The Ruins of Jerusalem: Psalm LXXVIII, the Crusades and Church Reform

In his biography of St Vedastis, the early bishop of Arras, the Carolingian scholar Alcuin (735–804) described the miracles through which the saint converted the people of the region to Christianity, but also his discovery of ancient, ruined churches that had been defiled by wild beasts or the worship of demons and idols.¹ Alcuin explained that this region had been Christian in Roman times, but that the sins of the Christians caused God to allow barbarians to invade and devastate the area.² Alcuin used the language of Psalm lxxviii to describe these acts of devastation and pollution. The ‘heathen’ had entered and defiled the temple of the Lord and had slaughtered the Christians. Alcuin insisted, however, that no matter which invaders inflicted these attacks, they were caused by the sins of the Christians. Like his contemporary Walafrid Strabo (805–49), he employed the violent language of Psalm lxxviii not primarily to record the persecution of Christians and call for vengeance, but mainly to describe the divine chastisements merited by the sins of the Christians and to inspire his readers to contrition and amendment.³

Psalm lxxviii was one of the scriptural pillars of the crusading movement. Allegedly quoted by Urban ii (r. 1088–99) at Clermont, the prominence of this text increased during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. Preachers used it to encourage Christians to join the crusades. Communities at home prayed the Psalm in support of these campaigns. Previous scholarship has typically emphasised the militaristic and vengeful language of the text as the chief source of its popularity among the crusaders. In this article, however, it is argued that the prominence of this Psalm stemmed not only from its ability to capture the dire situation in the Holy Land, but also, and primarily, because it had established a pedigree as a prayer for church reform. Scholars have long recognised that crusading campaigns and rhetoric supported broader ecclesiastical efforts to reform Christian discipline.⁴ This exposition of the established pre-crusading practice of interpreting Psalm lxxviii to promote reform, and its adoption by crusade preachers, re-emphasises the symbiotic relationship of the crusading and reform movements. The spirituality of the reform movement, reflected in its exegetical traditions, played an important and enduring role in shaping crusading...