 3 (09:17):
And I do think it's hard right to make a change just
because you have all youralumni who grew up with that
mascot and it is a big shift.
Speaker 2 (09:28):
Case in point our own .
Speaker 3 (09:29):
That's right.
Speaker 1 (09:30):
That's right.
Yet another podcast for anotherday.
We only talk about our belovedberry Vikings and where that may
or may not be going.
All right, let's go ahead andget into some depth.
Now We've got some of thesilliness aside.
Larry, this was your idea and,as you said you are, this is
something you have devoted yourlife to learning about the
crusades.
So tell us what should we knowabout the crusades, why is it
interesting and what does itmean for us today?
Speaker 2 (09:53):
I think the crusades are misunderstood because they
people often think that theywere about converting Muslims,
and that was never the case.
So the original Genesis forwhat was called the first
crusade although it wasn'tcalled anything really for a
long time afterwards is thatJerusalem in particular had
(10:13):
fallen into Muslim hands and thePope at the time, urban II,
believed that the land ofChrist's birth and passion
should be in Christian hands,and so that really was the
Genesis of the crusade.
It's a little more complicatedthan that, but that's usually
seen as the trigger forinitiating the first expedition.
(10:35):
They say they didn't even havea name for this until about a
century afterwards.
So that first expedition thesepeople rightly or wrongly
thought what they were doing wasliberating the birth and
passion right, the land ofChrist, for Christianity.
Speaker 3 (10:50):
Okay.
So I'd always thought ofcrusades not so much as trying
to convert Muslims, but as likea holy war of Christians just
defeating Muslims or fightingMuslims, would you say?
That's a misunderstanding aswell.
Speaker 2 (11:06):
Right.
I mean, what they wanted wasJerusalem.
Now, as it turns out, there'salways a difference between the
people who sort of put these inmotion than the people that were
fighting them on the ground.
I mean, after a three-yeardeath march, and most of the
people in that first expeditiondidn't even make it to Jerusalem
.
Those guys, once they got there, some of them realized that,
(11:30):
you know, we've led a lot alongthe way and we're not going to
just sort of simply let thingsgo.
I mean, in the next couple ofdecades they established some
buffer states, but again, theidea was to protect Jerusalem,
to keep that in Christian hands.
And I mean, as I say,everything is always more
complicated than it firstappears.
But that's essentially, I thinkabout, as accurate as I can.
Speaker 1 (11:52):
And let's take a moment to just talk about some
of the logistics of the Crusades, because even when you were
talking there, you said mostpeople didn't even get to
Jerusalem for this expedition.
Were they dying because ofwarfare along the way, or were
they dying because of lack ofresources?
Just how do you mobilizesomething like a crusade in
medieval times?
Speaker 2 (12:11):
So that was part of the problem.
I mean, how long do you have?
There was no name for this,there was no commander in charge
of it, the people that went onthis were from all social ranks,
at least six different majorlanguages, so people didn't
understand each other.
They left at different times.
The best estimate of thenumbers of people who
(12:31):
participated the first timearound were about 100,000.
And, of course, a lot of peoplewho shouldn't have been on a
military expedition started too,so they weren't really well
equipped.
So there was no central placeto equip them and logistics of
course and this is true reallyfor all pre-modern armies you
basically ate your way through.
So, in other words, that's whywarfare didn't happen 24, 7 days
(12:57):
a week, 12 months a year,because there wasn't enough food
anywhere.
So, basically, armies consumedwhat the produce from the lands
they went through, and so youhad 100,000 people.
They left at slightly differenttimes.
They decided to take the landroute across the Bosporus,
eventually along the southerncoast to what's now Turkey and
(13:19):
into the Holy Land.
They encountered various Muslimgroups, seljuk, turks and
others, and they ended upbesieging cities because they
couldn't really get past themand then being besieged in turn.
But the upshot is that, again,of the 100,000 people who went
about, 10,000 made it toJerusalem.
(13:39):
In other words, the 9th Tentdied along the way.
So it was a terrible journeyfor them.
Not to say that they didn'tinflict a lot of misery on the
people that they attacked,because they certainly did, but
most of them just didn't make it.
Speaker 1 (13:52):
So, how many expeditions, how many Crusades
were there, and were there somany because they kept losing
Jerusalem?
Or did the motives and thegoals change?
Speaker 2 (14:03):
over the centuries, a little bit of both.
So again they didn't have aname for it and they couldn't
really have a name until maybethey tried it again and there
were no numbers assigned to anyof them, until maybe the 16th
century people started numberingthem.
So the term Crusade started toappear in the records in the
late 12th century, and it camefrom Latin, cucas ignatos, which
(14:26):
is the sign of the cross.
So pilgrims, those people whowere making a religious journey,
used to sew cross on their leftshoulder and, again in a
roundabout way, those guys onthat first expedition thought
they were making a pilgrimage,in other words, that's what they
considered to be.
So there was no word forCrusade, but a century into it
or so, then that word began tomake its way into the records
(14:48):
and it depends on what Crusadeyou want to pick.
There are typically amongCrusade historians.
They number about seven oreight, but after the first five
it's kind of up in the air as toyou know, whether they deserve
numbers.
Now the fact is they wereCrusades in between.
Speaker 1 (15:04):
Kind of like Pluto and being a planet.
Speaker 2 (15:05):
Yeah, that's right.
Speaker 1 (15:06):
Is this a Crusade or is this not so in?
Speaker 2 (15:08):
other words, nobody in the 12th or 13th centuries in
the Middle East was saying ohyeah, this is, you know, this is
the third Crusade.
They didn't do that.
That came a lot later and, as Isaid so, for example, the first
Crusade traditionally ended in1099 when they took the city of
Jerusalem.
But there was a Crusade in 1101.
It was a big disaster and mostof the people didn't even make
it, so it never got a number.
(15:29):
And then the second Crusadehappened about 50 years after
that, and so they all have sortof different, slightly different
genesis for it.
The third Crusade was preachedbecause Christians lost
Jerusalem and they never got itback after 1187.
So it fell in 1187 and otherCrusades were launched to get it
, but they never got it back.
Speaker 4 (15:51):
Okay.
It's worth noting that Muslimsin the Middle East did not
experience the Crusades as thefirst Crusade being a first
encounter with European armies.
They had started the FatimidCaliphate, which had previously
held Jerusalem and only recentlylost it to the Seljuk Empire,
had been losing territory toEuropean militaries previous to
(16:12):
that in Sicily, and then thecontinuation of the Cordoba
Caliphate, which is veryimportant to understand here is,
there is not one Muslim polityin this period.
There are several.
They are sometimes at war witheach other, but the one that had
been holding Spain was losingterritory in Spain as well.
So for periodizing the Crusadesfrom the Muslim perspective,
(16:35):
the first Crusade was not afirst encounter.
Speaker 1 (16:39):
You jumped in at the exact right time because I was
going to come to you and say,Kelsey, I'm so appreciative that
you would come and be part ofthe podcast because you come
from a very different angle thanLarry and just probably most
Americans and people listeningto this podcast that you come at
from a more Islamic perspectiveand what was happening in the
Muslim world at that time.
(17:00):
So what's the big picture?
What was the big picture?
How did Muslims understand whatwas going on here during the
Crusades?
Speaker 4 (17:06):
So a big picture was Syria had been fairly recently
had changed hands, so it hadbeen part of what was known as
the Fatimid Caliphate, which wascentered in Egypt.
This was a Shia MuslimCaliphate, although the majority
of the people being ruled wereSunni.
Speaker 1 (17:20):
Muslims and we probably won't be able to get
details on everything but veryquickly Shia, Sunni, so within
Islam, there's two majorbranches of Islam Sunni and Shia
.
Speaker 4 (17:30):
The majority of the world's Muslims are Sunni,
anywhere between 85 and 90percent.
Well, between 10 and 15 percentare Shia.
But the Fatimids were at theend of what was kind of called
the Shia century, where you hadseveral really powerful Shia
states rise up and conquer largeterritories.
However, the majority of theMuslim populations being
conquered remained Sunni.
(17:51):
All right, wait and defineCaliphate real quick, so real
quick.
Sorry, we did just have a lessonon this in my upper level class
.
So after the death of Muhammad,who was considered the seal of
the prophets and therefore thefinal prophet, leader of the
Ummah, the community ofbelievers transitioned to a
(18:12):
Caliph who was both a religiousand political leader.
By the time we are talkingabout, the Caliph no longer has
widespread religious authorityand there are multiple competing
claimants to the title Caliph.
But the use of the termCaliphate is a claim of
legitimacy, kind of a religiouslegitimacy that rulers in the
Muslim world would use.
(18:32):
So the Fatimid Caliphate is notthe only Caliphate.
You also have the AbbasidCaliphate at this time, which is
Sunni, then headquartered inBaghdad and no longer actually
in control.
Speaker 1 (18:42):
Would this be akin to different claims on the papacy
at different times?
I know it's not exactly thesame, but Ish yeah.
Speaker 4 (18:52):
At this point the most religious authority had
transferred to scholars, membersof the Ummah, so religious
scholars, but the title ofCaliph still came with a certain
amount of currency and so yousee it used in various.
The Caliphate only fully wasabolished in 1924.
So you have various competingclaims to the Caliphate and the
(19:12):
Fatimid Caliphate was one of.
If you look at the history ofkind of Caliphate, the Fatimid
Caliphate is one of the longlasting Caliphates but it is
coexisting with the AbbasidCaliphate, which is under the
rule of the Seljuk TurkishEmpire.
So the Seljuk Turks had comeout of Central Asia.
So what we have in this periodof time are two major competing
Muslim empires, the Seljuk Turksheadquartered in Baghdad and
(19:36):
the Fatimids headquartered inCairo.
The Fatimids had held Syria butlost it to the Seljuk Turks and
so Syria had fairly recentlycome under Seljuk rule.
The Fatimids are very much indecline.
So one of the things happeninghere is when the Crusades are
getting to Egypt, they'rearriving to a empire in decline,
so it's quite vulnerable toincursion For the Seljuks.
(19:59):
It was notable to take Jerusalem.
Jerusalem is a holy city inIslam as well, but where the
center of the economy, theculture is for the Seljuk Turks
is in Baghdad, so it's inMesopotamia and Persia.
So modern days, iraq and Iran,that's where most of the people
are, that's where most of thepolitical concerns are.
So when the Crusaders tookJerusalem, the Sultan of the
(20:21):
Seljuk Turks really didn'trespond because he was not that
concerned.
Syria was a new acquisition.
It was a bit of a backwatercompared to where the cultural
center was for that empire.
Eventually they do decide thatthey need to go get this holy
city, but again, you call it aholy city.
Speaker 1 (20:41):
It's a holy city, but it is not the holy city.
Speaker 4 (20:43):
No, it's the.
If we're ranking, it's thethird holiest city within Islam.
So if Europeans had showed upand tried to seize Mecca or
Medina in the Hejaz region ofthe Arabian Peninsula,
modern-day Saudi Arabia, therewould have been just a sea of
military response.
But that was safely still inFatimid hands at the time.
Europeans did not want to gothere.
(21:05):
They did not try to go there,unless Larry's the expert here.
Speaker 2 (21:08):
I think that your response is really an excellent
one, because it very much ohthey got the applause yeah.
It outlines the very differentperspectives that people had at
the time.
As I say, this idea of thisfixation, this obsession with
Jerusalem for the West, whereasMuslims are looking at things
(21:31):
very differently.
And it's true that people havesuggested that crusade-like
activity began before the firstcrusade in the Iberian Peninsula
.
For sure, Although I guess Icould say is that part of their
argument for that reconquest inthe Iberia was because it had
been Christian first.
So it really gets down to thesekind of weird arguments of who
(21:52):
had things first.
But I would say, as I say, forthe West it was an obsession
with gaining and retaining thecity of Jerusalem.
But the first expeditionsucceeded because the very
reasons that Kelsey stated isthat the Muslim world was split
and really didn't have a unitedresponse.
And so what happened in thethird crusade, when it was
reunited under Saladin, whoabolished the Fatima caliphate?
Speaker 1 (22:17):
is.
I wouldn't do this to Kelseybecause she was new, but I'm
going to go ahead and do it toyou, that's giving me a headache
.
Speaker 2 (22:21):
There you go.
Oh, okay, there's no way to getaround it.
Yeah, In any event, once theMuslims were slightly more on
the same page politically, itwas impossible for a Western
army to get at Jerusalem again.
And in fact, as I say, some ofthe later crusades the fourth
(22:43):
and the fifth crusades theactual target was not Jerusalem.
Actually, the strategy was totake Jerusalem, but to do it via
backdoor.
But that's partially because,as I say, the Muslim world
appeared to be more unified, atleast in the Western part of the
Eastern Mediterranean.
Speaker 1 (22:59):
So, if I'm gathering this right, if I'm processing
this right, religiousintolerance wasn't at the core.
