The Knights Templars

by C. G. Addison

Jerusalem was crowded with fugitives who had been driven into the Holy City from the provinces. The houses could not contain them, and the streets were filled with women and children, who slept night after night upon the cold pavement. At the expiration of a fortnight, Saladin finding his incessant attacks continually foiled, retired from the walls, and employed his troops in the construction of military engines, stationing ten thousand cavalry around the city to intercept fugitives, and prevent the introduction of supplies. When his engines were completed, he directed all his efforts against the northern wall of the city, which extends between St. Stephen’s gate and the gate of Jaffa. Ten thousand soldiers were attached to the military engines, and were employed day and night in battering the fortifications. Barefoot processions of women, monks, and priests were made to the holy sepulchre, to implore the Son of God to save his tomb and his inheritance from impious violation. The females, as a mark of humility and distress, cut off their hair and cast it to the winds; and the ladies of Jerusalem made their daughters do penance by standing up to their necks in tubs of cold water placed upon Mount Calvary. But it availed nought, “for our Lord Jesus Christ,” says the chronicler, “would not listen to any prayer that they made, for the filth, the luxury, and the adultery which prevailed in the city did not suffer prayer or supplication to ascend before God.”

To prevent the garrison from attempting to break the force of the battering-rams, Saladin constructed vast mangonels and machines, which cast enormous stones and flaming beams of timber, covered with pitch and naptha, upon the ramparts, and over the walls into the city. He moreover employed miners to sap the foundations of the towers, and on the 16th of October the angle of the northern wall, where it touches the valley of Gehinnon, was thrown down with a tremendous crash. The appalling intelligence spread through the city, and filled every heart with mourning. Friends embraced one another as it were for the last time; mothers clung to their little ones, anticipating with heart-rending agony the fearful moment when they would be torn from them for ever; and the men gazed around in gloomy silence, appalled and stupified. Young mothers might be seen carrying their babes in their arms to Mount Calvary, and placing them before the altars of the church of the Resurrection, as if they thought that the sweet innocence of these helpless objects would appease the wrath of heaven. The panic-stricken garrison deserted the fortifications, but the infidels fortunately deferred the assault until the succeeding morning. During the night attempts were made, but in vain, to organize a strong guard to watch the breach. “With my own ears,” says abbot Coggleshale, “I heard it proclaimed, between the wall and the counterscarp, by the patriarch and the chief men of the city, that if fifty strong and valiant foot soldiers would undertake to guard for one night only the angle which had been overthrown, they should receive fifty golden bezants; but none could be found to undertake the duty.”

In the morning a suppliant deputation proceeded to Saladin to implore his mercy, but ere they reached the imperial tent the assault had commenced, and twelve banners of the prophet waved in triumph upon the breach. The haughty sultan accordingly refused to hear the messengers, and dismissed them, declaring that he would take Jerusalem from the Franks as they had taken it from the Moslems, that is say, sword in hand. But some spirit of resistance had at last been infused into the quailing garrison, the few Templars and Hospitallers in Jerusalem manned the breach, and in a desperate struggle the Moslems were repulsed, and the standards of the prophet were torn down from the walls. The messengers then returned to Saladin, and declared that if he refused to treat for the surrender of Jerusalem, the Christians would set fire to the Temple or Mosque of Omar, would destroy all the treasures they possessed in the city, and massacre their Moslem prisoners. The announcement of this desperate determination, which was accompanied with the offer of a very considerable ransom, induced Saladin to listen to terms, and a treaty was entered into with the Christians to the following effect. The Moslems were immediately to be put into possession of all the gates of Jerusalem, and the liberty and security of the inhabitants were to be purchased in the following manner. Every man was to pay to Saladin ten golden bezants as a ransom, every woman five, and every child under seven years was to pay one bezant.

