Yesterday I decided to go and see the much talked about movie, “Kingdom of Heaven”. I suppose one should thank the director for a positive portrayal of the Muslims in a Western movie — something very rare indeed. His representation of the Muslims is in sharp contrast to the usual view that makes us look like something superior to savages and less than repulsive. Muslims are so disappointed at the negative portrayal of their faith and race that they will receive any kind gesture toward them with such enthusiasm it can break one’s heart. Please don’t misunderstand and take me for an ungrateful or petty person, not in the least.
I’m just fed up with the interminable reference to the Crusade when dealing with the present situation in the Middle East. For heavens sake, where in the world does an event that occurred a thousand years ago weigh in on current geopolitical analysis? Does anyone bother to ask if Saint Bartholomew’s Day Massacre of the Protestants by the Catholics in France a few centuries ago — therefore closer to the present than the Crusade — affects the relationship between majority Catholic and majority Protestant nations in our times. Or, maybe, Russia should attack and massacre every living Mongol for what their ancestors did to the Russians a thousand years ago. No, no one analyzes a present situation — be it local, regional or international — by what took place in history millennia ago or even half a millennia ago. That should be the norm in the study of any civilization but when it comes to Islam words like Crusade, the Mongol invasion and Andalusia appear in any study.
Oh, the lost paradise of Andalusia where, Muslims, Jews and Christians lived in harmony and if only we could achieve this again. Well, we did. Muslims, Jews and Christians lived together in harmony all over the lands of Islam including Andalusia for centuries and even after the fall of Andalusia and the extermination of its Muslim citizens and their culture still we lived together in harmony everywhere else and cultural exchanges between the various religions of the East never ceased.
It is only in modern times and after the collapse of the Ottoman Empire and the rise of nationalism inspired by the Western culture the persecution of minorities be they Christian, Jewish or even Muslims of different ethnicity took root. For example the majority of Istanbul’s population were Christian until the beginning of the twentieth century after eight centuries of Muslim rule. We the Muslims did not remain in suspended animation after the Crusade or the loss of Andalusia, not in the least. We thrived, grew, developed and mutated like every other civilization. It doesn’t mean we cease to exist when the West is not in the picture; you are just a detail in our history as much as we are in yours.
At the end of the movie “Kingdom of Heaven” an epilogue is added to describe what happened after the fall of Jerusalem which says that Salahuddin (Saladin) and Richard the Lion Hearted finally reached a tentative peace which will soon be broken and the wars will continue in Jerusalem till the present day which means we in the region have been in a state of war for the past millennia. If that were true none of us would be left alive today. However we flourished. In the Muslim world several empires rose and fell without real interest or contact with the West. I wish you would cease to have the Henry Higgens view of history, the world “does” turn without you twirling it and we the Muslims exist, have existed and will continue to exist regardless of our contact with the West or not.
Finally, I think the best actor in the movie “Kingdom of Heaven” was the horse. No doubt about it.
— Reem Al-Faisal is a Saudi photographer and writer. She is based in Jeddah.
