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On Tuesday, May 29, 1453, the armies of the Ottoman Sultan Mehmet II entered Constantinople, breaking through the defenses of a vastly outnumbered and indomitably courageous Byzantine force. Historian Steven Runciman notes what happened next: the Muslim soldiers "slew everyone that they met in the streets, men, women, and children without discrimination. The blood ran in rivers down the steep streets from the heights of Petra toward the Golden Horn. But soon the lust for slaughter was assuaged. The soldiers realized that captives and precious objects would bring them greater profit." (The Fall of Constantinople 1453, Cambridge University Press, 1965, p. 145.)
It has come to be known as Black Tuesday, the Last Day of the World.
Some jihadists "made for the small but splendid churches by the walls, Saint George by the Charisian Gate, Saint John in Petra, and the lovely church of the monastery of the Holy Saviour in Chora, to strip them of their stores of plate and their vestments and everything else that could be torn from them. In the Chora they left the mosaics and frescoes, but they destroyed the icon of the Mother of God, the Hodigitria, the holiest picture in all Byzantium, painted, so men said, by Saint Luke himself. It had been taken there from its own church beside the Palace at the beginning of the siege, that its beneficient presence might be at hand to inspire the defenders on the walls. It was taken from its setting and hacked into four pieces." (P. 146.)
The jihadists also entered the Hagia Sophia, which for nearly a thousand years had been the grandest church in Christendom. The faithful had gathered within its hallowed walls to pray during the city’s last agony. The Muslims, according to Runciman, halted the celebration of Orthros (morning prayer); the priests, according to legend, took the sacred vessels and disappeared into the cathedral’s eastern wall, through which they shall return to complete the divine service one day. Muslim men then killed the elderly and weak and led the rest off into slavery.
Once the Muslims had thoroughly subdued Constantinople, they set out to Islamize it. According to the Muslim chronicler Hoca Sa’deddin, tutor of the sixteenth-century Sultans Murad III and Mehmed III, "churches which were within the city were emptied of their vile idols and cleansed from the filthy and idolatrous impurities and by the defacement of their images and the erection of Islamic prayer niches and pulpits many monasteries and chapels became the envy of the gardens of Paradise."
Tuesday has been regarded as unlucky by superstitious Greeks ever since.
Why did this happen?
It had been a long time coming. The once-great Empire had been by the time of this last siege of Constantinople reduced to little more than the city itself. But a few chief causes can be isolated:
1. Realpolitik. Short-sighted Byzantine Emperors such as John VI Cantacuzenes made ill-advised alliances with the Ottomans; in 1347 he invited them into Europe to aid them in a dynastic dispute, and they haven't left yet.
2. Disunity. The Western European powers were themselves disunited and preoccupied with their own affairs. Compounding that was the fact that they couldn't rally much support for a bailout of the Byzantines without an ecclesiastical unity that, when it was affected on paper by the Patriarch of Constantinople and the Emperor, was rejected by the people of the Empire. The force the West finally sent was too small, and it was annihilated by the Muslims at Varna in Bulgaria in 1444. Far too many Westerners didn't see the peril of Constantinople as their peril, and far too many Easterners subscribed to the Byzantine official Lukas Notaras' quip: "Better the turban of the Sultan than the tiara of the Pope."
Yes, well, Notaras found out otherwise when the Sultan took a liking to the official's teenage boys ("like pearls," Qur'an 52:24) and had them beheaded before his eyes when Notaras refused to give his blessing to the Sultan's taking them for his pleasure. The Pope, for all his enormities, was not likely to have done that.
Meanwhile, the world has forgotten what happened on Black Tuesday, and so many other days like it from India to Spain, and persists in the fantasy that Islam does not contain an imperialist impulse and that Muslims can be admitted without limit into Western countries without any attempt to determine how many would like ultimately to subjugate and Islamize their new countries, the way their forefathers did to Constantinople so long ago.
And today we see the same ill-informed games of realpolitik, pragmatic alliances made with those who would conquer and subjugate us, and the same disunity and finger-pointing at each other instead of unity in the face of this threat to our common survival. It is the same sentiment Pastor Niemöller bewailed in his famous poem -- may we be spared from discovering when they come for us that there is no one left to speak for us, for they have all already been taken.