When these terms, so disgraceful to the christian negotiators, were known in the Holy City, nothing could exceed the grief and indignation of the poorer classes of people, who had no money wherewith to pay the ransom, and had consequently been delivered up to perpetual bondage by their richer christian brethren. All resistance on their part, however, to the treaty was then hopeless; the poor had been betrayed by the rich; the infidels were already in possession of the tower of David, and their spears were gleaming in the streets of the Holy City. It is recorded to the praise of the few Templars and Hospitallers who were then in Jerusalem, that they spent all the money they possessed in ransoming their poor christian brethren, whom they escorted in safety to Tripoli. The number of those who, being unable to pay the ransom, were reduced to a state of hopeless slavery, is estimated at fourteen thousand, men, women, and children. They were sold in the common slave-markets, and distributed through all the Mussulman countries of Asia. The women became the concubines and the handmaids of their masters, and the children were educated in the Mohammedan faith.

The Arabian writers express their astonishment at the number of the christian captives, and give a heart-rending account of their sorrows and misfortunes. One of them tells us that he saw in his native village a fair European woman, bright as the morning star, who had two beautiful children. She seldom spoke, but remained the live-long day absorbed in melancholy contemplation; there was, says he, such a sweetness and gentleness in her deportment, that it made one’s heart ache to see her. “When I was at Aleppo,” says the historian, Azz’eddin Ali Ibn-Al’atsyr, who fought in Saladin’s army, and was present at the battle of Tiberias, “I had for a slave one of the christian women taken at Jaffa. She had with her a little child, about a year old, and many a bitter tear did she shed over this tender infant. I did my best to comfort her, but she exclaimed, ‘Alas, sir, it is not for this child that I weep; I had a husband and two sisters, and I know not what has become of them. I had also six brothers, all of whom have perished.’ This is the case of one person only. Another day I saw at Aleppo a christian slave accompanying her master to the house of a neighbour. The master knocked at the door, and another Frank woman came to open it; the two females immediately give a loud cry; they rush into each other’s arms; they weep; they sit down on the ground and enter into conversation. They were two sisters who had been sold as slaves to different masters, and had been brought without knowing it to the same town.”[73]

Thus fell the holy city of Jerusalem, eighty-eight years after its conquest by Godfrey de Bouillon and the crusaders. Our excellent chronicler, Radolph, abbot of Coggleshale, who was redeemed from bondage by payment of the ten golden bezants, throws a pitying glance upon the misfortunes and miseries of the poor captives, but attributes the fall of Jerusalem, and all the calamities consequent thereon, to the sins and iniquities of the inhabitants. “They honoured God,” says he, “with their lips, but their hearts were far from him.” He speaks of the beautiful women who thronged Jerusalem, and of the general corruption of the city, and exclaims, in the words of the prophet, “The Lord hath said unto the heathen, Go ye up against her walls and destroy, take away her battlements, for they are not the Lord’s.”

Immediately after the surrender of the city (October 11, A. D. 1187) the Moslems rushed to the Temple (Templum Domini, ante [p. 12]) in thousands. “The imauns and the doctors and expounders of the wicked errors of Mahomet,” says Abbot Coggleshale, “first ascended to the Temple of the Lord, called by the infidels Beit Allah, (the house of God,) in which, as a place of prayer and religion, they place their great hope of salvation. With horrible bellowings they proclaimed the law of Mahomet, and vociferated, with polluted lips, Allah acbar—Allah acbar (God is victorious). They defiled all the places that are contained within the Temple; i. e. the place of the presentation, where the mother and glorious Virgin Mary delivered the Son of God into the hands of the just Simeon; and the place of the confession, looking towards the porch of Solomon, where the Lord judged the woman taken in adultery. They placed guards that no Christian might enter within the seven atria of the Temple; and as a disgrace to the Christians, with vast clamour, with laughter and with mockery, they hurled down the golden cross from the pinnacle of the building, and dragged it with ropes throughout the city, amid the exulting shouts of the infidels and the tears and lamentations of the followers of Christ.” When every Christian had been removed from the precincts of the Temple, Saladin proceeded with vast pomp to say his prayers in the Beit Allah, the holy house of God, or “Temple of the Lord,” erected by the Caliph Omar. He was preceded by five camels laden with rose-water, which he had procured from Damascus, and he entered the sacred courts to the sound of martial music, and with his banners streaming in the wind. The Beit Allah, “the Temple of the Lord,” was then again consecrated to the service of one God and his prophet Mahomet; the walls and pavements were washed and purified with rose-water; and a pulpit, the labour of Noureddin, was erected in the sanctuary.[74]

