The Romans under Titus retaliated against a
Jewish uprising, destroyed Jerusalem and the Temple, enslaved
many leaders and dispersed the Jewish people. In 79 Titus
succeeded Vespasian as emperor. Jews and Christians suffered
under him and emperor Domitian.
88 - 97
Pope St. Clement blamed the Jews for Nero's
persecution of the Christians.
113 - 116
The second Jewish revolt against Rome under
emperor Trajan was unsuccessful.
135
The third Jewish rebellion against Rome was
crushed and its leader, Bar Kochba, whom many Jews had accepted
to be the Messiah, was killed. Rabbi Akiba was tortured and
killed as well.
200
When emperor Severus created laws forbidding
heathens, under penalty of severe punishment, to embrace Judaism,
the Bishop of Alexandria, Origen, wrote: "We may thus assert
in utter confidence that the Jews will not return to their
earlier situation, for they have committed the most abominable of
crimes, in forming the conspiracy against the Savior of the human
race ... Hence the city where Jesus suffered was necessarily
destroyed, the Jewish nation was driven from its country, and
another people [meaning the church] was called by God to the
blessed election."
300
Eusebius, Bishop of Caesaria, claimed that Jews
in every community crucified a Christian at their Purim festival
as a rejection of Jesus. He used the charge of ritual murder made
by the pagans Democritus and Apion, which the Romans had first
made against the early Christians. Eusebius made a distinction
between Hebrews who were good men in the Old Testament and Jews
whom he characterized as evil.
306
The church Synod of Elvira (Spain) banned all
community contacts between Christians and the "evil"
Hebrews and stated that Christians could not marry Jews.
324
When Constantine became emperor he claimed to be
a Christian and urged his subjects to convert to Christianity. He
reenacted the laws of his predecessors forbidding Jews to live in
Jerusalem and to engage in any proselytizing activity.
325
The church Council of Nicea, called by
Constantine, to settle a theological controversy concerning the
nature of Christ, continued efforts to separate Christianity from
Judaism by deciding that Easter should no longer be determined by
the Jewish Passover (pesach): "For it is unbecoming beyond
measure that on this holiest of festivals we should follow the
customs of the Jews. Henceforth let us have nothing in common
with this odious people..."
337
Emperor Constantius declared: "Let my will
be religion and the law of the church!" One of his first
acts was to prohibit under punishment of death the marriage
between a Jew and a Christian woman.
367 - 376
St. Hilary of Poitiers wrote and spoke of the
Jews as a perverse people forever accursed by God. St. Ephroem
refers in his hymns to synagogues as whorehouses.
379 - 395
Emperor Theodosius protected the Jews from the
church's persecutions of heretics. Chrysostom and Ambrose of
Milan - both sainted - wanted to include Jews in this
persecution. Chrysostom: "The Jews are the most worthless of
all men... They are perfidious murderers of Christ. They worship
the devil, their religion is a sickness..." Ambrose
reprimanded the emperor for rebuilding a synagogue and offered to
burn it down himself. St. Gregory of Nyssa characterized Jews as
assassins of the prophets, companions of the devil, a race of
vipers, a sanhedrin of demons, enemies of all that is beautiful,
hogs and goats in their lewd grossness."
The church Council of Laodicea forbade Christians to respect the
Jewish Sabbath.
395 - 408
Christian fanaticism was resisted by the
Byzantine Emperor Arcadius. He did not allow the destruction of
synagogues. St. Epiphonius characterized Jews as dishonest and
indolent.
408 - 450
Theodosius II forbade Jews to build new
synagogues.
415
St. Cyril, the Bishop of Alexandria, incited a
mob against the Jews and had them expelled. Bishop Severus burned
a synagogue and incited people to attack and harass Jews in the
streets. Many Jews converted to Christianity out of fear.
St. Augustine, Bishop of Hippo: "The true image of the
Hebrew is Judas Iscariot, who sells the Lord for silver. The Jew
can never understand the Scriptures and forever will bear the
guilt for the death of Jesus."
418
Bishop Severus of Majorca forced Jews to
convert. Violent street fighting broke out with a mob incited by
the bishop. The synagogue was burnt. Finally the leaders of the
Jewish community gave in and 540 Jews were converted.
St. Jerome, who had studied with Jewish scholars in Palestine and
translated the Bible into Latin (the Vulgate), wrote about the
synagogue: "If you call it a brothel, a den of vice, the
Devil's refuge, Satan's fortress, a place to deprave the
soul, an abyss of every conceivable disaster or whatever you
will, you are still saying less than it deserves."
489
A Christian mob set fire to the synagogues in
Antioch and threw the bodies of slain Jews into the fire.
506
A Christian mob attacked and destroyed the
synagogue at Daphne near Antioch. The congregation was
slaughtered.
519
The Christian population of Ravenna attacked
Jews and burnt the synagogue.
528
Under emperor Justinian Roman Law was
systematized and codified as Corpus Iuris Civilis also known as
the Justinian Code. Church Law and doctrine became state policy.
