The Miracle of Freedom

by Ted Stewart

  ^8. Stark, Victory of Reason, 6.

  ^9. Historian Edward Grant said, “What made it possible for Western civilization to develop science and the social sciences in a way that no other civilization had ever done before? The answer, I am convinced, lies in a pervasive and deep-seated spirit of inquiry that was a natural consequence of the emphasis on reason that began in the Middle Ages” (Woods, Catholic Church, 66).

  ^10. Stark points out the irony that Christianity was influenced by the Greeks’ commitment to reason, when at the same time it is so clear that Greek philosophers totally failed to influence their own religion. The religious faith of the Greeks fell in line with what most other non-Christian religions believed, that religion totally lacked reason and evidence that it was divine. This acceptance of the unknown, and the belief that it could never be known, denied the Greeks (and subsequent faiths) the motivation to seek to understand the whys and wherefores of their religions. Centuries later, Christianity forged the first bond between reason and faith.

  ^11. Stark, Victory of Reason, 7. Gerber of Aurillac, who became Pope Sylvester II (r. 999–1003), is quoted as saying, “The just man lives by faith, but it is good that he should combine science with his faith.” Elsewhere he said, “The Divinity made a great gift to men in giving them faith while not denying them knowledge” (in Woods, Catholic Church, 23).

  ^12. See Woods, Catholic Church, 153–67, for a discussion of the influence of the medieval Catholic church on free markets and economic theory generally.

  ^13. See Stark, Victory of Reason, 16–22; Woods, Catholic Church, 75–85.

  ^14. See Stark, Victory of Reason, 22–23; emphasis in original.

  ^15. Woods, Catholic Church, 4.

  ^16. Stark, Victory of Reason, xiii.

  ^17. See ibid., 26–32.

  ^18. Quoted in ibid., 77.

  ^19. See ibid., xiii; Woods, Catholic Church, 197–202.

  ^20. John Dunn, as quoted in Waldron, God, Locke, and Equality, 12. Waldron goes into great detail explaining the role of Christianity in Locke’s theories of equality, freedom, ownership of property, and natural rights.

  ^21. Stark, Victory of Reason, 79–80. For a full discussion of the role of Christianity in the development of Western political thought and its emergence as the leader in science, technology, and capitalism, see Stark, Victory of Reason, as well as two of his other works, The Rise of Christianity and Cities of God. See also Woods, Catholic Church.

  ^22. Neusner, Religious Foundations, 3–23.

  ^23. Marty, Christian World, 17.

  ^24. Neusner, Religious Foundations, ix.

  ^25. Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, 270.

  ^26. See Stark, Rise of Christianity, 49–71.

  ^27. See ibid., 29–47. See also Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, 271–73.

  ^28. See Stark, Rise of Christianity, 3–27.

  ^29. Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, 238–64.

  ^30. See Stark, Rise of Christianity.

  ^31. As depicted in Acts 7.

  ^32. Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, 19.

  ^33. Ibid., 276.

  ^34. See ibid., 276–85, for what historians surmise to be the justifications for intolerance of Christianity in the otherwise tolerant Roman society.

  ^35. Ibid., 308. For general descriptions of the persecutions of the Christian faith, see also Durant, Caesar and Christ, 596–619, 646–52; Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, 276–314; Stark, Rise of Christianity, 163–89.

  ^36. Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, 381.

  ^37. Durant, Caesar and Christ, 654.

  ^38. Ibid., 664.

  ^39. Davis, 100 Decisive Battles, 82. For information about Constantine and his conversion, see ibid., 78–82; Durant, Caesar and Christ, 653–64; Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, 213–36, 376–400.

  ^40. See Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, 423–53.

  ^41. For a brief review of the post-Roman history of Christianity in Europe, see Woods, Catholic Church, 9–23. For a more extensive review, see Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, 466–1252.

  Chapter 4

  The Battle That Preserved a Christian Europe

  Poitiers was the turning point of one of the most important epochs in the history of the world.

  Noted German historian Leopold von Ranke1

  On the Eastern Tip of the Pyrenees Mountains Southern France AD 732

  Underneath the vast, perfectly blue sky, the Pyrenees stretched east and west as far as the eye could see, an unending sea of mountains, their white-capped peaks broken by vertical slabs of black stone. Older than the Alps, cut by glaciers, with multiple peaks above eleven thousand feet, the mountain range extended for more than three hundred miles, forming a natural and nearly impenetrable barrier between what would one day be called France and Spain. From the Bay of Biscay on the west to the Mediterranean Sea in the east, the terrain rose suddenly from gently rolling hills to sharp peaks, beautiful geological formations of granite and limestone.

  The two men met in a meadow on the east end of the range. A winding road, really more of a trail, ran at the narrow end of the meadow, the main passage through the mountains on the Mediterranean side. It was early summer, but the air was crisp and cold from the snow that lingered on the peaks above them. They stared at each other without speaking. They were brothers, but it had been years, almost a generation, since they had been together, and they were from two vastly different worlds now. One of them was dressed in eastern garb: dark robes, leather shoes, wool turban, black scarf wrapped around his face, a long beard. The other was dressed like any European laborer: a thigh-length tunic, short-sleeved and cinched with a leather belt, barbarian trousers underneath. His hair was to his shoulders, but he did not wear a beard.