I know that may be too much to ask. After all, you are a _____. What possible accord could you have with ______s? Fill in the blanks yourself. And remember when you do, that both groups you filled the blanks in with are on the list of those the mujahedin wish to subjugate.
It is fitting that Black Tuesday coincides this year with Memorial Day. For only a strong defense -- not just military, but cultural and spiritual, a civilizational defense -- will conquer the forces of jihad and keep there from being many more Black Tuesdays, many more Last Days of the World. May we mount that defense, and speedily.
Posted by Robert at May 29, 2006 5:58 PM
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It is absolutely impossible for a person with the slightest conscience to reconcile with the innumerable verses in the koran that preaches, violence, cruelty, murder, rape, plunder, inhumanity, violation of basic human rights, and degradation of women. the koran is absolutely against everything in humanity we consider civilized. we can probably forgive the inaccuracies, inconsistencies, and scientific blunders in the koran. But can we forgive the koran when we see what is being done to humanity in Islamic paradises (like Iran, Afghanistan, Sudan,ect?) In these countries we see the koran in action. The real islam in practice...If this is the real islam then imagine what will happen to the entire world if the islamist find a way to force islam on the world."ABUL KASEM"...Leaving Islam...(He paints a dark and scary world...We must yell Louder)
Posted by: storagemanager![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.jihadwatch.org/nav-commenters.gif)
at May 29, 2006 6:50 PM
DID HE DO IT BEACUSE OF THE PEACE AND LOVE HE FOUND IN THE koran?............Reuters employee issues 'Zionist pig' death threat
Worker suspended after telling American blogger: 'I look forward to day when you pigs get your throats cut'
Yaakov Lappin
A Reuters employee has been suspended after sending a death threat to an American blogger.
The message, sent from a Reuters internet account, read: "I look forward to the day when you pigs get your throats cut."
It was sent to Charles Johnson, owner of the Little Green Footballs (LGF) weblog, a popular site which often backs Israel and highlights jihadist terrorist activities.
In the threat, the Reuters staff member, who has not been named, left his email address as "zionistpig" at hotmail.com.
Reporting the message to his readers, Johnson wrote on his website: "This particular death threat is a bit different from the run of the mill hate mail we get around here, because an IP lookup on the sender reveals that he/she/it was using an account at none other than Reuters News
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3256534,00.html
at May 29, 2006 6:59 PM
Robert,
Thank-you for the reminder. And the struggle for Constantinople goes on. One day, if God so wills, we will take it back, but in the meantime the Patriarchate is under attack (and the EU thinks that it can let Turkey in).
From
http://www.archons.org/news/detail.asp?id=115
...the current survival struggle that is unfolding before us regarding the life of the Ecumenical Patriarchate to which the world community and the Orthodox faithful have barely awakened. The call to action to which all women and men of conscience should respond is the call to protect the living institution of the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople. For the greater part of eighteen centuries, the Ecumenical Patriarchate has preserved and passed on the Christian message. Through countless and unimaginable hardships it has remained as a testament to faith and the enlightment for all mankind. Over the course of the last several decades, elements in the Turkish government have systematically moved to extinguish the Ecumenical Patriarchate. Not only has an environment of religious intolerance been fomented, certain members of the Turkish state have persecuted the Orthodox clergy and laity, closed down its only theological school and confiscated its properties. The litany of aggressive persecutions is vast and ghastly.
Dominic.
Posted by: necessitasnonhabetlegem at May 29, 2006 7:14 PM
Constantinople used to be known jocularly as the city built opposite the blind. Today, it should stand as warning to all those who are blind to the barbarous islamic threat that we civilised peoples face.
Dominic.
Posted by: necessitasnonhabetlegem at May 29, 2006 7:19 PM
I think it's time for the West to acquire more than simply a will to defend, to maintain, to stand guard.
No. I think we need now a will for decisive engagement.
It's time for islam to be toppled, for that false dominion to "fall like lightening from the sky."
There lots of space up there on the ash heap of history, and I think it's time for islam to make its way thereon.
But I appreciate retelling the tale of the fall and sack of Constantinople.