Jews were not permitted to testify against Christians. They could
not celebrate Passover before Easter and were allowed only a
prescribed version of Scripture in their synagogues and were
prohibited to use prayers that were seen as
anti-trinitarian.
535
The church Synod of Claremont decreed that Jews
could not hold public office or have authority over
Christians.
538
Jews were (again) forbidden to have Christian
servants or slaves, which effectively excluded them from
agriculture. The Third and Fourth Councils of Orleans forbade
Jews to appear in public during the Passion and Easter
periods.
554
Bishop Avitus of Averna tried to convert the
Jews with no result. Then he incited a mob which destroyed the
synagogues. The Jews had to choose between baptism and expulsion.
One Jew converted. During the procession after his baptism a Jews
sprinkled him with rancid oil. That enraged the mob and many Jews
were killed. 500 Jews allowed themselves to be baptized. The rest
fled to Marseilles.
561
The Bishop of Uzes in France forced the Jews in
his diocese to decide between baptism and expulsion.
582
John of Ephesus turned seven Jewish synagogues
into churches.
Under king Chilperic of Merovingia all Jews in his kingdom had to
choose between conversion or having their eyes torn out.
589
The king of Visigoth Spain, Reccared, ordered
children born of mixed marriages to be forcibly baptized.
612 - 621
The Spanish king Sisebut severely restricted the
rights of Jews in his kingdom. They were not allowed to own or
work the land or operate certain trades. Later he issued an
ultimatum to all Jews: convert or be exiled.
628 - 629
Emperor Heraclius ordered the forced conversion
of all Jews in his empire and renewed the Hadrian and Constantine
codes that barred Jews from Jerusalem.
Dagobert, the Merovingian king, followed the example of Heraclius
and forced the Jews in his kingdom under the threat of death to
convert to Christianity.
633
The Third Council of Toledo decided against
forcible conversions. However, Jews who had in the past been
forcibly converted were not allowed to return to Judaism and had
to separate from the Jewish communities. Jewish children were
taken from their parents and raised in monasteries. Neither Jews
nor converts to Christianity were allowed to hold public office.
The Council was chaired by Isodore, Bishop of Hispalis
(Seville).
638
The Fourth Council of Toledo decreed that Jewish
children baptized as Christians were not to be returned to their
blood parents. Converts had to be strictly supervised by church
authorities. Jews hat to swear that they had given up Jewish law
and practice. Penalties ranged from flogging, loss of limb,
confiscation of property to burning at the stake.
The Bishops of Seville and Toledo, Isodore and Julian wrote
polemical papers against the Jews.
638 - 642
Non-Catholics were expelled from Visigoth
Spain.
653
The Eighth Council of Toledo agreed with king
Recceswith of Spain who appeared before the Council, called
Judaism a pollution of his country and asked for removal of all
unbelievers. Jews had to sign an oath (placitum) that made the
practice of Judaism almost impossible. Violations were punished
by burning or stoning.
655
The Ninth Council of Toledo ordered converted
Jews to spend all Jewish and Christian holy days in the presence
of a bishop.
681
King Erwig of Spain forbade practicing Jews to
enter seaports. All Jews were ordered to be baptized. Converts
hat to listen to Christian sermons and were not allowed to follow
dietary laws.
The Twelfth Council of Toledo confirmed the orders of the king
and decreed to burn the Talmud and other Jewish literature.
692
The Trulanic Synod (Quinisext) of the Eastern
empire prohibited Christians attendance of Jewish feasts,
friendly relations with Jews and patronage of Jewish
physicians.
693 - 694
The Sixteenth and Seventeenth Councils of
Toledo, chaired by king Egica and the successor of Bishop Julian,
Felix, again severely restricted the rights of Jews and charged
them with undermining the church, massacre of Catholics, plotting
with the Moors and destruction of the country. Jews were declared
slaves, their property was confiscated and their children
forcibly raised in Catholic families or monasteries.
722
Judaism was outlawed in the empire of Leo III
and Jews were forcibly baptized. Some burned to death in their
synagogues.
829
The Archbishop of Lyon, St. Agobard, wrote in
his Epistles that Jews were born slaves and that they were
stealing Christian children to sell them to the Arabs.
845
The bishops of Lyon, Rheims, Sens and Bourges
called the Council of Meaux to renew anti-Jewish restrictions.
Emperor Charles the Bald refused to implement them in the council
of Paris (846).
855
Louis II, king of Italy, expelled the Jews
effective October 1, 855.
In sermons during the Easter season the people in Beziers were
encouraged to revenge the crucifixion of Jesus. The nobility of
Toulouse had for some years the privilege of publicly boxing the
ears of the president of the Jewish community on Good Fridays.
Later this was changed to an annual payment the Jews had to
make.
1009 - 1012
As a result of the destruction by Muslims of the
Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem Jewish communities were attacked by
mobs in Orleans, Rouen, Limoges and Rome.
Jews who refused conversion were expelled from Mainz under
emperor Henry II in the first serious persecution in
Germany.
1021
Rome was struck by an earthquake and a hurricane
on Good Friday. A number of Jews were arrested and accused of
having put a nail through a host the day before, thereby causing
the natural disaster. Under torture they confessed to host
desecration and were burned to death. Host desecration became a
widespread charge. It was often made worse by rumors that the
host had bled. To the uneducated and superstitious masses it
confirmed the dogma of the Eucharist.
