The strive for power is often done at the expense of the lives of others. This idea is largely seen throughout history but is more specifically seen in the popes’ crave for power during the Crusades. The Crusades were a series of military campaigns from 1095 to the end of the 13th century that were religiously aimed at taking back the Holy Land from Islamic rule. The Crusades started when the Byzantine Empire was losing territory to the Turks, who was starting to gain control of Anatolia, the main population of the empire. To solve this, the Byzantine Empire asked Pope Urban II for troops from the West to help defeat the Turkish threats. As a result, Urban II made a speech to the Western Christians about reclaiming the Holy Land from Muslim …show more content…
As a pope of the Western Empire, Pope Urban II wanted more power over earthly rulers, such as kings and noble vassals. This conflict was known as the Investiture Controversy, which was the struggle of power between the Pope and the political system. This controversy started after the Kings had intruded the pope’s sacred right to run his own business by picking the men who constituted the church. As a result, in order to gain more papal authority over the kings, Urban II decided to shift “the theatre of action in this political conflict to an arena where medieval kings had traditionally reigned supreme, the battlefield. In doing so, Urban usurped the prerogative most secular rulers had claimed traditionally to declare an enemy and muster troops for battle,” conveying how Pope Urban II used the Crusades to assert more authority over the secular rulers by claiming their prerogative of declaring an enemy and mustering troops for battle (Crusades). Through these actions, Pope Urban II was able to boost his position and take control of the battlefield, despite the fact that it was originally meant to be ruled by kings. Moreover, another pope who wanted to assert papal authority over others was Innocent III, who during the Fourth Crusade, wanted to, “impose a Christian monarchy over the whole of the known world. He had long wanted the Eastern Orthodox Church to bow to the authority of Rome,” thereby indicating how like Urban II, Innocent III had also used the Crusades to his political advantage as a way to take control of the Eastern Orthodox Church (Crusades). Innocent III had realized, by using the Crusades, he would be able to gain papal leadership not just over kings, but also over papal leadership in the East as well, thus causing this to serve as a motivation for him in the Crusades. By
Foss explains, “What Urban needed was an enterprise, clearly virtuous in serving the ends of Christiandome… in these moments of reflection, the popes mind turned towards Jerusalem.” Urban II reflects back on the first taking of the Holy City after the defeat of the Byzantine Empire in 1071, and begins to question what his people know about the Turkish race and really the ideology of Islamic thought. Foss goes on to examine the ignorance of westerners and needed to be “reminded [by the pope] of the infamous heathens, their cruelty and hatred of Christians,” hoping this would justify the first Holy Crusade. However, Foss identifies the creativity of the Pope’s language to persuade the knights and army of the people to embark on the Holy Crusade based on the Muslims cruel actions turned onto their fellow Christians. Claiming the Muslims “Killed captives by torture…poor captives were whipped…and others were bound to the post and used as a target for arrows.” Foss examines the Popes words as an effective effort of persuasion in creating an army of crusaders to help clean “…Holy places, which are now treated with ignominy and polluted with Filthiness” and any sacrifice in Jerusalem is a “promise of a spiritual reward… and death for
After hearing about Pope Urban II’s pronouncement, huge amounts of people are now moving across Europe! However, most of these first responders seem to be religious people as opposed to lords and knights. Since taking back the Holy Land is not as important to these knights and lords, it is understandable that they haven’t been rushing to fight.
The First Crusade was a widely appealing armed pilgrimage, and mobilized a vast conquering force at a time when the Christian Church was moving towards centralization and greater political influence in Europe. The Church gained a wider audience more accepting of its leadership, benefitted economically, and developed its own militarily force. These outcomes, along with the Church’s documented ambition to expand and its reversal of prior teachings, support the idea that the First Crusade was a deliberate political maneuver, intended to to expand and consolidate the authority of the
Kings often struggled with the Church over power and land, both trying desperately to obtain them, both committing atrocities to hold onto them. Time and time again, the Popes of the postclassical period went to great extremes to secure the Church’s position in the world. Both the Crusades and the Inquisition are examples of this. D...