By informing us of these great historic events, you provide historic context, which throws greater light upon our present day problems.
Posted by: Dan at May 29, 2006 7:23 PM
This dark day should be a warning to what the west is up against. Ironic also because it was on another Tuesday, five years coming in a few months that the jihadists struck again.
Posted by: bigcatgirl13106 at May 29, 2006 7:30 PM
"One day, if God so wills, we will take it back, but in the meantime the Patriarchate is under attack (and the EU thinks that it can let Turkey in)"
The European people do not at all want to let Turkey in! European people are mentally deficient in a million ways, but not in this special way. Answering the question: "Let Turkey into the EU or not let them in? " there is a decided NO from the people. (I guess in every country). Unfortunately politicians do not listen to their people in EU-dictatorship.
We debate the matter in forums and I'm continiously attacked with hateful statements "YOUR friends in the USA force us to let Turkey in". I'm a little helpless in these debates because I know, that the USA indeed endorse Turkey's entry to the EU and that president Bush seems to be convinced, that Turkey is a "good" Muslim country and a good friend to the West. Maybe he's right. I think, on a long term he is wrong. Surely - Turkey's armed forces are Kemalist and anti-Islamist. But how long can the military forces resist Erdogan AND the normal people, who forgot Atatürk and embrace Islam more and more?
There are many Turkish in my country, and I have lived in a Turkish quarter for the last 18 years and I know many of them. Most of them are friendly people - as long as you don't talk politics with them. I've never met a single Turkish person (in real life and on internet) who was not filled up with anti-American conspiration theories (most often cencorening nine-eleven) and eager to blame the West, especially America and Israel for all evil existing on earth.
Posted by: Eisvogel at May 29, 2006 8:12 PM
Eisvogel,
Met the same types here in the UK. I agree, we the people, do not want Turkey in the EU - or any other barbarous moslem country for that matter.
Dominic.
Posted by: necessitasnonhabetlegem at May 29, 2006 8:19 PM
ISLAM THE MINDS OF REASON............Fears that Azerbaijan has systematically destroyed hundreds of 500-year-old Christian artefacts have exploded into a diplomatic row, after Euro MPs were barred from inspecting an ancient Armenian burial site.
The predominantly Muslim country's government has been accused of "flagrant vandalism" similar to the Taliban's demolition of the Bamiyan Buddhas in Afghanistan.
http://news.independent.co.uk/europe/article621782.ece
Posted by: storagemanager at May 29, 2006 8:44 PM
Muslim men then killed the elderly and weak and led the rest off into slavery.
Which European city will be the next to fall? Paris? Or one of Sweden's cities? Or maybe Manchester or Leeds? Oh, wait they already fell didn't they?
at May 29, 2006 8:50 PM
Thanks Robert. Sadly, Muslims gained control of Constantinople after the sacking by western powers. The invading Muslims basically Islamicized this once mighty Christian city.
It is an interesting topic that is worthy of more study.
I recommend this link for more study for some brief history:
http://www.historyguide.org/ancient/lecture25b.html
at May 29, 2006 8:50 PM
Ooops. I apologize for pasting the wrong link.
Discard the last one....it is not very good.
Here is the one that I meant to send:
http://www.answers.com/topic/fall-of-constantinople
at May 29, 2006 8:55 PM
Hello!!!
The 4th Crusade!
A Italian Catholic army crushed the city in 1204. From that point on they were a shadow of their former self. No wonder why the eastern christians were scared of the western catholics. Yes it would have been better to have been ruled by the pope then some sultan but the fall of constantinople has one and only one fault....The Catholic Church. If they had tried to help their fellow christians and europeans instead of trying to always convert them to accept the almighty pope maybe the fate of Constantinople might have been different. The real point is let the generals and men of war run things NOT the church. Look at the mongols...they seemed not to have the same problems fighting the muslims yet Christian europeans could not get out of their own way despite certian advantages.
Posted by: greatcometof1577 at May 29, 2006 8:55 PM
dan wrote...No. I think we need now a will for decisive engagement.
http://www.psywarrior.com/GermanWWIPSYOP.html
As soon as they kill the absolute wrong person.
