“ANOTHER New Monotheistic Religion? But We Just Got THIS One Going–!”
31 July 2006 by Eve
By popular demand (*cough* Sean’s *cough*), I’ve undertaken (none too wisely, it seems) what is turning into a pretty huge task: collecting, sorting, synthesizing, and making manageable some basic information on the Crusades, Inquisitions, and the Great Witch Hunts of Europe. I’m running into such fascinating material along the way to the Crusades in the eleventh century, however, that it’s been really hard just boiling things down to the facts. So please forgive me if I skim over what otherwise would make entire posts in and of themselves on this journey through the youth of the Christian world…
The story thus far: Theo the Great’s death in 395 split the Roman Empire into the Eastern Roman (a.k.a. Byzantine) Empire, which would continue united for a few more centuries, and the Western Roman Empire, which would begin almost immediately to fragment under the pressure of complex forces, including Orthodox vs. Arian struggles, conversion movements, migrations, and fluid political, economic, and military patterns (see “Christian” Persecution).
Barely had the Middle Ages begun in Europe when a little phenomenon called the birth of Islam occurred way over in what is today modern Saudi Arabia.
A new monotheistic religion directly influenced by Christianity and Judaism, and founded by the Arab prophet Muhammad in the 600s, Islam spread like wildfire across the Middle East. The former Roman province of Palestine and its capital city of Jerusalem soon fell to the Muslims in their expansion in 638, but since the Islamic conquerors didn’t interrupt or interfere with Christian pilgrimage to and within the Holy Land, Western Europe paid little attention at first to these developments. The Byzantine Empire, however, watched the new religion’s rapid spread with well-founded concern.
As “People of the Book” (the Bible’s Old Testament, for Muhammad also considered Abraham the progenitor of the Arabic peoples), Jews and Christians experienced more tolerance under Islamic rule than followers of other religions did, but they still paid taxes as non-Muslims and couldn’t bear arms or testify in court at trials that involved Muslims. Although the new religion remained mostly tolerant toward non-Muslims, conversion to Islam was always attractive not only for strictly religious reasons but also for the obvious advantages of belonging to the ruling, often majority religion.
Inexorably, the Muslims annexed the Mediterranean coast of Africa until they stood poised to invade Europe via the Iberian Peninsula. Some experts claim that the heirs of Christian Visigothic King Wittiza actually invited them into Spain on April 30, 711 in hopes of winning the current civil war with the aid of such powerful allies. The Moors soon swept over and controlled most of Iberia and before long, aimed their formidable forces at today’s France - and the rest of Europe beyond.
(Note: Islamic civilization, especially under the Caliphate centered in Baghdad, is a whole field of study in and of itself. Muslim scholars made great advances in mathematics, science, and medicine, including giving the West our numeral system, and like Christian monks, translated and thus preserved many works of the ancient Greco-Roman world. Not to mention giving us A Thousand and One Nights - but don’t go by the children’s version; you need Burton’s original unexpurgated translation to get a taste of its rich and often erotic complexity. Digression over.)
What Western civilization would be like today had Islam overrun Europe back then we’ll never know, because on October 10, 732, Frankish leader Charles Martel (“the Hammer”) defeated the Moors at the Battle of Tours (or Poitiers), halting their northward expansion. He parlayed this victory into the establishment of his own Carolingian Empire, which his famous descendant Charlemagne turned into the Holy Roman Empire, often using such ruthless means as forcible conversion to Christianity of conquered peoples like the Saxons in the late eighth century.
(Another note: The Carolingian Empire is another example of too much information to be adequately covered in such a small space. Often referred to as the “Father of Europe,” Charlemagne made highly significant administrative reforms in money, education, writing, government, military, and religion, impacting European culture and society for years to come. He, along with his semi-legendary champion Roland, also inspired art and literature, most famously in stirring epic poems such as Ariosto’s “Orlando Furioso” [1516]. This digression also over.)
Other than a brief jihad by sea, during which Muslim ships harried Christian vessels, the Moors basically settled down to run the Iberian Peninsula – and to their credit, run it very well. Especially here, Jews and Christians enjoyed a relatively high social status, although many converted to Islam because of the greater advantages of belonging to the religion in power, which soon became the majority religion as well. Among other subjects, the philosophy, medicine, and science of the age flourished in Spain under Muslim rule, but internal conflicts began to disrupt the kingdom, and the unconquered Christian areas soon rallied themselves to begin pushing at their Moorish occupiers.
