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Why Is The Crusades Justified Dbq

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The Crusades were Holy Wars during the 11th century that intended to expand Christian territory. The Crusades began when Christians initiated military campaigns to take control of the Holy Lands around the city of Jerusalem. Ever since the fall of the Roman Empire, Christianity had been so strong that people were able to spread it through campaigning. Different people from the time period of the Crusades have varying viewpoints on it, a few of which being that the Crusades caused fear and destruction, the violence of the Crusades were justified because of religious reasons, and that the Crusades were not only harmful to Muslims, but Jews and Christians.
The first viewpoint believed by many is that the Crusades caused fear and destruction. Documents 4 and 5 especially support this opinion. These sources both explain the demolition caused in Southwest Asia by the Europeans during the Crusades. Document 4, the excerpt from The Crusades Through the Arabs Eyes, describes the torture and murder of Arabs by Franks. One vivid description in the source is, “The Franks arrived at dawn. It was carnage. As Ibn …show more content…

Documents 3 and 7 support this opinion. Document 3 shows the harm Christians brought to Jews during the Crusades. The writer of this chronicle describes how heavily the Jews prayed in fear of the Christians attacks. A piece of information not mentioned in this document, but that is relevant to the topic, is that attacks during the Crusades on Jews originally started from small groups of peasants and were condemned by the Church, but soon the Jews started getting attacked by bigger and bigger mobs. The author of Source 7, is outraged by the attacks on Christians from Crusaders, and believes it is a violation of the Church. A quote describing these attacks is, “the divine body and blood of Christ was spilled upon the ground or thrown about,”

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