Holy War: The Crusades and Their Impact on Today's World [Paperback]

Karen Armstrong (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 27, 2001

Karen Armstrong, bestselling author of A History of God, skillfully narrates this history of the Crusades with a view toward their profound and continuing influence.

In 1095 Pope Urban II summoned Christian warriors to take up the cross and reconquer the Holy Land. Thus began the holy wars that would focus the power of Europe against a common enemy and become the stuff of romantic legend. In reality the Crusades were a series of rabidly savage conflicts in the name of piety. And, as Armstrong demonstrates in this fascinating book, their legacy of religious violence continues today in the Middle East, where the age-old conflict of Christians, Jews, and Muslims persists.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Judaism, Christianity and Islam--obviously central to Middle East crises today--were also at the crux of the Crusades nearly 1000 years ago. Maps.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Library Journal

Recent historians have convincingly demonstrated that 13th-century European governments institutionalized three forms of irrational bigotry that have tragically affected the modern world: anti-Semitism, anti-homosexuality, and anti-Islam. This important book, which brings the perspective of a student of theology and literature who also knows traditional political history, sees the medieval Crusades as the root of current Middle East conflicts. Such a view substantiates the historical interpretation. The book attempts a "triple vision" of the concept of crusade or holy war for Jews, Christians, and Muslims, tracing the religious origins of conflict among the three peoples to their differing interpretations of scripture, the secular origins to 19th-century nationalism and imperialism. The result is an erudite, balanced, and lucidly written study which shows that false images, ridiculous perceptions, and absurd demons have haunted all three peoples. A mine of useful information on Muslim-Western perceptions of each other, this book for the general reader can be beneficially read by scholars and Middle Eastern experts.
-Bennett D. Hill, Georgetown Univ., Washington, D.C.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 628 pages
• Publisher: Anchor Books; 2nd edition (November 27, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0385721404
• ISBN-13: 978-0385721400
• Product Dimensions: 5.2 x 1.5 x 8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (81 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #190,186 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Karen Armstrong is the author of numerous other books on religious affairs-including A History of God, The Battle for God, Holy War, Islam, Buddha, and The Great Transformation-and two memoirs, Through the Narrow Gate and The Spiral Staircase. Her work has been translated into forty-five languages. She has addressed members of the U.S. Congress on three occasions; lectured to policy makers at the U.S. State Department; participated in the World Economic Forum in New York, Jordan, and Davos; addressed the Council on Foreign Relations in Washington and New York; is increasingly invited to speak in Muslim countries; and is now an ambassador for the UN Alliance of Civilizations. In February 2008 she was awarded the TED Prize and is currently working with TED on a major international project to launch and propagate a Charter for Compassion, created online by the general public and crafted by leading thinkers in Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, and Buddhism, to be signed in the fall of 2009 by a thousand religious and secular leaders. She lives in London.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

24 of 26 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The crusades in modern context, November 25, 2004

By 

frumiousb "frumiousb" (Amsterdam, the Netherlands) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (TOP 500 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Holy War: The Crusades and Their Impact on Today's World (Paperback)

As is abundantly clear from the title, in Holy War Armstrong develops the thesis that the Crusades had a lasting impact which persists into the present. Perhaps the larger point that she is making is that the relationship between Islam/Christianity/Judaism today needs to be seen in the context of the past (including the more distant past) rather than being seen ahistorically.

Armstrong structures the book to support her thesis-- interspersing chapters relating to the current history of Jerusalem and Palestine with chapters about the major waves of crusades. It is not clear when you buy the book that you are going to get so much modern Middle Eastern history, and potential buyers should be aware of this as it may cause some frustration if you are expecting a book more like The Crusades Through Arab Eyes or a straight up crusading history.

In the reviews here at Amazon and in other forums there have been broad accusations of pro-Islamic bias levelled at Armstrong. I believe these accusations to be largely in error. If you read more than one of her books, Armstrong has dedicated herself to her notion of triple vision. Her stated project is to foster understanding between the three religions by talking directly to the misconceptions that we hold about each other. The writing in Holy War makes very clear that she intends the book for a western audience. Accordingly, she spends a great deal of time explaining the Islamic perspective under the assumption that it will be the point of view most lacking from the potential audience. I assume that were her presumed audience to be primarily Islamic she would probably irritate them by constantly defending the Christians.

However, it does seems that in this book Armstrong lends herself more readily to accusations of bias through a number of significant elisions. For instance, she doesn't mention the aggressive pre-crusades contact between Christians and Muslims. Nor does she detail in any length the period that she refers to as the Islamic dark ages. It may be a serious miscalculation on her part to fail to understand that an audience wears its hair shirt more readily if it believes that its neighbor has to wear one as well.

Readers should also not be fooled by the misleading introduction to the new edition-- the book itself has not been updated past its 1991 US release. Recent events in the middle east (or elsewhere) have not been addressed.

