www.byzcath.org Forums Faith & Christian Life The Christian East & West The Great Cathedral of Constantinople

Dear Friends,

And one of my patrons, St Alexander Nevsky, defeated the Teutonic Crusader Knights more than once in defence of Orthodoxy . . .

But generalizations are never good.

The Knights Templar have a history that is as chequered as their pie-bald banner.

And yet they brought the learning of Muslim civilization into the West, along with the banking system and many other things.

A Franciscan once visited a Templar Promontory in France when he came across a Muslim saying his prayers there.

He began to yell for help to eject the fellow when the Templars came running to see what was the matter.

They summarily scolded the Friar and told him to leave their friend alone.

The Templars also adopted many religious aspects of Muslim devotion, including praying five times daily.

Alex

Dear Abdur:

The majority of Spanish Muslims were never Moors--Arabs--but converts from the indigenous population---hardly foreigners, I would deduce.

If this were true why were the moors always considered to be racially different from the Christians?

Also, the Visigoths were also invaders, essentially conquering Iberia from the earlier "Latin" population. In other words, the Moors were just one more group of invaders among many groups that invaded and settled "Spain."

The Visigoths were pagan conquerers who took over from the original Latin peoples. They became Christian, adopted Latin customs, and the two cultures were melded into one. They did not supplant one culture for another. The outcome of this can be openly seen in Spain & Portugal today.

The Spanish Muslims (again:indigenous converts to Islam including the majority of the Visigothic nobility )

Never have I ever heard that the majority of the Visigothic Nobility became Moors and I find this hard to believe. The Moors were not gentle invaders, just look at the ancient Martyrologies and see why.

The Moors never fully conquered Iberia, they just drove our people into the most remote parts of the country. It was from these places that they conducted the struggle for 700 years.

Spain was the homeland of the Spanish Muslims and their love for "Andalusia" was legendary.

I'm sure that the Christians hovering in cold caves in the north would have appreciated how much their country was loved by the Moors.

No, the Alhambra, Alcazar, and other great Spanish Islamic sites are the work of the devotion of those Spaniards known as Muslims, and not just of the Arabs.

Even today they look as natural to Spain and Portugal as Disneyland looks to Paris. We had nothing to do with their construction, the architects came from North Africa.

Certainly, my point of view is not religously or politically correct, but it is the historical truth.

You will forgive me, but I think that your view is bised and is taken from your personal perspective.


defreitas

[ 04-04-2002: Message edited by: defreitas ]

Dear Abdur,

When it comes to the historical sciences, I wouldn't go up against Defreitas on the topic of Ukrainian history, much less Iberian!

Alex

The truth is, the majority of Iberian Muslims were indigenous people who converted to Islam, or were their descendents.

At no time--in all of the 700 years of Spanish Islamic history--were there more than 50,000 Arabs--Moors--inhabiting Iberia (at the maximum) at any given time.

However, we know that there were far more than 50,000 Muslim Spaniards inhabiting Iberia at any given time during the majority of the Islamic historical period.


Therefore, we know that the majority of Spanish Muslims were converts to Islam or the descendents of converts.


Certainly, I am biased---as are you.
And I am not interested in fighting the battles of the past, but facts are facts and shouldn't rational beings accept the facts and live with them?

I am well aware that there were many martyrs that gave their lives for
Christ and the Church. I am not in denial about these facts, either.

But just as there was a rich and vibrant Jewish culture in Spain, so there was a rich and vibrant Muslim culture. Both of these cultures were destroyed by the Spanish Christians and many, many Spanish Jews and Muslims were martyred for their respective faiths. These are facts that one cannot deny, in my opinion.

Neither you or I are responsible for the atrocities on either side. But shouldn't we be aware of them, if for no other reason than intellectual honesty?

I am not a very emotional person. Maybe I "see" things differently than you or Alex do; maybe.

Salaam,

Abdur

[ 04-04-2002: Message edited by: Abdur Islamovic ]

Dear Alex,

Then he will accept historical facts!

Salaam,

Abdur

Dear Abdur,

I am not saying who is right here.

I was just commenting on the fact that Jose is widely read, as are you, and that when I discussed matters of obscure historical interest that few know anything about, Jose was right there with an abundance of knowledge.

He knows more than I or most people I know - that's all.

If anything, I was just trying to say that Jose speaks with less emotion, and more knowledge.

And I'm not saying you do less - please don't feel as if I am against you or Islam. I hope you know me better than that.

