Curiosities of Christian History Prior to the ReformationPaterson, James
History
Curiosities of Christian History Prior to the Reformation
Paterson, James
Church history -- Middle Ages, 600-1500; Church history -- Miscellanea; Church history -- Primitive and early church, ca. 30-600
In 1236 Raimund Lull was born, and early developed a turn for verse, and
wrote sprightly drinking songs; but at the age of thirty he suddenly felt
a desire to convert the Saracens, as the Crusaders hitherto had made so
little impression on them. Yet he did not know the language; hence he
bought a Saracen, who taught him Arabic. His notion was to go and
encounter the most learned Mohammedans, and refute all their arguments
against Christianity face to face. He first went and urged the Pope to
found colleges to educate missionaries in foreign languages, saying that
missions would keep them better employed than they used to be in their
idle haunts. But he made no impression, and felt bound to go out
singlehanded and encounter all the dangers of the enterprise he advocated.
He arrived at Tunis, and assembled the Mohammedan doctors and disputed
with them. One of them, however, soon complained that he was seditious,
and proposed that Raimund should be put to death; but another of the
natives interceded and saved him, on condition of his quitting the
country. He then composed a learned work, in which he refuted all the
arguments usually brought against Christians, urging again and again the
necessity of schools and colleges to train the missionary mind. He also
tried his skill at argument on all the Jews and Saracens within his reach
at Majorca and Cyprus. He soon again became restless, and sailed to Africa
and attacked the Mohammedan religion, and again he narrowly escaped death
and was banished. He next wrote a treatise, setting forth his plan for
establishing colleges for missionaries, and also for uniting the various
orders of knighthood, to recover the countries taken from the Christians
by unbelievers. He thought that unbelievers ought never to be fought with
the sword, but only by the force of truth, and that martyrdom in such a
cause was the greatest of honours. He could not repress his desire to act
on this view, and again he sailed to Africa and attacked the leading men
with fiery zeal. They at last stoned him to death, and his body was
afterwards brought and buried in his native island, Majorca.
ST. IGNATIUS OF LOYOLA (A.D. 1520).
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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