Then the fire begins.
at May 29, 2006 9:27 PM
Folks, a few posts back, Robert Spencer encouraged everybody to sign up for a copy of Ali Sina's first book (about Islam and the Muslim mind) because doing so will help bring in a top publisher for the book. Sina is a former Iranian Muslim and brilliantly devastating in his critique of Islam. To sign up for the book, click here
If before signing up for Sina's book, you want to see how brilliant and entertaining Sina can be, check out this debate in which Robert Spencer and Ali Sina teamed up together against two Muslims debaters, who never knew what hit them. This was my introduction to Sina and I was blown away.
Posted by: traeh at May 29, 2006 9:50 PM
kurtz,
Is that Col. kurtz?
Of course we can. It just takes time. We are just gearing up.
traeh,
Got ya!
at May 29, 2006 9:56 PM
The fall of Constantinople was especially satisfying for Islam as it had been a thorn in its side for near 800 years and had effectively blocked Islamic expansion to the northeast over this period. Hence they expanded in all other directions.
But do not delude yourselves that what happened there was any different to what happenened when any Islamic army took ANY defended Christian town or city. In fact, as the slaughter was stopped to allow the looting and enslavement, it may well have been less (%wise) than what happened in all of those north African or middle eastern Cities taken by Islam and the destruction may well have been less. At least Hagia Sophia is still standing. Go have a look in north Africs for any preislamic churches still standing.
Am I minimising "Black Tuesday"> No way!! I just wanted to say that it was typical of Islamic conquest to kill most and destroy all as a rule: book, church,priest.
One of the lesser know Islamic "habits" was of "clean sweeping" the countryside when they invaded. No other invading army in history has made this a permanent everyday strategy although many did it on occasions. This tactic was one where they esentially killed EVERYONE not in a defended town or city and enabled muslim expansion into these carefully maintained farms and houses. When they could not stay they ensured that the surviving locals could not either by destroying ALL crops before they left.
Even the vikings did not do this as it usually killed off the population and they had no one to raid later on. However Islam always has one eye upon expansion and an empty land is just waiting for islamic settlers and so genocide has gone hand in hand with islamic expansion throughout history. India which was heavily populated suffered even more in this regard.
I am no Islamophobe, Instead I am a misoIslamist with the vengeance of a ~1400 year history of murder, destruction, enslavement theft and the malignant diffusion of conqeror's genes over all subdued lands.
There is no other word to descibe Islam except a "PLAGUE" upon mankind, and such an inferior plague that it can only maintain success by contantly lying to and brainwashing of its adherents. If inferior islam does win then mankind will have shown that he is not good enough to survive or to deserve survival.
Posted by: Zathras at May 29, 2006 11:11 PM
ooops "northwest" not "northeast"...apologies
Posted by: Zathras at May 29, 2006 11:13 PM
Thank your for that link, treah -- I just read the "debate". I've never seen it before.
Ms. Roach is a very disturbing character. She seems to be a seething mess of contradictions, and I feel quite sorry for her. In concluding her comments she states:
"Whatever good has been said here it is from Allah and whatever bad has been said here is from me or the shaitan (satan). "
Was this a slip? After vituperating against "Christian mysogeny" and lashing out against abuse of women mainly in the West, and then whitewashing Islam's institutionalized abuse of women -- I had to read this stunning statement of self abasement several times to make sure I got it right.
Something obviously damaged this woman so profoundly that the transition from hating outside of Islam to hating from within Islam has left her completely unenlightened about herself or the world around her. Furthermore, she seems quite oblivious to her own self loathing as evidenced in this concluding quote.
I am increasingly convinced that the horrific nature of Islam stems primarily from the mangled psyche of Islam's founder Muhammad. Orpaned and abused, this man's neurosis ended was enshrined by Arabs and has peddled ever since in the 'guide to better living' known as "Islam".
Sadly, an ever widening circle of humanity (which numbers in the billions at this point) continues to suffer the rage and pathology of a single damaged personality from over 1300 ago.
STAGGERING!
Posted by: jsla at May 29, 2006 11:13 PM
Zathras,
You Are Right!