When in the late 800s the Carolingian Empire ended and the local European borders stabilized under continued Christianization, affairs in Spain attracted scores of soldier knights who now had few places to practice their military profession. The guerrilla warfare of the Christian princes of Galicia, Asturias, Navarre, and Basque country against the Moors gave these knights a chance to employ their battle skills – and reinforce their faith against a common infidel enemy in the struggle that came to be known as the “Reconquista” (”Reconquest”).
(Just one more note: The Reconquista lasted several centuries and ended in the eventual victory of the Christians against the Moors. Like the Carolingian Empire, it also fired the imaginations of poets and dramatists, especially in the historical figure of Rodrigo Diaz de Vivar “El Cid,” knight-prince extraordinaire of the Spanish Christian forces.)
This sense of Christian identity strengthened into a mostly unified zealous piety throughout Western Europe, but it really started to crystallize into equally powerful purpose with the 1009 sacking of the pilgrimage hospice and destruction of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem by the Muslim Caliph al-Hakim bi-Amr Allah. The thunderclouds of the Crusades had begun to gather on the horizon…
Next: Heresy and the Big Break-Up
31 July 2006, on 8:59 pm
Great read, Eve. A diarist over at dailykos called “Unitary Moonbat” has dropped some serious knowledge on the Crusades- all the way up through the Albigensian and Children’s. Might be a good spot for some of that “data mining” that W. is always on about. I found them informative anyway. How ’bout some Old Man On the Mountain/Alamut, you know, Hassan al Sabbah- or ibn al-Sabbah- and the Cult of the Hashishim?
31 July 2006, on 9:23 pm
Yeah, great job Eve! I particularly liked this:
Although the new religion remained mostly tolerant toward non-Muslims, conversion to Islam was always attractive not only for strictly religious reasons but also for the obvious advantages of belonging to the ruling, often majority religion.
Which i why I am of the opinion that religions are forms of governance rather than guides to spirituality.
“Sorry, you don’t follow God/Buddha/Allah/Flying spaghetti monster, so the law can’t help you!
And don’t get me started on the on the Arian and Saxon massacres by the Holy Roman Empire!
31 July 2006, on 9:39 pm
Thanks for the 4-1-1, Raindog; I’m trying to find a new angle to write from on all these subjects, since so many of them have been done to death. This post, despite all my best efforts, still sounds an awful lot like filler-on-the-way-to-the-good-stuff to me. And the Hashishim is a great idea; it might actually dovetail in with something else I’m working on.
Rat, I was only able to just touch upon the Arian conflict and forcible conversions of the Saxon by Charlemagne in my “Persecution” post and the beginning of this one; like I apologized above, once in a while I’m just gonna hafta summarize!
31 July 2006, on 9:42 pm
Don’t sell yourself short, Eve. You did a fine job.
31 July 2006, on 9:53 pm
Eve, this post does seem like it’s on the way to good stuff but the road there is strewn with good stuff along the way. It’s a huge undertaking and every sidenote or digression is probably worthy of a post in and of itself, so it’s probably a little dissatisfying having to pass them up. I’m enjoying it and have one more suggestion:
The fight over Icons in the 7th-8th century Eastern(Byzantine)Church and whether the Islamic prohibition on Iconography is in some way related.
31 July 2006, on 9:57 pm
“Which i why I am of the opinion that religions are forms of governance rather than guides to spirituality.” Not really. Religions are more like philosophies with unprovable beliefs added on.
31 July 2006, on 10:06 pm
Petersen, you dumb ass, did you not read the part where the non moslems were denied the right to due process? Or on the other side, forced conversions, mass murders, crusades and inquisitions?
Moslems have ALWAYS killed atheists, by the way. Right from the beginning? Philiosophies do not have enforcement/oppression mechanisms built into them.
Oh, don’t adhere to the philiosophy? BLAM! You’re dead! Next!
31 July 2006, on 10:08 pm
*grumbles as takes notes* “Fight over Icons in 7-8th-c. Byzantine Church” - crap, more cursed research - “and Possible Relation to–”
Raindog, Rat, thanks again for the kudos. One of the great things about posting here is that commenters can help me fill in gaps, suggest further lines of research, and otherwise give me faboo ideas.
