Arnaud (or Arnau) Amalric (died 1225) was a Cistercian church leader who took a prominent role in the Albigensian Crusade. He is remembered for allegedly giving advice to a soldier wondering how to distinguish the Catholic friendlies from the Cathar enemies to just "Kill them all. For the Lord knows them that are His."
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He was abbot of Poblet from 1196 to 1198, then of Grandselve from 1198 to 1202.[1]. He then became the seventeenth abbot of Cîteaux (until 1212).
In 1204, he was named a papal legate and inquisitor and was sent by Innocent III with Peter of Castelnau and Arnoul to attempt the conversion of the Albigensians. Failing in this, he distinguished himself by the zeal with which he incited men by his preaching to the crusade against these heretics. He was in charge of the crusader army that sacked Béziers in 1209.[2] There, according to the Cistercian writer Caesar of Heisterbach, Arnaul Amalric supposedly responded when asked by a Crusader how to distinguish the Cathars from the Catholics,
Caedite eos. Novit enim Dominus qui sunt eius (Kill them all. For the Lord knoweth them that are His.)[3].
This is the origin of the modern phrase, "Kill them all and let God sort them out."
On the other hand, the legate's own statement, in a letter to the Pope in August 1209 (col.139), states:
While discussions were still going on with the barons about the release of those in the city who were deemed to be Catholics, the servants and other persons of low rank and unarmed attacked the city without waiting for orders from their leaders. To our amazement, crying "to arms, to arms!", within the space of two or three hours they crossed the ditches and the walls and Béziers was taken. Our men spared no one, irrespective of rank, sex or age, and put to the sword almost 20,000 people. After this great slaughter the whole city was despoiled and burnt...[4]
As a matter of fact, Caesar did not state that this sentence had been actually uttered: more exactly he just wrote that Amalric was reported to have said it (dixisse fertur in the original text).[5]
According to Moréri, Arnaud was named archbishop of Narbonne about 1212, after his return from an expedition into Spain to encourage the Christians against the Moors. He left an account of this expedition. His stirring spirit embroiled him with his sovereign, Simon de Montfort. In 1224, he presided in the council of Montpellier, assembled to consider the complaints of the Albigensians.[6]