Crusades
“If someone strikes you on the right cheek, assemble an army and slaughter them all. Deus vult!”
The Crusades. What do you think of when that subject comes up? A preacher in a pulpit asking his congregation to confess their sins and book a holiday in Israel? The Salvation Army lecturing you on the dangers of the demon drink? Or a fancy dress theme knight to remember, where you hope to finish the evening and head out to look for trouble? Perhaps your imagination stretches to the images of men in shining armour and flowing cloaks as they gallop over the sand chasing after fleeing foreigners and entering a harem to help themselves to Turkish delight and Egyptian belly dancers.
Well, historically speaking The Crusades was a specific time when Catholic Europeans were encouraged to emigrate to the Middle East and found a new nation dedicated to the Christian savior. It was a time when people of all races put aside their differences to fight over religion. They took at least nine attempts to do this but were an eventual failure. Still hasn't stopped other people using this description to throw a silk mantle over their pet causes.
Origins
The Crusades were launched by the Pope Urban II at a press conference in Clermont, France, in 1095. It should have been held in Rome, but Urban preferred France as they had better food and their women were much more ... owyoozay ... friendly. His home city was also full of German tourists who wanted to kill him, but that's another story. (See Holy Roman Empire if you want the full gizzards.)
Urban (or Urbane as he is known in French) had received a scented letter from the Byzantine Emperor Alexis Skintandbrokethelotofus asking for money to bail out his lands from foreclosure by the Seljuk Turk Debt Collection Agency. Alexis said it would be the end of his dynasty and "the end of Christendom and my contract". Perhaps because of a faulty translation or a drunk priest, the message became scrambled: "Jerusalem has fallen to Islamic fanatics." What Urban forgot to mention was that Jerusalem had been lost to the Muslims in 638 – but no one watched CNN in those days.
The response to this (old) news exceeded all expectations. Europeans were now told Jerusalem was a Land of Milk and Honey, Ben and Jerry's, Mc and Donald and that all they needed was to follow their local religious preacher due east and the Holy Land would be liberated. Urban slapped himself on the back for coming up with an epoch-making decision and guaranteeing that his encyclopedic entry in the future would be a big one.
In France, Germany, England, Belgium, Luxemburg, South America, and other places Christians – who were out of work and hope – responded by stitching the new Crusade fashion-logo (crosses) on everything. Each country had a different-coloured cross. The French initially sewed red crosses on white but the English claimed they had filed an earlier patent on the design, thanks to that Anglo-Saxon hero ... er, Saint George. The French eventually went with a double cross-and-helix design in white on blue. The Germans chose sharp-edged black crosses whilst others made it up as they went along. All agreed: Jerusalem had to be Christian again. So who were the great antagonists in all this?
Christianity
The Christians traced their ownership of Jerusalem back to Jesus of Nazareth. They had had a contract on the Holy Land ever since Jesus was born in Bethlehem and the town won a competition to host his birth on a local radio station. Though Jesus's mother was disqualified on a residency issue (which is why Jesus is not logically known as "Jesus of Bethlehem") the town welcomed his birth, as it was a much-needed economic boost to the mainly pastoral agricultural community. Not much is known of his early life, except that Jesus spent his youth hiding in his parents' basement practicing dark magic, namely misanthropic Luciferian chaos magic and exorcisms. Jesus also pulled rabbits out of hats, but those stories are exclusive to the apocryphal Gospel According to David Copperfield.
When he was 30 Jesus went around telling people God was going to increase his TV ratings. They needed to accept this by loving each other and forgiving everybody and shit like that. Since no one important really cared about what he said, Jesus spent a lot of his time with common people telling them, "We're all equal in the eyes of God." He stole a goat belonging to a goat-herder by declaring that, since he was the son of God, everything belonged to him. The herder (who was from a Jewish tribe) reported him to the elders of Zion, who as we all know control the world power, including the world power of that time, i.e. Romans and MSNBC. The Romans also feared Jesus because of his scary monster-biker friends, his uncircumcised penis, and his extremely oversized nut-sack collectively known as "The Jew Baiter". (Jesus always knew how to make cool pals.)
