Balian of Ibelin Quotes in Kingdom of Heaven (2005)

Balian of Ibelin: What is Jerusalem worth?

Saladin: Nothing.

[walks away]

Saladin: Everything!

Balian of Ibelin: [Saladin has just offered safe conduct in his terms] When the Christians captured Jerusalem, they massacred every Muslim in the city walls...

Saladin: I am not those men. I am Salahudin.

[with more emphasis]

Saladin: Sala-hu-din!

King Baldwin IV: Come forward. I am glad to meet Godfrey's son. He was one of my greatest teachers. He was there when, playing with the other boys, my arm was cut. It was he, not my father's physicians, who noticed that I felt no pain. He wept when he gave my father the news... that I am a leper. The Saracens say that this disease is God's vengence against the vanity of our kingdom. As wretched as I am, these Arabs believe that the chastisement that awaits me in hell is far more severe and lasting. If that's true, I call it unfair. Come. Sit.

[they sit down on opposite sides of a chessboard]

King Baldwin IV: Do you play?

Balian of Ibelin: No.

King Baldwin IV: The whole world is in chess. Any move can be the death of you. Do anything except remain where you started, and you can't be sure of your end. Were you sure of your end once?

Balian of Ibelin: I was.

King Baldwin IV: What was it?

Balian of Ibelin: To be buried a hundred yards from where I was born.

King Baldwin IV: And now?

Balian of Ibelin: Now I sit in Jerusalem, and look upon a king.

King Baldwin IV: [Baldwin chuckles] When I was sixteen, I won a great victory. I felt in that moment I would live to be a hundred. Now I know I shall not see thirty. None of us know our end, really, or what hand will guide us there. A king may move a man, a father may claim a son, but that man can also move himself, and only then does that man truly begin his own game. Remember that howsoever you are played or by whom, your soul is in your keeping alone, even though those who presume to play you be kings or men of power. When you stand before God, you cannot say, "But I was told by others to do thus," or that virtue was not convenient at the time. This will not suffice. Remember that.

Balian of Ibelin: I will.

Balian of Ibelin: What man is a man who does not make the world better.

Balian of Ibelin: God will understand, my lord. And if he doesn't, then he is not God and we need not worry.

Balian of Ibelin: It is a kingdom of conscience, or nothing.

Saladin: Will you yield the city?

Balian of Ibelin: Before I lose it, I will burn it to the ground. Your holy places - ours. Every last thing in Jerusalem that drives men mad.

Saladin: I wonder if it would not be better if you did.

Saladin: As-Salaam-Alaikum

Balian of Ibelin: And peace be with you.

English Sergeant: [walking along the waterfront at Messina] When we took the Holy Land, we took the Saracen trading ports. The Italian ships carry silks and spices... and pilgrims, if they have money. And Italy becomes rich, as the Savior intended.

Balian of Ibelin: [Balian sees a group of men praying on the beach] Who are those men?

English Sergeant: Muslims. Saracens.

Balian of Ibelin: And they are allowed their prayers?

English Sergeant: If they pay the tax. "Subhana Rabbi'l Adhim."

[he turns to Balian]

English Sergeant: "Praise be to God. It is proper to praise him."

Balian of Ibelin: Sounds like our prayers.

Balian of Ibelin: [praying to his wife] how can you be in hell when you're in my heart.

Balian of Ibelin: [to the people of Jerusalem] It has fallen to us, to defend Jerusalem, and we have made our preparations as well as they can be made. None of us took this city from Muslims. No Muslim of the great army now coming against us was born when this city was lost. We fight over an offence we did not give, against those who were not alive to be offended. What is Jerusalem? Your holy places lie over the Jewish temple that the Romans pulled down. The Muslim places of worship lie over yours. Which is more holy?

[pause]

Balian of Ibelin: The wall? The Mosque? The Sepulchre? Who has claim? No one has claim.

[raises his voice]

Balian of Ibelin: All have claim!