The following account of these transactions was forwarded to Henry the Second, king of England. “To the beloved Lord Henry, by the grace of God, the illustrious king of the English, duke of Normandy and Guienne, and count of Anjou, Brother Terric, formerly Grand Preceptor of the house of the Temple at Jerusalem, sendeth greeting,—salvation through him who saveth kings. Know that Jerusalem, with the citadel of David, hath been surrendered to Saladin. The Syrian Christians, however, have the custody of the holy sepulchre up to the fourth day after Michaelmas, and Saladin himself hath permitted ten of the brethren of the Hospital to remain in the house of the hospital for the space of one year, to take care of the sick.... Jerusalem, alas, hath fallen; Saladin hath caused the cross to be thrown down from the summit of the Temple of the Lord, and for two days to be publicly kicked and dragged in the dirt through the city. He then caused the Temple of the Lord to be washed within and without, upwards and downwards, with rose-water, and the law of Mahomet to be proclaimed throughout the four quarters of the Temple with wonderful clamour....”[75]

Bohadin, Saladin’s secretary, mentions as a remarkable and happy circumstance, that the holy city was surrendered to the sultan of most pious memory, and that God restored to the faithful their sanctuary on the 27th of the month Regeb, on the night of which very day their most glorious prophet Mahomet performed his wonderful nocturnal journey from the Temple of the Lord, through the seven heavens, to the throne of God. He also describes the sacred congregation of the Mussulmen gathered together in the Temple and the solemn prayer offered up to God; the shouting and the sounds of applause, and the voices lifted up to heaven, causing the holy buildings to resound with thanks and praises to the most bountiful Lord God. He glories in the casting down of the golden cross, and exults in the very splendid triumph of Islam. Saladin restored the sacred area of the Temple to its original condition under the first Mussulman conquerors of Jerusalem (ante, [p. 12]). The ancient christian church of the Virgin (the mosque Al Acsa, and “Temple of Solomon”) was washed with rose-water, and was once again dedicated to the religious services of the Moslems. On the western side of this venerable edifice the Templars had erected, according to the Arabian writers, an immense building in which they lodged, together with granaries of corn and various offices, which enclosed and concealed a great portion of the edifice. Most of these were pulled down by the sultan to make a clear and open area for the resort of the Mussulmen to prayer. Some new erections placed between the columns in the interior of the structure were taken away, and the floor was covered with the richest carpets. “Lamps innumerable,” says Ibn Alatsyr, “were suspended from the ceiling; verses of the Koran were again inscribed on the walls; the call to prayer was again heard; the bells were silenced; the exiled faith returned to its ancient sanctuary; the devout Mussulmen again bent the knee in adoration of the one only God, and the voice of the imaun was again heard from the pulpit, reminding the true believers of the resurrection and the last judgment.”[76]

The Friday after the surrender of the city, the army of Saladin, and crowds of true believers, who had flocked to Jerusalem from all parts of the East, assembled in the Temple of the Lord to assist in the religious services of the Mussulman sabbath. Omad, Saladin’s secretary, who was present, gives the following interesting account of the ceremony, and of the sermon that was preached. “On Friday morning at daybreak,” says he, “everybody was asking whom the sultan had appointed to preach. The Temple was full; the congregation was impatient; all eyes were fixed on the pulpit; the ears were on the stretch; our hearts beat fast, and tears trickled down our faces. On all sides were to be heard rapturous exclamations of ‘What a glorious sight! What a congregation! Happy are those who have lived to see the resurrection of Islam.’ At length the sultan ordered the judge (doctor of the law) Mohieddin Aboulmehali-Mohammed to fulfil the sacred function of imaun. I immediately lent him the black vestment which I had received as a present from the caliph. He then mounted into the pulpit and spoke. All were hushed. His expressions were graceful and easy, and his discourse was eloquent and much admired. He displayed the virtue and sanctity of Jerusalem; he spoke of the purification of the Temple; he alluded to the silence of the bells, and to the flight of the infidel priests. In his prayer he named the caliph and the sultan, and terminated his discourse with that chapter of the Koran in which God orders justice and good works. He then descended from the pulpit, and prayed in the Mihrab. Immediately afterwards a sermon was preached before the congregation.”