31 July 2006, on 11:05 pm
RainDog,
I think I have a partial answer for you. According to my Mirriam Webster Encyclopedia on World , there’s a reference to what’s known as Aniconism, which is the opposition to to the use of icons and/or visual images to depict living creatres or religious figures. It seems that Islam borrowed this idea from Byzantium (via the Old testament?), and Jews also had this ban in place, but did not enforce as severely as Islam has.
Of course, this was all borne out of the a fear of idolatry.
It als oseems that the Byzantines had their won little jihad over pictures. Known a the Iconoclatic controversy, Emperor Leo III had taken a public stand against icons after several centuries of lax enforcement of the “craven image” clause in the bibble, and in 730 their use was prohibited.
Of course, as religions do, there wa a wave of persecution of “idol worshippers” that grew more brutal when Constantine V came into power in 741.
This subsided in 787, when empress Irene convoked the the 7th ecumenical council at Nicaea. Iconoclasts came back into power in 814, banned it again, then lost power in 842, thus ending the ban for good. They designated a feast day for this final restoration, called the Feast of Orthodoxy.
I don’t see any reference to the Islam/Byzantine conflict that would suggest Aniconism as a root of said conflict, though.
31 July 2006, on 11:06 pm
Shit. that’s M.W.’s Encyclopedia on World Religions.
31 July 2006, on 11:22 pm
Next time someone claims that Jews stole Palestine, show them this, and call them a hypocrite.
The pedophile followers really knocked out the Zoroastrians in Persia.
I’m pretty sure the Zoroastrians were the first monotheistic religion, and the Jews and especially the Christians hijacked that religion.
31 July 2006, on 11:27 pm
Random bit of trivia–Charles Martel’s son was named Pippin “The Short”.
31 July 2006, on 11:28 pm
Yeah, Rat, Iconoclasts Leo III and son, Constantine Copronymus- so named for purportedly fouling his baptismal font, were the forefront of the Iconoclast movement. Their opponents were “Iconodules”. I already knew the Byzantine side of things from grad school but the focus wasn’t on the inception of Islam, so I just wondered if their ban was influenced by or borrowed from the Orthodox. Thanks. Personally, I’ve banned all images of George W. Bush in my household because there’s something both evil and vapid about that smirk.
Couple more topics, Eve: Gnostics, Mithraism, Mel Gibson’s Holocaust-denying father, Hutton, Cathar/Albigensian heresy, the Nichomachean(sp?)Ethics, Hannibal’s Dad, Hamilcar, Disneyworld at Thanksgiving, um, Submit A Drawing of Mohammed Day- any publicity is good publicity.
31 July 2006, on 11:30 pm
Battle of GayBar? Pepin the Short? What about the Merovingians or the Plantagenets?
31 July 2006, on 11:44 pm
Constantine Copronymus? Didst thou shat himself, and yea, the fecal matter was blessed, so it was given to the masses who rejoiced in their shitty religious idol-idoicy.
Do not worship idols; worship my shit.
But, what’s the difference?
Gawd will have to get back with you on that one…
1 August 2006, on 12:04 am
What a project Eve!; “We’re not worthy”!
I’m enjoying the read, as well as the usual literate incites of our regulars!
“Pepin the Short?”…an abreviation perhaps of: “Peepin’ in the shorts”?
1 August 2006, on 12:45 am
Another great and illuminating post by Eve, our prof. of Mythology and Lore (Marcus, too, when the mood striketh him!)
1 August 2006, on 2:41 am
TAJ:
I’m pretty sure the Zoroastrians were the first monotheistic religion, and the Jews and especially the Christians hijacked that religion.
No, that would be Akhenaton, who tossed out the polytheism in Egypt in favor of the worship of Aton, 1353-1356 BCE. Zoroastrianism came along around 628 BCE.
Eve:
Muslim scholars made great advances in mathematics, science, and medicine, including giving the West our numeral system, and like Christian monks, translated and thus preserved many works of the ancient Greco-Roman world.
Very good. Note the concept of zero originated in India, & was transported to the Arab world, who in turn passed it to Western civilization. I try to bear that in mind as I use my computer.
