Failed crusades eroded European hopes of defeating Islam by 1300

Evidence

The despair caused by Saladin’s capture of Jerusalem gave way to new calls for crusade, inspiring in various authors hopes of crusader victory, of mass conversion of Muslims, or of an alliance with a Christianized Mongol empire. These hopes were regularly dashed as the news reached Europe of the failure of successive Crusades, culminating in the Mamluk capture of Acre in 1291 and the conversion to Islam of the prominent Mongol rulers. The mood at the end of the thirteenth century was decidedly bleak. — John V. Tolan, Saracens, 1004 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

Islam, for the young Llull, was something positive, and Muslims’ piety and learning would lead them (with the help of Llull’s Art) to abandon their errors and embrace the doctrines of the Trinity and Incarnation. Llull pushes admiration and appreciation of the religious other to its limits. For neither Llull nor any other thirteenth-century author (Muslim, Jew, or Christian) could simply conclude that a rival faith was as valid and salutary as his own. There can be only one true religion. Llull’s genteel philosophical politeness begins to fray as the Jewish and Muslim infidels refuse to be convinced by his arguments. He advocates compulsory Christian education for them, advocates war of conquest to force them to listen to Christian missionaries. The theater of religious debate was no longer a verdant grove, as it had been for the young Llull when he composed the Libre del gentil; it had become a dark prison. — John V. Tolan, Saracens, 1353 (#complicates, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Failed crusades shifted narrative hopes from victory to conversion miracles; Thirteenth-century crusading and missions failed to convert Muslims or reclaim the Holy Land; A series of dashed apocalyptic hopes left thirteenth-century crusade ideology bleak — John V. Tolan, Saracens, 1004 (+10 more)

Broader Connections

• Thirteenth-century crusading and missions failed to convert Muslims or reclaim the Holy Land #corroborates (0.95)
• A series of dashed apocalyptic hopes left thirteenth-century crusade ideology bleak #corroborates (0.95) — John V. Tolan, Saracens, 1004
• Medieval appreciation of Islam collapsed into coercion when persuasion failed #complicates (0.80) — John V. Tolan, Saracens, 1353
• Europe’s anti-Islamic polemic arsenal was forged by 1300 and merely reused after #complicates (0.80) — John V. Tolan, Saracens, 1356
• Europe’s anti-Islam polemics stagnated after the thirteenth century #complicates (0.75)
• Medieval Christian polemic against Islam was ineffective self-consolation since Muslims never engaged it #complicates (0.70) — Norman Daniel, Islam and the West, 2419
• Thirteenth-century Christianity repeatedly fantasized mass Muslim conversions that never happened #complicates (0.70) — John V. Tolan, Saracens, 1037