Persecution of Jews

Who Persecuted Whom

Many Jews argue that Christians have been the primary persecutors of Jews. In fact, anti-Semitism began with the Pharaoh who knew not Joseph and enslaved the Israelite people in Egypt for four hundred years. Then the Amalekites, Ammonites, Amorites, Babylonians, Canaanites, Hittites, Jebusites, Kadmonites, Kenites, Kenizites, Midianites, Moabites, Perizzites, Philistines, Rephaim and other tribes constantly attacked the Israelite tribes. Antiochus was consumed with murdering Jews. During the past thirteen centuries from time to time Muslims have ferociously attacked Jews. Today the State of Israel is threatened with destruction by Muslims. Christians, particularly in the United States, are its greatest defenders.

It’s also worth observing that the Jewish authorities persecuted Christians from the beginning. They began by persecuting Jesus Himself. After He announced the Holy Eucharist in the synagogue at Capernaum, Jn 7:1 “Jesus went about in Galilee; he would not go about in Judea, because the Jews sought to kill him.” Jn 19:6 “When the chief priests and the officers saw him, they cried out, ‘Crucify him, crucify him!’ Pilate said to them, ‘Take him yourselves and crucify him, for I find no crime in him.’ The Jews answered him, ‘We have a law, and by that law he ought to die, because he has made himself the Son of God.’” After Jesus’ crucifixion they persecuted His apostles. Acts 5:17 “But the high priest rose up and all who were with him, that is, the party of the Sadducees, and filled with jealousy they arrested the apostles and put them in the common prison.” And after the Jewish mob killed St. Stephen, the big persecution began. Acts 8:1 “And on that day a great persecution arose against the church in Jerusalem; and they were all scattered throughout the region of Judea and Samaria, except the apostles. Devout men buried Stephen, and made great lamentation over him. But Saul was ravaging the church, and entering house after house, he dragged off men and women and committed them to prison. God used that very persecution to spread Christianity. Acts 8:4 “ Now those who were scattered went about preaching the word. Philip went down to a city of Samaria, and proclaimed to them the Christ. And the multitudes with one accord gave heed to what was said by Philip, when they heard him and saw the signs which he did. For unclean spirits came out of many who were possessed, crying with a loud voice; and many who were paralyzed or lame were healed. So there was much joy in that city.” The Jewish authorities continued that persecution as long as they could, until the summer of 64 AD when the Romans began persecuting both Jews and Christians. The Jewish authorities of that time never considered the possibility that Christians might become much more numerous, and individual Christians might do to Jews what they had done to Christians.

Popes Who Protected Jews

The individual Christians who persecuted Jews found no support in Christ’s teaching. He taught His followers, Mt 5:43 “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.” No Catholic doctrine teaches, and no pope has ever ordered, a general persecution of Jews. Jesus taught us, Jn 13:35 “By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”

Many Jewish histories in current circulation try to “pile on” accusations of persecution by Christians. May I recommend some of the giants of Jewish historical scholarship. Israel Abrahams, the great Cambridge University scholar, in his monumental book, Jewish Life in the Middle Ages, is one. Abrahams reported, “It was a tradition with the popes of Rome to protect the Jews who were near at hand.” Philadelphia: The Jewish Publication Society of America, 1896, p. 400 Even more important, Cecil Roth held Oxford University’s chair in Jewish history from 1939 to 1964 and served as editor-in-chief of the Encyclopedia Judaica. His histories of Jewish life, particularly The History of the Jews of Italy, History of the Jews in Venice, and The Jews in the Renaissance, are still definitive. Throughout his many writings and lectures, Roth insisted that during times of rampant anti-Semitism the popes in Rome were often the only leaders to raise their voices in defense and support of the Jews. “Of all the dynasties in Europe” Roth observed, “the papacy not only refused to persecute the Jews … but through ages popes were protectors of Jews … The truth is that the popes and the Catholic Church from the earliest days of the Church were never responsible for physical persecution of Jews and only Rome, among the capitals of the world, is free from having been a place of Jewish tragedy. For this we Jews must have gratitude.” Quoted by David Goldstein in Jewish Panorama (Boston: Catholic Campaigners for Christ, 1940) p. 200