Jesus's publicity campaign backfired when he was arrested and crucified by Roman soldiers on demand of the Jews. The Roman Governator Pontius Arnold Pilate had tried to palm off responsibility to the Jewish leader Herod Antipas but in the end ordered Jesus nailed up on the planks to mark the start of Passover.
Three days after his crucifixion Jesus was found by his followers, apparently alive (quite undead actually). He told them crucifixion sucked (literally), and that if they wanted eternal life, he would have to bite them and they would have to drink his blood. He also told them his death was part of God's plan and that they should spread God's words and the hope of life after death by infecting as many mortals as possible with this gift. Meanwhile, Jerusalem became a pagan town and Christians were mocked in all the pagan comedy clubs.
Christianity finally returned to Jerusalem with the help of Emperor Constantine the Great. The city was dug up to look for the spot where Jesus had been killed (well not really of course). A church was built on the site and the city became thoroughly Christianized. Churches, chapels, prayer halls, and parking lots were all turned over to God. The good times (for Christians) lasted another three hundred years until a new religion came on the scene.
Islam
In contrast to Christians, the Muslims claimed they owned Jerusalem as their prophet Mohammad had ridden a magic horse all the way to the Temple Mount and had jumped off into the sky to meet God. This remarkable event happened when the Byzantines controlled the city, but no one mentioned any suicidal horse jockeys at the time.
Mohammad was born in Mecca in 570. Whereas Jesus waited until he was 30 to begin his mission, Mohammad had idled about for another ten years before starting out on his religious awakening. Having tried a number of jobs – including, allegedly, weapons trader and soft fruit smuggler – he finally got lucky and married a rich widow. Perhaps getting bored and wondering if that was all he needed to do in life, Mohammad decided to do some rock climbing outside the city, and in 610 he claimed to have met the Angel Gabriel in a cave. He was looking for someone to take down dictation as God wanted to update his message to humanity. This document is known as The Qu’ran.
Mohammad returned to the city and began urging his fellow Meccans to turn away from bingo and belly dancing and look to God for the answer. Instead of random numbers and lubricating oils, God's answer as delivered via Mohammad looked a bit crap to the Meccans so they told Mohammad to leave town if he wanted to keep his knee caps. The budding prophet, his family, and all his friends and servants survived the plane crash outside Medina. This journey is called the Hijra.
Once in Medina (then called Yahooville), Mohammad's entourage needed to expand. By now Mecca was "gamed out" and Mohammad returned back a hero. He destroyed the gambling clubs and launched Islam. It was around this time that he also popped over to Jerusalem as had hoped to persuade the Jews that he was their messiah but they said that Mohammad was wrong as he won too easily – a true messiah would have to suffer a lot more for his religion.
Following the brush off Mohammad went ahead and started to trade his new monotheistic religion as "the final answer to the last question" on the issue of What God Really Really Wants. There were just Five Pillars or steps to learn:
- Mohammad has got the final message.
- Allah lives alone. He goes on to the internet sometimes.
- Men can have up to four wives. Women can have four cats.
- Make a pilgrimage to Disneyland every year. Don't drink on the plane.
- Google Earth is an untrustworthy source of information.
Jerusalem was deemed the Third Holy City after Medina and Mecca. (Dubai hopes to replace one of them soon.) When Mohammad died his followers went on to conquer half the known world to get over it. Jerusalem was taken and a mosque built in the shape of a horse and trampoline to mark Mohammad's celestial jumping off point.
Judaism
Who? Not important. The pro-Israel lobby in the USA was very weak at this time.
History (condensed)
There were ten official crusades between 1095 and 2001. Some received Papal backing/sponsorship, others relied on national leaders to get their women folk to sew crosses on their surcoats and abstain from sex whilst on active duty. Most missed the Holy Land by some considerable margin, ending up in Constantinople, Alexandria, Tunis and ... er, St. Tropez.
Rip-offs, fakes, etc.