I am well aware of the situation with the Jews of Iberia and, as you know yourself, there are Rabbis in Spain who are gathering descendants of the Crypto-Jews there who have continued to perform Jewish Rites even as Catholics down through the centuries.

Even though Ukrainians fought Muslim Tatars and Turks (actually they fought the Tatars when they were still pagans), they have learned to admire and respect their former Muslim adversaries.

There are even Orthodox shrines in the Crimea, such as the Shrine of Bakhchesaraisk, that is frequented by Muslims as well.

Other such shrines include that of St Vasili Ostroshki in Serbia where Muslims have experienced miraculous answers to their prayers there at the relics of that Orthodox saint.

In any event, the Spanish Rite is today the Mozarabic Rite that has been given permission to be used throughout Spain once again.

As a Catholic liturgical tradition, it does reflect the influence of Muslim/Arabic culture.

Suffice it to say that neither of our histories with respect to how we treated each other is deserving of admiration.

Alex

[ 04-04-2002: Message edited by: Orthodox Catholic ]

Dear Abdur:

I am aware of all you say.

But here I stand.

defreitas

I would not at all be shocked to find out this is all myth. I have known catholic culture my entire life, and some things one can not just believe by mere fact of some popular story/ies. A former employer of mine who was black and non-denominational Protestant continualy told me that catholics were the one down south (in America) hanging black people. Having known catholic culture my entire life I had and have a hard time believing this, I don't even need to know and understand that the Klan is a product of white, southern, Protestant, America and that much of that lynch culture grew out of a majority WASP southern culture.

Some things in the catholic blood run deeper then history books. Now it is being discovered that some of the "known" and "proven" "facts" of the Inquisition are actually false.

Abdur, the Sicilians claimed that the English Crusaders had tails hidden under their garments. Were they telling the truth?

I can accept that a fraction of Crusaders didn't respect the Eastern Cristians at all and would do bodily harm to it's Priesthood. But I can't imagine on any orginized level allowed by devote catholic soldiers - catholics to defile the alter and have prostitutes dance on the alter. For the fear of the wrath of God would have been in the catholic heart. Of course Greek or Turk could write whatever they want and claim it fact, but that doesn't mean it was fact.

The Crusaders are often displayed as wild cruel undisiplined brutes. In some respects some of that maybe true. But you don't make the expedition they did with an undisiplined horde that's soley stupid and greedy. These were men from out of barbarian cultures, that were dangerously violent, they were men who's concept of honor ran deep, in their beginnings by ways of Christian monks to refine themselves, yet the landscape of their culture still made them the toughs they were. You could take the neighborhood of some poor Mexican section of L.A. and compare it to an upper middle class black neigborhood of Chicago. The young Mexicans in this case would shock the young black upper middle class Chicagoans, with their less refined ways and quick to violence tendencies. Their scars, eyes, and mannerisims would speak the brutal side of them. And they would very well in some ways be less disciplined then the upper middle class blacks. But their sense of what they consider honor and loyalty would run far deeper then that of the upper middle class black kids. And depending on who I hate or like I can write them up any way I want, that doesn't mean my write up would be fair to them.

Dear Maximus,

Actually, the Crusaders did do those things that Abdur mentioned.

They really should have been called "Sword-Bearers" rather than "Cross-Bearers" aka "Crusaders."

The prostitute thing bothers me less than the way they desecrated Eastern Icons and literally threw Chalices into the streets.

(Besides, the placement of prostitutes in churches and similar episodes was repeated following the martyrdom of Jerome Savonarola, the Dominican reformer Monk of Florence - it shocked one of his followers so much that he went to Russia and became an Orthodox monk - today he is "St Maximus the Greek" of the Orthodox Church).

The Crusaders/Sword-Bearers/hooligans-whatever believed the East to be in schism and therefore without grace.

RC soldiers did similar things with Orthodox and Eastern Catholic churches in Eastern Europe.

There is a book "The Church in Ruins" that is a pictorial record of ruined Orthodox churches - by Latin Catholics, with twisted cupolas and crosses, left in cow-fields and the like.

Metropolitan Andrew Sheptytsky himself protested twice to the Catholic government of his day in defence of the Orthodox Churches in Kholm and Volyn that were being vandalized and burned, but not by communists, but by Catholics.

It is an historical fact that many Eastern Christians preferred to be under the Turks rather than Latin Catholic Crusaders.

Sad, but true.

Alex

Believe what you will. But I believe the Greeks because the atrocities committed by the Crusaders are confirmed by papal Latin sources.