Among some of the largest conflicts in the world stand the Crusades; a brutal conflict that lasted over 200 years and was debatably one of the largest armed religious conflicts in the history of humankind. Since this is so clearly an event of importance, historians have searched vigorously for the true answer as to why the crusades began. Ultimately, because of accusatory views on both the sides of the Christians and of the Muslims, the two groups grew in such hatred of each other that they began to act in deep discrimination of each other. Moreover, Christian motives seemed to be driven mostly by the capture of Jerusalem, the dark ages of Europe and the common-folks desperation for land, wealth, and a spot in heaven. What seems to be continually
This was enough to convince about 60,000 Europeans, many of them peasants to start on the First Crusade to the Holy Land ("THE CRUSADES TO THE HOLY LAND”). Many of the soldiers who went on the Crusades also hoped to acquire land and riches and return a war hero. This was the first time the Catholic Church had seen penitential warfare- “warfare in the service and defense of the Church for the ‘remission of your sins’”("THE CRUSADES TO THE HOLY LAND”). The whole mentality of the Crusades was to destroy any other beliefs including paganism and Judaism, which lead to all kinds of violence and persecution, with Jews becoming a common target, even entire Jewish communities were slaughtered ("How Christianity Rose to Dominate Europe."). Even the Christians were not safe, as many were killed in settlements along the way. Pope Urban was the one who brought out this idea that it was okay to kill non-Christians, and, even beyond that, IF you went to the Holy Land on a Crusade, you received a free ticket to heaven even if you died there. Does this sound a little bit familiar? Perhaps a little like those who truly believe that they’re gaining salvation by blowing up a group of innocent people along with themselves? Or flying a plane full of passengers into building full of people? Well, the First Crusaders marched to Jerusalem leaving death and
Some of the most widely-repeated interpretations of the Crusaders are that they are viewed as either motivated by greed or religion. According to Riley-Smith, historians throughout history have had various flipping beliefs as to what motivated the Crusaders on their raiding. Riley-Smith believes that views change "to reflect the mood of the times." He disagrees with the view that the Crusaders were motivated by greed because there is no direct evidence to bolster the contention that the Crusaders took these rash measures "to prevent the break-up of their estates" or because they were attracted "by the hope of adventure, spoils, and land overseas." He believes that many historians have disregarded motivation from religion because of a disdain
In the perspective of the Pope if the land is won over he gains more authority, wealth, and property. The Crusade for the Pope was more of the land then the ideology. The spiritual preference was the way of manipulating the people into agreeing and joining.
When Pope Urban II called for a Crusade to liberate Jerusalem from Muslim forces and also to aid the Byzantine Empire which was under Muslim attack both Permit the Hermit and Godfrey of Bouillon volunteered to be in the crusade in order to help the crusaders take back the Holy Land and Liberate it and to assist the Byzantine Empire. They both led people in the Crusade and went into battle. This meant that they had to kill people if they ever wanted to control the areas they were trying to take over. Both of their men would capture towns and cities that they come across and eliminated everybody in it until they reach Jerusalem and capture
The significance of Pope Urban II’s role in the First Crusade has been debated amongst historians. Monks and Clerics dominated literature in Europe during 1095-1120 and therefore their testimony emphasised upon the religious impact of Pope Urban in conceiving the expedition of the crusades often holding him up as a man of great significance. However, this is one perspective of the significance of Pope Urban between 1095-1120 but some Historians have attempted to broaden their research and use different methodology to investigate this perspective and thus have drawn a range of conclusions and created different interpretations of the First Crusade and the significance of Pope Urban II and the Papal response. Thomas Asbridge’s overall interpretation is that the First Crusade was an attempt for Pope Urban II to seek Church reform by expanding their power and to unite all Christians as there has been tension between
During the Crusades, the Pope’s aspiration for power originated from political reasons. In 1095, there were many problems in the Christian land the Pope couldn’t do much about. For example, there was a great deal of fighting between knights and nobles, and the Pope had very little power (Visual, NA). When the Church tried to reform it by ordering a truce, it did not work. So when the Pope saw the holy land was controlled by Muslims that did not allow them to go there, he decided to use that as a way to restore order in the Church (Crusades, NA). He knew it would solve the problems he was faced with because it would send all the fighting knights away to war, and if they captured Jerusalem he would have control over the most sought out land, giving him power (Crusades, NA). He knew that many knights won’t want to leave the land when they can claim the land that another knight left when they went to war. So to ensure more knights’ participation, he promises remissions from all sins committed. However, the Pope knew he must convince more people than just knight to win Jerusalem and that reason is what Urban states in his speech. “Or rather the Lord, beseech you as Chris...
Pope Urban beckoned for the Christian people to take back the holy land only on the values that he set in the recollections, “The Call for Crusade” whereas the values are pretty much broken when the crusaders sack the Christian city of Constantinople from “Annals” Pope Urban was under minded ultimately by the Christian warriors and leaders.
Vanessa Brake says the same thing. “Pope Urban II launched the First Crusade by calling upon his fellow Christians to reclaim the Holy City of Jerusalem, and to seek revenge on the followers of Islam, whom he accused of committing horrendous crimes against Christendom”. These men for whatever reason; selfishness, self-glory, riches, power, fear, godly power, took up the cross to the Holy Land to fight the foreign threat.
In the 11th century, Christianity underwent many changes. The church split in 1054, after many years of lack of communication between the east and west. The church also had many problems on its own, where power-hungry, greedy popes and bishops ruled the church. This continued in 1095, when Pope Urban II preached the First Crusade to aid emperor Alexius and the Byzantines against the Turks. This was a call from God to aid the Christian Byzantines against the “enemies of Christ”--those who were not Christian and were living in the Holy Land--but in reality, was only a move for power. The Crusades were caused primarily by the desire for political and economic gain.
...f Pope Urban II. The Turks were expanding their land into the Catholic Church reach; this new fear of even more land loss to the Turks as well as the ideal of claiming Jerusalem for the Catholic Church lead to the start of the First Crusade a “Holy War.” This land never belonged to any European country, yet the Church deemed it fit for the European countries to capture it as well as the lands in between. Pope Urban II called back all the churches bishops and abbots back to Vatican. Once these religious leaders returned back to the Vatican, the Pope made a decree to them, “‘Concerning this Affair, I, with Suppliant prayer – not I, but the Lord – exhort you, heralds of Christ, to persuade all of whatever class, both knight and footmen, both rich and poor, in numerous edicts, to strive to help expel that wicked face from our Christian lands before it is too late.’”