Bishop, Patriarch of Jerusalem: That is blasphemy!

Almaric: [to the Patriarch] Be quiet.

Balian of Ibelin: We defend this city, not to protect these stones, but the people living within these walls.

Balian of Ibelin: You go with the army?

Hospitaller: My order is with the army.

Balian of Ibelin: You go to certain death.

Hospitaller: All death is certain. I shall tell your father what I've seen you become.

[rides away]

Bishop, Patriarch of Jerusalem: Convert to Islam... repent later!

Balian of Ibelin: You've taught me a lot about religion, your Eminence.

Jerusalem: Who do you think you are? Will you alter the world? Does making a man a knight make him a better fighter?

Balian of Ibelin: [pause, turn slowly to face Bishop] Yes.

Richard's Knight: We crusade to recover the kingdom of Jerusalem

Balian of Ibelin: Go till the men speak Italian and continue until they speak something else

Richard Coeur de Lion: We come along this road to find Balian of Ibelin, who defended Jerusalem against the Saracens.

Balian of Ibelin: I am a blacksmith

Richard Coeur de Lion: And I am the king of England

Balian of Ibelin: [pauses] I am a blacksmith.

Balian of Ibelin: What could a king ask of a man like me?

Godfrey of Ibelin: A better world than has ever been seen. A kingdom of conscience. A kingdom of heaven.

Hospitaller: One may stare into the light, until one becomes the light. I've done it many times.

Balian of Ibelin: [throws a rock at a bush that catches fire by the spark] There's your religion. One spark, a creosote bush. There's your Moses. I did not hear it speak.

Hospitaller: That does not mean that there is no God. Do you love her?

Balian of Ibelin: Yes.

Hospitaller: The heart will mend. Your duty is to the people of the city. I go to pray.

Balian of Ibelin: For what?

Hospitaller: For the strength to endure what is to come.

Balian of Ibelin: And what is to come?

Hospitaller: The reckoning is to come for what was done one hundred years before. The Muslims will never forget. Nor should they.

[the Hospitaler slowly walks away as a second bush several yards from the burning one catches fire. The Hospitaler is nowhere to be seen in the clear and open desert]

Odo: Have you been at war?

Balian of Ibelin: On horse. And as an engineer also.

Odo: Against whom and for whom did you fight?

Balian of Ibelin: For one lord against another, on a point which cannot be remembered.

Odo: There's better game now: one God against another. The pay is proportionate.

[chuckles]

Imad: [a Saracen knight yells at Balian in Arabic] He says, that is his horse.

Balian of Ibelin: Why would it be his horse?

Imad: Because it is on his land.

Balian of Ibelin: I took this horse from the sea.

Imad: [Imad translates, the knight yells again] He says you are a great liar and he will fight you because you are a liar.

Balian of Ibelin: I have no desire to fight.

Imad: Then you must give him the horse.

[Balian draws his sword]

Balian of Ibelin: How can you be in hell, when you are in my heart?

Godfrey of Ibelin: Do you know what lies in the Holy Land? A new world. A man who, in France, had not a house, is, in the Holy Land, the master of a city. He who was the master of a city begs in the gutter. There, at the end of the world, you are not what you were born, but what you have it in yourself to be.

Balian of Ibelin: I have to find forgiveness. That's all I know.

Godfrey of Ibelin: Whatever your position, you are of my house, and that means you will serve the King of Jerusalem.

Balian of Ibelin: What could a king ask of a man like me?

Godfrey of Ibelin: A better world than has ever been seen. A kingdom of conscience. A kingdom of heaven. There is peace between Christian and Muslim. We live together, or between Saladin and the king, we try. Did you think that lay at the end of a Crusade?

[Balian shakes his head]

Godfrey of Ibelin: It does. My son, you are all that survives me. Do not disappoint me.

Godfrey of Ibelin: It was not that they had no right to take you, it was the way they asked.