There is no quarter in the coming years. Strengthen your heart like leather, your mind like hot molten steel. There are two types of souls on the Earth today, Lions and Sheep, Be A Lion!
at May 29, 2006 11:21 PM
Bravo! Robert. excellent essay, which shows the historic continuity of Jihad over the centuries, more chilling though is the equally historic manifestation of dihimmitude and infighting among the many victims of Muslim expansion.
This is why I have express, many times, the need for global solidarity and unity of every citizen of the world, when faced with Islamic aggression.
Posted by: El Cid at May 29, 2006 11:31 PM
I remembered it was 553 years ago today that constantinople fell while I was at work. Its amazing how few people know about this horrible holocaust against an entire civilization. What was sad about the fall was that there were more greeks fighting for the turks then defending the wall. Also while the venetians fought bravery there were dhimmi genoese who sold out hoping top be spared once the city fell. They were forced to leave their colony of galata shortly after.
I have a question I read that the crescent in Islam comes from the turks. And that the turks adopted the symbol from constantinople as it was a symbol of the city. Yet I have never seen a crescent in byzantine art. Does anyone know if this story is true?
Posted by: pissedoffcanadian at May 29, 2006 11:44 PM
tsuga-
There is a third type:
Jackals.
From the nihilistic swine like Ward Churchill and Ramsay Clark to petrodollar pimps like Bill Clinton and Al Gore (among too many other former politicians to note) who are willing to sell out their Civilization for "speaking fees".
Along with "moderate" Muslims just waiting to pounce on any outnumbered prey -like the crowds in Kabul, Afghanistan who just went mad over a traffic acccident and began an "anti-American riot".
Jackals- the intermediate beast.
Posted by: profitsbeard at May 30, 2006 12:11 AM
Such good comments, thank you all.
jsla, it is staggering but I think
moh was psychotic not neurotic.
His psychosis is quite deep.
Neurotic is what we are.
And many are only asleep.
But they will wake and
the groaning earth will quake
with their power,
their will to resist
this demon's kiss of death
to their last breath.
Under a waning crescent moon
victims of jihad quietly ally,
tell our tales
and cry tears of blood,
molten tears of jihad.
at May 30, 2006 12:15 AM
Thank you for the essay on the fall of Constantinople; we need to remember. My people, the Armenians, have suffered for nearly 1400 years, either being under Islamist control, or suffered by being near it. They capped it off by trying to exterminate us in the 20th century (and recently in Baku), but we're still there, we're not giving up, and still fighting them today in Nagorno-Karabakh. Please help my people; we're on the front lines of the battle.
The Serbs are on the front lines of the battle in the Balkans but were stabbed in the back by the West. The anti-Serb propaganda about genocide was planted by a public relations firm, Ruder-Finn, that was funded my Muslim money from Saudi Arabia. The West is in the process of establishing a Muslim state in the Balkans.
at May 30, 2006 12:29 AM
kurtz 65% of ethiopia is muslim. I always wondered about that. Every ethiopian I meet is Christian. Ethiopian orthodox(similar to coptic churcht)to be precise. Yet american sites like the cia factbook always portray ethiopia as islamic. Its almost like the west wants ethiopia to be islamic.
Other interesting thing is the eritrea ethipopia civil war was always portrayed as being nationalistic. Yet eritrea was funded by arab countries. I never read this anywhere but I had an ethiopian roomate who told me Saddam funded eritrea along with other countries. eritrea is 50/50 muslim/christian.
I also agree with arius above the west is trying to establish an islamic state in the Balkans.
Why is the west so pro muslim? I just can't comprehend how ancient cultures that fought islam for centuries and endured are now being eradicated this centurwe either by western money or propoganda.
Posted by: pissedoffcanadian at May 30, 2006 2:28 AM
by coincidence I'd been reading about Jewish iconography the past few days, cabalist geometry and the numerological associations of the Sheild of David and the Menorah, the seven-branched candelabra, from the second temple. After being rescued from the Vandals by the Byzantines following the sack of Rome, it was taken to Constantinople for safe keeping... small fry amongst everything alse that was lost, but until reading this essay I'd no idea it was the anniversary. Five centuries later the Moslems still treat infidel property with the same contempt, from the churches of occupied Kosovo to the synagogues of Gush Katif to the Church of the Nativity, the Bamiyan Buddhas, Ronald McDonald, French automobiles, buildings, mass transit systems etc. etc. Incidently the Vandals got their name from a short stay in Andalusia en-route to Carthage, etymologically linking the word "vandalism" to the Moslem invaders of Europe. Vandalism is synonymous with Islamism.