They weren't going to convertMuslims, but it was still bloody
and it was still.
We can still say that thecrusades were wrong in some kind
of historical scope, or is thatsomething that?
Speaker 2 (23:15):
historians don't want to say, I guess I would say, is
that from their standpoint itwasn't.
I mean, from our standpointobviously it was, and there were
people that, especially as timewent on, that criticized.
So I guess there were somepeople in Western Europe that
thought it was wrong.
But I think one of the reasonswhy again they say that hey,
this first one succeeded becauseit really was very improbable
(23:37):
that it succeeded is becausethose people, that 10,000 of
people left, they reallybelieved in what they were doing
.
Again, it's something we can'tunderstand, but they really
believed it and it allowed themto sort of persevere over
everything that was against them.
So I guess it just depends onhow you want to judge things.
Speaker 3 (23:56):
So my kind of question is so there's warfare
going on all over at this time,right Between European states, I
assume there's warfare going onbetween Muslim states at the
same time.
So is the fact that they have acrusade name when they're
fighting against a differentkind of religious perspective.
(24:16):
Is that significant at all?
Does it mean something that theMuslims have some way of
referring to these wars also?
That was different than whenthey're fighting each other, or
no?
Speaker 4 (24:28):
So from the Muslim perspective the crusades were
something different.
Initially it was interpreted aspunishment right Divine
punishment for somehow fallingaway.
Why would you lose a holy cityunless God had deemed you not
good stewards of that holy city?
From the Muslim perspective,there was some sort of divine
punishment at play that youwouldn't necessarily experience
if you were at war with anotherMuslim state.
(24:49):
Certainly they didn't call itcrusades.
They tended to refer to thecrusaders as infidels or infidel
dogs for some of the morecolorful chroniclers.
Speaker 2 (24:59):
Yeah, and they called everybody Franks.
I mean, they basically assumedthey were all sort of French or
French-esque.
Speaker 1 (25:04):
Now the question that Michael Bailey would ask if you
were here, was that the biggercriticism?
Speaker 2 (25:10):
I mean.
I guess I should put in here isthat when we're talking about
crusades in the Middle East,again there's that obsession
with Jerusalem.
But even the reconquest in theIberian Peninsula they didn't
try to convert people there oncethey took the territory, that
didn't happen really until the15th century when basically it
was virtually in Spanish hands.
(25:31):
But the other crusade thatnobody would talk about I guess
there's no real reason to in theUnited States is the Baltic
crusades.
So there were crusades in thesort of northwest part of Europe
, in places like parts ofmodern-day Germany, poland,
latvia, and those crusades theydid try to convert the
population because thepopulations there prior to the
(25:52):
12th century were pagan.
So I think one of the thingsthat sometimes people don't
understand, even about thecrusades, is that Christians,
christian thinkers, grudginglygave Muslims credit for their
religion, even though theythought it was wrong, but they
gave no credit at all to a paganreligion.
So in the Baltic region in the12th and 13th, 14th, 15th
(26:15):
century they seized territoryand they also converted the
population.
Speaker 1 (26:21):
So this is very interesting.
So there was some level andmaybe columns isn't quite the
right word, but some level ofChristian accommodation.
To Muslim at least it wasn'ttop priority and Muslims, as far
as I understand, had that samekind of approach when they would
conquer Christian areas thatthey allowed Christians to
continue worshiping with theirfaith.
Speaker 4 (26:42):
Is that?
Speaker 1 (26:42):
a fair characterization.
Speaker 4 (26:43):
One thing we need to be really clear on is that Syria
was not just the Muslimpopulation.
When it was conquered by thecrusaders, it had a large native
Christian and Jewish population, so there were a lot of Arab
Christians or a lot of Arab Jews.
The crusaders weren't alwaysvery good at telling the
difference between ArabChristians and Arab Muslims.
Speaker 1 (26:59):
I should be laughing, but yeah, that's a good point
and killed plenty of them.
Speaker 4 (27:03):
So there was already, and Jerusalem has historically
been, a plurality in terms ofwhat religion was dominant, had
Jewish, christian, arabpopulations and, at least in the
19th century, the largest ofthat plurality was Christian.
I can't say at the time of thecrusades.
Speaker 2 (27:18):
Yeah, no, I think that's right.
Speaker 4 (27:20):
But yes, within Islam , if you are a people of the
book, which would be Christiansand Jews, a fellow Abrahamic
religions, you cannot becompelled to convert.
You pay a different tax thanMuslims pay, and there was
higher or lower?
So there was in fact a bit ofdiscouragement towards
conversion for certainpopulations who were Christian
(27:41):
and Jewish, because that was avaluable tax base.
So there are histories, various, certain empires that would not
allow conversion to Islam forconquered Christian and Jewish
populations, because it alwayscomes down to money, doesn't it
oh?
Speaker 2 (27:56):
So I think, as you say, there are cases where I
mean, and the Latin Christianswho went on this crusade, they
did have questions and concernsabout native Christians, like
whether it was the right kind ofChristianity, but I think,
generally speaking, as you say,they were not wars of conversion
, now individuals and individualattempts.
Of course those kind of thingshappened when you see the movie
(28:20):
Saving Private Ryan and you haveAmerican soldiers wants to get
up on the beach and they end upshooting prisoners that they've
captured.
And we think Americans don't dothat.
We take prisoners.
You know, in the middle ofthings sometimes the rules get
thrown out the window.
Speaker 1 (28:34):
So not to say I remember the first time I was
kind of awakened to just howfrequently friendly fire happens
.
Speaker 2 (28:40):
You know, and just Well, that's very unfriendly
fire.
Oh, I misunderstood, I'm sorry,yeah, somebody's put their hands
up and then you shoot them, asthey show in that movie.
And I think that very often inAmerican responses we just don't
.
We didn't do that.
Of course we did.
And so, as you see, on thecrusades, there are times when
obviously people wereslaughtered because of their
(29:01):
religion.
But again, it was not theintent, at least initially, to
ever convert the population, butit was to have Jerusalem in
Christian hands, and thencrusades in the Iberian
Peninsula was to take territoryback.
They didn't really care toomuch about conversion until
after it was all in their hands,centuries later.
Speaker 1 (29:20):
Well, larry, I'm speaking for that student in the
back row, kind of distracted.
Who cares?
But why have you devoted yourlife to studying something like
the Crusades?
What is the importance for?
Speaker 2 (29:32):
us today.
I guess, at least from mystandpoint as a historian, there
doesn't have to be anyrelevance whatsoever.
Speaker 1 (29:39):
Where is that boo button?
That is not a good answer forthat student in the back of your
class.
Speaker 2 (29:44):
I mean, I think it's.
I see history as art with rules,and when we look at a piece of
art, it doesn't have to havesome kind of meaning for us
today, it just sort of stands infor itself.
I think understanding things isalways valuable, and trying to
be sympathetic and understandboth sides is good.
(30:05):
I do believe particularly goingback to 9-11, that there's this
idea that Christians andMuslims have always hated each
other, and it goes back to theCrusades, and I think that's a
gross oversimplification toactually just being factually
wrong.
And so understanding why thesethings happen, even if we can't
(30:25):
agree and can't even totallysympathize, I think is still a
valuable exercise.
So knowing that these things,the tensions between Muslims and
Christians, really are muchmore complicated than just going
back to the Crusades I mean,after all, one of the things I
tell my classes when I talkabout them is that at the end of
the day 1291, even thoughChristians tried a little bit
(30:46):
after that to occasionally takeJerusalem, the reality is the
Muslim world won.
They defeated Christians, theywere essentially out, and so in
that sense, this was a bigdefeat for Christianity, if you
want to see it that way.
Thank you.
Speaker 1 (31:00):
And Kelsey, how about you?
I know Crusades aren't yourparticular area of focus.
So just in general, studyinghistory and looking back, what
are some of the lessons that weought to draw or understand from
the Crusades or anything elsein your professional studies
here?
Speaker 4 (31:15):
Yeah, I am primarily a historian of the modern Middle
East, where the Crusades arealso leveraged in anti-Western
rhetoric, in the same way thatWesterners especially after 9-11
, have leveraged the Crusades inanti-Islamic rhetoric, and what
I see in the value of this ispeople with power often like to
take history and try to use itto make arguments for their
(31:38):
actions and for why they shouldcontrol things, why power
structures should exist the waythey are, and so if history is a
powerful weapon in the hands ofauthoritarians, then it is in
the interest of all people whowant to be responsible citizens
to be able to actually analyzeand understand history and be
able to counter those simplistic, weaponized rhetorics.
Speaker 1 (32:01):
Yeah, that's a good answer.
Kelsey gets a good answer.
Speaker 4 (32:06):
And yeah, we should be able to, when we see people
using the Crusades to sayChristendom and Islam have been
at war with each other for amillennia, and be able to say
that's simply not the case.
Speaker 1 (32:18):
Yeah, great.
Thank you, kristi.
You've been interjecting nicely, but we've been keeping you on
the sidelines because you'regoing to talk to us about modern
Crusades.
Yeah, although From modern,being a historian's perspective
of modern.
Speaker 3 (32:30):
Yeah, I guess, like there, the war on terror is
probably kind of the biggestidea that here is.
There's a book called Crusade2.0 by John Feffer and he very
much Wait, wait.
We got the Citation.
Speaker 1 (32:46):
There you go.
Speaker 3 (32:47):
And he very much presents the war on terror as
kind of a reassurgence ofwestern warfare on the Islamic
world and he talks about kind ofwhy it's again problematic to
see it that way, but also why insome cases it's beneficial to
(33:10):
think about it or for leaders touse this rhetoric because it
can motivate your population toaccomplish your military goals.
Speaker 1 (33:20):
We're going to Kelsey and Larry's point that's kind
of wrongheaded, though right Tobe thinking of this as Crusade
2.0, because it was verydifferent.
Yeah Well, I think I'm justbehind it.
Speaker 3 (33:29):
Yeah, and I think you see that, even in the way the
US government talked right afterthe 9-11 attacks, president
Bush at the time I think he madea couple of he used the word I
think.
Yeah, he did use the wordCrusade, did he really?
Oh yeah, in fact I can give youthe quote here real quick.
He uttered the phrase thisCrusade, this war on terrorism
(33:53):
is going to take a while, but healso quickly backed off after
that to explain that this is nota war on all of Islam, that the
people that we are fighting areextremist Muslims right.
That it's not a general war onChristianity against Islamic
terrorists.
Speaker 1 (34:13):
Because, as I remembered, his initial address
kind of made that point in a bigway.
So I'm very surprised to hearthat rhetoric.
That rhetoric was used evenbefore.
Yeah, I think it was.
Speaker 3 (34:20):
Because I really believe it was a mistake in yeah
it seems that way.
Because they really, I think,tried to avoid it afterwards,
and part of that is because Imean 2001,.
There's large Westernpopulations of Muslims, right,
and we don't want it to be, andthere are nations in the Middle
(34:44):
East that we needed as ourallies if we want to use their
air bases and things like this,so it cannot be a general
religious war.
I think that becomes, at leastin Phefer's argument, the new
Crusade, right, this war onterror.
And especially because itlasted so long, right Over 20
years, because in the UnitedStates, you know, you have
(35:07):
reassurgences, like after BarackObama is elected, you have some
states passing laws against anytype of.
What was it?
What is the term for the?
Speaker 4 (35:17):
Sharia law.
Speaker 3 (35:17):
Sharia law right, and you know, whenever community
centers were being built,there's a backlash around that
time period as well, and so Ithink you know there's something
going on underneath, even ifthe leaders are refusing to
refer to it as a religious war,that it's hard to break away
from.
Speaker 1 (35:36):
I'm going to pause here for a second because I lost
my thought, so this will getedited out, because the whole
point is to make me look goodand not to stutter over these
thoughts.
Speaker 2 (35:46):
Did Samuel Huntington's book have an impact
too?
Speaker 3 (35:49):
Yeah, so I was going to talk about, yeah, samuel
Huntington.
In 1998, he had, or 1996, sorry, he published a book called the
Clash of Civilizations and theMaking of World Order.
So this is after the fall ofthe Soviet Union.
And he was like, yeah, then thenext big fights in the world
(36:09):
aren't going to be between likesuperpowers or over political,
economic, ideology, it's goingto be a clash of civilizations.
And he, you know until 2001,.
Speaker 2 (36:20):
I think he was pretty much mocked maybe for that
argument that really got bigafter 9-11.
Speaker 3 (36:25):
Yeah, but it seemed to resonate a lot afterwards.
Speaker 4 (36:29):
It is still one of the most assigned books in
college curriculums, even thoughalmost no political scientists
consider the arguments valid.
Oh really.
Speaker 2 (36:37):
Yeah, I'm not very impressed by it.
Speaker 4 (36:40):
No, it's colonialist essentially in its worldview.
