When the First Crusade set
off for Jerusalem at the end of the eleventh century, the provision of social
welfare services was not a public or state function. Care of the sick, insane,
dying, orphans, senile elders, the disabled, the unemployed and the destitute
was viewed as the family’s responsibility. Only when families had failed did
the Church – as a last resort and out of charity – assume responsibility for
those in need. Yet, in the Holy Land in the wake of the crusades this
traditional form of charity came to be increasingly supplemented by
large-scale, organised social welfare. The movement towards institutionalised
church social welfare emanated from Jerusalem, and the change was largely the
as a result of a single institution — and its imitators.
As the site
associated with Christian salvation, Jerusalem inevitably attracted a
disproportionate number of people suffering from hardship or crisis. Year after
year, countless chronically ill, disabled, destitute and homeless, abandoned
and unemployed people undertook a pilgrimage to Jerusalem hoping for a miracle
at best, or death in a holy place at worst. Many others who set out in good
health became ill, injured, exhausted, destitute or abandoned along the arduous
road to Jerusalem. The plight of many pilgrims arriving in Jerusalem was so
piteous, that numerous attempts to
establish hospices in the Holy City were made over the centuries, all of which
proved unsustainable under Muslim rule. In or about 1080, the Benedictines
established a hospice in Jerusalem to care for the neediest Christian pilgrims
under a monk named Gerard.
Nineteen
years later, Jerusalem fell to the forces of the First Crusade. Not only did
the trickle of pilgrims to Jerusalem became a flood, thus creating a huge
demand for social welfare services, but the political and religious environment
was transformed. It became possible to build Christian structures, to openly
preach Christianity, and to appeal to Christian patrons for aid and support. Gerard
proved a talented, charismatic and exceptional leader. He created an
institution which would, in due time, be recognised by the pope as a unique
religious order — one of the few not named for its inspired founder. This order
was first known as the Hospital of St. John in Jerusalem, but its members were
later called simply ‘the Hospitallers’. During its period of militarization,
the order was known as the Knights of St. John or the Knights Hospitaller.
This new
order was not dedicated to contemplation, learning and education, or the fight
against heresy or even preaching and the purification of souls. Rather, the
Hospitallers were dedicated to ‘serving the holy poor’. Regardless of their
background or social standing in the secular world, members of the order
considered themselves ‘serfs’ — or sometimes ‘slaves’ — of the poor.[i]
Strikingly, this new order made no distinction between the religion of the
poor, vowing to serve all, regardless of creed, colour or race. The members of
the new order were admonished to ‘love your enemies and do good to those who
hate you’.[ii]
Even after
the militarization of the Hospitallers in the late twelfth century, nursing and
caring for the sick and injured remained an obligation of all members of the
Order of St. John, including the knights. In fact, the hospital’s
militarisation caused a major internal crisis lasting more than three decades,
from 1171 to 1206. Initially, the Hospitallers appear to have employed
mercenaries to fulfil duties such as defending their installations or field
hospitals. Gradually, however, the Templar model took root inside the Order of
St. John, and full-fledged monks were allowed to bear arms and engage in
combat. Yet, despite the addition of knights and castles to the organization
and warfare to the agenda, charitable and merciful activities – and above all, health
care – remained the raison d’être of the Hospitallers.
Over time,
other religious orders with similar missions — albeit rarely with mandates as
broad or an ethos as humble — were established. These included the German
Hospital (that later became the Teutonic Knights), the Hospitallers of St.
Thomas of Canterbury (providing medical care to English crusaders), the Order
of St. Lazarus (dedicated to caring for lepers), the Trinitarian Order
(dedicated to ransoming prisoners from Muslim captivity and slavery) and the
Spanish equivalent, the Mercedarians. Centuries later, the Hospitallers would
be imitated by the Salvation Army. Yet none of the medieval orders were as
rich, powerful or widespread as the Hospitallers, and none of the others has
endured into our own time.
As
international organizations, these religious institutions could draw on
resources, both material and human, from across Christendom and pool these
resources for specific tasks. This allowed them to collect recruits, alms,
gifts, grants and patronage wherever available and deploy it in accordance with
need. Royal or noble patronage of an institution could be decisive in its
success, and truly international orders like the Hospitallers could obtain
royal patronage, not from one, but dozens of crowned heads and their magnates —
an enormous resource. For example, in one instance, the King of Jerusalem
granted half the spoils of a military campaign to the Order of St. John. But it
was more common to endow the order with land or other sources of income. The
location where the money was raised was unrelated to where it was spent. The
international charitable orders could not only take from the rich to give to
the poor but also take from the West to give to the East. While this sounds
self-evident to us today, in the twelfth century, it was a radical innovation.
[i]
Jonathan Riley-Smith, Hospitallers: The History of the Order of St. John
(London: Hambledon Press, 1999), 21.
[ii]
See note 24, Riley-Smith, Hospitallers, 21.
The bulk of this entry is an excerpt from Dr. Schrader's comprehensive study of the crusader states.
Dr.
Helena P. Schrader is also the author of six books set in the Holy Land
in the Era of the Crusades.
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