Averroës kept Hellenistic traditions alive during the middle ages, preserving the works of Aristotle, & had a deep influence on Aquinas.
1 August 2006, on 7:35 am
[...] “ANOTHER New Monotheistic Religion? But We Just Got THIS One Going–!” [...]
1 August 2006, on 9:36 am
Eve,
Very nicely done- I enjoy the effort you put into these.
Sean,
“Marcus, too, when the mood striketh him!”
Heh… it’s hard for me to be erudite when I’m having so much fun.
1 August 2006, on 3:49 pm
Great post, Eve. A lot of research went into gathering this information and finding links, etc. and is appreciated.
1 August 2006, on 4:00 pm
*still taking notes* “Disneyworld at Thanksgiving,” “Akhenaton”…
Damn, I better get through the Middle Ages first!
2 August 2006, on 3:40 pm
I don’t know, there is some people who think the Zoroastrians date back to 1500 BC.
2 August 2006, on 6:28 pm
TAJ:
I don’t know, there is some people who think the Zoroastrians date back to 1500 BC.
http://www.answers.com/topic/zoroaster -
“(born c. 628, probably Rhages, Iran-died c. 551 BCE) Iranian religious reformer and prophet, founder of Zoroastrianism and Parsiism. ”
Thus far, Akhenaton is in the lead.
Who knows, maybe they’ll unearth something a week from today, that’ll tip the world on its ear?
Have you read anything by Osman? He’s got some pretty wild theories (Moses was Akhenaton, or his bro, something like that).
2 August 2006, on 6:42 pm
RA, I’ve read the Moses = Akhenaton theory; I think it would make a great premise for fiction (seeing as how the evidence is still pretty thin).
I too would love for them to discover something ear-tipping (like 10,000-year-old human ruins that could confirm the Atlantis myth?).
2 August 2006, on 7:38 pm
Most scholars agree that Plato was speaking of the Volcanic eruption and subsequent annihilation of the civilization on Thera when he spoke of Atlantis. Today, the island resembles a rolled out pie crust with the circular pie part missing. However, I apparently have the sign of the Atlanteans on my palm.
2 August 2006, on 7:43 pm
Akhenaten- the heretic, was also very tall and may have suffered from Marfan’s Syndrome. I’ve always wanted a Syndrome named after me…
2 August 2006, on 8:32 pm
The religion was founded by Zarathushtra (Zoroaster in Greek; Zarthosht in India and Persia). Conservative Zoroastrians assign a date of 6000 BCE to the founding of the religion; other followers estimate 600 BCE. Historians and religious scholars generally date his life sometime between 1500 and 1000 BCE on the basis of his style of writing.
http://www.religioustolerance.org/zoroastr.htm
2 August 2006, on 8:36 pm
Eve:
RA, I’ve read the Moses = Akhenaton theory; I think it would make a great premise for fiction (seeing as how the evidence is still pretty thin).
Yeah, Osman gets pretty far out there. He also claim King Tut was jebus.
I’m approaching it w/brains firmly in place. He did identify Joseph as Amenhotep’s father-in-law, not that that firms up some of his theories. He’s a hard read: way too much data overload.
Trimmed down to a timeline though, it makes a weird sort of sense…but the jury’s still out & deliberating.
RDG:
I’ve always wanted a Syndrome named after me…
Here’s a tip of the glass, to hoping you never do.
2 August 2006, on 9:00 pm
RDZ
What is it’s symptomology? Does it hurt or is it a mind consuming syndrome. We could name one for you just to be on the safe side though. You know, just in case.
2 August 2006, on 9:07 pm
Hmmm, RA, I didn’t know about Osman’s theory on Jesus = King Tut; isn’t the timeline *way* off there? Moses as Akhenaton makes a lot more sense to me; I remember reading an American or English writer agreeing with Osman’s position, but I can’t recall his name. He was really woo-woo, claiming that the ancient Egyptians also possessed the secret to making monoatomic gold, and elongating their lives and travelling through time and space with it (or some such whackadoolery).
AJ, it seems there’s a lack of consensus on Zoroaster’s timeline overall; Wikipedia says, “Zoroaster is generally accepted as a historical figure, but efforts to date Zoroaster vary widely. Scholarly estimates are usually roughly near 1200 BC, making him a candidate as the founder of the earliest religion based on revealed scripture, while others place him anywhere between the 18th and the 6th centuries BC.”