Speaker 2 (36:43):
And it's very superficial.
I mean it reflects somebody whoprobably knows just enough
history to be dangerous really.
Speaker 4 (36:51):
And knows nothing of the immense diversity of the
Islamic world by the modern era,you know, a quarter of the
world's population is Muslim.
It's hard to say that there'sgoing to be some grand clash
that's going to involveIndonesia and Saudi Arabia and
Iran, right?
Speaker 1 (37:08):
So do you think the ways Muslims were perceived in
the Middle East has changed?
Not much, then.
In terms of how we perceiveMuslims today in the Western
world, do we still have kind ofa blanket caricature?
Speaker 4 (37:21):
Not from the Middle Ages, no, I think contemporary
perceptions of Islam that areproblematic can mostly be traced
to the 19th century andEuropean colonization of the
Middle East.
That's where we really see.
Speaker 1 (37:33):
And Larry's shaking his head yes, yeah, that's right
, it's out of cessation andracial hierarchies really being
cemented.
Speaker 4 (37:39):
In terms of the Middle Ages, these states
encountered each other asmilitary equals in a lot of ways
, yeah.
Speaker 2 (37:46):
And occasionally Christian crusaders had a lot of
respect for Muslims, I meanthey were very clean compared.
King Richard De Lionheart.
I mean he had sort of romancegoing on with salad they really,
we waited until the end of thepodcast to get to this.
Let's hear more about this here.
I mean they respected eachother as warriors and so they
(38:06):
exchanged letters.
I mean I don't think theyactually ever met, but Saladin's
brother was used as an envoyfor Richard and they really got
along famously, and I think thatthere was even this rumor that
Saladin was going to marry oneof Richard's sisters.
Muslims and Christians weren'talways, as they say, sort of
death or a war to the knife, Imean even during the Crusade.
(38:28):
I mean that's just one examplebut there are plenty of other
times of what you might call, Iguess, for lack of a better term
, a sort of accommodation or agrudging respect for each other.
Speaker 3 (38:36):
Okay, and you wonder whether that is continuing, kind
of.
So not only have our wars inAfghanistan and Iraq ended, but
you have the professional golftournament now.
Right, the PGA is allied withthe Saudi Arabian.
Speaker 1 (38:54):
To hear some people, though that's very problematic.
Speaker 3 (38:56):
I think it probably is problematic but it's not
problematic for religious.
Speaker 4 (39:01):
Very good point.
Speaker 1 (39:03):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (39:04):
And likewise in some of the recent protests you've
seen happening in communitiesover what our kids being taught
to sexual material in schools.
Right, those protests seem tocontain very conservative
Christians and very conservativeMuslims like marching together,
and it suggests that maybethere are some connections and
(39:27):
things that are today bringing.
You can't easily today all putpaint the world as being
separated by religion any longeras well, I think that's a good
point, and, larry, whenever weget together, I always pick your
brain on this.
Speaker 1 (39:39):
and Kelsey, you jump in too, just whenever religious
ideology and political powerseem to come together.
It seems like the religiousideology gets used as a pawn in
this.
But you said that with theCrusades, at least at the
beginning, that was not the case, that there was a true
religious motivation for goingdown there and taking Jerusalem.
But with these armed forces,there must be some political
(40:01):
power behind it, yes or not?
Speaker 2 (40:03):
No.
So I mean, the Pope had tocorral that kind of support and
obviously political leaders didwhat they wanted and they didn't
necessarily go along with whatthe Pope wanted.
So, for example, on the 5thCrusade, that was one of the
backdoor ones where, instead oftrying to get at Jerusalem
because they knew they couldn'ttake it, they decided to go.
(40:24):
They attacked Egypt, the ideabeing they wanted to threaten
the city of Cairo, hoping thatthe Muslim world would see it.
It's better to have Cairo,which was a big, vibrant,
economically important city, andget rid of Jerusalem, sort of a
backwater.
And what happened is that thePope wanted the ruler of Germany
, the emperor, holy RomanEmperor for those who would
(40:47):
recognize that term, I guess togo there and to kind of lead up
the effort.
And he kept delaying and itpartially caused that crusade
actually to collapse.
But it was partially becausethe Pope couldn't get a secular
ruler to do what he wanted.
But for the most part, thecrusades were not really led by
political leaders.
I mean, they were and theyweren't.
(41:08):
So yeah, again, I think thereligious motivations were more
important.
But when the state got involved, as I said earlier the last
podcast the state almost alwayswins.
Speaker 1 (41:16):
What haven't we said yet?
Kelsey, christie, larry, whathasn't been said yet, that needs
to be said before we wrap uphere?
Speaker 3 (41:22):
Kelsey isn't All right, so this is my again.
My weak understanding Is Jihada religious war against
Christians?
Speaker 4 (41:31):
No, no, all right.
Jihad means struggle.
It translates to struggle andwithin Islamic theology you have
two forms of Jihad.
You have the greater Jihad,which is the personal struggle
to stay on the straight path andbe a good Muslim, and then you
have the lesser Jihad, which isreligious war.
So Jihad can be used shorthandfor religious war and has
(41:53):
historically been used in byMuslim states for kind of
anymore.
But in the same way that GeorgeBush accidentally called the
invasion of I don't know if itwas Iraq or Afghanistan a
crusade, is the same way thatsecular leaders of Muslim states
might use the term Jihad whenalmost no religious scholar
would designate the conflict tobe a Jihad.
(42:14):
So again, it translates tostruggle.
It's a given name in the Arabworld.
It can be a person's first name, it's not and it does not
specifically mean fightingChristians.
Speaker 3 (42:25):
So you could use it fighting other Muslims as well.
Speaker 4 (42:28):
Yeah, if you think you have, if you're right, yeah,
I'm not right.
Speaker 2 (42:33):
The thoughts on your side, yeah, and nobody would go
to war thinking they were wrong.
Speaker 4 (42:37):
Exactly yes, jihad has been certainly the
understanding of fighting thecrusaders.
The term Jihad was used by theMuslims fighting the crusaders
and in a similar way to whichyou pointed to contemporary
Westerners using crusades forthese geopolitical reasons,
muslim commentators will alsopoint to the crusades and use
that and in fact Osama bin Ladenin the 90s said I was statement
(43:00):
calling for Jihad against Jewsand crusaders and the crusaders
meant the West.
So crusader can be used inshorthand in the Middle East as
well in anti-Western rhetoric Iguess I was going to say
something to Christy or ask herabout.
Speaker 2 (43:15):
Is that how the use of crusade has been used in the
20th century?
And again, this is not my fieldfor sure, but crusade against
alcohol or sex trafficking orthat kind of thing, it seems
like it's used pretty frequently.
Speaker 3 (43:31):
Yeah, there definitely was a temperance
crusade against alcohol, and Ithink it is that it was
purposely used, that this is aholy war against this evil.
It didn't necessarily mean thatthe evil was Muslim.
It could just be an evil insociety that we need to bring
down, and God is on our side inthis fight, and I do think that
(43:52):
was the way that, especially inthe 19th century, it is used
throughout American history.
Speaker 2 (43:58):
And, as I said before , we started that.
Dwight Eisenhower used it inhis D-Day speech when they were
about ready to attack the shores.
Now we're embarked on the greatcrusade, and again it was
against evil.
Speaker 1 (44:09):
So that's interesting because I was about to say it
sounds like the word crusade isused whenever you want to make
sure that there's a religiousconnotation to it.
I'm not sure if Eisenhowermeant it that way, or certainly
wanted to at least give it thatthere's a transcendent, that God
is on our side, yeah, and it'salmost a sacred mission.
Well, thank you so much forcoming and talking to us about
(44:29):
the Crusades.
I learned a lot, and I guess wecan sum it up by what.
The Crusades are more complexthan than our tiny little usage
of the term Everything always isthat's right, that's right.
Speaker 3 (44:40):
So Maybe be careful when you use the term we know.
Speaker 2 (44:43):
I think that's right, actually, yes, very good.
Don't use it.
Just don't use it.
Don't have it as your mascot.
Speaker 1 (44:48):
Use beacon and blaze as your mascot, chocolate Lab
and Golden Retriever to replacethe Crusaders.
So Well, I want to thank ouraudience today for sitting
around the table with us.
I hope that we have providedyou with some food for thought
and something to chew on.
But we aren't done yet.
After we finish the music, wealways have some leftovers for
(45:10):
you to enjoy, some additionalthoughts we share with one
another after we wrap up.
So feel free to continuelistening.
We appreciate your support and,as part of that support, please
consider subscribing ratingreviewing.
This is when I feel the mostlike a podcaster.
I come most alive.
Subscribe rate and review toChurch Potluck, wherever you are
downloading it, until we gatheraround the table next time.
(45:31):
This has been Church Potluckand thank you for listening.
Speaker 2 (45:43):
Do you time that music at the end?
How long you're going to makeit last?
Speaker 1 (45:47):
No, yeah no.
Speaker 2 (45:49):
I just have.
I might figure out a buttonhere, that's right.
Speaker 1 (45:51):
You know what?
I don't know that kind of outtrod at the right time.
So yeah, Do you mean in termsof the where it is in the song?
Speaker 2 (46:01):
Well, I was just wondering whether you had sort
of a timer, like you're countingoff 1001, 1002.
Speaker 1 (46:06):
I am such a seasoned professional at this now that
there's just an internal clock.
Okay, that feels right.
Speaker 2 (46:12):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (46:14):
Well, thank you, I learned a lot on that one.
I've got many blind spots in myintellectual life, and the
middle ages is certainly one ofthem.
Speaker 2 (46:22):
Well, I guess one of the things that if he had more
time or was another subject wastalk about why they went in the
first place.
I mean, besides trying to takeJerusalem back, I mean because
their sins would be forgiven.
So, again, it was worth theirwhile to die along the way if
their sins would be forgiven,which also tells you how
important religion was to themat that moment.
So, and the whole concept ofthe indulgence you know,
(46:45):
eventually that morphed into thesame problems they had during
the Reformation.
So that was a product of theircrusades.
Speaker 1 (46:51):
Yeah, and I never really asked.
I guess I'm not such a seasonedpodcaster after all, because a
seasoned podcaster would haveasked you about why would they
even, why would so many peopleeven go in the first place to do
such a thing?
Speaker 2 (47:00):
So that's why they did it.
Speaker 1 (47:02):
They were guaranteed to.
Speaker 2 (47:04):
Yeah, and I think that is you know they weren't
going there on behalf of a state, right, and they weren't going
there serving government, unlessyou count the papacy as a
government, which you could kindof.
But we'll just say no for themoment.
But yeah, they were goingbecause they thought that this
was important, but also, too,that in the end, the sins that
(47:25):
they'd committed would beforgiven and they'd have a
chance of going to heaven.
Very cool.
Speaker 1 (47:31):
Plus, I don't need to leave soon, so just you should
feel free to just bounce up andget.
This is just a debriefing timewhere we just kind of say here's
what we should have said orthis other thought set coming to
mind.
Speaker 2 (47:43):
No, no, I thought it was nice and productive and I
liked all our positions.
Speaker 3 (47:47):
Well, it was nice to have.
I was glad that Kelsey was ableto come just to get like that
the Muslim point of view fromthe, because I don't know that
I've ever heard that like itpresented.
Well, this is what the Muslimswere thinking at the time, and
so it was very Something.
Speaker 1 (48:02):
you may have said it and I just I just missed it, but
you said that wasn't even themajor conflict, that they were
most worried about it.
Speaker 4 (48:08):
Yeah, it did not come up.
In the 13th century the Mongolsarrived.
Speaker 2 (48:15):
Yeah, they were much bigger.
Speaker 4 (48:17):
And the Mongols won.
Islam still won because theMongols converted.
But the Mongol invasions weresignificantly more traumatic,
hit all of the major populationcenters.
Certain cities were goneforever after the major cities
Merv, nishapur and Baghdad wassacked and the Abbasid Caliphate
(48:39):
was ended by the Mongols.
So when you look at Muslimhistories and chronicles about
this area, the Crusades were asideshow and then the true
traumatic wave came in the formof the Mongol invasions and that
is what takes a lot more focusthan the Mongols did not take
Egypt.
Speaker 3 (48:58):
But from a Christian perspective I don't know if
that's we should feel better orworse about yeah that's kind of
like yeah, so, yeah, we were sobad, right, so that's one, we're
not so bad, or man, we'repathetic that we're not even the
major threat.
Speaker 2 (49:14):
It is amazing to read Muslim sources to see really
how little impact it seemed likethe Crusades had at the moment.
But yeah, when you write them,mongols came.
It was all hands on deck.
Speaker 4 (49:26):
If you read Muslim sources about the Mongols, it's
like this is the end of theworld.
This is God's judgment.
The end is now, but in the end,almost all the Mongol states
ended up embracing Islam.
Speaker 1 (49:40):
So what would be your explanation for that?