1063
When soldiers on their marches attacked Jewish
communities during the war to oust the Saracen from Spain, Pope
Alexander II warned the French leaders of the armies not to harm
the Jews.
1078
Pope Gregory VII decreed that Jews could not
hold office or be superiors to Christians. In 1081 Alfonso VI of
Toledo, Spain, was reprimanded by the Pope for appointing Jews to
offices of the state. Jews had to pay extra taxes to support the
church.
1095 - 1096
Pope Urban II called for a Crusade against the
Turks.
The Duke of Lorraine tried to gather an army for the Crusade. To
collect money he spread the rumor that he would kill the Jews to
avenge the death of Christ. The Jews of the Rhineland paid him
500 pieces of silver as ransom.
Emperor Henry IV ordered the knights of his empire not to attack
the Jews.
Crusaders slaughtered Jews of Rouen and other cities in Lorraine.
Jewish communities in Germany supplied the army of Peter the
Hermit thereby trying to avoid the attacks of the Crusaders.
An estimated 10,000 Jews were massacred in France and Germany.
Emich of Leisinger with his band of thousands of Crusaders
ignored the order of the emperor and began a terror campaign
against the Jews. In Speir he killed twelve. The rest of the
community was protected by the Bishop of Speir who punished some
of the murderers by cutting their hands off. Count Emich then
moved his band to Worms, where 500 Jews were murdered in spite of
having paid protection money. The Bishop of Worms could not
protect the Jews in his diocese. The Archbishop of Mainz
(Mayence) and civil authorities gave sanctuary to Jews and closed
the gates of the city to Count Emich. His soldiers forced the
gates open and killed 1,000 Jews. The Jews of Cologne had fled,
only two were killed and the synagogue was burned. When the bands
moved down through the Rhine Valley an estimated 12,000 Jews were
murdered in the cities along the Rhine River. Bands of troops
moved through the Moselle Valley killing Jews on their way. The
Jewish community of Treves was given protection by the Bishop
under condition of conversion. Many were baptized, others
committed suicide. The Crusaders of William the Carpenter
executed others.
The knight Volkmar arrived in Hungary with 10,000 men to join the
army of Peter the Hermit. He attacked the Jewish community in
Prague. Bishop Cosmos and city leaders tried in vain to stop the
slaughters. When he tried to attack the Jews in Nitra, the
Hungarians came to their defense and defeated the Crusaders.
Gottschalk, a knight in the army of Peter the Hermit, lead the
section under his command to massacre the Jewish community of
Ratisbon.
1099
The Crusaders under Godfrey of Bouillon
conquered Jerusalem. He massacred the Muslims and drove Jews,
Rabbanites and Karaites into a synagogue and burned them
alive.
1100
The first pogroms against the Jews in Kiev. In
several riots the mobs looted homes and plundered the Jewish
section.
1120
Pope Urban II stated that Jews should be
tolerated. In his call for the Crusade he spoke favorably about
the Jews. Though the Crusades were directed against the Muslims
in the Holy Land, the gathering bands of Crusaders marching
through the country brought untold suffering to Jews who together
with Muslims were seen as the enemies of Christianity.
1140
The Cistercian monk Rudolf enflamed people
against the Jews in France and Germany. Massacres occurred in
Cologne, Mainz, Worms, Spier and Strasbourg. The Archbishop of
Mainz and Cologne urged Bernard of Clairvaux to silence Rudolf
and to order the people not to molest Jews. When this had no
effect, Bernard finally came to Germany and ordered Rudolf back
into the monastery. Though Bernard opposed the killing of Jews he
also demonized them and called for the Second Crusade.
1144
The first recorded charge of ritual murder
against Jews occurred in Norwich, England. Jewish leaders were
killed.
Peter the Venerable of Cluny tried to turn Louis VII of France
against the Jews. He wanted them to finance the Crusades.
1146
The preaching of the monk Rudolf continued to
have effect in mob attacks, massacres and forced baptisms all
over the Rhine Valley. Simon the Pious of Treves and a Jewish
woman in Speir were killed when they refused to be baptized, in
spite of attempts of civil and church authorities to protect the
Jews.
1147
Crusaders in Germany murdered 20 Jews in
Wurzburg. In Belitz all Jews were burned. 150 Jews were murdered
in Bohemia. Attacks on Jewish communities also in France.
1171
Charge of ritual murder in Blois, France. The
entire Jewish community of 34 men and 17 women were tortured and
burned.
1181
Ritual murder charge at Bury St. Edmund,
England. 1183 the same in Bristol. 1192 in Winchester.
1188
When Richard I was crowned, mobs attacked the
Jewish communities in London and York. Richard punished the
rioters. Jews who had been forcibly baptized were allowed to
return to their faith.
1190
King Richard was able to protect the Jews as
long as he was in the country. When he left for a new Crusade,
the assembled Crusaders in England attacked Jewish communities.