Some examples. Pope Gregory I (“the Great”) issued the historic decree Sicut Judaeis, “As for the Jews.” He affirmed that the Jews “should have no infringement of their rights … We forbid to vilify the Jews. We allow them to live as Romans and to have full authority over their possessions.” And he was specific in declaring, (1) that the Jews are not to be compelled by force to embrace Christianity, but are only to be baptized of their own free will; (2) that apart from a judicial sentence in a court of law no one is to injure them in life or limb or to take away their property or to interfere with such customary rights as they may have enjoyed in the places where they live; (3) that they are not to be attacked with sticks and stones on occasion of their festival celebrations, nor are they to be compelled to render any feudal services beyond such as are customary; and (4) that their cemeteries in particular are not to violated. Sicut Judaeis was reissued and confirmed by some twenty or thirty subsequent popes during the ensuing 400 years, and is therefore of much more weight in laying down the Church’s view of the duty of toleration, as an abstract principle, than any persecuting edicts evoked by special circumstances.

Some early theologians, reading Mt 27:25 “His blood be on us and on our children,” thought that it implied collective guilt for the crucifixion, but that has never been held to mean all Jews should be punished. The Church, rather, has always invited their voluntary conversion. In 1179 St. Bernard of Clairvaux wrote,

“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, from the rising up of the sun to the going down thereof, that the veil may be taken from their hearts so that they may be led from the darkness of error into the light of truth, been instituted in vain? If she did not hope that they would believe and be converted, it would seem useless and vain for her to pray for them. But with the eye of mercy she considers how the Lord regards with favor him who renders good for evil and love for hatred.”

Some canons of the third and fourth Lateran councils appear anti-Semitic. At that time, the Church in every Christian nation provided temporal as well as spiritual government. Let us look at these canons.

The Third Lateran Council in 1179 prohibited Jews from employing Christians as servants. The Council believed that Jews who exercised authority over Christians might pressure them to abandon their faith. The Fourth Lateran Council in 1215 barred Jews from holding public office for the same reason.

Another decree of the Fourth Lateran Council required Jews to wear identifying dress. There were instances in Spain where Jews infiltrated Christian organizations to subvert their Christian character, and the Council feared that it might occur elsewhere. The Council pointedly observed that Jewish law at the time also required the wearing of identifying symbols. There was a prevailing sense at the time that good citizenship was consistent with strong religious confession.

Within the cultural context of the time these decrees were quite reasonable. Further, in 1273, Pope Gregory X issued “…an encyclical to all Christians forbidding them to baptize Jews by force or to injure their persons, or to take away their money, or to disturb them during the celebration of their religious festivals.”

Catholics who did not understand their Church’s teaching have persecuted Jews many times during our two thousand year common history. We saw the first example at Gethsemane. As the crowd prepared to arrest Jesus, Peter Lk 22:50 “…struck the slave of the high priest and cut off his ear. But Jesus said, ‘No more of this!’ And he touched Malchus’ ear and healed him.” Peter had not yet received the infallibility in faith and morals that would arrive with the descent of the Holy Spirit. Acts 2 Peter thought he was helping Jesus, but he did the opposite of what Jesus wanted. Since then we have seen the expulsion of Jews from England in 1290-1291, from France in 1306-1394, from Spain in 1492 and Portugal in 1496, the institution of the Jewish ghettos in Venice in 1516 and Rome in 1555, and the expulsion of Jews from Vienna in 1670.

There were other stories that spread like wildfire among Christians. For example, during the Black Death, a plague that killed twenty-five million people in 1348, it was reported that leaders in the Jewish city of Toledo had deliberately started the plague, and that the chief conspirator was a Rabbi Peyret who had his headquarters in Chambéry, Savoy, and dispatched poisoners all over Europe. No such conspiracy ever existed, but at the time everyone was looking for some reason this calamity had occurred, and the Rabbi Peyret fiction was persuasive.