Speaker 4 (49:42):
For their embrace of Islam.
Speaker 1 (49:44):
Yeah, especially since they're coming in as
winners, right.
Speaker 4 (49:48):
The Pope is in Mongolia right now and just gave
a speech.
Oh really.
Speaker 3 (49:52):
I didn't realize that we buried the lead.
Speaker 1 (49:54):
I know we should have opened the episode.
Speaker 4 (49:58):
Actually the Pope is in Mongolia.
And he just gave a speech wherehe praised the Mongol Empire
for its religious tolerance andreferred to the Pax Mongolica,
the Mongol peace that happenedafter the very devastating
invasions, as something perhapsaspirational, which, I have to
say, amazing spin on thathistory for the audience Very
(50:19):
clever.
So the Mongols had theirreligion, which was Tangrism.
So Tangri is the great sky god,but the Mongols had there's a
long history of nomads fromCentral Asia embracing Islam
because they are culturallyflexible peoples.
(50:41):
If you're a nomadic people, youtend to be able to absorb
diverse influences, and what youget with the Mongols is they
settle in Persia and Persiasimilar to China.
Right, the Mongols that conquerChina don't become Muslim, they
become essentially Chinese andthey were Chinese.
Persia is similar to Chinawhere it has this really long
(51:02):
history of literate culture, ofbureaucracy, of empire, and it
gets invaded a lot.
China and Persia share this.
Why do they get invaded a lot?
They have all the nice stuff.
So what tends to happen when youinvade Persia and set up a new
empire in Persia is you persify,you become more Persian because
the structures are alreadythere for the civilization, the
(51:24):
language, for the bureaucracy isthere.
So like are you going to?
You know the Mongols don't havewords in their language to run
a complex empire, but Persia isalready there.
You're going to co-opt thePersian elites to run the empire
for you.
So what happens is Persia willabsorb its invaders and make
them look like Persia, and sothe Mongols get in there and
(51:46):
they settle in and just and fora long time they resisted.
There were explicit policies ofsome of them sons of Genghis
Khan.
Some of them really didn't likeIslam, but it was just
inevitable if they were going tostay there and build their
empires.
The Islamic tradition and thePersian tradition had been there
for so long that if you weregoing to stay there, you were
(52:08):
going to end up Persian andMuslim.
Speaker 2 (52:10):
Yeah, so that initial antagonism again maybe a topic
for another day.
But you know, christian leaders, including Louis IX, king of
France in the 13th century,thought that the Mongols might
become an ally, you know, and sothey.
He sent representatives, acouple of Franciscan friars, to
one of the Khans, hoping thatthey would just join forces
(52:33):
together and then they woulddestroy Islam and, of course,
the Mongols weren't entrusted inpartnership.
Speaker 3 (52:39):
Did we not bring a lot to the table, or the
Westerners not bring a lot tothe table?
Speaker 2 (52:44):
Those monks when they went there.
I think the Khan was surprisedthat they weren't there to
submit.
He was just expecting that theywould.
But yeah, so that was going onin those early days too.
So yeah, there's an awful lotgoing on and it's really pretty
exciting.
It tells you how vibrant thiswhole region is for historical
(53:08):
study.
Speaker 1 (53:10):
I almost pressed you on your image as art with
structure.
Speaker 2 (53:16):
Art with rules.
Speaker 1 (53:17):
Art with rules that I didn't want to be flipping
about and say are you saying theCrusades were beautiful?
I'm not saying that, I'm notsaying I'm quite excited to go
there, but I liked your, I likedthat imagery, even if I didn't
fully understand it.
You know the thinking aboutwhat you're doing is an art,
even though you're dealing withfacts and figures, and I would
(53:40):
guess maybe you do tell yourstudents that your students
would be surprised to hear youreferring to what you're doing
as being artistic.
Speaker 2 (53:50):
I mean, I'm fairly honest about it Again.
History has rules that wefollow or protocols, but I do
see it as a kind of art forart's sake and maybe that's.
It isn't kind of really, really, really, really old-fashioned.
Speaker 4 (54:08):
I would say Larry and I are generationally different
in how we interpret the purposeof our disciplines.
Speaker 1 (54:14):
How would you say?
Speaker 4 (54:16):
Well, I do think.
I think history has always beenused as a political tool.
So the job of the historian isnot to politicize history, but
history does have significancepolitically.
Speaker 1 (54:28):
So speaks truth to power.
Speaker 4 (54:31):
And sometimes the truth to power isn't what people
want to hear.
For instance, I don't subscribeto the thesis that the arc of
history bends towards justice.
Speaker 2 (54:43):
Yeah, I don't either.
Speaker 4 (54:44):
It's a nice thought, but sometimes some realism is
helpful.
Even if you are engaged in asocial justice project, Perhaps
acknowledge you don't want tobecome complacent.
Speaker 1 (54:58):
I don't know if this is another podcast or just a
conversation you and I can chatabout.
I agree that it doesn'tnaturally bend, but would you
say, looking at the broad scopeof history, that we are less
brutal than we once were?
Am I?
So I'm being too polyannish interms of and I would say that
too.
Speaker 3 (55:19):
I was actually.
Speaker 2 (55:20):
We make kind of things from a totally different
perspective.
But I mean we all are togetherBecause, yeah, how can you say
an atomic bomb is more just andmodern warfare and cluster bombs
?
Speaker 3 (55:36):
Well, especially now, the use of drones, where you
don't even have to risk your ownlife to destroy other lives.
That's right.
Speaker 1 (55:47):
Sorry, dale, you can't say something more than
the king quote Not allowed.
Speaker 3 (55:52):
Well, it's actually not tonight, when Bernice King
is standing at the campus.
Speaker 2 (55:56):
It's a great saying but, it just really isn't true.
Speaker 4 (56:00):
I think in the end, I don't criticize him for saying
it.
He had a different goal.
Martin Luther King Jr was not ahistorian.
His project was not a closeanalysis of history.
He was mobilizing people.
But you also need that and youneed the historians pushing up
their glasses and getting downto the documents and being like
(56:20):
well, actually.
Speaker 1 (56:22):
All right, we might have more conversation on this,
because I still want you to bewrong, but Then there's more
than one.
Speaker 2 (56:32):
I mean, I'd be wrong too.
Speaker 4 (56:34):
Yeah, and Christy, so you and the plural I mean.
Speaker 2 (56:39):
I.
Speaker 1 (56:40):
You want all of us to be wrong.
That's right On that particularpoint.
Speaker 3 (56:44):
Well, except as a modernist, it's easy to say oh
yeah, things were just awfulback then.
So because I don't know enoughabout ancient history.
Speaker 1 (56:53):
And hopefully, if I'm being honest with myself, I
don't know enough about thekinds of things we're doing to
one another now either, yeah, Iignore it and I hear about it
and I don't pursue just howbrutal we are to one another
still.
Speaker 4 (57:09):
If it was the 10th century and you were born and
died in the center of theAbbasid Caliphate during a time
of peace, you lived a I mean,unless you needed some
antibiotics, then you were, butyou lived a fairly long, stable,
meaningful life 12th centuryFrance the same thing.
Speaker 2 (57:33):
You could have lived into your 60s and 70s and had a
pretty prosperous life.
Speaker 4 (57:38):
Yeah, and you never knew what a meme was.
You never had to get piled onon social media.
There's certain bliss in thelimited information networks
people used to exist with.
Speaker 1 (57:48):
You're not nasty, brutish and short, come on.
Speaker 4 (57:52):
We actually are going to discuss that in my next
class.
Speaker 1 (57:56):
Is that right?
Yes, so he was wrong too.
Speaker 4 (57:59):
I will say Barry students on average.
So we look at how Hobbes, lockeand Rousseau all conceptualize
the state of nature and it's therare Barry college student who
will make an argument for theHobbesian state of nature.
Speaker 1 (58:11):
All right, Well, thank you all so much Thank you.
Dale.
Speaker 2 (58:16):
That was fun that was great.
Speaker 1 (58:18):
It's always fun.
Speaker 2 (58:19):
Looking forward to the jacket.
Speaker 1 (58:23):
And now we exit, larry.
We are done recording.
So do you feel like you are fully enmeshed in the
semester now?
Have we started enough, or didthe Labor Day break throw you
off already?
Speaker 2 (00:16):
It's nared.
It's nared.
Yeah, I don't match that?
Speaker 3 (00:18):
Yeah, I was exhausted yesterday.
It was the first time I taughtsince Labor Day and, for some
reason, you felt it.
Speaker 1 (00:25):
You felt it Well.
Welcome everyone to ChurchPotluck, where we are serving up
a smorgasbord of ChristianCuriosity.
I'm your host, dale McConkey,sociology professor and United
Methodist pastor, and I'mturning this next section over
to Kristi Snyder, who has been arecurring guest and she's an
avid listener, so let's see ifshe can get this right.
(00:45):
Kristi, there are two keys to agood Church Potluck.
What are they?
Speaker 3 (00:50):
Good food and good conversation.
Speaker 1 (00:53):
Yes, but instead of food, it's food for thought.
Right, that's right.
So plenty of variety andengaging conversation, and that
is exactly what we try to dohere on Church Potluck Sitting
down with friends and sharingour ideas on a variety of topics
from a variety of academicdisciplines and a variety of
Christian traditions.
All right, so let us set thetable.
(01:14):
What are we talking about today?
I'm not smiling and laughing.
I've used this before, but I'dlove to approach it the Crusades
, needless bloodshed ornecessary defense?
(01:38):
Pious intolerance or religiousperseverance?
Pious fanaticism or politicalambitions?
Shameful history or pathway tointerfaith and intercultural
exchange?
Let's find out from ouresteemed Potluck guests.
First, we have the Doctor,larry Marvin no booze, no booze,
(02:07):
no boo buddhins.
Today, larry Marvin, tell usabout yourself.
Speaker 2 (02:10):
I am a professor of history at Berry College and my
scholarly specialty is theCrusades, though I did want to
ask what do I get for being onhere the third time?
Speaker 1 (02:20):
No, it's the fifth time SNL, the fifth time jacket,
so you have to be the fifthtime host.
Speaker 2 (02:24):
All right, so I'm working towards the jacket,
that's right, you know what?
Speaker 1 (02:28):
But what we do have for you is I have decided, you
know, because I use that musicfor you last previously, so this
is now your walk in music.
Ladies and gentlemen, DoctorLarry Marvin, I'm going to sit
outside your classrooms when youwalk into the class.
This is your walk up music.
Speaker 2 (02:46):
Please, please, please, please.
Speaker 1 (02:47):
You don't have to do it, because I won't be able to
that has much more Crusadefeeling, at least from movies,
than this is actually an albumthat I found called the Music of
the Crusades.
This is what was the first oneon that album.
It doesn't feel veryCrusade-like.
Speaker 3 (03:07):
Maybe more historically after it, I don't
know, maybe Crusade, maybe Allright, anyway.
Speaker 1 (03:13):
So that's a little finish that up, but thank you
very much.
And our next guest, afirst-timer, so she gets no
jacket yet we have Dr KelseyRice.
Kelsey, tell us about yourself.
Speaker 4 (03:27):
Hi, I'm an assistant professor of history at Berry
College, where I teach MiddleEastern and Soviet history.
Speaker 1 (03:33):
All right, and I know you've leased of all of our
panelists and our paths have notcrossed a whole lot in the
short time that you've been hereat Berry.
So tell us a little bit moreSomething none of us at this
table might not know about youthat you're comfortable telling
you that was a very nervouslaugh there.
Speaker 3 (03:51):
Kelsey doesn't have tenure yet.
Speaker 4 (03:52):
Dale.
Speaker 3 (03:53):
Maybe not everything.
Speaker 4 (03:55):
I am a proud native of the great state of Washington
.
All right, I came here from,not from Washington.
I was living in New York when Icame down here, but I've come
from the north.
Speaker 1 (04:05):
My brother and sister ended up fleeing for the great
northwest and lived in Tacoma.
My sister still lives in Tacomaand my brother lived there for
a long time.
Anyway, thank you very much.
You get another applause.
Yay, kelsey, for joining ustoday and, like I said earlier,
we have a recurring guest, morethan three times so, outpacing
Larry.
(04:26):
She's wearing the jacket,that's right.
We have Dr Christy Snyder.
Speaker 3 (04:32):
Oh great, I'm delighted to be here again, and
I also teach in the Departmentof History.
I teach US history and, perhapsmost importantly for this class
, us art class for this podcastUS diplomacy and my faith
tradition is Roman Catholic.
Speaker 1 (04:51):
Great, we are so glad to have you on the episode and
I'm glad to get you this morningbecause I know I would not be
able to talk to you this evening.
Speaker 3 (04:58):
Oh yeah, no chiefs.
Speaker 1 (04:59):
Yes, that's right.
Christy is a big time KansasCity cheese fan and having a
she's in the golden age of herfootball fandom.
