Free Essay Sample on Pope Urban's Speech at Clermont

Many people wonder that a speech by the pope motivated people to move on a journey to fight in the holy land. The fact is that the speech and the personality of the pope played a critical role in influencing the decision that the people made. This paper describes why the speech moved the people to fight.

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First, it should be realized that the Pope is regarded as the holiest person servant of God in the Catholic religion. This means that he is never wrong in whatever he says. People are expected to listen to him and obey him because he usually communicates a message from God. Nobody is expected to ignore the message he conveys to the people (Mastnak, 6). If the Pope commanded the Christians to go and fight, the faithful who believed that the words from the pope could not be questioned went ahead and obeyed the Popes words.

Looking at the speech, one observes that the Pope incited the people in a great way. He used the Bible verses to prove his point. All Christians believe that the Bible is word of God, and no one is to question its authority (Mastnak, 91). What the Bible commands is what the Christians should do. The Pope was keen to use the Bible verses to convince the people that going to war were good for their religious beliefs.

The incitement started when the Pope described what was happening on the holy land. Foreigners, who were regarded as unfaithful attacked the Christians, took their land, killed them, made them migrate and were now committing sins in the holy land as well as in the religious buildings in the region. In such a situation, people sympathized with their fellow Christians affected by the brutality of the foreigners who had attacked the holy land.

The Pope then used the Bible to explain that human beings have a role to protect their Christian faith as well as the holy places of their Lord. According to the Bible, human beings should do everything they can to serve their master and nothing should turn them back. The people who leave their families to serve God, as well as their wealth, would be rewarded by God. However, those who reject God in favor of their family and wealth, God will also reject them. No Christian would accept to be rejected by God (Krey, 56). The individuals who heard the message were ready to travel, leave their family and wealth for the sake of their God.

The pope proved that the actions were not wrong in any way because their ancestors have done the same before. Their ancestors had invaded Turks and other parts of the world in a bid to spread Christianity. The invasion of Christians was a move to hinder the spread of the gospel which cannot be accepted by the Christians (Krey, 45). Since the Christians believe that their forefathers who spread gospel did the right thing, the Christians also have a duty to do in order to protect what their forefathers had achieved. There was no reason to sit and watch as Christianity is stopped in a certain region.

In conclusion, the Pope used the Bible and history very well to convince the people who were listening to his speech that the decision to fight the foreigners was the best option that they had. He proved to them that the decision was correct, and other Christians had done a similar thing before, hence, it was their time to play a similar role.

Works Cited

Mastnak, Tomaz. Crusading Peace: Christendom, the Muslim World, and Western Political Order. Berkeley, Calif: University of California Press, 2002. Print.

Krey, August C. The First Crusade: The Accounts of Eye-Witnesses and Participants. Merchantville, NJ: Evolution Pub, 2012. Print.