An
Outline History of Anti-Semitism
[This
paper should be read
with “An
outline history of and background to the
Israeli-Palestinian conflict” and “An
outline of anti-Arabism and Arab
problems with the Western World” in
order to gain a balanced picture of both
the Jewish and Arab aspects of the
story]
In order to understand the outlook and
reactions of Jewish people, including
Israelis, one must take seriously the
long, tragic history of anti-Semitism
culminating in the Holocaust.
Anti-Semitism is prejudice,
discrimination, hostility or hatred
against Jewish people. This has created
deep sensitivities and insecurities, and
these influence how Israelis approach
their situation in the Middle East.
Criticism of Israel
– even if justified
– can easily be seen as anti-Semitism.
True, this view can be used by Israelis
as an attempt
to fend off criticism, but much of it is
genuine concern. In the light of
anti-Semitism Israelis also have a deep
concern to ensure that nothing will come
anywhere near threatening their
continuing possession of their safe
homeland. Their reactions may sometimes
appear hypersensitive, extreme and
somewhat paranoid at times and it is
important that those rightly seeking
justice for the Palestinians understand
and are sensitive to these feelings,
especially when criticism of Israel is
warranted.
Anti-Semitism is first described in the
Book of Esther in the 5th
century BC, and then began to develop in
the third century BC in Egypt. Sadly, it
has also characterized a good deal of
the history of the Christian church.
EARLY TENSIONS BETWEEN THE CHURCH AND
THE JEWISH COMMUNITY
The early church was almost completely
Jewish. It centered around the Temple
and the synagogue. Soon, however, many
Gentiles came to faith. The Jewish
community regarded Jewish Christians as
traitors. We know from
John 9:22 that “the Jews had decided
that anyone who acknowledged that Jesus
was the Christ would be put out of the
synagogue.” Christians began to worship
on the first day of the week (David
Stern holds that this was our Saturday
evening rather than Sunday – in Jewish
reckoning the first day of the week
begins on what we call Saturday evening.
But the point is that it was not on the
Sabbath). They were also deemed to be
negative to the Torah (Law).
A serious division between the Christian
and Jewish communities developed when
Simon Bar Kochba (132-135) revolted
against the Romans. “Bar Kochba” means
“son of a star” and the great Rabbi
Akiva hailed Simon as the Messiah
because of Num 24:17 “…
A star will come out of Jacob; a sceptre
will rise out of Israel. He will crush
the foreheads of Moab, the skulls of all
the sons of Sheth.” Obviously
Christians could not accept this and the
rift between them and the Jewish
community widened.
ANTI-JEWISH POLEMIC BY THE CHURCH
By this time the church was calling
itself the new Israel replacing the
Jewish community. Justin Martyr wrote
his Dialogue with Trypho (who was
Jewish) in 160: “For
the true spiritual Israel, …. are we who
have been led to God through this
crucified Christ, as shall be
demonstrated while we proceed.” (Ch 12)
“We … are the true Israelite race.” (Ch
135) “For you have slain the Just One,
and his prophets before him; and now you
reject those who hope in him.” (Ch 16)
“You
are become twofold more the children of
Hell, as [Jesus] said himself.”
Irenaeus (130-200) and Tertullian
(160-220) wrote in similar ways.
It is debatable whether these writings
should be termed anti-Semitic. They used
strong language, as did Jesus and the NT
writers, but this was in the heat of
debate. Jewish criticism of Christianity
could likewise be very negative and
insulting, even blasphemous against
Jesus.
However it is true that, as the years
went by, this sadly developed into very
negative attitudes towards the Jewish
community. The increasingly Gentile
church began to distance itself from its
Jewish roots which led on to
anti-Judaism.