The Jewish quarters of the Port of Lynn in Norfolk were burned
and the Jews were slaughtered. Norwich Jews took refuge in the
royal castle. 1,500 Jews were murdered in York. The Jewish
community at Stanford was pillaged and those who did not reach
the castle were killed.
1191
In France the town of Bray was surrounded by
king Philip. Jews had the choice between baptism and death. The
community committed suicide. Philip burned 100. Children under 13
were spared.
1194
The Jews of London had to pay three times the
amount that Christian citizens had to pay toward the ransom of
Richard I.
1195
A priest, Fulk of Neuilly, who wanted to reform
the church, preached all over France against usury and urged
usurers to give their earnings back to the poor. Mobs used his
sermons to attack Jews, and Barons used them as an excuse to
expel Jews from their realms of authority and confiscate Jewish
property.
1209
During the Crusade against the Albigensians
(considered a Christian heresy) 20,000 people including the
Jewish community were massacred when the city of Bezziers was
stormed.
1215
The Fourth Lateran Council, which was presided
over by Pope Innocent III, ordered Jews to wear a distinctive
yellow badge in the form of a ring. This was the first time in
the West that Jews were required to distinguish themselves from
the rest of the population by their clothing. (The Code of Omar
had decreed this before in Muslim countries). Jews were not
allowed to wear their best clothes on Sunday or walk in public on
special days such as Easter.
1218
King Henry II made this Conciliar decree into a
secular one and ordered all Jews in England to wear a badge on
their outer clothing at all times to distinguish them from
Christians.
1222
During the Council of Canterbury the English
bishops issued an injunction forbidding Christians under pain of
ex-communication to sell provisions to Jews. To counteract this,
the kings justician, Hubert de Burgh issued an order forbidding
the king's subjects, under pain of imprisonment, to refuse to
provide Jews with the necessities of life.
1231
Pope Gregory IX established the Inquisition to
counteract many Christian heresies that had sprang up due to
greater freedoms in the rebirth of European countries. They
challenged the authority of the Roman Church. The Inquisition was
to root out heresies before they spread to the masses. Tribunals
composed mostly of monks served as police, prosecution, judge and
jury. Secular authorities carried out the torture and burning at
the stake of unrepentant heretics, because the Inquisitors were
to avoid the shedding of blood. Jews were, of course, especially
vulnerable to attacks during these purges.
1232
Pope Gregory IX complained to the bishops in
Germany that the Jews there were treated too well. He forbade
friendly relations between Christians and Jews.
1235
The Bishop of Lincoln stated that Jews were to
be in captivity to the princes of the earth. They have the brand
of Cain and are condemned to wander the face of the earth. But
they were to have the privilege of Cain also. They should not be
killed.
1236
Jewish communities in Anjou, Poitou, Bordeaux
and Angouleme were attacked by Crusaders. 500 Jews chose
conversion and over 3,000 were massacred. Pope Gregory IX, who
originally had called the Crusade, was outraged about this
brutality and criticized the clergy for not preventing it.
1239 - 1242
By order of Pope Gregory IX all copies of the
Talmud were to be turned over to the orders of the Franciscans
and Dominicans for examination.
It seems that the papal decree was carried out only in France.
Jewish books and the Talmud were also seized in England and book
burnings took place. In Paris 24 cartloads of Talmud copies were
burned. Pope Innocent IV stopped the confiscations and ordered
the Talmud copies to be returned, though not without first
expunging the passages that seemed objectionable to the
church.
1244
Jews in London were accused of ritual murder and
assessed a high amount of money as punishment.
1247
When the ritual murder charge became more
widespread and caused many atrocities, Pope Innocent IV ordered
an investigation of the charge that proved it to be an
anti-Jewish invention.
1255
The dead body of Little St. Hugh of Lincoln was
discovered in a cesspool near the house of a Jew. Under torture
he confessed that Hugh had been murdered for a ritual. King Henry
III ordered his hanging after he was dragged alive through the
streets tied to a horse. 100 Jews were brought to London for
trial. 18 were hanged without trial. 79 others were convicted and
hanged, 2 were pardoned and one was acquitted.
1261 - 1264
Canterbury students, priests and monks attacked
the Jewish quarter. Mobs sacked the Jewish section of London in
1262 and 1264.
1263
A disputation was held at Barcelona, Spain,
before King James I, nobility, bishops and leading monks. Rabbi
Moses ben Naleman had to defend the Talmud against a converted
Jew, Pablo Christiani, who tried to prove Christianity's
efficacy from the Talmud. King James ordered the Jews to erase
passages from the Talmud that were objectionable to
Christians.
1267
The Synod of Vienna decreed that Christians were
forbidden to attend Jewish ceremonies. Learned Jews were
forbidden to dispute with simple Christians. Jews had to wear
horned hats, called pileum cornutum. People actually believed
that Jews had horns which they were hiding under these hats and
that they were children of the devil.
Thomas Aquinas (1226-1274) said that Jews could not be treated as
neighbours but should live in perpetual servitude.
1270
Jews were massacred in Germany: Weissenberg,
Magdeburg, Sinzig, Erfurt and other cities. In Sinzig the
community was locked in the synagogue on the Sabbath and burned
alive.
