Author Archives: Andrew Holt Ph.D.

The Myth of Religion as the Cause of Most Wars

The following essay, by Andrew Holt, is republished from John D. Hosler‘s edited volume, Seven Myths of Military History (Hackett, 2022). It is provided here with both the permission of Professor Hosler and Hackett Publishing. Thoughtful feedback and comments are welcome and can be emailed directly to the author at aholt@fscj.edu.

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Chapter 1. War and the Divine: Is Religion the Cause of Most Wars?

Andrew Holt

“It is somewhat trite, but nevertheless sadly true, to say that more wars have been waged, more people killed, and these days more evil perpetrated in the name of religion than by any other institutional force in human history.”

—Richard Kimball[1]

To uproarious laughter, the late comedian and social critic George Carlin once condemned God as the cause of the “bloodiest and most brutal wars” ever fought, which were “all based on religious hatred.” He stated that millions have died simply because “God told” Hindus, Muslims, Jews, and Christians it would be a “good idea” for them to kill each other. Carlin’s comedy routine, entitled “Kill for God!” has received rave reviews by its viewers for being “brilliant” and “spot on,” with one anonymous fan confirming that religion is “by far the single biggest cause of human deaths.”[2]

To be clear, it is not modern military historians who claim religion is the cause of most wars, but rather many prominent intellectuals, scientists, academics, and politicians, often with far greater influence over popular cultural assumptions than professional historians, who have popularized such claims. In a 2006 interview, the neuroscientist and cultural commentator Sam Harris stated, “If I could wave a magic wand and get rid of either rape or religion, I would not hesitate to get rid of religion. I think more people are dying as a result of our religious myths than as a result of any other ideology.”[3] The Oxford University evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins claimed in 2003 that religion is the “principal label, and the most dangerous one,” by which human divisions occur, contributing to “wars, murders and terrorist attacks.”[4]

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Guest Essay: Santiago Matamoros in the Americas by Alfred J. Andrea

Main Image: Santiago Mataespañois, (Santiago, Killer of Spaniards) Museo das Peregrinacións e de Santiago. Photo by A. J. Andrea.

See also: Guest Essay: Santiago Matamoros by Alfred J. Andrea

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Santiago Matamoros was every bit as much the patron of the Spaniards’ conquests in the Americas as he had been during the preceding four and a half centuries of Iberian Reconquista.  The fact that numerous cities and towns throughout Latin America were blessed with the names “Santiago,” and “Matamoros,” including 27 Santiagos and 16 Matamoroses in Mexico alone, indicates the warrior saint’s importance to the conquistadors and the colonists who followed them. And those numbers do not include the many locales to which the saint’s name was added as an honorific, such as Mexico City’s Santiago de Tlateloco, which appears below.

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Guest Essay: Santiago Matamoros by Alfred J. Andrea

Main Image (Above): Francisco Camilo, El Apóstol Santiago a caballo o Santiago Matamoros (1649), Prado Museum. Source: https://www.museodelprado.es/coleccion/obra-de-arte/el-apostol-santiago-a-caballo-o-santiago-matamoros/cc593ac0-b3bf-428d-90fa-87f9a7d80294 (accessed December 15, 2020.

The following essay is by Alfred J. Andrea, the former president of the World History Association, a mentor, and a noted medieval historian. In it, he provides background on Santiago Matamoros, the subject of the cover image of our forthcoming book Sanctified Violence: Holy War in World History.

See also: Guest Essay: Santiago of the Americas by Andrea J. Andrea

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Santiago Matamoros

This seventeenth-century painting, which graces the cover of the paperback version of Andrea and Holt, Sanctified Violence: Holy War in World History, deserves a bit of explanation. The title translates as “The Apostle Saint James on Horseback, or Saint James the Moor-slayer.” How, one rightly asks, did an apostle of Jesus, the same Jesus who preached “Blessed are the peacemakers,”[1] get in the business of killing Moors? And what is that strange symbol on the white banner that he carries? Answers to those questions tells us quite a bit about the holy war known as the Spanish Reconquista and Spanish conquests in the Americas.

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Guest Essay: The Story Behind the Making of Sanctified Violence: Holy War in World History by Alfred J. Andrea

The following essay is by Alfred J. Andrea, the former president of the World History Association, a mentor, and a noted medieval historian. In it, he provides background on how our forthcoming book Sanctified Violence: Holy War in World History, was envisioned and came together.

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Religion is a shield against life’s assaults. But it is also a “terrible swift sword” unsheathed against the perceived enemies of divine righteousness. As a student of religious history, I have long been fascinated with the dual faces of devotion, especially religion’s sanctification of violence, but for many years did not expand my investigation of holy war beyond the boundaries of Christianity and Islam. That changed abruptly in 2003, while offering a seminar on the crusades at the Global History Center in Beijing. Discussion of Portuguese and Spanish crusades in the Indian Ocean and the Americas prompted a student, who was pursuing a PhD in global history, to ask if there are forms of holy war other than crusades and jihads that a world historian should be aware of. I was momentarily stumped, but promised a reply the next day.

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“Adversarial Camaraderie” at the Siege of Acre: Archery and Wrestling Competitions

Professor John D. Hosler’s fascinating book on the siege of Acre during the Third Crusade provides a brief, but interesting, consideration of the interactions that sometimes took place between combatants during the siege. Regardless of the violence of the siege, Hosler notes that “the spaces between the ramparts…were not necessarily a zone of death.” The shared experience that Muslim and Christians troops who took part in the lengthy and bloody siege (lasting from 1189-1191) could sometimes lead to “noticeable expressions of respect, and even an adversarial camaraderie.” Hosler describes two examples found in the sources.

