The primary motivation for the men and women who joined the Order of the Hospital of St John was, of course, religious. By the time of the Crusades, the concept of holy war had been accepted by most Western European Christians. According to religious scholars, taking part in a holy war was ‘commanded by God’, whereas taking part in a ‘just war’ was merely ‘allowed by God’. But the idea that men who died on crusade were martyrs seems to have been new. The recently emerged class of knights faced moral problems in their everyday role as a warrior elite which owed obedience to a secular lord. It was all very well for 12th century theologians like Stephen of Muret to suggest that while a knight could not refuse his feudal obedience, he could absolve himself by telling God that he wanted only to be a Christian knight and that he would ‘seek after that which is good on every occasion as much as I can’. Joining one of the Military Orders offered a solution. According to the mid-12th century lawyer Master Rolandus, ‘To kill evil persons for purposes of correction and justice is actually to minister unto God.’ In other words, such violence was a form of Christian charity as summed up by the 13th century historian and Bishop of Acre, Jacques de Vitry: ‘The brothers of a Military Order have been assigned the task of defending the Church of Christ against those who are not Christians, namely the Saracens in Syria, the Moors in Spain, and the pagans in Prussia, Livonia and Cumania, but also at the command of their superiors against schismatics in Greece and against heretics wherever they exist in the Universal Church.’
A - Front of the lead seal of the master, Father Roger de Moulins, showing him at prayer.
B - Back of the lead seal of Father Roger de Moulins who was killed in 1187.
C - Front and back of the Great Seal of the Master, Father Nicholas Lorgne, dating from around 1282.
D - Wax Seal of the Master, Father Hugues Revel, dating from around 1268.
The religious enthusiasm of the Hospitallers, like other crusaders, was supported by the use of sacred relics such as fragments of the True Cross which accompanied armies of the Crusader States on several campaigns. A beautiful crystal reliquary in the form of a bishop’s mitre set in a gilded bronze frame and containing tiny relics of the True Cross, the apostles and various saints was in fact buried in the former Hospitaller conventual church in Jerusalem. It was found by workmen near the old high altar in 1893. Brother-knights also retained the ethos and many of the attitudes of ordinary knights for whom it remained true that: ‘the hermit in his cell, the monk in his cloister, the knight in his lord’s household, all belonged to their distinct militia but for each the struggle could be hard and long’. Many must also have had that love of campaigning which was summed up by the southern French poet Pierre de Bergerac in the early 13th century: ‘I like to hear the slap of the hauberk against the saddle-bow ... and hear the tinkling and jingling of the harness, then I rush forth and see pourpoints and gambesons, thrown on top of armour, the rustling of the pennons lifts my spirits.’
A reliquary from the Church of Mar Hanna, formerly the Conventual Church of the Hospitallers, which was found in 1893 by workmen digging near the High Altar. It was probably buried in the troubled years 1242 or 1244. (Treasury of the Greek Patriarchate of the Church of Holy Sepulchre, Jerusalem)
Despite its religious motivation, the Order’s relations with the Papacy were not always entirely obedient, particularly when various popes wanted them to interfere in the internal affairs of the Crusader States during the 13th century. Some papal criticism of the Hospitallers may in reality have been attempts to put moral pressure on the Order as when, in March 1238, Pope Gregory IX wrote that he had heard that Hospitaller brethren kept harlots in their villages, owned private property and were even suspected of heresy. The Hospitallers were even more reluctant to get involved in European wars, and the popes knew that they would be accused of diverting the Military Order’s resources if they pushed the Orders to do so. As far at the Hospitallers themselves were concerned, they came to see themselves and the rival Templars as the primary Christian military power in the Holy Land and were even reluctant to get sidetracked into the affairs of the Crusader States in Greece.
Although the Hospitallers may have become recognised experts on Middle Eastern affairs, they never bridged the cultural gap with Orthodox Christians and never fully accepted that the survival of the Crusader States depended on co-existence with Islam. In fact, the supposed toleration of Muslims by the Military Orders merely reflected the pragmatic attitudes of those who actually lived on the religious-cultural frontier. The Rule of the Templars even permitted military service in the armies of the Seljuks of Rum (Anatolia), but Hospitaller rules on this matter are unfortunately unknown.
From the other side of the frontier, the dedication of the Hospitallers is clear in many Arabic sources. The death of the Hospitaller castellan of Krak des Chevaliers in 1170 was a cause for widespread celebration among Muslims, for example. As Ibn al-Athir wrote, he had been ‘a man who, through his bravery, occupied an eminent position and who was like a bone stuck in the throat of the Muslims’. According to al-Athir, Saladin executed captured Hospitallers and Templars after the battle of Hattin ‘because of the violent hatred they bore against the Muslims and because of their bravery’. Al-Harawi advised Saladin’s successor that he ‘should beware of the warrior monks ... for he cannot achieve his goals through them, for they have great fervour in religion, paying no attention to the things of this world. He cannot prevent them from interfering in political affairs. I have investigated them extensively and have found nothing which contradicts this.’ Almost a century later Abu’l-Fida celebrated the capture of the great Hospitaller castle of Marqab: ‘In this memorable day were revenged the evils caused by the house of the Hospitallers and the brightness of day replaced the shadows.’
