He Came as a Thief in the Night

 Taking of Jerusalem by the Crusaders by Emile Signol So, what's wrong with this picture? Well! It's certainly not the technique. The technique is stunning: look at the masterfully blended visual fields and the wealth of realistic detail. But what else do we see? The thing that sort of jumps out at you is the smoking buildings in the background and the dead bodies everywhere. Wow! Is this a Holy War or what! But actually, there is nothing holy about it, and a true Holy War has nothing to do with painting the town red at all, let alone doing so literally. This is more what a Holy War looks like, but more collective in its scope:  Proverbs 16:32 - King James Version (KJV) <32> He that is slow to anger is better than the mighty; and he that ruleth his spirit than he that taketh a city. Let me just share a few extracts from a several decades later account of the Jerusalem massacre:  "No mercy was shown to anyone, and the whole place was flooded with the blood of the vi...