  The two men took each other in. Same long noses. Same brown eyes. But that was the end of the similarities, and they did not embrace.

  At one time, their father had been a lord, with massive tracts of land on the south range of the Pyrenees Mountains. When the Arab armies had arrived some forty years before, the family had been separated, the father and his older son trapped on the Spanish side, the younger brother and his mother fleeing to her family across the mountains into France.

  The brothers had not seen each other since.

  Now, after all these years, they met here on their father’s lands on the eastern tip of the mountains.

  It would be the last time they would be together.

  In a short time, one of them would be dead.

  • • •

  One hundred years after the death of the Prophet Muhammad, a battle for the soul of Europe took place.

  It happened thousands of miles from the birthplace of Islam, in faraway Gaul, in what we now call France, a very different part of the world from the Arabian Peninsula where the body of Muhammad was laid to rest. It occurred at a very critical time, for the world had changed much since Islam had risen in the East. In fact, the years between the death of the Prophet and the Battle of Poitiers were some of the most dramatic and remarkable in the history of the world.

  The battle itself—one of several in a small war upon which the future of Europe hinged—was hardly noteworthy. Greater battles have been fought, with more magnificent armies and more compelling turns of events—famous wars with legendary heroes, their romantic tales told and retold through the years.

  Such is not the case with the Battle of Poitiers.

  Few of the men who led this battle are familiar to us now: Charles “the Hammer” Martel. Abd al-Rahman. Not many recognize these names. Who were these men? What were they fighting for? Where did the battle take place? And did the outcome of this battle really change the world?

  Though many
of the details of the Battle of Poitiers are lost to history, this much remains clear: it was here that Europe almost lost its Christian identity. It was here, among the forests and plains of western France, that the future of Christianity was saved. It was here, north of the Pyrenees Mountains, that the Christian defenders stopped the seemingly inevitable spread of Islam into Europe.

  But to understand the significance of what happened at Poitiers, we must understand the astonishing rise of the Arab Empire, the desperate Christian defenders who stood in the way of Islamic expansion, and—most important of all—why it was essential for European Christianity to be saved.

  Christianity, Freedom, and Islam

  Would it have mattered if Europe had become an Islamic state? Islam is, after all, one of the world’s great religions and, as with every great religion, it has many admirable traits—its emphasis on family, honesty, and fidelity, to name a few. Indeed, the Five Pillars of Islam are straightforward and clearly honorable:

  1. The Testimony of Faith. La ilaha illa Allah, Muhammadur rasoolu Allah. There is no true god but Allah and Muhammad is His prophet.

  2. The importance of daily prayer.

  3. Concern for the poor and almsgiving to the needy.

  4. Self-purification through fasting during the month of Ramadan.

  5. The annual pilgrimage (Hajj) to Makkah (Mecca) as a once-in-a-lifetime obligation for those who are physically and financially able to do so.2

  Given these admirable teachings, is it any wonder that hundreds of millions of people have been blessed by following the precepts of Islam?

  Not only are the religious teachings of Islam to be admired, so is much of its history. In the first centuries after it arose from the desert of Arabia, with the possible exception of China, Islam and the nations where it predominated were the most advanced on the earth.

  In less than a hundred years, it grew to become the mightiest military power in the world. From the borders of China to the waters of the Atlantic Ocean, the caliphate stretched its mighty sword, reaching from the slopes of eastern Asia to the Black Sea, from the Middle East and Arabian Peninsula across northern Africa to the Iberian Peninsula (which includes most of what we now call Spain). Along the northeastern shores of the Mediterranean Sea, the Byzantine Empire watched helplessly as the age of the caliphs dawned upon their world. To the west of the Byzantine Empire, the fragmented tribes and feeble kingdoms of central and western Europe seemed incapable of stopping the spread of the caliphs.

  And it was not just a great military power. The economic influence of the Islamic world stretched across a large portion of the globe, with trading relationships reaching into Asia, Europe, and Africa. These powerful trade associations, along with the hordes of slaves and booty they claimed in battle, provided the caliphate the resources it needed to finance a growing empire.

  The Islamic culture also had achieved the highest levels in the arts and sciences. For a time, it led the world in technological and cultural advancements, the West sitting as humble students at the feet of Islam. After it had absorbed much from the Greeks and the Persians, it took advantage of its expansive reach to borrow from the great, distant cultures of the time. For example, it adopted the use of paper from China and decimals and Indian numerals from India. Its own scientists added to the adopted body of knowledge with significant advances of their own.

  But it did not lead the way in cultural or scientific discovery for long.

  Soon, the Islamic world began to fall behind the West.

  As the West forged ahead in the sciences, technology, cultural advancements, and in the advancements in religious thought that led to the concepts of personal freedom and self-government, the world of Islam seemed to freeze. There were no Islamic nations in which personal liberty became a priority. There were no Islamic nations in which representative government emerged. Throughout the nations of Islam, scientific and technological advances came to an end. Industrialization passed Islamic nations by.