Speaker 3 (05:06):
Yeah, I really.
I have never lived through sucha successful fandom before, Not
just successful.
Speaker 1 (05:13):
But you got Patrick Mahomes, which just lights up,
you know the, the anything, andI was fortunate enough that I
got both.
Maybe not fortunate now, but Iwas fortunate enough to get both
Patrick Mahomes and TravisKelsey on my fantasy football
team.
So that may not be good fortonight.
Speaker 3 (05:28):
We'll see if you tell me, is Kelsey gonna play?
Speaker 1 (05:30):
I don't know, all right, thank you for your that
that definitive statement there.
Let's go ahead and let's let'sdig in here, let's dig in.
Let's start off with with agame show, all right.
So this game show.
It's a bad name, but I couldn'tthink of anything better.
This is crusader or crew nader.
(05:53):
Nay, as in that statement, iswrong.
So crusader or crew nader, allright.
So here we go around.
Larry, we'll start with you.
We'll just work our way aroundleft to right.
For this first couple of ones,the crusades were more about
politics than religion.
Speaker 2 (06:07):
Crusader or crew nader, crew nader.
The original genesis of themhad really had very little to do
with politics Cool.
Speaker 1 (06:14):
All right, thank you.
Not cool, but okay, but thankyou for that.
So all right, kelsey crusaderor crew nader, same question.
Speaker 4 (06:21):
Oh, I will go with crew nader.
Speaker 1 (06:23):
Also.
Speaker 4 (06:24):
So really think that you can easily separate politics
and religion in the era we'retalking?
Speaker 1 (06:29):
about.
That's a very good point.
Unfortunately, and Christy.
Speaker 3 (06:32):
Yeah, I'm just going to steal my colleagues' answers
and go it's crew nader as well,there you go.
Speaker 1 (06:36):
That's how we put you in the third seat for this part
, thank you.
So there you go.
All right, larry, we'll startwith you on this one again.
Crusader or crew nader.
Do crusades get a bum rap andunfairly characterized in modern
society?
Speaker 2 (06:49):
Crew nader, I guess.
Yeah, I mean they get a bum rap.
I mean I think it's amisunderstanding of what they
were trying to do and the resultof them.
Speaker 1 (06:58):
All right, we'll learn more about that, I am sure
, here in a second, and Kelsey.
Speaker 4 (07:03):
I'll just go with crusader.
One doesn't need to glorifyviolent periods of war, although
people do generallymisunderstand the crusades today
.
Speaker 1 (07:11):
Okay, great, thank you, and Christy, you don't know
where to go because they spinit.
Speaker 3 (07:16):
I know exactly, I think I am going to go with if
you're a crew, nader, I saidit's misunderstood.
Speaker 1 (07:22):
No crusader.
Is this misunderstood All?
Speaker 3 (07:24):
right, crusader, all right, I think it's
misunderstood.
Yeah, I agree, it'smisunderstood.
So.
Speaker 1 (07:29):
Larry's changing his answer.
That was kind of confusing.
Not a very well thought outgame show on my dad.
All right, let's see who we'regoing to.
Actually, we're going to turnthe table.
We're going to start off you,christy, because of the story I
just heard right before westarted here.
High schools and universitiesshould stop using crusaders as
their mascots.
Speaker 3 (07:45):
I would say yeah, crusader, they should stop using
.
Because, Because I think thereis a negative connotation that
if you're trying to bring awhole community together, that's
not a great way to do it.
Speaker 1 (07:58):
Thank you for that and go ahead and tell your story
.
Speaker 3 (08:01):
My son is going to Valparaiso University and I
don't know when they switched,but he started last year and
they are no longer the crusaders, they are now the beacons,
which is a lighthouse motif.
But he does go to the thriftstore in town and he is very
(08:21):
fond when he finds some of theold crusader gear or that.
So I think it was a coolermascot perhaps then.
Speaker 1 (08:28):
Although they've gone complete 180, different from
crusader, they've got two dogsright Like a chocolate lab and a
golden retriever, beacon andblaze as their mascots.
Now we can't get much moreopposite.
Speaker 3 (08:41):
It is very family friendly now.
Speaker 1 (08:43):
All right, All right, Kelsey crusader, crusader.
We should get rid of themascots.
Speaker 4 (08:49):
Crusader.
I don't think we need peoplemascots just to find a cool
animal.
Speaker 1 (08:52):
There you go.
And they did two cool animals,so Valparaiso and Larry.
Speaker 2 (08:57):
Yeah, sure, get rid of them, get rid of all of them.
Speaker 3 (09:01):
Who even needs sports right, larry?
Exactly, get rid of them, getrid of them all.
Speaker 1 (09:06):
That's another topic for another day.
We'll talk about Larry.
20 colleges this is the datamight be a little bit outdated,
but about 20 colleges still usecrusader as their mascot in
about 100 high schools.
Speaker 3 (09:17):
And I do think it's hard right to make a change just
because you have all youralumni who grew up with that
mascot and it is a big shift.
Speaker 2 (09:28):
Case in point our own .
Speaker 3 (09:29):
That's right.
Speaker 1 (09:30):
That's right.
Yet another podcast for anotherday.
We only talk about our belovedberry Vikings and where that may
or may not be going.
All right, let's go ahead andget into some depth.
Now We've got some of thesilliness aside.
Larry, this was your idea and,as you said you are, this is
something you have devoted yourlife to learning about the
crusades.
So tell us what should we knowabout the crusades, why is it
interesting and what does itmean for us today?
Speaker 2 (09:53):
I think the crusades are misunderstood because they
people often think that theywere about converting Muslims,
and that was never the case.
So the original Genesis forwhat was called the first
crusade although it wasn'tcalled anything really for a
long time afterwards is thatJerusalem in particular had
(10:13):
fallen into Muslim hands and thePope at the time, urban II,
believed that the land ofChrist's birth and passion
should be in Christian hands,and so that really was the
Genesis of the crusade.
It's a little more complicatedthan that, but that's usually
seen as the trigger forinitiating the first expedition.
(10:35):
They say they didn't even havea name for this until about a
century afterwards.
So that first expedition thesepeople rightly or wrongly
thought what they were doing wasliberating the birth and
passion right, the land ofChrist, for Christianity.
Speaker 3 (10:50):
Okay.
So I'd always thought ofcrusades not so much as trying
to convert Muslims, but as likea holy war of Christians just
defeating Muslims or fightingMuslims, would you say?
That's a misunderstanding aswell.
Speaker 2 (11:06):
Right.
I mean, what they wanted wasJerusalem.
Now, as it turns out, there'salways a difference between the
people who sort of put these inmotion than the people that were
fighting them on the ground.
I mean, after a three-yeardeath march, and most of the
people in that first expeditiondidn't even make it to Jerusalem
.
Those guys, once they got there, some of them realized that,
(11:30):
you know, we've led a lot alongthe way and we're not going to
just sort of simply let thingsgo.
I mean, in the next couple ofdecades they established some
buffer states, but again, theidea was to protect Jerusalem,
to keep that in Christian hands.
And I mean, as I say,everything is always more
complicated than it firstappears.
But that's essentially, I thinkabout, as accurate as I can.
Speaker 1 (11:52):
And let's take a moment to just talk about some
of the logistics of the Crusades, because even when you were
talking there, you said mostpeople didn't even get to
Jerusalem for this expedition.
Were they dying because ofwarfare along the way, or were
they dying because of lack ofresources?
Just how do you mobilizesomething like a crusade in
medieval times?
Speaker 2 (12:11):
So that was part of the problem.
I mean, how long do you have?
There was no name for this,there was no commander in charge
of it, the people that went onthis were from all social ranks,
at least six different majorlanguages, so people didn't
understand each other.
They left at different times.
The best estimate of thenumbers of people who
(12:31):
participated the first timearound were about 100,000.
And, of course, a lot of peoplewho shouldn't have been on a
military expedition started too,so they weren't really well
equipped.
So there was no central placeto equip them and logistics of
course and this is true reallyfor all pre-modern armies you
basically ate your way through.
So, in other words, that's whywarfare didn't happen 24, 7 days
(12:57):
a week, 12 months a year,because there wasn't enough food
anywhere.
So, basically, armies consumedwhat the produce from the lands
they went through, and so youhad 100,000 people.
They left at slightly differenttimes.
They decided to take the landroute across the Bosporus,
eventually along the southerncoast to what's now Turkey and
(13:19):
into the Holy Land.
They encountered various Muslimgroups, seljuk, turks and
others, and they ended upbesieging cities because they
couldn't really get past themand then being besieged in turn.
But the upshot is that, again,of the 100,000 people who went
about, 10,000 made it toJerusalem.
(13:39):
In other words, the 9th Tentdied along the way.
So it was a terrible journeyfor them.
Not to say that they didn'tinflict a lot of misery on the
people that they attacked,because they certainly did, but
most of them just didn't make it.
Speaker 1 (13:52):
So, how many expeditions, how many Crusades
were there, and were there somany because they kept losing
Jerusalem?
Or did the motives and thegoals change?
Speaker 2 (14:03):
over the centuries, a little bit of both.
So again they didn't have aname for it and they couldn't
really have a name until maybethey tried it again and there
were no numbers assigned to anyof them, until maybe the 16th
century people started numberingthem.
So the term Crusade started toappear in the records in the
late 12th century, and it camefrom Latin, cucas ignatos, which
(14:26):
is the sign of the cross.
So pilgrims, those people whowere making a religious journey,
used to sew cross on their leftshoulder and, again in a
roundabout way, those guys onthat first expedition thought
they were making a pilgrimage,in other words, that's what they
considered to be.
So there was no word forCrusade, but a century into it
or so, then that word began tomake its way into the records
(14:48):
and it depends on what Crusadeyou want to pick.
There are typically amongCrusade historians.
They number about seven oreight, but after the first five
it's kind of up in the air as toyou know, whether they deserve
numbers.
Now the fact is they wereCrusades in between.
Speaker 1 (15:04):
Kind of like Pluto and being a planet.
Speaker 2 (15:05):
Yeah, that's right.
Speaker 1 (15:06):
Is this a Crusade or is this not so in?
Speaker 2 (15:08):
other words, nobody in the 12th or 13th centuries in
the Middle East was saying ohyeah, this is, you know, this is
the third Crusade.
They didn't do that.
That came a lot later and, as Isaid so, for example, the first
Crusade traditionally ended in1099 when they took the city of
Jerusalem.
But there was a Crusade in 1101.
It was a big disaster and mostof the people didn't even make
it, so it never got a number.
(15:29):
And then the second Crusadehappened about 50 years after
that, and so they all have sortof different, slightly different
genesis for it.
The third Crusade was preachedbecause Christians lost
Jerusalem and they never got itback after 1187.
So it fell in 1187 and otherCrusades were launched to get it
, but they never got it back.
Speaker 4 (15:51):
Okay.
It's worth noting that Muslimsin the Middle East did not
experience the Crusades as thefirst Crusade being a first
encounter with European armies.
They had started the FatimidCaliphate, which had previously
held Jerusalem and only recentlylost it to the Seljuk Empire,
had been losing territory toEuropean militaries previous to
(16:12):
that in Sicily, and then thecontinuation of the Cordoba
Caliphate, which is veryimportant to understand here is,
there is not one Muslim polityin this period.
There are several.
They are sometimes at war witheach other, but the one that had
been holding Spain was losingterritory in Spain as well.
So for periodizing the Crusadesfrom the Muslim perspective,
(16:35):
the first Crusade was not afirst encounter.
Speaker 1 (16:39):
You jumped in at the exact right time because I was
going to come to you and say,Kelsey, I'm so appreciative that
you would come and be part ofthe podcast because you come
from a very different angle thanLarry and just probably most
Americans and people listeningto this podcast that you come at
from a more Islamic perspectiveand what was happening in the
Muslim world at that time.
(17:00):
So what's the big picture?
What was the big picture?
How did Muslims understand whatwas going on here during the
Crusades?
Speaker 4 (17:06):
So a big picture was Syria had been fairly recently
had changed hands, so it hadbeen part of what was known as
the Fatimid Caliphate, which wascentered in Egypt.
This was a Shia MuslimCaliphate, although the majority
of the people being ruled wereSunni.
Speaker 1 (17:20):
Muslims and we probably won't be able to get
details on everything but veryquickly Shia, Sunni, so within
Islam, there's two majorbranches of Islam Sunni and Shia
.
Speaker 4 (17:30):
The majority of the world's Muslims are Sunni,
anywhere between 85 and 90percent.
Well, between 10 and 15 percentare Shia.
But the Fatimids were at theend of what was kind of called
the Shia century, where you hadseveral really powerful Shia
states rise up and conquer largeterritories.
However, the majority of theMuslim populations being
conquered remained Sunni.
(17:51):
All right, wait and defineCaliphate real quick, so real
quick.