Balian of Ibelin: They had the right to take me.

Godfrey of Ibelin: So do I.

[last lines]

Richard Coeur de Lion: We come by this road to find Balian, who was defender of Jerusalem.

Balian of Ibelin: I am the blacksmith.

Richard Coeur de Lion: And I am the king of England.

Balian of Ibelin: [pauses] I am the blacksmith.

King Baldwin IV: If you continue like this, I shall have to find some use for you. If God can spare you, that is.

Balian of Ibelin: God does not know me.

King Baldwin IV: Yes, but I do.

Balian of Ibelin: This army will be destroyed, and the city left defenseless.

Guy de Lusignan: When I wish a blacksmith to advise me in war, I will tell him.

Balian of Ibelin: Saladin wants you to come out. He is waiting for you to make that mistake.

Balian of Ibelin: [a single horsemen is seen in the distance standing on top of a hill] They are here.

Almaric: It is only one man.

Balian of Ibelin: No, they are here.

[the camera zooms out and makes the whole Saracen army visible behind the hill]

Sybilla: What becomes of us?

Balian of Ibelin: The world will decide. The world always decides.

Balian of Ibelin: Such as we are... you will be.

Godfrey of Ibelin: [Balian catches up with Godfrey's group after killing the village priest] If you've come to kill me... even these days, it is not easy. Well?

Balian of Ibelin: I have done... murder.

Godfrey of Ibelin: Haven't we all.

Balian of Ibelin: Is it true that in Jerusalem I can erase my sins... and those of my wife? Is it true?

Godfrey of Ibelin: We can find out together.

Almaric: You must have known him.

Balian of Ibelin: What?

Almaric: Since you carry Godfrey's sword, you must have known him.

Balian of Ibelin: I did.

Almaric: A man my size?

Balian of Ibelin: Yes.

Almaric: And green eyes?

Balian of Ibelin: [Balian hesitates for a moment before he realizes what is going on] Blue.

Almaric: [pause] Come with us... my lord.

[Almaric and his men bow to Balian]

Sybilla: [walking] Do you fear being with me?

Balian of Ibelin: No.

[stops]

Balian of Ibelin: And yes.

Sybilla: [laughs] A woman in my place has two faces; one for the world, and one which she wears in private. With you I'll be only Sibylla.

Sybilla: [hears a noise and turns her head. A servant hides behind a wall] Tiberias thinks me unpredictable. I am unpredictable.

Balian of Ibelin: A queen never walks. Yet you are walking.

Bishop, Patriarch of Jerusalem: [almost crying] Who do you think you are? Will you alter the world? Does making a man a knight make him a better fighter?

Balian of Ibelin: Yes

Balian of Ibelin: Be without fear in the face of your enemies. Safeguard the helpless. Never lie, even if it leads to your death; that is your oath.

[slap]

Balian of Ibelin: And that is so you don't forget it. Rise a knight... rise a knight!

Patriarch of Jerusalem: When a body is burnt, it cannot be resurrected until Judgment Day.

Balian of Ibelin: If we do not burn these bodies, we will all be dead of disease in three days. God will understand, my lord. And if he doesn't... then he is not God, and we need not worry.

Richard's Knight: We crusade to recover the city of Jerusalem.

Balian of Ibelin: You go to where the men speak Italian, and then continue until they speak something else.

Hospitaller: [while watching the public execution of some Templars in Jerusalem] The king has made a peace with Saladin these past six years. He holds Jerusalem as a place of prayer for all faiths, as the Muslims did before we came. These men are Templars. They killed Arabs.

Balian of Ibelin: So they are dying for what the Pope would command them to do.

Hospitaller: Yes... but not Christ, I think. Nor this king.

Bishop, Patriarch of Jerusalem: Who are you? Do you think you can change the World? Does making a man a knight make him a better fighter?

Balian of Ibelin: [pause, turn slowly to face Bishop] Yes.