Salvation
What Pope Urban discovered was that if you offered anyone salvation, they would kill just about everyone in the name of Jesus Christ. Fornicate like a rabbit today but if you squeeze a cross and say your prayers without cursing God will still let you into Heaven. Just sign or leave your handprint. It was a fantastic scheme and the Holy Land looked like a lovely sunny place compared to the compounded houses of crap built in Europe at this time.
If you join in a crusade you get for free a nice cross to put in your hearth; if you have no cross a Muslim or a Jew can kill you everywhere and you may get eaten by a grue. If you were a crusader you can get the eternal salvation granted by God or just burn in hell for a while. Most people chose to burn in Hell as it's a wicked cool party spot.
In 1291 the last crusader outposts in the Holy Land were uprooted and their settlements destroyed. (Payback time!) There were some other crusades against pagans in the Baltic, the Turks when they crossed into Eastern Europe and the ongoing crusade in Spain against the Moors (finished in 1492) but none of these were connected with retaking Jerusalem. Later crusades were about alcohol and sin. Former US President George Dubya Bush brought it back to the original intention in 2001 with the War Against Turbans.
Military monastic orders
Once the Holy Land had been reclaimed for Christian power, the authorities realised they needed more than travel agents and representatives to keep the Muslims out. But as this was also Christ's Own Land, the new policing powers would have to combine piety, cruelty and business acumen – holy men who would combine piety and skull-splitting in equal measure. It was an ingenious combination.
The first recruits tended to be filthy old hermits or traffic wardens but once these new "military orders" got their uniforms and benefits, and special zero-tax status, the quality of the recruits eventually rose. So in this fashion emerged the Knights Templar, the Knights of St. John (also called the Hospitallers as they were originally incompetent medical students) and finally the Teutonic knights, a German-only order.
The one "MMO" everyone wanted to join were the Knights in White Satin. They were difficult to locate as their head office was located in a wardrobe round the back of the Church of the Holy Lion in Narnia Street. A contemporary chronicler of the time who was in the Holy Land to sell concert tickets said these knights were the "hardest, toughest but most tender" of all Christian soldiers, who always respected women. There was an attempt to set up a military order for nuns by Queen Eleanor of France (and then later England). They were called the "Chaste Chevaliers of Madonna" and wore iron conical bras to scare the Muslin enemy. However, they were suppressed by their brother military orders who found them a "battlefield distraction".
Knights Templar
The Templar knights were founded in AD 1118 to protect the caravans of cardinals trying to take ... sorry, pray at the Holy Land. The Templars were called Templars because they liked Simon Templar, a resident DJ at Club Dogma (Edinburgh), as he played bangin' techno music, and bore an uncanny resemblance to Roger Moore. Once you joined the Templars, you were barred from entertaining women and were expected to "whip your physical desires out" every Friday. Since they wore a red cross on a white shirt, the Templars' laundry bills were vast.
An alternative to physically abusing yourself was to go and attack any "uppity" Muslims, Jews or non-Catholic Christians who got in your way. Later on it was claimed the Templars worshipped a bat called Baphomet. This at least was the allegation once some Templars confessed to later when the Inquisition held their genitals over an open hearth fire. When the Holy Land was eventually lost to the Muslims, the Templars were blamed for taking more interest in business rather than war. King Philip IV of France asked to see their accounts and when the Templars declined, arm twisted the Pope Clement V (who was living in France under a false passport) in having the military order squashed.
Those Templars who escaped then brought down Philip's home website by spamming it with lots of little red crosses. When this didn't stop the French king, a Templar broke his vows on bestiality and dressed up as a wild boar to gore Philip to death at pig racing derby. But it was too late. The Templars were 14th-century fish-and-chip paper.
Facts about the Templars
- They rode in pairs on horses as they liked performing acrobatic stunts before battle.
- The Illuminati are really Templars.
- Leonardo da Vinci liked bats.
- Confiscated Templar treasure help fund Charles De Gaulle's nuclear weapons programme.
- They didn't wear anything underneath their tunics.
- They drove purple pimpmobiles into battle.
