Templar and Hospitaller attitudes towards Islam in the Holy Land during the 12th and 13th centuries: some historiographical reflections

Abstract

This article reviews the current state of research on the Templar and Hospitaller orders’ attitudes towards Muslims, focusing specifically on the Holy Land during the 12th and 13th centuries. It draws together many disparate studies, exploring the orders’ military, commercial, diplomatic and religious dealings with the Islamic world. Having examined the various facets of the orders’ interactions with Muslims, it explores how these might be unified into overall institutional stances for both orders. This work concludes by comparing the orders’ actions and policies against the modern-day orthodoxies surrounding ‘Medieval European attitudes towards Islam’.

Keywords:

• Templar
• Hospitaller
• Christian and Islamic relations
• Kingdom of Jerusalem
• Crusades

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank the Council for British Research in the Levant for their ongoing support for my wider project, exploring crusading attitudes towards Islam, of which this article is part. I would also like to offer my thanks to Dr Jochen Schenk and Prof. Helen Nicholson for their advice and support.

Notes

1 The question of the military orders’ attitudes towards Islam is vast and touches upon a wide array of topics and sources. In this article I have tried to assemble and consider as many texts and factors as possible (focusing in particular on the most recent statements on any given subject), but inevitably there will be many which have not been included. I would ask that the authors of such texts accept my apologies and recognize that a selection has had to be made from the substantial historiography of the military orders.

2 This quotation has been widely referenced. See, for example, Claverie's (2009: 148) article.

3 Whilst the Templars may have been influenced by Islamic building techniques, it is now widely accepted that the concept of the ‘military order’ was not imported from the Muslim world. The argument has been made that these institutions were inspired by Islamic ribats, but this is now widely contested. For a sample of works that touch upon this matter see (Barber 1994: 40–41; Forey 1985: 177–81). Demurger (2005: 46–50) advances a slightly different view. He rejects the idea that the ribat formed the archetype for the concept of Templars, but he explores the notion that some aspects of the military orders’ practices, may have been influenced by this Islamic model.