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Guest Essay: The Global Middle Ages, by Alfred J. Andrea

The following essay is by Alfred J. Andrea, the former president of the World History Association and a noted medieval historian. In it, he provides his insights on the development, and challenges, of studying the Global Middle Ages.

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Most historians who specialize in medieval Europe are ambivalent about the term “the Middle Ages.” While proudly calling themselves “medievalists” (from the Latin medium aevum—middle age), they insist that the millennium or more separating late Roman antiquity from the so-called early modern period was not a middle period in any meaningful way. And it certainly was not a valley of darkness between two lofty golden ages.

Even more problematical or worse in the eyes of many medievalists is the term “the Global Middle Ages.” How, they ask, can one apply such a questionable label as Middle Ages, itself the misbegotten product of out-of-date historical thinking, to the rest of the world? What did India’s Gupta Empire (ca. 320-ca. 550) have in common with the roughly contemporaneous Visigothic Kingdom or China’s Tang dynasty (618-907) with the Carolingian dynasty? What possible connection was there between the twelfth-century Toltecs of central Mesoamerica and the Hohenstaufens of central Europe, or between Mali’s Epic of Sundiata and the Nibelungenlied? Although historians who promote study of the Global Middle Ages might claim that finally medieval history has been shorn of its Eurocentrism, conceivably their critics could counter that applying an obviously Eurocentric label to non-Western cultures is another example of Western academic imperialism. Continue reading →

Joan of Arc’s Holy War

Above Image: Dante Gabriel Rossetti (1828-82)- Jehane le Pucelle. Source: Wikimedia

The following selection of text was cut from an early draft of Chapter 3, “Holy Wars in Defense of the Sacred,” in the forthcoming book (expected March 2021) Sanctified Violence: Holy War in World History. Rather than discarding it, the authors, Alfred J. Andrea, emeritus professor of history at the University of Vermont, and Andrew Holt, professor of history at Florida State College at Jacksonville, wanted to make it available here. The book, aimed primarily at a student readership, explores the various types of wars waged in the name of religion that have occurred around the world over the past 5,000 years. It will be offered by Hackett Publishing as part of their Critical Themes in World History Series. Please see more information about the project below.

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Accounts of the Mongols in The Medieval Record

Hackett Publishing has kindly given permission to reproduce the following source selections from my friend and senior colleague Alfred J. Andrea’s excellent sourcebook, The Medieval Record: Sources of Medieval History (Second Revised Edition). This more than 500-page book contains numerous important sources from Ancient Rome to the discovery of the New World, with many of them original translations by Professor Andrea. The sources provided here include:

Matthew Paris, The Greater Chronicle: An Entry for 1241

Ivo of Narbonne’s Confession

Matthew Paris’ Illustration of The Tartar Feast

Each of the sources offers fascinating insights into how European Christians during the thirteenth century understood the Mongols and the ferocity of their attacks on various peoples. The depictions are detailed, graphic, and fearful. Of special interest is the image of The Tartar Feast provided at the end of Ivo of Narbonne’s letter. Professor Andrea’s helpful introductory text and “Questions for Consideration” precede the sources immediately below: Continue reading →

Buddhist Holy Warriors in Modern Tibet

While working on a book (Sanctified Violence: Holy War in World History) for Hackett Publishing that considers holy war in a broader world history context (co-authored with my friend and senior historian Alfred J. Andrea), I have spent the last year considering considering the various modes and types of holy war that have taken place within different faith traditions. Professor Andrea, as the former head of the World History Association and a leading world historian, has been a wonderful guide in directing me to important readings in areas beyond my normal research focus (Christian and Islamic holy war).

Two books I have read recently that may appeal to some of you who are interested in the broader topic of holy war are Sorrow Mountain: The Journey of a Tibetan Warrior Nun and Buddha’s Warriors: The Story of the CIA Backed Tibetan Freedom Fighters, the Chinese Invasion, and the Ultimate Fall of Tibet (both pictured above). Continue reading →

Armenian Contributions to the Birth of the Crusading Movement

Much has been written about the plight of eastern Christians prior to the calling of the First Crusade, and the way in which their extensive lobbying efforts for military aid from the West contributed to the birth of the crusading movement.

See, for example, the following:

Peter Frankopan on the Byzantine Recruitment of Western Warriors before the First Crusade.

Peter Frankopan and Jonathan Phillips on The Situation for Eastern Christians in the 1090s prior to the First Crusade.

Pope Gregory VII on the Plight of Eastern Christians Prior to the First Crusade.

Jonathan Riley-Smith on the Motivations of the First Crusaders.

In making such a case, the focus is usually on Byzantine Christians and their letters and embassies to popes and western nobility, as well as their attendance at ecclesiastical councils like Piacenza and Clermont, all in an effort to win military support through sympathetic descriptions of their suffering in the east as a result of Turkish invasions of Asia-Minor and surrounding regions.

Recently, I have been rereading Oxford scholar Jacob G. Ghazarian’s book The Armenian Kingdom in Cilicia During the Crusades (Routledge, 2000), and was intrigued to note his description of Armenian Christians who also participated in such efforts in the years leading up to the calling of the First Crusade. Continue reading →