Sorry, we did just have a lessonon this in my upper level class
.
So after the death of Muhammad,who was considered the seal of
the prophets and therefore thefinal prophet, leader of the
Ummah, the community ofbelievers transitioned to a
(18:12):
Caliph who was both a religiousand political leader.
By the time we are talkingabout, the Caliph no longer has
widespread religious authorityand there are multiple competing
claimants to the title Caliph.
But the use of the termCaliphate is a claim of
legitimacy, kind of a religiouslegitimacy that rulers in the
Muslim world would use.
(18:32):
So the Fatimid Caliphate is notthe only Caliphate.
You also have the AbbasidCaliphate at this time, which is
Sunni, then headquartered inBaghdad and no longer actually
in control.
Speaker 1 (18:42):
Would this be akin to different claims on the papacy
at different times?
I know it's not exactly thesame, but Ish yeah.
Speaker 4 (18:52):
At this point the most religious authority had
transferred to scholars, membersof the Ummah, so religious
scholars, but the title ofCaliph still came with a certain
amount of currency and so yousee it used in various.
The Caliphate only fully wasabolished in 1924.
So you have various competingclaims to the Caliphate and the
(19:12):
Fatimid Caliphate was one of.
If you look at the history ofkind of Caliphate, the Fatimid
Caliphate is one of the longlasting Caliphates but it is
coexisting with the AbbasidCaliphate, which is under the
rule of the Seljuk TurkishEmpire.
So the Seljuk Turks had comeout of Central Asia.
So what we have in this periodof time are two major competing
Muslim empires, the Seljuk Turksheadquartered in Baghdad and
(19:36):
the Fatimids headquartered inCairo.
The Fatimids had held Syria butlost it to the Seljuk Turks and
so Syria had fairly recentlycome under Seljuk rule.
The Fatimids are very much indecline.
So one of the things happeninghere is when the Crusades are
getting to Egypt, they'rearriving to a empire in decline,
so it's quite vulnerable toincursion For the Seljuks.
(19:59):
It was notable to take Jerusalem.
Jerusalem is a holy city inIslam as well, but where the
center of the economy, theculture is for the Seljuk Turks
is in Baghdad, so it's inMesopotamia and Persia.
So modern days, iraq and Iran,that's where most of the people
are, that's where most of thepolitical concerns are.
So when the Crusaders tookJerusalem, the Sultan of the
(20:21):
Seljuk Turks really didn'trespond because he was not that
concerned.
Syria was a new acquisition.
It was a bit of a backwatercompared to where the cultural
center was for that empire.
Eventually they do decide thatthey need to go get this holy
city, but again, you call it aholy city.
Speaker 1 (20:41):
It's a holy city, but it is not the holy city.
Speaker 4 (20:43):
No, it's the.
If we're ranking, it's thethird holiest city within Islam.
So if Europeans had showed upand tried to seize Mecca or
Medina in the Hejaz region ofthe Arabian Peninsula,
modern-day Saudi Arabia, therewould have been just a sea of
military response.
But that was safely still inFatimid hands at the time.
Europeans did not want to gothere.
(21:05):
They did not try to go there,unless Larry's the expert here.
Speaker 2 (21:08):
I think that your response is really an excellent
one, because it very much ohthey got the applause yeah.
It outlines the very differentperspectives that people had at
the time.
As I say, this idea of thisfixation, this obsession with
Jerusalem for the West, whereasMuslims are looking at things
(21:31):
very differently.
And it's true that people havesuggested that crusade-like
activity began before the firstcrusade in the Iberian Peninsula
.
For sure, Although I guess Icould say is that part of their
argument for that reconquest inthe Iberia was because it had
been Christian first.
So it really gets down to thesekind of weird arguments of who
(21:52):
had things first.
But I would say, as I say, forthe West it was an obsession
with gaining and retaining thecity of Jerusalem.
But the first expeditionsucceeded because the very
reasons that Kelsey stated isthat the Muslim world was split
and really didn't have a unitedresponse.
And so what happened in thethird crusade, when it was
reunited under Saladin, whoabolished the Fatima caliphate?
Speaker 1 (22:17):
is.
I wouldn't do this to Kelseybecause she was new, but I'm
going to go ahead and do it toyou, that's giving me a headache
.
Speaker 2 (22:21):
There you go.
Oh, okay, there's no way to getaround it.
Yeah, In any event, once theMuslims were slightly more on
the same page politically, itwas impossible for a Western
army to get at Jerusalem again.
And in fact, as I say, some ofthe later crusades the fourth
(22:43):
and the fifth crusades theactual target was not Jerusalem.
Actually, the strategy was totake Jerusalem, but to do it via
backdoor.
But that's partially because,as I say, the Muslim world
appeared to be more unified, atleast in the Western part of the
Eastern Mediterranean.
Speaker 1 (22:59):
So, if I'm gathering this right, if I'm processing
this right, religiousintolerance wasn't at the core.
They weren't going to convertMuslims, but it was still bloody
and it was still.
We can still say that thecrusades were wrong in some kind
of historical scope, or is thatsomething that?
Speaker 2 (23:15):
historians don't want to say, I guess I would say, is
that from their standpoint itwasn't.
I mean, from our standpointobviously it was, and there were
people that, especially as timewent on, that criticized.
So I guess there were somepeople in Western Europe that
thought it was wrong.
But I think one of the reasonswhy again they say that hey,
this first one succeeded becauseit really was very improbable
(23:37):
that it succeeded is becausethose people, that 10,000 of
people left, they reallybelieved in what they were doing
.
Again, it's something we can'tunderstand, but they really
believed it and it allowed themto sort of persevere over
everything that was against them.
So I guess it just depends onhow you want to judge things.
Speaker 3 (23:56):
So my kind of question is so there's warfare
going on all over at this time,right Between European states, I
assume there's warfare going onbetween Muslim states at the
same time.
So is the fact that they have acrusade name when they're
fighting against a differentkind of religious perspective.
(24:16):
Is that significant at all?
Does it mean something that theMuslims have some way of
referring to these wars also?
That was different than whenthey're fighting each other, or
no?
Speaker 4 (24:28):
So from the Muslim perspective the crusades were
something different.
Initially it was interpreted aspunishment right Divine
punishment for somehow fallingaway.
Why would you lose a holy cityunless God had deemed you not
good stewards of that holy city?
From the Muslim perspective,there was some sort of divine
punishment at play that youwouldn't necessarily experience
if you were at war with anotherMuslim state.
(24:49):
Certainly they didn't call itcrusades.
They tended to refer to thecrusaders as infidels or infidel
dogs for some of the morecolorful chroniclers.
Speaker 2 (24:59):
Yeah, and they called everybody Franks.
I mean, they basically assumedthey were all sort of French or
French-esque.
Speaker 1 (25:04):
Now the question that Michael Bailey would ask if you
were here, was that the biggercriticism?
Speaker 2 (25:10):
I mean.
I guess I should put in here isthat when we're talking about
crusades in the Middle East,again there's that obsession
with Jerusalem.
But even the reconquest in theIberian Peninsula they didn't
try to convert people there oncethey took the territory, that
didn't happen really until the15th century when basically it
was virtually in Spanish hands.
(25:31):
But the other crusade thatnobody would talk about I guess
there's no real reason to in theUnited States is the Baltic
crusades.
So there were crusades in thesort of northwest part of Europe
, in places like parts ofmodern-day Germany, poland,
latvia, and those crusades theydid try to convert the
population because thepopulations there prior to the
(25:52):
12th century were pagan.
So I think one of the thingsthat sometimes people don't
understand, even about thecrusades, is that Christians,
christian thinkers, grudginglygave Muslims credit for their
religion, even though theythought it was wrong, but they
gave no credit at all to a paganreligion.
So in the Baltic region in the12th and 13th, 14th, 15th
(26:15):
century they seized territoryand they also converted the
population.
Speaker 1 (26:21):
So this is very interesting.
So there was some level andmaybe columns isn't quite the
right word, but some level ofChristian accommodation.
To Muslim at least it wasn'ttop priority and Muslims, as far
as I understand, had that samekind of approach when they would
conquer Christian areas thatthey allowed Christians to
continue worshiping with theirfaith.
Speaker 4 (26:42):
Is that?
Speaker 1 (26:42):
a fair characterization.
Speaker 4 (26:43):
One thing we need to be really clear on is that Syria
was not just the Muslimpopulation.
When it was conquered by thecrusaders, it had a large native
Christian and Jewish population, so there were a lot of Arab
Christians or a lot of Arab Jews.
The crusaders weren't alwaysvery good at telling the
difference between ArabChristians and Arab Muslims.
Speaker 1 (26:59):
I should be laughing, but yeah, that's a good point
and killed plenty of them.
Speaker 4 (27:03):
So there was already, and Jerusalem has historically
been, a plurality in terms ofwhat religion was dominant, had
Jewish, christian, arabpopulations and, at least in the
19th century, the largest ofthat plurality was Christian.
I can't say at the time of thecrusades.
Speaker 2 (27:18):
Yeah, no, I think that's right.
Speaker 4 (27:20):
But yes, within Islam , if you are a people of the
book, which would be Christiansand Jews, a fellow Abrahamic
religions, you cannot becompelled to convert.
You pay a different tax thanMuslims pay, and there was
higher or lower?
So there was in fact a bit ofdiscouragement towards
conversion for certainpopulations who were Christian
(27:41):
and Jewish, because that was avaluable tax base.
So there are histories, various, certain empires that would not
allow conversion to Islam forconquered Christian and Jewish
populations, because it alwayscomes down to money, doesn't it
oh?
Speaker 2 (27:56):
So I think, as you say, there are cases where I
mean, and the Latin Christianswho went on this crusade, they
did have questions and concernsabout native Christians, like
whether it was the right kind ofChristianity, but I think,
generally speaking, as you say,they were not wars of conversion
, now individuals and individualattempts.
Of course those kind of thingshappened when you see the movie
(28:20):
Saving Private Ryan and you haveAmerican soldiers wants to get
up on the beach and they end upshooting prisoners that they've
captured.
And we think Americans don't dothat.
We take prisoners.
You know, in the middle ofthings sometimes the rules get
thrown out the window.
Speaker 1 (28:34):
So not to say I remember the first time I was
kind of awakened to just howfrequently friendly fire happens
.
Speaker 2 (28:40):
You know, and just Well, that's very unfriendly
fire.
Oh, I misunderstood, I'm sorry,yeah, somebody's put their hands
up and then you shoot them, asthey show in that movie.
And I think that very often inAmerican responses we just don't
.
We didn't do that.
Of course we did.
And so, as you see, on thecrusades, there are times when
obviously people wereslaughtered because of their
(29:01):
religion.
But again, it was not theintent, at least initially, to
ever convert the population, butit was to have Jerusalem in
Christian hands, and thencrusades in the Iberian
Peninsula was to take territoryback.
They didn't really care toomuch about conversion until
after it was all in their hands,centuries later.
Speaker 1 (29:20):
Well, larry, I'm speaking for that student in the
back row, kind of distracted.
Who cares?
But why have you devoted yourlife to studying something like
the Crusades?
What is the importance for?
Speaker 2 (29:32):
us today.
I guess, at least from mystandpoint as a historian, there
doesn't have to be anyrelevance whatsoever.
Speaker 1 (29:39):
Where is that boo button?
That is not a good answer forthat student in the back of your
class.
Speaker 2 (29:44):
I mean, I think it's.
I see history as art with rules,and when we look at a piece of
art, it doesn't have to havesome kind of meaning for us
today, it just sort of stands infor itself.
I think understanding things isalways valuable, and trying to
be sympathetic and understandboth sides is good.
(30:05):
I do believe particularly goingback to 9-11, that there's this
idea that Christians andMuslims have always hated each
other, and it goes back to theCrusades, and I think that's a
gross oversimplification toactually just being factually
wrong.
And so understanding why thesethings happen, even if we can't
(30:25):
agree and can't even totallysympathize, I think is still a
valuable exercise.
So knowing that these things,the tensions between Muslims and
Christians, really are muchmore complicated than just going
back to the Crusades I mean,after all, one of the things I
tell my classes when I talkabout them is that at the end of
the day 1291, even thoughChristians tried a little bit
(30:46):
after that to occasionally takeJerusalem, the reality is the
Muslim world won.
They defeated Christians, theywere essentially out, and so in
that sense, this was a bigdefeat for Christianity, if you
want to see it that way.
Thank you.
Speaker 1 (31:00):
And Kelsey, how about you?
I know Crusades aren't yourparticular area of focus.
So just in general, studyinghistory and looking back, what
are some of the lessons that weought to draw or understand from
the Crusades or anything elsein your professional studies
here?