Posted by: Animus at May 30, 2006 3:27 AM
Where is Western Psychologies comment on all this...
Front Page Mag carries comment from psychologists from time-to-time.
For example, there is this on suicide-bombing. It comes from a psychiatrist (and prison doctor) not a psychoanalyst and is, therefore, not burdened with questionable Freudian concepts. The doctor simply shows, by reference to a range of material and to his conversations with a patient, why he believes that they are following what has become for them an almost ineluctable emotional logic.
I'd think one might reasonably question whether he extrapolates too far from the British context (which is what he knows) and whether, therefore, he makes too much of the psychological effects of "secularization". He seems to say that violence, including death for the self, might be an extreme way of throwing off what are experienced as the temptations of modern Western society, of purifying the bomber's "tainted" soul. But I'd have to ask: would this hold elsewhere - for "Palestinian" bombers in Israel, for example?
Still, it is an interesting piece. It also suggests that Bernard Lewis's opinion on whether "suicide-bombing" counts as suicide in Islam (questioned by Robert on the other board)is a bit beside the point. No one is going to desist from such actions on the basis of legalistic opinions from Bernard Lewis if such actions have become an inner necessity for him, owing to the way his emotional economy works.
There are a few other "psychological" pieces at Front Page Mag, but they do tend to have a psychoanalytical tinge to them.
at May 30, 2006 4:13 AM
On a more general note, more power to Robert's elbow, as ever. I can't unerstand why people should, for example, look askance at Aayan Hirsi Ali, because they don't like her opinions on other issues. Well, fine, but she's done sterling service on the one where she really can help: publicizing what women have to suffer under Islam.
Posted by: Yojimbo at May 30, 2006 4:17 AM
Here is an often posted link. It is a broad overview of the muslim invasion on India. Just in case anyone is interested.
www.voi.org/books/negaind/ch2.htm
The pattern of the aggression and the actual attacks and genocides of the Hindus in thousands of towns and cities across India is the same as that of Constantinople. The phrase "rivers of blood" is also used by survivors through the centuries. 600 million Hindus in 1200 years.
Posted by: arjun.sevak at May 30, 2006 6:02 AM
the poetess,
Nice.
at May 30, 2006 6:15 AM
necessitasnonhabetlegem/Dominic.
You posted above that:
"Constantinople used to be known jocularly as the city built opposite the blind."
I had not heard this before. Is this a reference to the Turks? Could you please enlarge upon this for me?
Thanks.
Cheers to Zathras also. How are things?
at May 30, 2006 6:41 AM
necessitasnonhabetlegem/Dominic.
You posted above that:
"Constantinople used to be known jocularly as the city built opposite the blind."
I had not heard this before. Is this a reference to the Turks? Could you please enlarge upon this for me?
Thanks.
Cheers to Zathras also. How are things?
at May 30, 2006 6:43 AM
Anthony,
It was a Roman/Latin reference from the early Imperial years. It arose from the fact that the city on the opposite shore of the Bosphorus was built with dreadful harbour facilities caused by its geographical situation well before Constantinople was founded on the shores of the superb natural harbour known today as The Golden Horn. It was reckoned by the Romans that the people on the opposite shore must have been blind to have founded their city there instead of on The Horn. Therefore New Rome on the Phanar (Constantinople) was jocularly referred to as the city built opposite the blind. One of the Sybiline Oracles, I can't remember which one but Cumaea I think, also prophesied that a great city would one day be built 'opposite the blind' and this obviously added piquancy to the Roman mot juste. There is more to the prophesy but I can't remember it properly. It is something about the City falling twice to the same barbarians.
Dominic.
Posted by: necessitasnonhabetlegem at May 30, 2006 8:35 AM
I've relayed this story before, but thought the occasion required a re-airing.
I was thumbing through my daughter's World History high-school textbook last year to examine how Islam was being portrayed.
