Urban's
Speech at Claremont
and Recruiting for the Crusades
A Paper by Shoeless Wanderer
http://www.shoelesswander.net
Please do not redistribute without permission
When
Pope Urban II addressed the Council of Clermont in 1095, he asked western
Christians to aid the Byzantine church in a struggle to regain the Holy Land from Muslim invaders. Although accounts
of the council have not been well kept, several accounts of Urban's speech have
survived; a testament to the speech's power.
These accounts contain great discrepancy in describing what Urban said
to the council, but contain universal themes that helped to recruit soldiers
for the crusading effort.
Although
they were written to appeal to different audiences, the accounts of Fulcher of
Chartres, Robert the Monk and Gesta Francorum have several key themes in
common. The most important aspect of all of the accounts is the emphasis
on the importance of going on a crusade to regain the Holy
Land. Each makes it painstakingly clear that by going on a
crusade, the person in question was following the will of God. Fulcher of
Chartes makes this point explicit when he recounts Urban II saying, "God
has put you as stewards over his family to minister to it. Happy indeed
will you be if he finds you faithful in your stewardship."
As religious piety was a key part of medieval life, this statement
and others similar to it appealed not only to the nobles and knights in Western Europe, but to the lay people as well. The
other aspect that the texts emphasize is that by going to free the Holy Land from "a race utterly alienated from God” crusaders
follow in the footsteps of Jesus. According to Gesta Franncorum Urban
said "if anyone desired to follow the Lord zealously, with a pure
heart and mind, and wished faithfully to bear the cross after Him, he would no
longer hesitate to take up the way to the Holy Sepulcher."
This rhetoric further emphasized the fact that Crusades were holy warfare and
moreover, an act of devotion. By emphasizing these two aspects of Urban's
speech at Clermont, the appeal of the first Crusade attracted nobility and lay
people alike to take up arms and become Crusaders. The nobles were attracted to the idea of
glory as well as gaining land, as were the lay people. Moreover, the aspect that made it the most
attractive was that this war was in the name of God.
Some changes were made to Urban's speech, primarily to emphasize different
aspects of the crusades for recruiting purposes. Robert the Monk and
Fulcher of Chartes go into great detail about the violent rulers of Jerusalem. This
"accursed race" is responsible for overtaking Christian lands,
destroying churches and alters, circumcising Christians, raping women,
"devastating the [Byzantine] empire" and torturing people to
death. These
actions are described in rather disturbing detail, most likely to cause outrage
amongst those hearing the account of what horrors are occurring in the holy
city of Jerusalem. By
writing about such violence in the one place on earth that is supposed to
reflect God's kingdom in Heaven, it was easy to recruit many angered nobles and
lay people to engage in the crusade effort. The rulers of Jerusalem were also demonized to a great extent, making
their presence in the Holy Land that much more
unacceptable. Robert the Monk’s vivid depictions of the gruesome and
outrageous actions of the rulers over Jerusalem
according only continue to make them appear to be less than human. By
demonizing the Muslims, the crusade was justified. People were not being killed, after all. Rather, when one went on a crusade one was
expelling a plague of demons, much like Jesus himself. Using this angle,
knights who had nothing better to do than to kill each other could channel
their violence in a more productive manner. In addition, this also
allowed for the papacy to explain why the crusades were justified.
Fighting and killing demons was not the same as fighting and killing
other people. This subtle difference helped immensely in gaining
crusaders.
What is curious when comparing the documents is that while Robert the Monk is
said to have used Gesta Francorum as a source, the two bear very few
similarities in terms of content. Robert the Monk's account of Urban II's
speech emphasizes the violence occurring in Jerusalem whereas Gesta Francorum does not
mention violence anywhere. Robert's documentation of the Speech at Claremont is said to have been written approximately
twenty five years after the speech was given, so it is plausible that the
violence described within his writings is a reflection of the war effort
occurring in Jerusalem
at the time the text was written rather than when Urban addressed the council
in 1095. However, both documents share a similar emphasis on how the
Crusades were a means of following in the footsteps of Jesus. Gesta emphasizes the
spiritual aspect and importance of the crusades, as Urban is said to have drawn
parallels to Jesus saying "Ye must suffer much in My name," which is similar to Robert's account where he
relates that "He that taketh not his cross and followeth after me, is not
worth of me."
Both authors use the example of Jesus' suffering to suggest that
crusaders continue on in the tradition of suffering great agony for the benefit
of many, just as Christ died for the sins of humanity.
Something that goes unnoted in Gesta
Francorum and Robert the Monk but is given prominent space in the account of
Fulcher of Chartres is remission of sin for crusaders. Fulcher reports Urban saying “All who
die…shall have immediate remission of sins,” and
then lamenting the conquest of Christians being ruled over by a race “which
worships demons.” However, it seems that some of the motivation
for granting the remission of sins was because of the widespread senseless
violence throughout Western Europe in the form
of mercenaries, robbers and violent knights seeking out sparring matches due to
boredom. It seems that including Fulcher’s
relation Urban’s laments toward Western Europe would be counter productive if
the account of Fulcher was used as crusade recruitment material, as the lines
about robbers, people fighting against their relatives and mercenaries are
certainly insulting to the very people that Urban hopes will sign up to join
the crusade. Perhaps the promise of the
remission of sins would be enough for people to gloss over the insults, but the
ending indicates that rather than insult and belittle those being addressed in
the speech, Urban sees the crusade as a chance for reform, such as the line,
“Let those for a long time, have been robbers, now become knights.” Since the language used suggests
transformation rather than simply insulting and condemning actions, it is easy
to see why the sorts of people addressed would still be willing to go on a
crusade. By going, they could transform
from an ungodly life to gaining glory by fighting for God. The remission of sins were an added
incentive, designed to encourage those already considering going to fight in
the Holy Land.
The fact that remission of sins is not included in the other texts is
curious, but it seems that Robert the Monk and the Gesta Francorum were less
concerned with providing that particular incentive and more interested in the
devotional aspect of a crusade, appealing to crusaders with a more spiritual
side in mind.
While various accounts of Pope Urban
II’s speech at Claremont
contain central themes relating to the divine nature of embarking on a crusade,
no two accounts agree on the exact details of what Urban said. The differing accounts instead indicate that
while the sanctioned nature of the first crusade was appealing to many, details
had to be added or excluded to appeal to a specific group in order to have the
readers agree to fight the Muslims in Jerusalem. The emphasis varied from a focus on the
rulers of Jerusalem
persecuting Christians to following in the footsteps of Jesus to promise of forgiveness of sins. Despite the various differences in the
accounts of Urban’s speech at Claremont,
the universal appeals within these accounts helped to recruit various nobles,
knights and lay people to the cause of the first crusade.