1272
The main synagogue in London was closed. The
reason given was that the chanting disturbed the devotion of the
monks in the neighborhood. Jews had to gather in private homes
but even that was restricted by order of the Bishop of
London.
1275
The Statutum Judeismo was passed in England
under King Edward I. The law forbade Jews to charge interest,
restricted the areas where they could live, ordered all Jews from
the age of seven to wear the badge and required those above the
age of twelve to pay an annual poll tax at Easter. But the law
also allowed Jews, for the first time, to lease land for farming
and become merchants and artisans.
1278
Edward I charged Jews with coin clipping.
House-to-house searches took place throughout England and 680
Jews were thrown into the Tower of London. Many were hanged and
their property seized by the crown.
1280
In Poland civic authorities attempted to attract
Jews by establishing Jewish life on a rational basis. But the
church insisted that Jews be isolated from the rest of the
population.
The Synod of Buda introduced the Jewish badge.
In Spain Jews were forced to listen to conversion sermons of the
monks in their own synagogues. Fanatical mobs attacked Jews
against the orders of civic authorities.
1281
Most Spanish Jews were arrested in their
synagogues on a Sabbath in January, but released again on promise
to pay a huge amount of ransom money.
1282
The Archbishop of Canterbury closed all
synagogues in his diocese.
1283 - 1285
Ten Jews were murdered by a mob in Mainz after
they had been charged with ritual murder.
26 Jews were killed as a result of a ritual murder charge in
Bacharach.
40 Jews were murdered after a ritual murder charge in
Oberwellel.
In Munich 180 Jews were burned alive in the synagogue after a
ritual murder charge.
1290
On July 18 King Edward I in Council ordered all
Jews in England under pain of death to leave the country by the
first of November.
1298
Severe persecutions took place in Franconia,
Bavaria and Austria. A German nobleman by the name of Rindfleisch
(he was called the Judenschlächter) gathered a small army
and began to slaughter Jews from city to city. In about six
months he burned and massacred an estimated 100,000 Jews in 140
communities including Wurzburg, Ratisbon, Nuremberg, Augsburg,
Heilbronn and Rottingen.
1306
Under Philip IV (le Bel) all Jews of his realm,
approximately 100,000, were imprisoned on July 22. They were told
to leave the country within one month. They could only take the
clothes on their backs and provisions for one day. Their property
left behind was used by Philip to replenish the royal treasury,
which had been exhausted through his feud with the Pope and his
war against the Flemish.
1308
The Bishop of Strasbourg, John of Dirpheim,
demanded the Jews of Sulzmatt and Rufach on the charge of host
desecration. They were burned alive.
1315
King Louis X called back the Jews who had been
expelled from France. They in turn set conditions which were met.
But again they had to wear badges.
1320
Pope John XII ordered the Inquisition in
Toulouse. There and in Perpignon the Talmud was burned.
During the Crusade of the Shepherds 40,000 shepherds and peasants
marched from Agen to Toulouse and killed any Jew who was not
willing to be baptized. In Verdun 500 Jews had fled to a tower.
When they were besieged they committed suicide. 120 Jewish
communities in southern France and northern Spain were wiped
out.
1328
Thousands of Jews were murdered by mobs around
Estella when a monk preached inflaming anti-Jewish sermons.
1338
Bishop John of Dirpheim caused the massacre of
Jews in Strasbourg on the anniversary of the Conversion of St.
Paul.
1348
When the plague raged in Europe Jews in Spain
were charged with planning to poison the wells of Christians. In
France, Spain and Switzerland Jews were murdered because people
believed they had poisoned the wells or intended to do so.
In September Pope Clement VI issued a papal bull declaring the
Jews innocent of the charge of causing the plague. He urged the
clergy to protect the Jews and even excommunicated murderers. But
the mobs could not be stopped.
10,000 Jews were murdered by mobs in the cities bordering Germany
in spite of the royal protection given to them by King
Casimir.
The mayor of Strasbourg, Conrad of Winterthur, together with
other authorities defended the Jews against mob attacks and the
accusations of the bishop. The Councils of other cities tried the
same.
1349
The Jewish community of Basle was burned to
death in a specially built structure. 2,000 Jews perished in
Strasbourg. In Worms 400 Jews were burned. In Oppenheim the Jews
burned themselves in fear of torture. The same happened in
Frankfurt. In Mainz 6,000 Jews were burned to death when a mob
set fire to their houses. In Erfurt the Jewish community of 3,000
was slaughtered and in Breslau all Jews perished. In Vienna the
Jews committed suicide on the advice of their rabbi to avoid
torture. The Jewish communities of Augsburg, Wurzburg and Munich
were destroyed. Jews were expelled from Heilbronn. The Jews of
Nuremberg who had not fled were burned to death in a place that
since is known as Judenbühl. The Jews of Konigsberg were
murdered. In Brussels approximately 500 Jews died in a
massacre.
1354
12,000 Jews were murdered in Toledo
1357
When the plague returned a second time in
Franconia, the Jews again were blamed of poisoning the wells. The
plague, also called the Black Death, killed thousands. During
this time the myth of an international Jewish conspiracy was
invented that in spite of its absurdities is still believed by
many, even today!