Speaker 4 (31:15):
Yeah, I am primarily a historian of the modern Middle
East, where the Crusades arealso leveraged in anti-Western
rhetoric, in the same way thatWesterners especially after 9-11
, have leveraged the Crusades inanti-Islamic rhetoric, and what
I see in the value of this ispeople with power often like to
take history and try to use itto make arguments for their
(31:38):
actions and for why they shouldcontrol things, why power
structures should exist the waythey are, and so if history is a
powerful weapon in the hands ofauthoritarians, then it is in
the interest of all people whowant to be responsible citizens
to be able to actually analyzeand understand history and be
able to counter those simplistic, weaponized rhetorics.
Speaker 1 (32:01):
Yeah, that's a good answer.
Kelsey gets a good answer.
Speaker 4 (32:06):
And yeah, we should be able to, when we see people
using the Crusades to sayChristendom and Islam have been
at war with each other for amillennia, and be able to say
that's simply not the case.
Speaker 1 (32:18):
Yeah, great.
Thank you, kristi.
You've been interjecting nicely, but we've been keeping you on
the sidelines because you'regoing to talk to us about modern
Crusades.
Yeah, although From modern,being a historian's perspective
of modern.
Speaker 3 (32:30):
Yeah, I guess, like there, the war on terror is
probably kind of the biggestidea that here is.
There's a book called Crusade2.0 by John Feffer and he very
much Wait, wait.
We got the Citation.
Speaker 1 (32:46):
There you go.
Speaker 3 (32:47):
And he very much presents the war on terror as
kind of a reassurgence ofwestern warfare on the Islamic
world and he talks about kind ofwhy it's again problematic to
see it that way, but also why insome cases it's beneficial to
(33:10):
think about it or for leaders touse this rhetoric because it
can motivate your population toaccomplish your military goals.
Speaker 1 (33:20):
We're going to Kelsey and Larry's point that's kind
of wrongheaded, though right Tobe thinking of this as Crusade
2.0, because it was verydifferent.
Yeah Well, I think I'm justbehind it.
Speaker 3 (33:29):
Yeah, and I think you see that, even in the way the
US government talked right afterthe 9-11 attacks, president
Bush at the time I think he madea couple of he used the word I
think.
Yeah, he did use the wordCrusade, did he really?
Oh yeah, in fact I can give youthe quote here real quick.
He uttered the phrase thisCrusade, this war on terrorism
(33:53):
is going to take a while, but healso quickly backed off after
that to explain that this is nota war on all of Islam, that the
people that we are fighting areextremist Muslims right.
That it's not a general war onChristianity against Islamic
terrorists.
Speaker 1 (34:13):
Because, as I remembered, his initial address
kind of made that point in a bigway.
So I'm very surprised to hearthat rhetoric.
That rhetoric was used evenbefore.
Yeah, I think it was.
Speaker 3 (34:20):
Because I really believe it was a mistake in yeah
it seems that way.
Because they really, I think,tried to avoid it afterwards,
and part of that is because Imean 2001,.
There's large Westernpopulations of Muslims, right,
and we don't want it to be, andthere are nations in the Middle
(34:44):
East that we needed as ourallies if we want to use their
air bases and things like this,so it cannot be a general
religious war.
I think that becomes, at leastin Phefer's argument, the new
Crusade, right, this war onterror.
And especially because itlasted so long, right Over 20
years, because in the UnitedStates, you know, you have
(35:07):
reassurgences, like after BarackObama is elected, you have some
states passing laws against anytype of.
What was it?
What is the term for the?
Speaker 4 (35:17):
Sharia law.
Speaker 3 (35:17):
Sharia law right, and you know, whenever community
centers were being built,there's a backlash around that
time period as well, and so Ithink you know there's something
going on underneath, even ifthe leaders are refusing to
refer to it as a religious war,that it's hard to break away
from.
Speaker 1 (35:36):
I'm going to pause here for a second because I lost
my thought, so this will getedited out, because the whole
point is to make me look goodand not to stutter over these
thoughts.
Speaker 2 (35:46):
Did Samuel Huntington's book have an impact
too?
Speaker 3 (35:49):
Yeah, so I was going to talk about, yeah, samuel
Huntington.
In 1998, he had, or 1996, sorry, he published a book called the
Clash of Civilizations and theMaking of World Order.
So this is after the fall ofthe Soviet Union.
And he was like, yeah, then thenext big fights in the world
(36:09):
aren't going to be between likesuperpowers or over political,
economic, ideology, it's goingto be a clash of civilizations.
And he, you know until 2001,.
Speaker 2 (36:20):
I think he was pretty much mocked maybe for that
argument that really got bigafter 9-11.
Speaker 3 (36:25):
Yeah, but it seemed to resonate a lot afterwards.
Speaker 4 (36:29):
It is still one of the most assigned books in
college curriculums, even thoughalmost no political scientists
consider the arguments valid.
Oh really.
Speaker 2 (36:37):
Yeah, I'm not very impressed by it.
Speaker 4 (36:40):
No, it's colonialist essentially in its worldview.
Speaker 2 (36:43):
And it's very superficial.
I mean it reflects somebody whoprobably knows just enough
history to be dangerous really.
Speaker 4 (36:51):
And knows nothing of the immense diversity of the
Islamic world by the modern era,you know, a quarter of the
world's population is Muslim.
It's hard to say that there'sgoing to be some grand clash
that's going to involveIndonesia and Saudi Arabia and
Iran, right?
Speaker 1 (37:08):
So do you think the ways Muslims were perceived in
the Middle East has changed?
Not much, then.
In terms of how we perceiveMuslims today in the Western
world, do we still have kind ofa blanket caricature?
Speaker 4 (37:21):
Not from the Middle Ages, no, I think contemporary
perceptions of Islam that areproblematic can mostly be traced
to the 19th century andEuropean colonization of the
Middle East.
That's where we really see.
Speaker 1 (37:33):
And Larry's shaking his head yes, yeah, that's right
, it's out of cessation andracial hierarchies really being
cemented.
Speaker 4 (37:39):
In terms of the Middle Ages, these states
encountered each other asmilitary equals in a lot of ways
, yeah.
Speaker 2 (37:46):
And occasionally Christian crusaders had a lot of
respect for Muslims, I meanthey were very clean compared.
King Richard De Lionheart.
I mean he had sort of romancegoing on with salad they really,
we waited until the end of thepodcast to get to this.
Let's hear more about this here.
I mean they respected eachother as warriors and so they
(38:06):
exchanged letters.
I mean I don't think theyactually ever met, but Saladin's
brother was used as an envoyfor Richard and they really got
along famously, and I think thatthere was even this rumor that
Saladin was going to marry oneof Richard's sisters.
Muslims and Christians weren'talways, as they say, sort of
death or a war to the knife, Imean even during the Crusade.
(38:28):
I mean that's just one examplebut there are plenty of other
times of what you might call, Iguess, for lack of a better term
, a sort of accommodation or agrudging respect for each other.
Speaker 3 (38:36):
Okay, and you wonder whether that is continuing, kind
of.
So not only have our wars inAfghanistan and Iraq ended, but
you have the professional golftournament now.
Right, the PGA is allied withthe Saudi Arabian.
Speaker 1 (38:54):
To hear some people, though that's very problematic.
Speaker 3 (38:56):
I think it probably is problematic but it's not
problematic for religious.
Speaker 4 (39:01):
Very good point.
Speaker 1 (39:03):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (39:04):
And likewise in some of the recent protests you've
seen happening in communitiesover what our kids being taught
to sexual material in schools.
Right, those protests seem tocontain very conservative
Christians and very conservativeMuslims like marching together,
and it suggests that maybethere are some connections and
(39:27):
things that are today bringing.
You can't easily today all putpaint the world as being
separated by religion any longeras well, I think that's a good
point, and, larry, whenever weget together, I always pick your
brain on this.
Speaker 1 (39:39):
and Kelsey, you jump in too, just whenever religious
ideology and political powerseem to come together.
It seems like the religiousideology gets used as a pawn in
this.
But you said that with theCrusades, at least at the
beginning, that was not the case, that there was a true
religious motivation for goingdown there and taking Jerusalem.
But with these armed forces,there must be some political
(40:01):
power behind it, yes or not?
Speaker 2 (40:03):
No.
So I mean, the Pope had tocorral that kind of support and
obviously political leaders didwhat they wanted and they didn't
necessarily go along with whatthe Pope wanted.
So, for example, on the 5thCrusade, that was one of the
backdoor ones where, instead oftrying to get at Jerusalem
because they knew they couldn'ttake it, they decided to go.
(40:24):
They attacked Egypt, the ideabeing they wanted to threaten
the city of Cairo, hoping thatthe Muslim world would see it.
It's better to have Cairo,which was a big, vibrant,
economically important city, andget rid of Jerusalem, sort of a
backwater.
And what happened is that thePope wanted the ruler of Germany
, the emperor, holy RomanEmperor for those who would
(40:47):
recognize that term, I guess togo there and to kind of lead up
the effort.
And he kept delaying and itpartially caused that crusade
actually to collapse.
But it was partially becausethe Pope couldn't get a secular
ruler to do what he wanted.
But for the most part, thecrusades were not really led by
political leaders.
I mean, they were and theyweren't.
(41:08):
So yeah, again, I think thereligious motivations were more
important.
But when the state got involved, as I said earlier the last
podcast the state almost alwayswins.
Speaker 1 (41:16):
What haven't we said yet?
Kelsey, christie, larry, whathasn't been said yet, that needs
to be said before we wrap uphere?
Speaker 3 (41:22):
Kelsey isn't All right, so this is my again.
My weak understanding Is Jihada religious war against
Christians?
Speaker 4 (41:31):
No, no, all right.
Jihad means struggle.
It translates to struggle andwithin Islamic theology you have
two forms of Jihad.
You have the greater Jihad,which is the personal struggle
to stay on the straight path andbe a good Muslim, and then you
have the lesser Jihad, which isreligious war.
So Jihad can be used shorthandfor religious war and has
(41:53):
historically been used in byMuslim states for kind of
anymore.
But in the same way that GeorgeBush accidentally called the
invasion of I don't know if itwas Iraq or Afghanistan a
crusade, is the same way thatsecular leaders of Muslim states
might use the term Jihad whenalmost no religious scholar
would designate the conflict tobe a Jihad.
(42:14):
So again, it translates tostruggle.
It's a given name in the Arabworld.
It can be a person's first name, it's not and it does not
specifically mean fightingChristians.
Speaker 3 (42:25):
So you could use it fighting other Muslims as well.
Speaker 4 (42:28):
Yeah, if you think you have, if you're right, yeah,
I'm not right.
Speaker 2 (42:33):
The thoughts on your side, yeah, and nobody would go
to war thinking they were wrong.
Speaker 4 (42:37):
Exactly yes, jihad has been certainly the
understanding of fighting thecrusaders.
The term Jihad was used by theMuslims fighting the crusaders
and in a similar way to whichyou pointed to contemporary
Westerners using crusades forthese geopolitical reasons,
muslim commentators will alsopoint to the crusades and use
that and in fact Osama bin Ladenin the 90s said I was statement
(43:00):
calling for Jihad against Jewsand crusaders and the crusaders
meant the West.
So crusader can be used inshorthand in the Middle East as
well in anti-Western rhetoric Iguess I was going to say
something to Christy or ask herabout.
Speaker 2 (43:15):
Is that how the use of crusade has been used in the
20th century?
And again, this is not my fieldfor sure, but crusade against
alcohol or sex trafficking orthat kind of thing, it seems
like it's used pretty frequently.
Speaker 3 (43:31):
Yeah, there definitely was a temperance
crusade against alcohol, and Ithink it is that it was
purposely used, that this is aholy war against this evil.
It didn't necessarily mean thatthe evil was Muslim.
It could just be an evil insociety that we need to bring
down, and God is on our side inthis fight, and I do think that
(43:52):
was the way that, especially inthe 19th century, it is used
throughout American history.
Speaker 2 (43:58):
And, as I said before , we started that.
Dwight Eisenhower used it inhis D-Day speech when they were
about ready to attack the shores.
Now we're embarked on the greatcrusade, and again it was
against evil.
Speaker 1 (44:09):
So that's interesting because I was about to say it
sounds like the word crusade isused whenever you want to make
sure that there's a religiousconnotation to it.
I'm not sure if Eisenhowermeant it that way, or certainly
wanted to at least give it thatthere's a transcendent, that God
is on our side, yeah, and it'salmost a sacred mission.
Well, thank you so much forcoming and talking to us about
(44:29):
the Crusades.
I learned a lot, and I guess wecan sum it up by what.
The Crusades are more complexthan than our tiny little usage
of the term Everything always isthat's right, that's right.
Speaker 3 (44:40):
So Maybe be careful when you use the term we know.
Speaker 2 (44:43):
I think that's right, actually, yes, very good.
Don't use it.
Just don't use it.
Don't have it as your mascot.
Speaker 1 (44:48):
Use beacon and blaze as your mascot, chocolate Lab
and Golden Retriever to replacethe Crusaders.