  But why would this happen?

  After creating a massive kingdom from the sands of the Arabian desert, after spreading its reach across most of the known world and creating an empire that would lead the world in many technological advancements, how could the entire culture come to such a dramatic standstill?

  There are a number of explanations:

  1. In fundamentalist Islam, there is no law but religious law, the Sharia, or Holy Law of Islam. Sharia law is divine, the word of God. And it is all-encompassing, regulating every aspect of life: civil, commercial, criminal, and religious. As such, to the devout Muslim, the Holy Law of Islam is all the law that is needed. One does not add to or detract from Sharia, for to do so would presume that man knows better than God.

  It is, therefore, absurd to think that there would be any need for mortal men to meet for the purpose of creating new law. It is absurd to think that a parliament or a congress or any other deliberative body could better the Holy Law of Islam. This leaves no room in strict Islam for self-government or representative government.

  As Scholar Bernard Lewis explains, “In the Muslim perception, there is no human legislative power.”3

  2. The idea of separation of church and state is utterly foreign in Islam. Separation of the religious from the secular is a creation of Christianity and, as such, it is entirely rejected by the Islamic faithful. In Islamic culture, there is no equivalent of “render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s and unto God what is God’s,” for everything necessary to direct the affairs of men is found within the Holy Law.

  3. The concept of freedom has a very limited meaning in Islam. Bernard Lewis explains:

  Westerners have become accustomed to think of good and bad government in terms of tyranny versus liberty. In Middle-Eastern usage, liberty or freedom was a legal not a political term. It meant one who was not a slave. . . . For traditional Muslims, the converse of tyranny was not liberty but justice. Justice in this context meant essentially two things, that the ruler was there by right and not by usurpation, and that he governed according to God’s law.4

  This very narrow understanding of freedom and justice meant, essentially, that you were either a slave or you were not. Such a limited understanding of personal liberty made it nearly impossible for a faithful follower of Islam to think it was necessary, or even good, to make laws that guaranteed any further individual freedom. It made it impossible for a faithful follower of Islam to think it was either good or necessary to create a political institution that sought to enhance individual liberty, whether political or economic.

  The understanding of justice in the Western world is that all men are entitled to protection under the law. This stands in stark contrast to the Muslim view that justice simply means that one is governed by God’s intended rulers and according to God’s law.

  4. When Islam began, its views of equality were, ironically, viewed as extremely liberal. At a time when the world was a hostile, brutal, and unequal place, with power and wealth concentrated in the hands of a very few, Islam strongly denounced privilege, elitism, and inequality. In fact, many of the everyday citizens of the Persian and Byzantine Empires who were conquered by Islamic armies found themselves with more freedom and opportunity than they had ever enjoyed before. This was particularly true of Jews and minority Christian groups.

  However, as Islam evolved, aristocracy returned. Within a few generations, whatever improvements these people might have enjoyed had entirely slipped away.

  More fundamentally, there are three groups of people who would never be equal to Muslim men within Islamic law: women, slaves, and nonbelievers. Islamic law simply viewed these groups as forever less than equal.

  Full equality has never been available to women. In fundamental Islamic states, this is as true today as it was in the seventh century. And it likely will never be much different, for there is a deep-seated difference between the belief
s of Islam and Western cultures regarding the role of the sexes. Although it is true that Western pressure has somewhat bettered the treatment of the nonbelievers, it still can be very difficult, and sometimes deadly, to live as a nonbeliever in a Muslim culture today. Of course, slavery has been abolished, but deeply held traditions may still allow for a blind eye to be turned to the trade of women for sexual exploitation.

  5. Secular education was never important among the believers of Islam. With the Law of Islam being the final word on both government and the affairs of men, it was accepted that no one but religious leaders needed to be educated. Furthering this lack of interest in secular education, as Islam aged, it adopted the view that “knowledge was something to be acquired, stored, if necessary bought, rather than grown or developed.”5

  As the Renaissance and, later, the technological revolution were beginning to sweep through Europe, in the world of Islam, “independent inquiry virtually came to an end, and science was for the most part reduced to the veneration of a corpus of approved knowledge.”6

  While enormously important advances in science, the arts, technology, and industrialization were taking hold in Europe—advancements that bettered the lives of European citizens in almost every way—the world of Islam refused to adopt them. And how could they, with the feelings that they held? Christianity was a mortal enemy to Islam. For centuries, and in many different conflicts, Islam had become obsessed with a desire to overrun Christian Europe. And because Christianity was the enemy, any advance that might be tainted with Christianity—that had its origin in Europe, for instance—was deemed to be unworthy. The only exception to this rule was in means of warfare, religious authorities declaring that it was permissible to copy weapons and battlefield tactics from the infidels if the purpose of copying these new technologies was to defeat them.

  6. Even when they had been exposed to the concepts of freedom, liberty, and self-government, Islamic nations turned their backs on them. As the centuries passed, a few of these concepts have seeped into the mind-set of some Middle Eastern leaders, but even today the ability of Middle Eastern nations to implement such concepts into effective governance is severely limited.