What did medeval Christians think about...

...Muslims? I mean, the religions are quite similar, both are Abrahamic faiths, monotheistic and so forth. I'm just wondering, what did your average mideval Christian think about Muslims? What was there to hate about them besides the fact that they didn't accept Jesus as god (though they did/do accept him as a prophet)? That's the only real major difference between them that I can see really leading to a war.

Then again, Catholics and Protestants in Ireland fight over almost nothing, so I guess it doesn't really matter. And again, the Crusades and Ireland fighting were never really about religion anyways...

and how do you spell medeval?

 

medieval (medi=middle, eval=age)

if you were a member of the catholic church, you were a member of the One True Church, united under one pope, and the only way to God. heck, the east and west christians split up because the greeks couldn't take the authority of the pope and held that the Spirit doesn't proceed from the Son and the Father, but only from the Father. whoop de do!

so obviously, Islam gave the medieval Christians a huge rival and they were enemies for centuries; finally the Christians launched the Crusades, massacring every jew or muslim they could find. even massacring constantinople in the east, which was a christian city!

the smallest things can lead to war. the differences between the christians and the muslims were enormous compared to the differences between the greeks and latins, and look how they turned out.

 

by the way, i love your sig pic.

 

That's cuz the city was rich, like I said, the crusades probably had little to do with religion besides the fact that a) it got the regular people to volunteer to fight and b) Islam might have been a competitor for the RCC, thus meaning it wouldn't get as much money or power.

Still, I was wondering what the regular folks actually thought about Islam. Not that anyone would know because regular people couldn't probably write and if they did and wrote their own ideas about Islam they'd be burned at the stake...

 

yeah, well the middle ages was the age of faith, right - not much intellectual or cultural achievement, hence the sometimes-used term 'dark' ages. i don't suspect the average joe gave much time to philosophising over another religion when the general idea was you're with the Church (& God), or you're not. i wonder how much they would even know about the specifics of the muslim faith? probably very little. they were just the barbarians that had to be converted or killed.

and the crusades weren't just about war, they were the perfect mix of religion and military. the christian religious warrior or whatever. medieval knights had to be ordained before a cleric in special ceremony and stuff. they were pretty sure of themselves to be working for God, a noble and holy cause and all that -

 

Lol - it wasn't quite as bad as Nightmarehippygirl makes out.

Depending on what part of the world you were in of course. There is not a great ammount of record of Muslims being percescuted as such, frowned upon certianly but the impression I get is that the two religions seemed to co-exist in Europe. A good example is Spain, there is a denomination of the Spanish church that is very very old and basically it's a Islam/Christianity fusion. In Germany, especially in the south the Arabs were given refuge when they were having trouble elsewhere and now much such German archetecture has a strong dose of Muslim influence.

Religion was never, at any time in history, something everyone was completely fanatic about - you really have got to bare it in mind as a part of the culture, not neccesarily such a great part of the psyche.

Blessings

Sebbi

 

hahaha, yeah that did sound a little fanatical huh

but i mean, as far as what did the average medieval catholic think of islam, i doubt that there was any feeling of acceptance, rightness - the One True Church was the catholic church, you know? so when they wanted to recapture jerusalem, the church & its war went hand in hand.

you've got to remember, the modern, more accepting & positive outlook of the Catholic church really only came about after vatican II in the 60s or whenever it was.

edit: btw, that's an interesting note about a spanish muslim-christian fusion church, what an odd offshoot! i've never heard of it.

peace

 

Well, there was that whole ottoman empire thing as well.....kinda hard to persecute someone who'll wallop ya and take over......

 

the medieval church was a political/financial institution that lied to it's adherants, telling them it was the best/only way. much like modern government. the crusades, while it had many devout foot soldiers, was mainly a treasure/land/power grab.

 

Ever hear of the Crusades? That should give a little insight to their relations.

 

remember trippin, the average joe back in middle-ages britain/france/etc was serverely, and i mean severely uneducated. i wouldnt be surprised if they had no oppinion on muslims other than that they were evil enemies fighting against the one true god. or even if they knew about their opponents religion at all, in many cases, and just fought the 'enemy', which to them, clearly wasnt christian.

 

I recognize that fact. But they must have talked about something at the taverns and pubs. Uneducated or not, I'm interested in their point of view. That's the major failing of history: it focuses on the kings, emperors, and other wealthy, while completely ommiting the majority, that is, the poor. What were their lives like? What did they talk about? What concerns did they really have? That's what interests me. Most of history is the history of big egos in power having wars and other disturbing things.

Clearly they were uneducated. But that doesn't mean they had no opinions. Remember, heresy was rampant even back then, but remember, the victors write history, and the Church, for a long time, was the victor. But there were people out there having real opinions. I imagine that even the uneducated, illiterate serf back then must have had his own thoughts on things. But I guess no one knows what they were.

 

i guess shakespeare sorta gives insight to some of the issues people talked about. im sure if you looke dhard enough you could find information on that sort of thing but my guess is that they really didnt have oppinions on much outside their township and country. i mean.. when you talk to really really uneducated bums in pubs.. they dont talk about anything interesting.. they dont really erven talk about things outside teh coutnry unless its an issue brought up on the news, and when that happens theyve not no idea what theyre talking about most of the time. uneducated people talk about the things they are involved with.. like farming issues.. community issues.. complaining about taxes and police, seasonal changes, foods, tradesman's wares, etc

but i guess thats just my oppinion in itself hehe

 

That's a good point. But surely it was discussed, what with Inquisitions and Crusades going on in their country and maybe their villiage or city.

 

Considering the Muslims started the Crusades by sacking Jerusalem in 1070, the Crusades were well warranted.