1366 - 1369
While the Spanish civil war raged between King
Pedro and Henry of Trastamora many Jews were killed by
mercenaries employed by both sides.
1384
The Jews in Nordlingen were attacked and
massacred.
1389
Mobs attacked and murdered thousands of Jews in
Prague.
1391
The Inquisition turned against the Jews who had
converted to Christianity. In many cases they secretly continued
to practice Judaism and were therefore considered heretics.
Throughout the Inquisition an estimated number of 50,000 Jews
were killed and another 160,000 forcibly baptized.
In many cities in Spain synagogues and mosques were turned into
churches and Jewish communities suffered terrible persecution.
After 300 Jews were killed or committed suicide in Barcelona,
11,000 Jews allowed themselves to be baptized.
1399
In Posen, Poland, a rabbi and 13 elders of the
Jewish community were slowly burned to death on the charge of
stabbing the host and throwing it into a pit. Rumors had
circulated that the host had bled, which, of course, confirmed
the dogma of the Eucharist.
1407
The fiery sermons of the monk and reformer
Vincent Ferrer caused oppressive actions against the Jews of
Spain and mob attacks. He is credited with 20,000 forced baptisms
in Castille and Aragon.
1413 - 1415
Don Ferdinand of Aragon convened disputations in
Tortosa. They were supposed to make it easier for Jews to convert
to Christianity. The leading Jews of Aragon were forced to debate
with a converted Jew, Geronimo de Sante Fe. The disputations
lasted for one year and nine months with negative results for the
Jewish communities.
1419
Pope Martin V and the Spanish kings restored
Jewish rights. Synagogues and Talmud copies were returned to
them.
1422
The Crusade against the Hussites in Bohemia and
Moravia caused much harm to Jewish communities. On their march to
Prague the army of the German emperor Sigismund with Dutch
mercenaries destroyed Jewish communities along the Rhine River,
in Thuringia and Bavaria, all to avenge the insulted God of the
Christians.
1427 - 1429
A bull issued by Pope Martin V forbade sea
captains to transport Jews to the Holy Land. He also, in another
bull, urged the protection of the Jews and established community
rights, among them allowing Jews to study at universities.
1431
A ritual murder charge led to the destruction of
the southern German Jewish communities of Ravensburg, Uberlingen
and Lindau.
1432
Jews were expelled from Saxony.
1434
The Council of Basle, presided over by Pope
Eugenius IV revoked the freedoms Martin V had bestowed. Jews were
to live in separate quarters of the cities, attend conversion
sermons and were not permitted to attend universities.
1443
Jews in Venice had to wear the yellow
badge.
1451
Pope Nicholas V in a bull confirmed the old
exclusions of Jews from Christian society and all honorable walks
of life. John of Capistrano was appointed by the Pope to lead the
Inquisition of the Jews. In his sermons he repeated the charges
of ritual murder and host desecration which led to persecutions
in Breslau under King Ladislav of Silesia.
1454
When the Polish army was defeated by the
Teutonic Order and the Prussians, the clergy, who had been
stirred by Capistranos sermons in Poland, blamed the royal
leniency toward the Jews for the calamity. Jewish rights were
withdrawn and mobs attacked Jewish communities.
1457
Polish troops on march to the Crusade against
the Turks attacked the Jews of Cracow and killed about 30.
1492
All Jews were expelled from Catholic Spain.
1500 - 1530
The Dominicans baptized many Jews. These
converts, however, were not much safer from mob attacks. Some of
the converts wrote extremely hostile anti-Jewish volumes,
intending to cause damage to Jewry: Victor of Carben 1505, John
Pfefferkorn (four vitriolic pieces) 1505-09, Anthony Margharita
1530. The Dominicans also renounced the study of the Hebrew
language.
1509
Emperor Maximilian authorized John Pfefferkorn
to destroy everything that was blasphemous or hostile to
Christianity. He began in Frankfurt, Main, where he searched
Jewish homes and synagogues and confiscated more than 1,500
manuscripts.
1517
At the time of the Reformation the Pope issued a
bull, "Cum nimis absurdum". It is recognized as the
most devastating Christian anti-Jewish document ever written. It
required Jews to wear badges of shame, live in ghettos, and sell
any property outside the ghetto walls.
1521 - 1523
In "The Magnificat" and in his
treatise "That Jesus Christ was born a Jew," Martin
Luther reacted against the harsh treatment of Jews, hoping they
would eventually convert. The Reformation contributed to more
freedom for Jews. In Protestant countries they enjoyed greater
tolerance and fewer restrictions and were able to develop a more
dynamic culture than in Catholic countries. However, Jews
continued to live precarious lives everywhere. In Catholic
countries ghettoization became the norm. Jewish culture was
stifled and the new stereotype of the ghetto Jew was added to the
many already in existence.