Of course, I don’t know if Akhenaton’s beliefs can be described as “revealed scripture,” since the ancient Egyptians didn’t really approach religion that way in general. I think I might post on this subject in the future, for sure…
2 August 2006, on 9:22 pm
Marfan’s is what the world’s tallest man had.
“Skeletal manifestations of Marfan’s syndrome are the most obvious. Patients are tall and lanky, with long extremities. Scoliosis and joint hypermobility are common. There are also associated sternal and spinal deformities.”
I want “Raindog Syndrome” to mean when somebody is still so close to their simian ancestors that their eyes almost cross with the strain of thinking- i.e., most fundies. A long look at Ann Coulter’s wrists shows she might be a candidate.
2 August 2006, on 10:20 pm
RDZ,
It’s like she has one of the Alien face-grabbers eating her arm.
2 August 2006, on 10:46 pm
Ooops, I meant Ann was a Marfan’s candidate.
3 August 2006, on 2:48 am
Eve:
Hmmm, RA, I didn’t know about Osman’s theory on Jesus = King Tut; isn’t the timeline *way* off there? Moses as Akhenaton makes a lot more sense to me; I remember reading an American or English writer agreeing with Osman’s position, but I can’t recall his name. He was really woo-woo, claiming that the ancient Egyptians also possessed the secret to making monoatomic gold, and elongating their lives and travelling through time and space with it (or some such whackadoolery).
I acutally was lent 3 books, by a good friend. 1 is titled ‘Jesus in the House of the Pharaohs’.
Biggest problems w/Osman: he cherrypicks a lot, believes the Exodus took place, & leaps about like water on a hot griddle. It’s weird, but the timeline he has in the appendices makes more sense than the entire book, which is why I don’t dismiss him outright. His book(s) are somewhat disorganized.
‘Whackadoolery’. I love it! Can I use it, pwetty, pwetty pwease?
As to Zoroaster: I almost always go to answers.com (a subsidiary? of Wiki), inasmuch as it provides a Wiki, Encyclopedia, & oodles of cross-references (contingent on the subject).
3 August 2006, on 2:27 pm
Soitanly you can use “whackadoolery,” RA; I like it ‘coz it sounds like “tomfoolery!”
I really just started using answers.com yesterday and I agree, it’s really comprehensive. King Tut = Jesus - might be worth some investigating…
3 August 2006, on 4:10 pm
Eve:
Soitanly you can use “whackadoolery,” RA; I like it ‘coz it sounds like “tomfoolery!”
Hey, Moe! She’s a wise guy! OOOOHHH, you make me so mad! Er-RUFF, Er-Ruff, Woooo-woo-woo - dammit, I really DO do a killer Curly impression. Pee-wee Herman, too (at least the laugh).
I really just started using answers.com yesterday and I agree, it’s really comprehensive.
Well, I started steering clear of Wiki after I saw that post on it here, & saw the Wiki entry for Bush, where some dolt(s) edited to read that Bush was gay, & getting a divorce from Laura.
King Tut = Jesus - might be worth some investigating…
I think I may be posting on this sometime in the very near future. I rather enjoy poking around in fringe theories & whatnot, as the imaginations of religious folks are…tres intriguing, to say the least.
4 August 2006, on 9:55 pm
Go for it, RA!
7 August 2006, on 9:26 pm
[...] The Story Thus Far: The Christian “Reconquista” movement against the Moorish occupation of the Iberian Peninsula and “Mad” Caliph al-Hakim bin-Amr Allah’s 1009 destruction of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Islam-controlled Jerusalem finally directed the attention of mostly Christian Western Europe to the now-mostly Muslim Middle East (see “ANOTHER New Monotheistic Religion? But We Just Got THIS One Started–!”)… [...]
14 August 2006, on 5:53 am
If any of you are interested in the Moses/Akhnaten scenario … good old Sigmund Freud dabbled in that topic himself in a book titled: “Moses and Monotheism,” which extensively makes the argument that Moses was an Egyptian nobleman who followed the teachings of Akhnaten. He even psychoanalyzed him/them…
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0394700147/002-8497405-1665635?v=glance&n=283155
14 August 2006, on 5:57 pm
Thanks for the tip, Kafir!