EARLY CHRISTIAN ANTI-SEMITISM
Hippolytus (170-236)
laid the blame for the death of Jesus
solely on the Jewish community and
claimed they boasted about it. Origen
(185-254) wrote: “And these calamities
they have suffered, because they were a
most wicked nation, which, though guilty
of many other sins, yet has been
punished so severely for none, as for
those that were committed against our
Jesus.” (Against Celsus 2.8).
John Chrysostom (347-407) wrote of the
Jewish people in “Adversus Judaeos”:
But the synagogue is not only a brothel
and a theater; it also is a den of
robbers and a lodging for wild beasts.
…. when God forsakes a people, what hope
of salvation is left? When God forsakes
a place, that place becomes the dwelling
of demons.” (I III 1). “They live for
their bellies, they gape for the things
of this world, their condition is not
better than that of pigs or goats
because of their wanton ways and
excessive gluttony. They know but one
thing: to fill their bellies and be
drunk, to get all cut and bruised, to be
hurt and wounded while fighting for
their favorite charioteers.” (I IV 1).
Bishop Ambrose of Milan (380) sought to
dissuade the Emperor Thodosius from
ordering a bishop accused of inciting a
mob to burn down synagogues to rebuild
the synagogues.
His reason was that Jewish people had
caused churches to be burnt down in the
reign of Julian.
In the 4th century AD the
Emperor Constantine favoured the
church’s decision to separate the date
of Easter from that of the Passover. In
his argument he referred to the Jewish
community as “detestable … adversaries …
murderers of our Lord.”
In 1218 the Pope ordered that Jewish
people must wear distinguishing
clothing;
In1239 the Pope ordered the seizure and
destruction of the Talmud and other
Jewish literature.
Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274)
agreed that the Jewish community
deserved “perpetual servitude” and that
“the lords of the lands in which they
dwell may take things from them as
though they were their own.” (However he
added that “the necessary subsidies of
life in no way be taken from them.”).
This sort of teaching led to Jewish
people facing special taxes, being
obliged to wear special clothes and
suffering religious limitations.
In 1482 the Pope empowered kings to ban
Jewish practices.
In 1569 the Jewish people were accused
of magic and expelled them from papal
territories;
In 1577 and 1584 the Pope ordered that
ordered that Jewish people must attend
church and listen to evangelistic
sermons.
CHRISTIAN LEADERS WHO WERE NOT
ANTI-SEMITIC
However, some Christian leaders were not
anti-Semitic. Pope Gregory I (590-604),
wrote: “For it is necessary to gather
those who are at odds with the Christian
religion the unity of faith by meekness,
by kindness, by admonishing, by
persuading, lest these...should be
repelled by threats and terrors.” He
censured a bishop for baptizing Jewish
people by force and urged another not to
disturb Jewish people in the celebration
of their religious festivals.
Pope Alexander III
(1159-1181)wrote: “[The Jews] ought to
suffer no prejudice. … We grant them the
buckler of Our protection. For We make
the law that no Christian compel them,
unwilling or refusing, by violence to
come to baptism … Too, no Christian
ought to presume...to injure their
persons, or with violence to take their
property, or to change the good customs
which they have had until now …” This
statement was reaffirmed by many popes
down to the 15th century.
Bernard of Clairvaux wrote in 1146: “Is
it not a far better triumph for the
Church to convince and convert the Jews
than to put them all to the sword? Has
that prayer which the Church offers for
the Jews...been instituted in vain?”
Pope Gregory X (1271-76) condemned what
became known as the “Blood Libel”
against the Jewish people: “And most
falsely do these Christians claim that
the Jews have secretly and furtively
carried away these children and killed
them, and that the Jews offer sacrifice
from the heart and blood of these
children, since their law in this matter
precisely and expressly forbids Jews to
sacrifice, eat, or drink the blood, or
to eat the flesh of animals having
claws.”
MARTIN LUTHER’S ANTI-SEMITISM
Martin Luther (1483 – 1546), the great
German Christian Reformer, who did so
much good for the church in restoring
belief in justification by grace through
faith, sadly became very anti-Semitic in
later life. Here are some quotations
from his essay “On the Jews and Their
Lies” written in 1543, three years
before his death.
