A thirteenth-century missionary praised Muslim virtue to shame Christians
Evidence
Ricoldo was baffled at the success and wealth of the Muslims. Why had God granted them all these things? All the same, he was exceptional in the depth and detail of his knowledge of Islam and also in his favourable estimation of Muslim manners and customs. In his Itinerarius, or ‘Journey’, he had much praise for the Arabs: ‘We therefore report certain Muslim works of perfection thus briefly, rather to shame the Christians than to praise the Muslims. For who will not be astonished if he carefully considers how great among these same Muslims is the attention to study, the devotion in prayer, pity for the poor, reverence for the name of God and the prophets and the holy places, their serious ways, their kindness to strangers, and their concord and love towards each other.’ Gravitas was a leading feature of Muslim life. — Robert Irwin, For Lust of Knowing, 78
Categorization
- XREF: Echoes the ‘virtuous Saracen vs. sinful Christian’ homiletic trope that recurs in medieval literature and later orientalism — parallels the moral-function of the ‘noble savage’ in Enlightenment writing.