unrepentantwarriorpriest: Warrior Culture : CrusadersThe Crusades were taken up by thousands, only a
unrepentantwarriorpriest: Warrior Culture : CrusadersThe Crusades were taken up by thousands, only a small portion of those anointed by the church. And yet these Militant Orders of the church have left us with a lasting impression, more so than the many thousands of knights soldiers and priests that surrounded them.The three main Orders of the church that shaped the Holy Lands were the the Poor Fellow-Soldiers of Christ and of the Temple of Solomon (Knights Templar), the Order of the Knights of Saint John (Knights Hospitaller) and the Order of Brothers of the German House of Saint Mary in Jerusalem (Teutonic Knights). They were Militant Orders within the church and opperated extensively during the Crusades. These Knights often surrendered their rights of inheritance, and all earthly property to the church in order to become Warrior Priests and Warrior Monks respectively. Now as clostered Soldiers of Christ they advanced on the Holy Lands. Each Order was given specific mandates at their inceptions by the Pope, and each approached these differently than the rest. However one duty they all held in common was to protect pilgrims along the long path from Europe to the Holy Sights. Protection was nessisary along the roads as bandits (both Christian and Muslim) plagued the region, and because local tribes and territories (generally Muslim) would also raid Pilgrim Caravans. A common misconception about the Crusades is that they were Imperialistic Expansions on behalf of the church. Where in reality it was a liberating movement, freeing many previously conquered Christian lands and kingdoms conquered generations earlier during Islam’s initial expansion out of the Arabic Peninsula. This is not to say that the Crusades were blameless or bloodless. As the brutalities, and tragedies of the Crusades are well documented, yet they were far fewer and less drastic than the 500 some odd Jihads depicted on the map. Under Crusader rule all were allowed to worship within the Holy City of Jerusalem, and attrocities like slavery and forced conversions were few and far between. Where as the Islamic invasions of Europe netted well over a milion slaves, rapes, and countless forced conversions. -- source link