Ten points supported by the yes side involves the starting point of the crusade was to help the Christian churches in the east. The original reason for the crusades changed to the freeing of the holy land, most of all Jerusalem. They wanted to free the holy land because it was territory run by Muslims and Jerusalem was the place of Jesus death, and resurrection which is the foundation of the Christian religion therefore they believed that Jerusalem belonged to the Christians. Jerusalem was looked at as such a holy place because many Christians made a pilgrimage to the city and looked at it as the climax of their religious life, others went there to clear their consciences and be forgiven for crimes they committed against the church and God, also they thought Jerusalem was where God walked and lived among his people and they thought it was a resting place of the righteous and a paradise with a tree of life that healed all men. When the Christians took pilgrimages to Jerusalem century after centur
y they started to believe that the Sepulcher of Christ belonged to them. They felt this way because they could not deal with the Muslims having possession and control over Jerusalem and the Sepulcher of Christ. The crusaders believed that going on the crusades they were doing Gods work therefore were also being forgiven for their sins. So this points to the whole motivation for the crusades was based on religion and the beliefs of the Christians.
Others don't think that the crusades were motivated by religion because in Jerusalem the Muslims were fighting one another because their leader Mohammad died and the Muslim world divided into two rivaling political parties. Also the Christians and Muslims had a past of war in Spain which could have provoked this upcoming crusade between the Christians and the Muslims not related to religion, also before the wars in Spain St. Augustine declared if you had just cause and fought with the right intentions Christians shouldn't feel bad about participa
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