The Albigension Crusade in southern France during the early 13th century, is one of Europe's least told stories, but it reflects back some important themes In particular I could never understand one important factor in the 'Cathar' rebellion against the centralized despotism of the Catholic Church and its princely French allies the Capetians of Paris. Why did the elite of Toulouse and much of southern France embrace Catharism, one of the most bizarre and perfectly weird mysticisms which has ever made an appearance in European history? Why would the elite which had gained so much from the religious-social-economic and political status quo, willingly adopt an irrational paganism as its theology of choice ? The answer was so obvious that it eluded my febrile mind for some time. Yet we see the same pattern in today's world with the Western elite's defense of Islam.
The elite's obsession with not only 'tolerating' a set of bizarre, undemocratic, and anti-humanist theologies is widespread within the West today. Instead of declaring Islam to be an anti-Western, anti-humanist and irrational cult, which is most assuredly is, our elite throws its arms around the Allah-group; declaring the cult members whose activities today include female mutilation, stoning, labia cutting, slave-trading, war, jihad and terrorism; a sanctified and holy agglomeration of non-white freedom fighters. Apparently 1.7 billion Muslims – the largest cult grouping in history – is now a 'minority'. Yeah that makes sense. Any of these positions strikes a normal person as deranged. Yet historically it is not unique. The Albigensian Crusade 800 years ago, proves that the elite is oftentimes quite stupid indeed and embraces theologies which will destroy it.
Catharism, [the word Cathar comes from the Greek word for purity], originated out of the Balkans and was likely carried into southern France by the Bogomils. It was a severe and very weird set of ideas. Cathars divided the world into black and white, good and bad, the material and the spiritual. Like the Gnostics and Manicheans they rejected the physical world and its comforts – including sex. Marriage, sex, material objects, 'rich' foods, fun, nice clothes, any of the accouterments of civilisation were to be shunned. Only spiritual understanding could lead to a good life here on earth, and in the next life. The Cathar cult had its 'elected' clergy or the 'Perfects', those who were selected by the divine to lead the flock from the corruption of this material existence to the purity of the spiritual world and ever-lasting life. It was a dour, negative, unproductive theology, barren of any real social, political or economic usefulness. This was precisely why the southern French elite converted in droves.
In the 13th century Languedoc was a wealthy, politically fractious, independent proud and economically advanced set of fiefs. In toto the elite in southern France had little use for a centralized authority and little inclination to pay the various fees and taxes to Rome. Taxes to support the Crusades and the Church in general, were levied throughout Western Europe during the 12th to 17th centuries. The elite within Languedoc, like many other regions in Western domains, resented some of these impositions. Catharism might have offered the southern French elite a means to unify their own disparate properties and population into a faction which could fight off what was viewed by many as the heavy burden of the Catholic state and centralized political domination:
“Politically fractious, the counts and nobles of Languedoc formed a loose conglomerate of disparate brethren united by fragile alliances. Economically, the people of Languedoc prospered by trading heavily with Spain, Italy and northern France. Religiously, they formed a motley group of Catharist supporters, some of whom were members of the faith, while others were simply advocates of the religion living peacefully alongside its adherents.”
Catharism gave the Languedoc nobility a cause-celebre to appropriate and take over Church lands. Rich monastic property, well-tilled farms, and the existing church system of taxes were in some cases, simply taken over by the Languedoc nobility with nary a coin sent to Rome. The Cathar threat to the Church was thus both existential and monetary. Not only were souls being lost, but so too was treasure and political power.
The Church as the unifying agent in European affairs and one that probably saved Europe from Muslim domination, could not let a rich province in southern France secede, any more than Lincoln could have tolerated the secession of South Carolina in 1860. The Catholic Church had to condemn any sect of Christianity as heresy that differed from the traditional Catholic teachings. Otherwise Europe would be riven by ever worse internal-warring than it was already experiencing and it would be impossible to unite disparate kingdoms with disconnected theologies to fight off the Muslim threat, or to spread Christianity in Eastern Europe.
The great winner in the Albigensian crusade was the Capetian family which ruled northern France. By 1229 the Albigensians were exhausted though nominally undefeated. The land was raped and ravaged. Tens of thousands were dead. The economy and trade were in tatters. By the peace covenant of 1229 the territory of the Cathars passed to the Capetian House of Paris France and back to the traditional Catholic Church. For the first time since the days of Otto I, northern and southern France were unified. This unification would become the basis for the future power of the French state. The rich southern lands were an enormous accretion in wealth, power and prestige for both the Capetian Kings and their Church allies.
A main point overlooked by most historians is this – the Albigensian Crusade would never have occurred if the Languedoc elite had not become mesmerized by the strange and irrational cult of Catharism. In other words, the elite of southern France caused the war. The Cathar-cult spread for many reasons throughout the rich and educated classes of Languedoc. But primary amongst the factors of its success, was the belief that by accepting a theology which was anti-civilisational, irrational, and cultish in every sense of that word, the possessor of the cult would somehow differentiate him or herself from the 'peasant' class. Most of the serfs and lower-born were of course Catholic. I doubt that many people in this age, were as pious as our current imagination makes them out to be, but nonetheless most people were most likely, in some tepid manner, dedicated members of the Catholic church and its religious observances. The Languedoc elite, viewing themselves as 'special', better and certainly more intelligent than the menial, 'dirty class', actively sought out and converted to what one can only call a barbarous relic of Manicheanism, in order to set themselves apart from this 'unwashed' mass of 'deluded' Catholic knaves.
Catharism in this view is thus primarily a product of a deranged culture, and a means to uphold and enhance the egotistical desires of an elite. We can see the same process at work today with the elite's disregard of the barbarism called Islam, another 'eastern' import. Indeed whole sections of the European, British and even American elite have converted to the savagery of Mohammedanism, or at the very least, desire to protect it. I wonder if the 'unwashed dirty' mass of us peasantry can effect a 'Crusade' against this anti-civilisational ethos which now dominates our political-economy. There is no Innocent III in our world to call for the purging of our elitist masters. If we do overthrow the treacherous illiteracy of Cultural Marxism, it will come from a mass uprising, not one instigated by a powerful and intelligent leader. In any event one can see a direct linkage from the self-interested narcissism of the Languedoc elite in the 13th century, and our own deformed political and economic ruling class, which is desperately trying to protect the most demonic theology ever invented – Islam.