Overall, Holy War should be interesting to a wide variety of audiences. It is not as smooth as some of her later books (Battle for God is my personal favorite). Nor is it always comfortable to read. Armstrong has taken on a large project in her writing, and chosen an arena where to attempt objectivity is difficult at best, and thankless at worst. Read it for yourself and see what you think.

91 of 111 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Rich with facts, but not even-handed, March 30, 2004

By 

M. A Michaud "michael_michaud" (Dulles, VA United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Holy War (Hardcover)

Even those of us who have studied the Crusades will learn much from this book. Armstrong digs deep into the events of the crusading era, providing freshly perceived context for those military and religious ventures. Her learning is impressive.

Her objectivity is less so. While Armstrong condemns religiously motivated aggression by Western European Christians, she passes much more lightly over the earlier behavior of Islamic conquerors who also were driven by religious zeal. At one point, she writes that "It is obvious that the Muslim ideal of holy war is very different from the Crusade: it is essentially defensive whereas the Crusaders, like the Jewish holy warriors, had made a holy initiative when they attacked the enemies of God and his chosen people." Yet earlier in the same book she had written "It was the duty of the Muslim state (the house of Islam) to conquer the rest of the non-Muslim world (the House of War) so that the world could reflect the divine unity." How is this morally preferable to crusading theory?

Those who were crushed by Islamic expansionists in the seventh and eighth centuries seem to have been forgotten. Ask the Iranians how they feel about the Muslim conquest of Persia. The memory is hardly golden.

58 of 73 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Dangerously Misleading, April 15, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: Holy War: The Crusades and Their Impact on Today's World (Paperback)

As a non-Muslim citizen of an Islamic country, I must say that this is a very, very dangerously misleading book. From the onset of the book, it is clear where the author's sympathies lie. The western reader is "almost deceived" to think that the Crusaders were attacking a community of peace-loving Muslims in their homeland, without reason, when in fact the lands contested in the Crusades formed the heartland and cradle of Christianity. I use the phrase "almost deceived" because whilst the author acknowledges the pre-Crusades Muslim conquests, it is only when the Crusades is mentioned that the author becomes unduly critical, thereby implying that there was some unmentioned justification in the Muslim conquests.

Right from the beginning of this book, the author seems to insinuate that the Crusades (which was first started in 1096) is the source of the enmity between the Christians and the Muslims and in the absence of such provocation from the western Christians, many of today's problems would not exist.

How could this be? If the author's arguments are correct, then it does not explain why for hundreds of years before the First Crusade, the Muslims have been warring against the Christians and Jews. Even during Muhammad's lifetime, some of those who were subjugated in his wars in Arabia, were Christians and Jews. After the death of Muhammad, the Muslims poured out from Arabia and without provocation, conquered the then Christian Middle East and North Africa. How can the invasion of Spain and France in the 700s be attributed to the Crusades/western aggression? How does one justify the Turkish invasion of the Balkans, whose inhabitants were Orthodox Christians who viewed the Catholic Crusaders as heretics?

How does one link the Crusades to the aggression and attrocities committed by the Muslim armies in Western Africa, Persia, Central Asia, and the Indian subcontinent, where the inhabitants were not even Christians? How does one explain the persecution and even killings of the Coptic Christians in Egypt up to the present day and the 20th century genocide against the Armenians, who were not involved in the Crusades? How can one link the present conflict in the Middle East to the Crusades? Have the Jews ever waged a "crusade" against the Muslims?

If one would only go to a religious school in an Islamic country, like say Pakistan, and ask a boy why they are urged to wage war against America and Israel. Is it the Crusades? No. It is because we are Muslims and they are Christians and Jews. Period.

The Quran says:
"Fight those who do not believe in Allah, nor in the latter day, nor do they prohibit what Allah and His Apostle have prohibited, nor follow the religion of truth, out of those who have been given the Book, until they pay the tax in acknowledgment of superiority and they are in a state of subjection."

The very notion of Jihad is fundamental to Islam and is the Prophet Muhammad's equivalent to Jesus' "Go ye and preach the gospel to the world". By insinuating that Jihad is a reaction to western aggression, the author shows a poor understanding of Islam.

Because of this Islamic expansionist ideology to subjugate and conquer the infidel, there are bound to be many wars of conquests and retaliation between the Muslims and the "infidels". Take the reconquest of Spain, are the Christians not entitled to self-defence and recovery of the land.

Before I am thought of as another bigoted Christian, I wish to clarify that I am actually a non-religious Asian, who alienated by what seems to be a White Christianity while residing in the West, came very close to converting to Islam at one point until I was put off when I learned that the Prophet himself killed many people.

For those in the West who are interested in knowing more about Islam's relationship with Christianity, I suggest that they read "Jihad in the West" by Paul Fregosi together with "The Decline of Eastern Christianity under Islam" by Bat Ye'or. An excellent book giving some information on the Jewish communities in Islamic lands is "Jewish Communities in Exotic Places" by Ken Blady.