So Well, I want to thank ouraudience today for sitting
around the table with us.
I hope that we have providedyou with some food for thought
and something to chew on.
But we aren't done yet.
After we finish the music, wealways have some leftovers for
(45:10):
you to enjoy, some additionalthoughts we share with one
another after we wrap up.
So feel free to continuelistening.
We appreciate your support and,as part of that support, please
consider subscribing ratingreviewing.
This is when I feel the mostlike a podcaster.
I come most alive.
Subscribe rate and review toChurch Potluck, wherever you are
downloading it, until we gatheraround the table next time.
(45:31):
This has been Church Potluckand thank you for listening.
Speaker 2 (45:43):
Do you time that music at the end?
How long you're going to makeit last?
Speaker 1 (45:47):
No, yeah no.
Speaker 2 (45:49):
I just have.
I might figure out a buttonhere, that's right.
Speaker 1 (45:51):
You know what?
I don't know that kind of outtrod at the right time.
So yeah, Do you mean in termsof the where it is in the song?
Speaker 2 (46:01):
Well, I was just wondering whether you had sort
of a timer, like you're countingoff 1001, 1002.
Speaker 1 (46:06):
I am such a seasoned professional at this now that
there's just an internal clock.
Okay, that feels right.
Speaker 2 (46:12):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (46:14):
Well, thank you, I learned a lot on that one.
I've got many blind spots in myintellectual life, and the
middle ages is certainly one ofthem.
Speaker 2 (46:22):
Well, I guess one of the things that if he had more
time or was another subject wastalk about why they went in the
first place.
I mean, besides trying to takeJerusalem back, I mean because
their sins would be forgiven.
So, again, it was worth theirwhile to die along the way if
their sins would be forgiven,which also tells you how
important religion was to themat that moment.
So, and the whole concept ofthe indulgence you know,
(46:45):
eventually that morphed into thesame problems they had during
the Reformation.
So that was a product of theircrusades.
Speaker 1 (46:51):
Yeah, and I never really asked.
I guess I'm not such a seasonedpodcaster after all, because a
seasoned podcaster would haveasked you about why would they
even, why would so many peopleeven go in the first place to do
such a thing?
Speaker 2 (47:00):
So that's why they did it.
Speaker 1 (47:02):
They were guaranteed to.
Speaker 2 (47:04):
Yeah, and I think that is you know they weren't
going there on behalf of a state, right, and they weren't going
there serving government, unlessyou count the papacy as a
government, which you could kindof.
But we'll just say no for themoment.
But yeah, they were goingbecause they thought that this
was important, but also, too,that in the end, the sins that
(47:25):
they'd committed would beforgiven and they'd have a
chance of going to heaven.
Very cool.
Speaker 1 (47:31):
Plus, I don't need to leave soon, so just you should
feel free to just bounce up andget.
This is just a debriefing timewhere we just kind of say here's
what we should have said orthis other thought set coming to
mind.
Speaker 2 (47:43):
No, no, I thought it was nice and productive and I
liked all our positions.
Speaker 3 (47:47):
Well, it was nice to have.
I was glad that Kelsey was ableto come just to get like that
the Muslim point of view fromthe, because I don't know that
I've ever heard that like itpresented.
Well, this is what the Muslimswere thinking at the time, and
so it was very Something.
Speaker 1 (48:02):
you may have said it and I just I just missed it, but
you said that wasn't even themajor conflict, that they were
most worried about it.
Speaker 4 (48:08):
Yeah, it did not come up.
In the 13th century the Mongolsarrived.
Speaker 2 (48:15):
Yeah, they were much bigger.
Speaker 4 (48:17):
And the Mongols won.
Islam still won because theMongols converted.
But the Mongol invasions weresignificantly more traumatic,
hit all of the major populationcenters.
Certain cities were goneforever after the major cities
Merv, nishapur and Baghdad wassacked and the Abbasid Caliphate
(48:39):
was ended by the Mongols.
So when you look at Muslimhistories and chronicles about
this area, the Crusades were asideshow and then the true
traumatic wave came in the formof the Mongol invasions and that
is what takes a lot more focusthan the Mongols did not take
Egypt.
Speaker 3 (48:58):
But from a Christian perspective I don't know if
that's we should feel better orworse about yeah that's kind of
like yeah, so, yeah, we were sobad, right, so that's one, we're
not so bad, or man, we'repathetic that we're not even the
major threat.
Speaker 2 (49:14):
It is amazing to read Muslim sources to see really
how little impact it seemed likethe Crusades had at the moment.
But yeah, when you write them,mongols came.
It was all hands on deck.
Speaker 4 (49:26):
If you read Muslim sources about the Mongols, it's
like this is the end of theworld.
This is God's judgment.
The end is now, but in the end,almost all the Mongol states
ended up embracing Islam.
Speaker 1 (49:40):
So what would be your explanation for that?
Speaker 4 (49:42):
For their embrace of Islam.
Speaker 1 (49:44):
Yeah, especially since they're coming in as
winners, right.
Speaker 4 (49:48):
The Pope is in Mongolia right now and just gave
a speech.
Oh really.
Speaker 3 (49:52):
I didn't realize that we buried the lead.
Speaker 1 (49:54):
I know we should have opened the episode.
Speaker 4 (49:58):
Actually the Pope is in Mongolia.
And he just gave a speech wherehe praised the Mongol Empire
for its religious tolerance andreferred to the Pax Mongolica,
the Mongol peace that happenedafter the very devastating
invasions, as something perhapsaspirational, which, I have to
say, amazing spin on thathistory for the audience Very
(50:19):
clever.
So the Mongols had theirreligion, which was Tangrism.
So Tangri is the great sky god,but the Mongols had there's a
long history of nomads fromCentral Asia embracing Islam
because they are culturallyflexible peoples.
(50:41):
If you're a nomadic people, youtend to be able to absorb
diverse influences, and what youget with the Mongols is they
settle in Persia and Persiasimilar to China.
Right, the Mongols that conquerChina don't become Muslim, they
become essentially Chinese andthey were Chinese.
Persia is similar to Chinawhere it has this really long
(51:02):
history of literate culture, ofbureaucracy, of empire, and it
gets invaded a lot.
China and Persia share this.
Why do they get invaded a lot?
They have all the nice stuff.
So what tends to happen when youinvade Persia and set up a new
empire in Persia is you persify,you become more Persian because
the structures are alreadythere for the civilization, the
(51:24):
language, for the bureaucracy isthere.
So like are you going to?
You know the Mongols don't havewords in their language to run
a complex empire, but Persia isalready there.
You're going to co-opt thePersian elites to run the empire
for you.
So what happens is Persia willabsorb its invaders and make
them look like Persia, and sothe Mongols get in there and
(51:46):
they settle in and just and fora long time they resisted.
There were explicit policies ofsome of them sons of Genghis
Khan.
Some of them really didn't likeIslam, but it was just
inevitable if they were going tostay there and build their
empires.
The Islamic tradition and thePersian tradition had been there
for so long that if you weregoing to stay there, you were
(52:08):
going to end up Persian andMuslim.
Speaker 2 (52:10):
Yeah, so that initial antagonism again maybe a topic
for another day.
But you know, christian leaders, including Louis IX, king of
France in the 13th century,thought that the Mongols might
become an ally, you know, and sothey.
He sent representatives, acouple of Franciscan friars, to
one of the Khans, hoping thatthey would just join forces
(52:33):
together and then they woulddestroy Islam and, of course,
the Mongols weren't entrusted inpartnership.
Speaker 3 (52:39):
Did we not bring a lot to the table, or the
Westerners not bring a lot tothe table?
Speaker 2 (52:44):
Those monks when they went there.
I think the Khan was surprisedthat they weren't there to
submit.
He was just expecting that theywould.
But yeah, so that was going onin those early days too.
So yeah, there's an awful lotgoing on and it's really pretty
exciting.
It tells you how vibrant thiswhole region is for historical
(53:08):
study.
Speaker 1 (53:10):
I almost pressed you on your image as art with
structure.
Speaker 2 (53:16):
Art with rules.
Speaker 1 (53:17):
Art with rules that I didn't want to be flipping
about and say are you saying theCrusades were beautiful?
I'm not saying that, I'm notsaying I'm quite excited to go
there, but I liked your, I likedthat imagery, even if I didn't
fully understand it.
You know the thinking aboutwhat you're doing is an art,
even though you're dealing withfacts and figures, and I would
(53:40):
guess maybe you do tell yourstudents that your students
would be surprised to hear youreferring to what you're doing
as being artistic.
Speaker 2 (53:50):
I mean, I'm fairly honest about it Again.
History has rules that wefollow or protocols, but I do
see it as a kind of art forart's sake and maybe that's.
It isn't kind of really, really, really, really old-fashioned.
Speaker 4 (54:08):
I would say Larry and I are generationally different
in how we interpret the purposeof our disciplines.
Speaker 1 (54:14):
How would you say?
Speaker 4 (54:16):
Well, I do think.
I think history has always beenused as a political tool.
So the job of the historian isnot to politicize history, but
history does have significancepolitically.
Speaker 1 (54:28):
So speaks truth to power.
Speaker 4 (54:31):
And sometimes the truth to power isn't what people
want to hear.
For instance, I don't subscribeto the thesis that the arc of
history bends towards justice.
Speaker 2 (54:43):
Yeah, I don't either.
Speaker 4 (54:44):
It's a nice thought, but sometimes some realism is
helpful.
Even if you are engaged in asocial justice project, Perhaps
acknowledge you don't want tobecome complacent.
Speaker 1 (54:58):
I don't know if this is another podcast or just a
conversation you and I can chatabout.
I agree that it doesn'tnaturally bend, but would you
say, looking at the broad scopeof history, that we are less
brutal than we once were?
Am I?
So I'm being too polyannish interms of and I would say that
too.
Speaker 3 (55:19):
I was actually.
Speaker 2 (55:20):
We make kind of things from a totally different
perspective.
But I mean we all are togetherBecause, yeah, how can you say
an atomic bomb is more just andmodern warfare and cluster bombs
?
Speaker 3 (55:36):
Well, especially now, the use of drones, where you
don't even have to risk your ownlife to destroy other lives.
That's right.
Speaker 1 (55:47):
Sorry, dale, you can't say something more than
the king quote Not allowed.
Speaker 3 (55:52):
Well, it's actually not tonight, when Bernice King
is standing at the campus.
Speaker 2 (55:56):
It's a great saying but, it just really isn't true.
Speaker 4 (56:00):
I think in the end, I don't criticize him for saying
it.
He had a different goal.
Martin Luther King Jr was not ahistorian.
His project was not a closeanalysis of history.
He was mobilizing people.
But you also need that and youneed the historians pushing up
their glasses and getting downto the documents and being like
(56:20):
well, actually.
Speaker 1 (56:22):
All right, we might have more conversation on this,
because I still want you to bewrong, but Then there's more
than one.
Speaker 2 (56:32):
I mean, I'd be wrong too.
Speaker 4 (56:34):
Yeah, and Christy, so you and the plural I mean.
Speaker 2 (56:39):
I.
Speaker 1 (56:40):
You want all of us to be wrong.
That's right On that particularpoint.
Speaker 3 (56:44):
Well, except as a modernist, it's easy to say oh
yeah, things were just awfulback then.
So because I don't know enoughabout ancient history.
Speaker 1 (56:53):
And hopefully, if I'm being honest with myself, I
don't know enough about thekinds of things we're doing to
one another now either, yeah, Iignore it and I hear about it
and I don't pursue just howbrutal we are to one another
still.
Speaker 4 (57:09):
If it was the 10th century and you were born and
died in the center of theAbbasid Caliphate during a time
of peace, you lived a I mean,unless you needed some
antibiotics, then you were, butyou lived a fairly long, stable,
meaningful life 12th centuryFrance the same thing.
Speaker 2 (57:33):
You could have lived into your 60s and 70s and had a
pretty prosperous life.
Speaker 4 (57:38):
Yeah, and you never knew what a meme was.
You never had to get piled onon social media.
There's certain bliss in thelimited information networks
people used to exist with.
Speaker 1 (57:48):
You're not nasty, brutish and short, come on.
Speaker 4 (57:52):
We actually are going to discuss that in my next
class.
Speaker 1 (57:56):
Is that right?
Yes, so he was wrong too.
Speaker 4 (57:59):
I will say Barry students on average.
So we look at how Hobbes, lockeand Rousseau all conceptualize
the state of nature and it's therare Barry college student who
will make an argument for theHobbesian state of nature.
Speaker 1 (58:11):
All right, Well, thank you all so much Thank you.
Dale.
Speaker 2 (58:16):
That was fun that was great.
Speaker 1 (58:18):
It's always fun.
Speaker 2 (58:19):
Looking forward to the jacket.
Speaker 1 (58:23):
And now we exit, larry.
We are done recording.
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