1541
John Eck, the Roman Catholic polemicist, wrote a
treatise against David Gans, a Jew. Gans expected Protestantism
to be more tolerant of Judaism. Eck's pamphlet,
"Refutation of a Jewish Book", renews all the ancient
charges: ritual killing of infants, host desecration etc. In
addition he called Germany's Protestants "toadies and
lovers of Jews."
1543
This accusation may have contributed to
Luther's change of attitude towards the Jews. He leaked a
series of tracts, entitled "On the Jews and their lies, On
Shem Hamphoras": "Their synagogues should be set on
fire... their houses should likewise be broken down and
destroyed... Let them earn their bread by the sweat of their
noses, as is enjoined upon Adam's children." He reverted
to a medieval position sensing the danger of Eck's attack
against Protestantism and believing Eck's stories that the
Jews killed children for their rituals. In a tract, "On the
last words of David", he moderated his position, but
followed the tradition of interpreting the Old Testament in
Christological terms. These pamphlets proved unpopular and would
have been forgotten, if the Nazis had not resurrected them in the
Munich Edition (first vol.3, 1934).
Some famous men at the time of the Reformation who were
sympathetic towards Jews were John Brenz (1499 - 1570), the
Swabian Reformer and the theologians Andrew Osiander (1498 -
1552) and Matthias Flacius (1520 - 1575).
1554
In Geneva Theodore Beza published a book on
"Why heretics should be punished by the magistrates."
This was a rejoinder to Sebastian Castellio's eloquent plea
for religious freedom. Castellio had been removed from Geneva by
the Reformer John Calvin because he doubted that the Songs of
Songs belonged into the Scriptures.
1580 - 1620
The Republic of the Seven Netherlands (Holland)
became very tolerant of Jews. It became a haven for Jews fleeing
the Inquisition. There Castellio's arguments for religious
freedom won out over the influence of Beza.
1582
When the Netherlands came under the rule of
Cahrles V of Spain, the Jews were expelled.
In the "Scots Confession" ch.18 Reformer John Knox
upheld the original Calvinist tenet of intolerance,
distinguishing "the Harlot" (Rome) and "the filthy
synagogues" from "the true Kirk".
1622
King Christian IV of Denmark and others invited
Jews to reside in their lands, when the Thirty Year War raged in
central Europe.
1646 - 1647
"The Westminster Confession", by act
of the Scottish parliament, superseded the Scots Confession,
defining the church in universal terms with no anti-Roman or
antisemitic defamations in its chapter on the church.
1648 - 1649
During the rebellion of the Cossacks and Russian
peasants in Poland, Ukraine, White Russia and Lithuania the most
cruel tortures were invented for the Jews. Thousands died under
prolonged brutality. Children were not spared. There are reports
of rapes and gruesome slaughters, of people being slowly killed
with spears, of women being slit open and live cats sewed up in
them...
The city of Hamburg expelled its Jews.
1654
On September 22 Peter Stuyvesant sent an
anti-Semitic letter home from the Colonies in the New World to
the West India Company, which indicates that the Jews here were
in trouble too. The Puritans in New England saw Jews as challenge
to Christian evangelism.
1656
Oliver Cromwell allowed Jews to resettle in
England, supposedly as reward for Jewish
"Intelligencers" (old English for "spies")
which are said to have enabled Cromwell to avert the projected
invasion of England planned at Brussels early in 1656 between
Charles II. and the Spanish government.
1718
Charles XIII of Sweden opened the country to
Jewish immigration. However, economic and travel restrictions
were imposed.
1744
Jews were expelled from Bohemia and 1745 from
Moravia under Empress Maria Theresa.
1753
Under the Empress Elizabeth Petrovna about
35,000 Jews were expelled from Russia.
1768
Russia's expansion and the defeat of Poland
confronted the Russians with large established Jewish
communities, who had previously not been under their rule.
Czarina Catherine II, the Great, established a territory, the
so-called Pale of Settlement. It was to prevent the Jewish
population from influencing Russian society and to be a buffer
between Russia and its western neighbours. Jews needed special
permits to travel outside the Pale. Persecutions of Jews
continued violently in Poland, Lithuania and Russia, were Jews
had fled from Crusaders and the Inquisition in western
Europe.
1791
Jews were given citizenship in France. The age
of the Enlightenment (or reason) produced a rationalism that was
applied to social and economic issues.
The narrowing sense of nationhood brought trouble to the Jews
again, because they were living across many nations.
1796
The Netherlands granted Jews full equality and
citizenship.
1808 - 1810
Czar Alexander I wanted to integrate Jews into
Russian society and ordered them to leave the villages were they
resided. An estimated 500,000 Jews left the countryside and
flooded into the cities, were thousands starved, froze to death
or died of decease. Fear of an epidemic brought about the
cancellation of the law.
1814 - 1820
Jews in Denmark were granted almost complete
emancipation. German cities still regularly expelled Jews:
Lübeck, Bremen, Würzburg and many towns in Franconia,
Swabia and Bavaria. The so-called HEP! HEP! riots (a
Crusader's shout: Hierosolyma est Perdita - Jerusalem is
lost) took place in Frankfurt, Darmstadt, Beyreuth, Karlsruhe,
Dusseldorf, Heidelberg, Wurzburg and even in Copenhagen.