Warning: this is offensive anti-Semitic
material of which we thoroughly
disapprove, but Christians need to be
aware of it, as it had widespread
influence and prepared the way for the
much more extreme Nazi approach in 20th
century Germany.
Luther wrote of the Jewish people: “They
are a “miserable and accursed people …
much viler than the heathen ….
stiff-necked, disobedient,
prophet-murderers, arrogant, usurers,
and filled with every vice … dreary
dregs, … stinking scum, … dried-up
froth, … mouldy leaven and boggy morass
of Jewry … rotten, stinking, rejected
dregs of their fathers' lineage … dust
and ashes … damned by birth … real
liars and bloodhounds … filthy, blind,
hardened liars … an idle and lazy
people, such a useless, evil pernicious
people, such blasphemous enemies of God”
They have an “embittered, venomous,
blind heart … a bloodthirsty, vengeful,
murderous yearning and hope. Their
activities are “poisonous.” Their
interpretation of scripture is “vile …
They … continually perverted and
falsified all of Scripture.”
“The sun has never shone on a more
bloodthirsty and vengeful people.”
“There was never a viler people than
they, who with their lying, blaspheming,
cursing, maligning, their idolatry,
their robbery, usury, and all vices
accuse us Christians.”
“Alas, it cannot be anything but the
terrible wrath of God which permits
anyone to sink into such abysmal,
devilish, hellish, insane baseness, and
arrogance.”
“Therefore, dear Christian, be on your
guard against such damnable people whom
God has permitted to sink into such
profound abominations and lies, for all
they do and say must be sheer lying,
blasphemy, and malice, however fine it
may look.”
“Their synagogues are “a den of devils
in-which sheer self-glory, conceit,
lies, blasphemy, and defaming of God and
men are practiced most maliciously”
As if this were not enough, Luther
referred to the common anti-Semitic
allegations of Jewish people murdering
Christian children to use their blood in
religious rituals (the Blood Libel), and
poisoning of wells owned by Gentiles. He
did so in a way which implied he
believed them.
“The history books often accuse them of
contaminating wells, of kidnapping and
piercing children, … They, of course,
deny this. Whether it is true or not, I
do know that they do not lack the
complete, full, and ready will to do
such things either secretly or openly
where possible.”
“They have been blood thirsty
bloodhounds and murderers of all
Christendom for more than fourteen
hundred years in their intentions, and
would undoubtedly prefer to be such with
their deeds. Thus they have been accused
of poisoning water and wells, of
kidnaping children, of piercing them
through with an awl, of hacking them in
pieces, and in that way secretly cooling
their wrath with the blood of
Christians, for all of which they have
often been condemned to death by fire.”
I have read and heard many stories about
the Jews which agree with this judgment
of Christ, namely, how they have
poisoned wells, made assassinations,
kidnaped children, as related before. I
have heard that one Jew sent another
Jew, and this by means of a Christian, a
pot of blood, together with a barrel of
wine, in which when drunk empty, a dead
Jew was found. There are many other
similar stories. For their kidnapping of
children they have often been burned at
the stake or banished (as we already
heard). I am well aware that they deny
all of this. However, it all coincides
with the judgment of Christ which
declares that they are venomous, bitter,
vindictive, tricky serpents, assassins,
and children of the devil who sting and
work harm stealthily wherever they
cannot do it openly.
“We do not curse them but wish them
well, physically and spiritually. We
lodge them, we let them eat and drink
with us. We do not kidnap their children
and pierce them through; we do not
poison their wells; we do not thirst for
their blood.”
He then advised Christians:
“First, to set fire to their synagogues
or schools and to bury and cover with
dirt whatever will not burn, so that no
man will ever again see a stone or
cinder of them.”