I came across the Crusader sacking of Jerusalem, where the atrocities of the Christian attackers were exposed in chilling detail. But when I came across the Ottoman sacking of Constantinople, all I found was references to the courage of the Greek defenders. Not one mention of "the rivers of blood" that Historians Runcimen and Will Durant have amply chronicled.
One can only assume that the cultural gate-keepers worked their black magic and "properly" sanitized the texts. Interesting how active Muslim-advocacy groups are in the battle of the textbooks. That's allright. It's no surprise that they would want their religion portrayed as positively as possible.
What is inexplicable is the unqualified support they are receiving from their allies on the Left (including the 9th circuit). We have a veritable fifth column operating in the West. Calls for a broad anti-Islamist coalition have to take this into account.
Posted by: Cornelius at May 30, 2006 10:07 AM
Pissedoffcanadian
CRESCENT origin: From what I've been able to discern, the crescent symbol was applied to Islam because Islam is a MOON [and therefore outdated, dark, dead and rigid] belief system. Christianity, in contrast, is a SUN [bright, glowing and alive] religion. It is interesting to me that Constantinople was the site of the 8th Ecumenical Conference in 869 during which the word and concept of the human Spirit was abolished.
Thank you, Robert, for this historical account. The Hagia Sophia was indeed tremendously important to Christianity.
Posted by: LilOleMissy at May 30, 2006 10:30 AM
I once saw a documentary about Russian cinema that opened with a line something like:"In 1453 Constantinople fell and the only community of true Christian believers in the world was left cut off and alone." They seemed to think this one event explained much of Russian culture and national character - shades of 'socialism in one country'!
Posted by: wallyUK at May 30, 2006 11:14 AM
LilOleMissy,
I am not surprised that the crescent moon is the symbol of Islam. It is connected with the moon rock in Mecca.
Posted by: bigcatgirl13106 at May 30, 2006 11:25 AM
Anthony,,,Hi!! still frothing at the mouth with what I hear and read about the scourge of the green crescent. Hope that you and your are also well and uncontaminated.
Everytime that I looked at Islamic architecture it seemed awfully familiar to me but i could not say why. However several years ago, I recalled a childhood visit to Moscow in its worst days(not my fault:)) and the obvious Byzantine buildings which tend to dominate it.
Then I realised that even islamic architecture is plagiarised and nothing but Byzantine architecture with the benefit of arabesque scrollwork.
I am no architect, so does any real archiect here wish to correct me or enlighten me further?
Posted by: Zathras at May 30, 2006 11:57 AM
Zathras,
Bohemond here told me about Byzantine cathedrals being the basis of all muslim architecture of mosques. And it figures.
at May 30, 2006 12:18 PM
profitsbeard,
profitsbeard...Jackals.
Lions, Jackals, Sheep.
Lions, Jackals, Sheep.
You had to remind me just when I was starting consider them irrelevant. Many Thanks...
Sorry for the delay, got called away.
at May 30, 2006 12:20 PM
arius wrote...Please help my people; we're on the front lines of the battle. I have contacted my Congressman regarding this issue. Stand tall as you should.
Stabbed in the back by the West... Never met an average citizen that was in support of that travesty. As a wise man said "Jackals".
See you soon!
at May 30, 2006 12:39 PM
From Kurtz above –
"If I was in charge of the CIA you can bet I'd have all kinds of covert operations going on in France, Germany and England rallying the Natives against the Muslim populations. Now that would be money well spent... "
I think a higher priority would be to “take out” the EU crowd in Brussels and their cohorts in Paris, Berlin, London, etc. These totally blind elites need to go the way of the French elites of the 1790s. They are the ones who precipitated the Islamic crisis (Bat Ye’Or’s Eurabia) and are still trying to further their goal with the Turkey admittance. They are the ones condemning the Danes. They are traitors to the European peoples. Their continuance in power will surely lead to a European caliphate.
After they are gone, we can deal with the Muslim population, but it may take more force than the CIA can muster.
at May 30, 2006 1:57 PM
It seems nothing much has changed in 553 years. It seems there is an abundance of Notarases in the dhimmi Governments and populations of Europe and the United States. Of course, had the lefties been around then, they'd have been showing their solidarity woith the Sultan.