The discipline of the Hospitallers was recognised by friend and foe alike. On the other hand, a special decree issued in 1283, stating that no Hospitaller castle could surrender without first informing the Master, suggests that such an event had already happened. A few men left the Order, though they were strongly condemned for doing so. There was also friction between brother-knights and brother-sergeants who regarded the former as arrogant, while in the 13th century the status of brothers-in-service steadily declined. Christian prisoners-of-war who converted to Islam and fought against their previous comrades soon became a feature of crusading warfare, but very few of them had been members of the Military Orders and none are recorded from the Hospitallers.
The Qala'at Yahmur on the Syrian coast (after H. Kennedy). A - first floor. B - section. C - ground floor. D - the tower and fortified compound; f - originally a wooden floor; g - terrace on west side of compound; s - stairs; x - buttress against north wall.
It is also clear that the execution of captured brothers-in-arms by the Muslims was not a general practice, and by the mid-13th century a system of prisoner exchange had developed. During the final years of the Crusader States, large numbers of Hospitallers fell into Mamluk hands and those brethren who did become prisoners-of-war could expect to languish in bad conditions or to be worked hard on construction projects for many years. One English Hospitaller, Roger of Stanegrave, was still in Mamluk hands in 1318 and was still seeking a huge ransom of 12,000 gold florins from his friends and family.
Among the regular clergy, the Military Orders were regarded as inferior because they shed blood and were not always able to fulfil every religious vigil. In return, the Hospitallers were concerned to maintain their good reputation and used remarkably sophisticated propaganda to do so. Brothers who travelled abroad were urged to behave well, scandals were kept secret from the outside world and the Order soon had permanent representatives at the papal Curia in Rome as well as at the main secular courts. The Hospitaller headquarters also sent regular reports back to Europe. Though normally addressed to a specific individual, they were clearly intended to be made public. Visible forms of ‘image making’ devices such as commemorative carvings, wall-paintings and round churches which symbolised the great Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem served the same purpose. Seals were particularly useful as they were attached to documents sent throughout Christendom, and the reverse of Hospitaller seals usually showed a man lying on a mattress or bier. He represented a sick pilgrim being cared for in one of the Order’s hospitals. As enthusiasm for the crusade declined, patronage was harder to find and might only be offered in return for expensive religious duties such as maintaining chantry priests who sang regular masses for the departed benefactor.
A fragment of wall-painting from the chapel in the Hospitaller castle of Krak des Chevaliers shows ‘the child Jesus being presented at the Temple’. (Historical Museum, Tartus, Syria)
Among ordinary people, however, the Military Orders were often seen as the best part of the Church by the late 13th century, and despite scepticism the Hospitallers still enjoyed widespread support amongst European rulers. In 1274 Emperor Rudolf of Habsburg confirmed their rights and privileges in the German Empire, saying of the brethren: ‘Spurning worldly conflict, they fearlessly march against the forces of the pagan pestilence, staining the standards of Christian victory and the banners of their own knighthood in the blood of the glorious martyr, they fight valiantly against the barbarian nations and they do not fear to give themselves up to a worthy death.’
The Order associated itself with popular saints and had its first two Masters portrayed as ‘blessed’. Both Hospitallers and Templars wanted to be seen as ‘ancient’ rather than ‘modern’ creations. Hence the Hospitallers claimed that they had existed in the time of the Apostles, having been founded in Jerusalem at the time of the Roman Emperor Augustus. Other stories pushed the Order ever further back in history, maintaining that the Jewish hero Judas Maccabaeus was a patron of the Hospital in Jerusalem, that John the Baptist’s parents had worked there, that Christ himself had paid a visit, that Christ first appeared there after his Resurrection and that St Stephen the first martyr had been a Master of this ancient hospital.
Competition between the two Military Orders became fierce following the fall of the Crusader States and the leading hero in most widely read accounts of the fall of Acre was Brother Matthew of Claremont, the marshal of the Hospitallers. ‘Rushing through the midst of the troops like a raging man ... he crossed through St Anthony’s Gate beyond the whole army. By his blows he threw down many of the infidels dying to the ground. For they fled from him like sheep, whither they knew not, flee before the wolf.’ Matthew supposedly rode on into the middle of the city where, his horse exhausted, he made a final stand until struck down by the enemy’s spears. The disasters of 1291 clearly demoralised the Order of the Hospital of St John and when even the little off-shore island of Ruacl fell, both the Hospitallers and the Templars were in danger of losing their whole reason for existence. A new purpose had to be found and this would take many years of soul-searching.