“Second, I advise that their houses also
be razed and destroyed.”
“Third, I advise that all their prayer
books and Talmudic writings, in which
such idolatry, lies, cursing, and
blasphemy are taught, be taken from
them.”
“Fourth, I advise that their rabbis be
forbidden to teach henceforth on pain of
loss of life and limb.”
“Fifth, I advise that safe-conduct on
the highways be abolished completely for
the Jews.”
“Sixth, I advise that usury be
prohibited to them, and that all cash
and treasure of silver and gold be taken
from them and put aside for
safekeeping.”
He added “ that they be forbidden on
pain of death to praise God, to give
thanks, to pray, and to teach publicly
among us and in our country … that they
be forbidden to utter the name of God
within our hearing.”
However “They should not curse them or
harm their persons.”
It should be borne in mind that:
1.
Luther used strong language about the
Pope and his supporters. Even in this
essay he wrote: “the pope comes along
and the devil with him” I am no
longer amazed by either the Turks' or
the Jews' blindness, obduracy, and
malice, since I have to witness the same
thing in the most holy fathers of the
church, in pope, cardinals, and bishops.”
He also referred to “the papists'
Beelzebub”.
2.
He was opposing Jewish people some of
whom he believed spoke in a very
blasphemous way about Jesus.
“In the first place, they defame our
Lord Jesus Christ, calling him a
sorcerer and tool of the devil. This
they do because they cannot deny his
miracles …. Then they also call Jesus a
whore's son, saying that his mother Mary
was a whore, who conceived him in
adultery with a blacksmith … They
further lie and slander him and his
mother by saying that she conceived him
at an unnatural time [during her
menstrual period when it was believed
that]. … whatever is conceived at such a
time results in imperfect and infirm
fruit, that is, in insane children,
mental deficients, demon's offspring,
changelings, and the like -- people who
have unbalanced minds all their lives.
In this way the Jews would defame us
Christians, by saying that we honour as
the Messiah a person who was mentally
deficient from birth, or some sort of
demon.
3.
He was probably angrily frustrated that
the Jewish community had not responded
positively to the Lutheran message, as
he had expected
However, none of this justifies his
vitriolic anti-Semitism.
His statements that Jews' homes should
be destroyed, their synagogues burned,
money confiscated, and liberty
curtailed, were revived and given
widespread publicity by the Nazis in
Germany in 1933–45. However modern
anti-Semitism is based more on racial
myths rather than because they do not
accept Jesus as their Messiah.
On the 14th February 1546 –
four days before he died – Luther
preached his last sermon demanding that
Jewish people be driven from all German
lands.
ANTI-SEMITISM IN ENGLAND, EUROPE RUSSIA
AND N. AFRICA
In March 1144 a non-Jewish boy, William,
was found murdered outside Norwich. He
was an apprentice tanner who
regularly came into contact with local
Jewish community and visited their homes
as part of his trade. In actual fact he
may have died either from poisonous
fungi or a fit.
A few days after his death, the diocesan
synod met under the presidency of Bishop
Eborard and William's uncle, the priest
Godwin Stuart, accused the Jewish
community
of torturing and murdering him.
It was only
the intervention of the local sheriff,
representing the king, that saved the
Jews from the (Christian) mob. This was
the first medieval example of blood
libel against the Jewish community.
Immediately after his death William was
popularly venerated as a martyr and was
soon regarded as a local saint in
Norwich after miracles were attributed
to him.
Anti-Jewish feeling developed in various
parts of the country and other attacks
took place. What happened in Norwich was
repeated when children were killed in
Gloucester (1168), Bury St Edmunds
(1181) and Bristol (1183). In 1189
Jewish people attending Richard the
Lionheart’s coronation were killed. Then
in 1190 all the Jewish people found in
their own homes were killed.