Posted by: Spirit Of 1683 at May 30, 2006 3:17 PM
Gee, Robert, the causes of the fall of the Byzantine Empire is one huge subject that humbles the mind.
Let me add late Professor Peter Charanis' theory, built on painstaking research. I kind of followed his trail thru acts of donations and gifts and wills still extant in places outside Turkey.
Simply put, it was Byzantine piety expressed economically and socially that undermined the Empire from within. That is, huge real estate gone to monasteries--the largest peaceful transfer of real estate known until that point--which meant a huge loss of taxable income for the treasury; couples left their estates to monasteries and not to their children; young men took the monastic vows instead of fighting the Empire's battles. Young women did the same instead of getting married and bearing children.
What had been an institution where one found refuge, former emperors and princes and runnaways alike, became a choice.
The monastic model became, in the first centuries of the second millenium, the ideal. And the retreat into monasticism seemed to increase as the Ottomans advanced.
It may seem an improbable--and disturbing--theory, but the evidence is out there. And it's solid.
A survey of this huge wave of Byzantine piety is one of the most exhillarating a student can be afforded. The maps of Byzantium can't do justice to the churches and chapels and monasteries, many of them simple homesteads in the countryside, dedicated to one saint or another, many of them transferred out of pure piety, some out of concern with the dangerous times they were living, more insecure than most of us understand.
Some say that Saint Gregory Palamas and the Isichast movement he inspired were the crowning glory of late Byzantine theology. It was a retreat into the believing, struggling heart and individual salvation, still reenacted, day by day, around the clock, at Mount Athos, while the enemy was legion, and had no concept of the "heart."
at May 30, 2006 9:17 PM
Ovidius_naso,
There might be a multitude of theories on the cause of the Byzantine empire. There are a multitude of theories on the cause of the Indus Valley Civilization, too. I, put the cause at lack of ruthlessness. I have not read much about Byzantine, but, myself being a Hindu, do know that we lost to muslims because we were not ruthless enough to annihilate the enemy, to seek its roots and destroy it. If you are interested, you can follow the thread, "three Indians killed in Kashmir". Dunk posted some very accurate facts regarding the 1200 year old invasion on India.
at May 30, 2006 11:10 PM
Arjun.sevak.... thank you I shall follow that up
We all make the mistake of showing our enemy compassion and that is due (in JudaeoChristianity) to the pacifism of our culture. I do not know enough about Hinduism to aver that it also has this weakness but I suspect so.
In WW2 the eastern front had almost NO compassion shown to either enemy. There were exceptiona but they were just that. In the pacific war allied troops found a whole "new ball game" in fighting fanatical japanese and had to fight them in the same way to drop casualty numbers.
We can ONLY fight Islam by applying the same ruthless rules. A pity but truly needed. If we win we can always re-instate the Geneva convention. If they win it will not matter.
To do this we must root out all bleeding heart sympathy for the devils incarnate and leave not a mosque, not a Koran and certainly no Mecca or Medina standing. Total war vs Islam.This is how they play it and they only way that we can win.
Posted by: Zathras at May 31, 2006 2:03 AM
Zathras,
If you are going to follow that link, start at the top. protestcat asked a question about India. Many Hindus answered. I did too. Then Dunk posted. He is remarkably well informed about muslim aggression on India. The rest of the posts of Dunk and mine deal with remaining facts.
at May 31, 2006 6:42 AM
The Methodist preacher John Wesley was certainly referring to the Byzantine Empire, amongst many others, when he wrote this piece around 250 years ago:
"Ever since the religion of Islam appeared in the world, the espousers of it...have been as wolves and tigers to all other nations, rending and tearing all that fell into their merciless paws, and grinding them with their iron teeth; that numberless cities are raised from the foundation, and only their name remaining; that many countries, which were once as the garden of God, are now a desolate wilderness; and that so many once numerous and powerful nations are vanished from the earth! Such was, and is at this day, the rage, the fury, the revenge, of these destroyers of human kind."
Posted by: Spirit Of 1683 at May 31, 2006 4:45 PM
That's a keeper, Spirit... A great and timeless quote.
Posted by: jsla at May 31, 2006 4:53 PM
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