A thirteenth-century missionary’s theology fractured when military and missionary defeat contradicted it

Evidence

Riccoldo addresses the first of his Five Letters on the Fall of Acre to God, expressing his astonishment that he should allow such misfortune to befall Christendom, that he should give such power and glory to the Saracens. The Saracens, Jews, and Tartars mock us, asking, “Where is the God of Christians?” taunting Christians who thought that Jesus son of Mary was God and that he would help them. Riccoldo himself saw in Baghdad the sad procession of Christian prisoners bound for the slave markets, including nuns, sanctified virgins, now bound for infidels’ beds. … Riccoldo chides himself for having been so presumptuous as to think he could “defeat him [Muhammad] through Your force and destroy his perfidious law”; had not far better men attempted to slay this “beast” and failed, notably Francis and Dominic? Had not great kings and barons, including “Louis, Saint, King of France,” attempted to destroy it by force, only to suffer humiliating defeats that discouraged other Christians? — John V. Tolan, Saracens, 1239

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to the general theme of theodicy under empirical disconfirmation — parallels studies of crisis of faith when God’s actions don’t match believers’ expectations.
• SEED: Potential essay: how religious doubt arises not from argument but from God failing to deliver on military/political expectations — the ‘favoritism test’ of divinity.