Also in 1190 The worst Jewish massacre
took place in York. Local barons
doubtless wanted to cancel their debts
to Jewish creditors and many ordinary
people joined in the attack. Some Jewish
people were killed in their homes but
many took refuge in the Castle. Because
they wouldn’t allow the castle warden to
enter, he called for military help.
Rabbi Yom Tov of Joigny urged the Jewish
people to martyr themselves, which most
did. A few emerged from the castle the
next morning only to be killed.
In 1215 the Fourth Lateran Council
orders Jewish people to wear a badge.
In 1255 the Blood Libel arose in
Lincoln.
On July 18th 1290 Edward I
expelled all the Jewish people (about
16,000) from England and Wales and ban
on the Jews was not lifted until 1655,
when Oliver Cromwell responded to an
appeal by Dutch Jews led by Rabbi,
Manasseh ben Israel. It was not until
1789 that a small Jewish settlement was
re-established in England.
In Europe, the Black Death (1348-9) was
blamed on Jews poisoning water supplies.
Some “confessed” under torture. 350
Jewish communities were wiped out and
tens of thousands of Jewish people. This
led to a massive emigration to Polish
provinces. Between 1290-1496 Jews were
expelled 18 times from European
countries.
1473 Marranos, Jewish people who
privately observed Judaism but publicly
Christianity, were massacred in Spain.
In 1492
Ferdinand II of Aragon and
Isabella I of Castile, the
rulers of
Spain demanded that all
Jewish people in their territories
should either convert to Catholicism or
leave the country.
Massacres of Jewish people took place in
Portugal (1506) and Tunisia (1535).
The first Jewish ghetto was created in
Venice in 1553 and Jewish people were
massacred in Ancona (1556).
On the 14th February 1546 –
four days before he died – Luther
preached his last sermon demanding that
Jewish people be driven from all German
lands.
1648-9 Cossack leader Bogdan Chmielnicki,
initiated the massacre of 100,000 Jewish
people and the destruction of 300 Jewish
communities in the uprising against
Polish rule in the Ukraine.
There were also massacres of Jewish
people in Poland’s war with Russia and
Sweden (1655-6), Poland (1768, 1788) and
the destruction of Jewish communities in
Morocco (1790-92).
In 1791 Russia established the Pale of
Settlements, 25 provinces where Jewish
people were allowed to settle.
There were further massacres of Jewish
people in Algeria (1805) and in the
Russian pogroms (1881-84).
In October 1894, Albert Dreyfus, a
Jewish colonel in the French army, was
accused of selling military secrets to
the Germans. There was an outcry about
Jewish people not being loyal to the
state. Dreyfus was quickly convicted and
exiled to Devil’s Island Two years later
it was discovered that Dreyfus was
innocent, but documents were forged to
confirm his guilt. This led to very
public debate about military corruption
and anti-Semitism. France was split for
and against Dreyfus. In 1899 Dreyfus was
granted a presidential pardon and was
awarded the Legion of Honour in 1906.
Further Jewish massacres took place in
Russia (1903, 1904, 1906), Morocco
(1912), Ukraine and Poland (1917-21),
Hungary (1919).
On November 9-10, 1938 in what became
known as Kristallnacht, synagogues and
Jewish businesses in Germany and Austria
were attacked and many Jewish people
were sent to concentration camps.
World War II began and many massacres of
Jewish people took place, including in
Auschwitz and other concentration camps.
It is estimated that 5,820,960 Jewish
people were killed in the Holocaust.
Pogroms continued in Poland (1946) and
Libya (1948).
Various anti-Semitic myths still
survive, e.g.:
Sadly, anti-Semitism is still alive and
well in our modern world. In 2006, the
Global Forum against Anti-Semitism
reported a significant rise in
anti-Semitic incidents in Austria,
Germany and Scandinavia. There were
violent attacks as well as Holocaust
denial.
© Tony Higton
Paradox
Newsletter
© 2008
Paradox Ministries, a UK Charity: 1125582