Franciscan hagiography framed the sultan as admiring Francis but fearing his own people

Evidence

Bonaventure’s Legenda maior, which became the Franciscan order’s official biography of its founder, insists on Francis’s ardent desire for martyrdom. Bonaventure reuses and expands Thomas of Celano’s account of Francis’s thrice-foiled attempts to receive the martyr’s crown at the hands of the Saracens. He embellishes the interview with al-Kâmil, having Francis propose an ordeal in which he and the sultan’s “priests” would enter into a fire; the one who emerged unscathed would be shown to follow God’s true law. When the Saracen priests refuse, Francis urges the sultan to light a fire and let Francis enter it alone; this the sultan also refuses, fearing lest this provoke a revolt among his people. When Francis rejects the gifts the sultan offers, the sultan, “filled with admiration, conceived a greater devotion for him.” The sultan did not wish or did not dare to convert, Bonaventure concludes, so Francis left him. — John V. Tolan, Saracens, 1118

Categorization

• ADDENDUM: Gives concrete medieval detail for the ‘martyrdom as love/grief’ framing in the sacrifice article, here inflected toward missionary zeal rather than ritual.