Holy War

9-11, 2001.

Terrorists who call themselves warriors of God

against the crusaders of the West.

Two religions that demand peace

yet wage war throughout history.

Epochs of confrontation and collaboration.

Peoples and powers who fight in the name of God,

but who struggle for supremacy on Earth.

In the 11th century A.D., a monumental conflict

erupts over control of the Holy Land.

Christians are under threat.

The Pope calls for a crusade in the name of God.

The aim is the conquest of Jerusalem.

But are the Christian knights

really just fighting for their faith?

The so-called Holy War against the Muslims

will continue for two centuries.

Jerusalem, June 10, 99.

The crusaders arrive at the city walls.

For the first time, the self-styled armed pilgrims

catch a glimpse of their final destination.

They've been traveling for three years.

Many thousand crusaders had set out to the Holy Land

with an entourage ten times as large.

Only a third have reached the Holy City.

For now, all hardship seems to be forgotten.

The Pope promised all crusaders

the remission of their sins if they come

to the aid of their Christian brothers in Palestine

and free the holy sites of Muslim rule.

Commanders like Raymond of Toulouse, and Godfrey of Bouillon

have one burning desire in common.

They're determined to restore Christian rule

in the Holy Land, especially over Jerusalem

and the Tomb of Christ.

According to contemporary belief,

this was the land of the Lord, and of his heritage.

Jerusalem had been ruled

by Christian Byzantines for centuries.

In 638, the city was conquered by the followers of Muhammed.

Muslim rule was essentially tolerant

towards Jews and Christians.

But in the 11th century, there had been reports

of repeated attacks on Christian pilgrims.

The crusaders want to put an end to this.

News of the siege arrives at Damascus, 150 miles north.

The Muslim scholar, Al-Sulami,

wants to receive update information on the Christian army.

A messenger informs him

that the Christians are attacking Jerusalem.

They carry crosses and pray to God to invoke his help,

and there are many of them.

Al-Sulami is convinced that the attack

by the European Christians is no ordinary campaign.

He realizes that they haven't just come to loot,

but to wage war in the name of God.

The Siege of Jerusalem is in its fifth week.

There are no negotiations for a peaceful surrender.

Jerusalem's defenders have powerful weapons

to prevent a breach of the city walls.

Greek fire consists of burning oil

that can't be extinguished with water.

The Crusaders leader, Godfrey of Bouillon

knows that his knights are pushed to their limits.

Many of his men die outside the city walls.

They will go straight to Paradise,

or so the Crusaders believe.

If Jerusalem is captured by Christians,

the Muslims will lose one of their most sacred sites.

They'll also lose face before Allah.

According to the Islamic law of war,

territories conquered by Muslims

must never be lost again.

In the 11th century, the Islamic empires

stretched from India to Spain.

The Holy Land and Asia Minor,

once ruled by Byzantine Christians,

have been conquered step by step.

When Christians in the East,

asked for help from Christians in the West,

the Roman Pope takes the initiative

whilst visiting a city in France.

It's the year 1095 in Clermont,

four years prior to the Siege of Jerusalem.

In an impassioned speech, the head of the Catholic Church

will call for a crusade against the Muslim conquerors.

His name, Pope Urban the Second.

In November 1095, the successor of Saint Peter

assembles more than 200 bishops

from France, Italy and Spain.

The highlight of the Papal Synod is a ceremonial service.

Several thousand believers including noblemen and knights

have responded to the Pope's appeal.

The crowd is so large, the service

is held in a field outside of the cathedral.

Urban paints a picture of menace and threats.

He appeals to the faithful,

and to his brothers and sisters in Christ.

The infidels are stealing the territories of the Christians.

Many of them are killed, or deported without mercy.

Churches are burned down, and Jerusalem has been devastated.

Christian Byzantium is in danger.

It's the duty of every Christian

to come to the aid of his brothers in the East.

The term, brothers and sisters,

refers to the Byzantine eastern church.

Actually at the time, Christianity is deeply divided

between Catholic and Orthodox Christians,

whose center is Constantinople.

Ever since the Turkish Seljuks

drove the Byzantines out of Asia Minor,

the Christian world feels challenged.

Nomadic horsemen constitute the new great power

of the Islamic world.

As they advance, local Christians and Christian pilgrims

to the Holy Land come under attack.

The Seljuks also threatened the capital

of the Byzantine Empire, Constantinople.

The metropolis on the Bosphorus

was once the power center of the Christian world.

It's the reason why the Byzantine Emperor, Alexios,

has repeatedly asked the Pope for help

in the fight against the Seljuks.

In the summer of 1095, he writes to Urban the Second.

His letter doesn't go unnoticed.

Alexios asks Pope Urban for military support

against the Muslims, to save his empire,

and the whole of Christendom.

At Clermont, the Pope puts

the Byzantine call for help at the center of his sermon.

According to Urban, the Christians of the East

are under attack.

They're being enslaved and men and women are being defiled.

The heathen Muslims have reached

the gates of Constantinople.

All Christians are being urged to support

their Christian brethren in the East.

The Pope evidently gave a very effective sermon,

full of big gestures, and very well argued.

The Pope insists that it is God Himself

who is asking all Christians to take the cross

and go to war against the non-believing Muslims.

One attendant of the Synod,

Bishop Lambert of Arras, writes an account

of the Pope's speech at Clermont.

He describes how Urban promotes

the campaign to the Holy Land.

Those who set off for Jerusalem

for reasons of piety, not to gain honor or money,

can expect heavenly rewards.

After the speech, those present

fell into rapturous applause.

They sewed fabric crosses to their clothes

to show they'd taken the cross for the sake of God.

According to ancient sources, they cried out,

"This is the Will of God!"

Urban declares the liberation of the Holy Land

to be a penitential pilgrimage.

He wants to unite the divided Christians under one banner.

Church power is to reign over secular power.

The Pope is to be the protector of all of Christianity.

The true representative of Christ on earth.

Urban's plan worked, maybe more than he had expected.

The response was massive.

When the participants of the Council returned home,

they ensured that news of the Pope's appeal

would spread in their region.

Christian preachers called for a crusade

to Jerusalem, the land of the children of the Israelites.

Bishops and priests announced the Pope's message

in their churches.

Itinerant preachers carry it to the countryside.

Urban the Second undoubtedly touched

the nerve of the times.

There is no other way to explain the mass movement,

which even surprised contemporaries.

Hundreds of thousands,

invited or not invited, are on their way.

Christians are asked to liberate Jerusalem

in the name of God.

Fanatic monks take it on themselves

to promote the Crusade in the name of Christ.

People flocked to them in droves.

Ordinary countrymen, peasants, craftsmen,

and members of the lower nobility.

Not exactly the knights requested by Byzantium,

nor the warriors of God that Urban had in mind.

It's an army cobbled together without a plan,

about 15,000 people in all.

The so-called Crusade of the Poor

was a reaction to the publicity for the Crusade,

which itinerant preachers and others

brought to northern France, to the low countries,

and to the Rhineland.

This rag-tag army doesn't want to wait

for the departure date set by the Pope.

Some noblemen also want to leave immediately.

The desire to attain salvation

was shared by rich and poor alike.

It seemed to be a growing concern in the 11th century,