Even the contemporary pope was appalled by the reports of papal legates and roundly condemned the barbarity of the Crusaders who sacked Constantinople.

You should also read the accounts of the sacking of Jerusalem by the Crusaders, from the Latin sources of the very chaplains of the Crusader forces.

Is it a small wonder that the presence of the Crusaders only increased the attraction to Islam of the indigenous people?

Is it a small wonder that the Crusaders never received the sympathy or loyalty of the indigenous people; even the indigenous Christians soon grew weary of them and the Crusaders essentially became the hostages of the thick and high walls of their fortresses, and merely foreign "pilgrims" in a foreign land that wanted only one thing from them: their quick departure.

Well....as Jesus said: "Let the dead bury the dead."

Life goes on.

Salaam,

Abdur

[ 04-04-2002: Message edited by: Abdur Islamovic ]

Dear Friends in Christ,

I am not on this forum to attack the Roman Catholic Church, therefore what follows is evidence not necessarily of Church persecution against the Orthodox, but man's perverse extremism when secular ideals override love.

In 1985 I served with an elderly Byleorussian priest in Toronto who told me about the destruction of Orthodox Churches in Poland. He gave me a copy of his autobiography which described in details the hatred and anger between the two confessions. Again we are reminded of the genocide against the Serbian Orthodox (well documented and requiring a strong stomach to read and view the photographic evidence). The point I want to make is that my Catholic friends would have never been involved in such horrendous persecution. Some of them do not even know about the events that are being discussed here.

Man's inhumanity towards man, will always be with us. I am glad to be Orthodox here in the USA.

Yours in Christ,
Fr Serafim

www.fatherserafim.info [fatherserafim.info]

Dear Abdur,

You are right, of course, but again we must guard against over-generalizing.

Not all Crusaders were bad and they eventually did become the medium by which Arabic culture and learning entered into Europe.

The Eastern peoples didn't like the Crusaders, but they didn't like the Muslims either. For them, it was a question of which was the lesser of two evils, really.

And there are instances where Orthodox communities venerate as martyrs Crusaders killed fighting the Turks and others, such as the cult of St John the Crusader on Cyprus and elsewhere.

Many later Orthodox armies took up the symbolism of the Crusaders as did the Kozaks who considered themselves "Orthodox Crusaders" fighting the Turk and liberating Christians from slavery.

They adopted the Crusader flag, the white Cross on a red field, which is still the Kozak flag and is popular.

As for history being history, it is all a question of interpretation, truly.

Alex

Well perhaps I could be wrong. But the prostitution thing on the alters strikes me as an exageration. I am aware and do believe the Crusaders did many sinful things but I can't help to feel that much of the stuff written is either mythical or exaggerated. Again, white catholics in the US have never been over joyed with black Americans, yet I just can't imagine catholics orginized in a mob burning down black Churches. There is certain things catholics will do in an orginized fashion and things they won't do. At least this is my experience. But then it is a matter of fact that you can have twenty people observe the same event and all twenty will give you a different account of what happened.

Abdur, what is the 9-11 depection in predominately Arab and or Muslim countries, of the events of 9-11. I've heard that a number of Muslims believe that the Jews orgistrated the entire event. Infact I'm sure it is possible to find this in writing. I hear people that are pro-Israelie demonize the Palestinians and vice versa. Supposedly the Palestinians are so violent and heartless that they send their children out to be gunned down on purpose so it can be shown on tv and move the hearts of compassionate Americans. Supposedly all the Palestinaians are are blood thirsty animals who don't have an IQ high enough to run a civilized and peaceful society as Israel. -- Is this true?

Dear Maximus,

I never said you were wrong, Friend. I wasn't there myself, so I don't know. (It sounds like it would have been interesting, had we been . . . .

That exaggeration would have naturally come into play - that is a sure thing.

Pope Innocent III, the pope who met St Francis of Assisi, was himself shocked by the reports of what the Crusaders did, even though he later learned to accept the status quo.

It was really the attacks of the Crusaders that solidified that separation of Eastern and Western Churches, starting in 1204.

God bless,

Alex

I'm surprised no one has mentioned the one thing that would really stop this-security.

Even if St. Sophia was returned to the EP, the security surrounding it would probably have to be on the order of the White House, and would probably not be a good idea given the contemporary situation in the Middle East.
I believe the Cathedral is right in the thick of things in Istanbul, and then you would have to patrol the Sea of Marmara, or whatever it is called, as well, etc.

I would not want to be put in charge of the logistics, thats for sure.

MK