Crusades Vs. Jihads
Uploaded by blkbelt121 on Feb 04, 2008
Christian Crusades and Muslim Massacres
In the early part of the eleventh century, Christians led crusades to spread Christianity to the other religions of the world, mainly Muslims. However, the Crusades were not initially meant to be a religious war but instead to protect the Christians going on religious pilgrimages to Jerusalem from being persecuted by the Muslims who had also claimed Jerusalem as their holy city and destroyed the temple that was built in the city. In order to provide the protection that the Christians needed, Pope Urban II issued a plead for help. In his plead, the said that “God commanded,” that the Christians go and fight the infidels and expel them from the holy of holies.
During this time that the Pope was calling for help to support the Christians, the peasants did not know how to read Latin which happened to be the only language that the Bible was written in. Therefore, because the church held so much power during these times, the people went to war, believing it was what God has told them to do so. This is where the problem about the Crusades comes about. The people believed that it was their job to protect the Christians in Jerusalem, and they did this through ways that no Christian should ever dream of doing. On their way to the holy city, the Crusaders who were easily identified by the crosses on their shields killed all the Jews who appeared to them along the way. Then, when they laid siege to Jerusalem, they killed all of its inhabitants. These actions of the early Christians are no different than the actions of today’s Muslims except that the Christians did not know that what they were doing was not commanded nor allowed in the Bible, and their Muslim counterparts believed it was allowed and required. The minorities of Muslims who lead Jihads around the world, are also killing thousands, and destroying the lives of millions around the world, just like the Crusaders did during the early Crusades. However, the Muslim Jihads the Christian Crusades are the same in all aspects.
In a much stretched out way, Christian crusades can be justified as to say that the Christians honestly did not know that what they were doing was wrong because of their inability to read Latin, and they were protecting...