- Masons are Templars but not vice versa.
- Templars are the guardians of the Holy Trousers.
- They all played D&D and World of Warcraft, along with other Satanic stuff.
- James Bond is a lapsed Templar. His weakness for gin and women forced him to leave.
Order of the Hospital of St. John
The Knights of St. John were created before the Templars in 1111 (all ones). They were called "the Hospitallers" as they liked to hang around the beds of dying pilgrims to make them change their wills in favour of the church. ("We will not save you from the Muslims, n00B pilgrim!")
The "Medical Boys" as they were also called liked to wind up the notoriously staid Templars. They would mix severed fingers in the Templars soup or test their rivals vows of sanctity by slipping in a few naked nurses into the dormitories to see how far the "Temps" could maintain their vows.
When the Holy Land was lost, the Hospitallers sneaked into Rhodes and grabbed power. A couple centuries later they were forced by the Turks to move and bought Malta from Spain. Whilst the Templars had gone into banking, the Hospitallers became "ship inspectors", confiscating non-Christian crews and their cargo "for the cause".
Facts about the Hospitallers
- They were actually worse than the Templars, but claim to be better than Templars.
- Actually, they are a bunch of bishops and politicians.
- They cut the heads of the Templars (when no one was watching).
- They copied the colours of the Teutonics and reversed them. n00bz!
- They were allergic to top hats.
- Their ambulance service are excellent at treating injured knights and sick horses.
- Senior managers in the Order are allowed three assistants to attend their many needs.
- These are not specified.
Teutonic knights
The Teutonic knights were created during the Third Crusade by Germans ashamed their army had bollocksed up letting their leader Emperor Frederick Barbarossa go for a lengthy swim in a full suit of armour.
Their order was open only to "German or German-looking" men. They lived on a diet of sweaty sausage and strong mustard. The Teutonic knights wore white with an Age of Empires menace of a black jagged cross. The Teutonic knights' presence in the Holy Land forced even the Templars and Hospitallers to forget their mutual hatred and turn their scorn on these upstarts.
The Teutonic knights were asked to hand in their manual How to Tell a Terrorist From a Muslim to one titled How to Tell a Terrorist From a Pagan. Pope Innocent III suggested that the Teutonics should look for enemies elsewhere. They eventually moved to the Baltic and got to work on the local pagan tribes. The Order did very well at first and included the Russians (Schismatics!) on the list of enemies they don't need papal permission to bash. The Teutonic knights developed a reputation for merciless revenge and attracted other Christian warriors to join them. However, when in 1387 their main enemy the pagan Lithuanian Grand Duchy converted to Christianity and joined Poland in a marital alliance, the knights lost their main customer (for strikes against the head). Where now can these soldiers go on crusade? A Polish-Lithuanian army provided an answer by killing many of them in 1410 at the Battle of Grunwald. The Teutonic knights struggled on for another 115 years until one of its Grand Masters declared himself Duke of Prussia and placed a spikey crown on his head.
Facts about the Teutonic knights
- They were Teutonic.
- They were knights.
- They were German (no Hitler).
- Only Germans were allowed to be Teutonic knights. (German racism strikes again!)
- They were used as propaganda for Nazi Germany yet oppressed by the same regime (two-faced bastards).
- They claimed to be Templars and Hospitallers.
- They claimed to have the St. Paul Hospital.
- They wore super strange retarded wings and horns on their helmets. (Satanist heretics!)
- They were duffed up by Poles.
- They were all ex power rangers.
- Although many were furious soldiers, they could say "THE POWER OF CHRIST!!!" only with three exclamation marks!!!
- Presently, Angela Merkel is considered to be the last remaining Teutonic knight alive today.
Recent crusades
The Templars are now "an invisible order" (like the Ku Klux Klan) so they can be anyone or no one. The Hospitallers are still around, split into Protestant and Catholic teams. The Teutonic knights later became the SS.
Harrison Ford and Sean Connery led the Last Crusade to find the Holy Grail. The film finale should have been in Jerusalem but Steven Spielberg changed that to a desert location.
See also