1821
Thousands of Jews fled Greece after anti-Jewish
riots.
1844
Karl Marx (a Jew) published his treatise
"On the Jewish Question", Zur Judenfrage, repeating the
old stereotypes Christans had used.
1845
The French socialist, Alphonse Toussenel,
published his anti-Semitic attack "The Jews, King of the
Time", Les Juifs Rois de l'epoque.
1848
The revolution brought the emancipation of the
Jews, but already in 1851 the constitutions of Prussia and
Austria included again anti-Jewish restrictions.
1850
Riot against Jews in New York City led by three
Irish policemen.
1855
Comte de Gobineau published his "Essay on
the Inequality of the Human Races", Essai sur
l'ineqalite des races humaines. Modern antisemitism has
used this heavily.
1868
Hermann Gödsche published his novel
"Biarritz" under the pseudonum of Sir John Ratcliffe. A
chapter entitled "In the Jewish Cemetery in Prague" he
descibed a secret midnight meeting of representatives of the 12
tribes of Israel receiving directions from the Devil how to
dominate the world. In 1872 only this chapter was reprinted as a
pamphlet in St. Petersburg, Russia, with a statement saying that
although the story was fiction, it was based on fact. The
pamphlet was reprinted later in Moscow, Odessa and Prague.
1869
Jews received equal citizen status in
Germany.
1870
The Ghetto in Rome was formally abolished -
against the wishes of Pope Pius IX - and Jews became equal
citizens in the kingdom of Italy.
1871
Father August Rohling of Prague published his
pamphlet "The Talmud Jew", Der Talmudjude. It
was a vicious antisemitic attack widely circulated among
Catholics.
1873
Wilhelm Marr published his pamphlet
"Jewry's Victory over Teutonism", Der Sieg des
Judentums über das Germanentum. Here the term
'antisemitism' was used for the first time.
1875
Bismarck's Kulturkampf against the Catholics
in Germany was interpreted by Catholics as being influenced by
Jewish capital as revenge for the Roman persecution of the
Jews.
1878
Adolph Stoecker, the founder of the Christian
Socialist Workers Party in Germany, was committed to
antisemitism.
More than 100,000 Rumanian Jews immigrated to the United States
to avoid starvation because of discriminatory laws in their
country.
1879
Professor Heinrich von Treitschke at the
University of Berlin made himself a name in the world not only as
a historian but also as a modern antisemite. In a collection of
essays, "A Word about our Jewry", Ein Wort über
unser Judentum, he stated, for example, that antisemitism is
"a natural reaction of the German national feeling against a
foreign element which had usurped too large a place in our
life."
1881
A petition with 250,000 signatures was submitted
to Bismarck by the Berlin Movement calling for severe
restrictions on Jewish life in Germany.
The first of many severe pogroms against the Jews were initiated
by the Sacred League in Russia, consisting of 300 army officers.
The pogroms caused one of the major emigrations in Jewish
history.
Eugen Duhring published his "The Jewish Question as a
Problem of Race, Custom and Culture," Die Judenfrage als
Rassen-, Sitten- und Kulturfrage: "The origin of the
general contempt felt for the Jewish race lies in its absolute
inferiority in all intellectual fields. Jews show a lack of
scientific spirit, a feeble grasp of philosophy, an inability to
create in mathematics, art, and even music. Fidelity and
reverence with respect to anything great and noble are alien to
them. Therefore, the race is inferior and depraved... The duty of
the Nordic peoples is to exterminate such parasitic races as we
exterminate snakes and beasts of prey."
Berlin Movement rallies ended in riots of bands moving through
streets shouting "Juden raus!", attacking Jews or
"Jewish-looking" people, smashing windows of Jewish
businesses.
1882
Father E. A. Chabauty published "The Jews
our Master", Les Juifs, nos maitres!, about Christian
nations being attacked by a Jewish conspiracy.
1886
The German Antisemitic Alliance was formed by
rightwing parties.
Edouard-Adolphe Drumont published his "The Jews of
France", La France Juive, a violently antisemitic
work widely circulated.
1887
Otto Boeckel, one of the leaders of the German
Antisemitic Alliance was elected to the German Reichstag in
Berlin.
Karl Lüger, a leftist politician, made his antisemitism
public. He became a major leader of Austrian antisemitism. In
Mein Kampf Hitler attributes his antisemitism to Lüger's
influence.
1889
Max Liebermann von Sonnenberg who had been a
leader in the Berlin Movement founded the German Social
Antisemitc Party, Deutsch-Soziale Antisemitische Partei,
in Bochum, Westpahlia.
The first antisemitic newspaper in Hungary appeared in
Pressburg.
1890 and after
Four million Jews fled to Western Europe and
America due to persecutions in Eastern Europe. But here too - in
the Land of the Free - Jews were restricted and suffered the old
accusations.
Zionism developed in Europe.
Hermann Ahlwardt published his "The Aryan Peoples'
Battle of Despair Against Jewry", Der Verzweiflungskampf
der Arischen Völker mit dem Judentum, depicting Jewry as
an octopus controlling every sector of the German nation.
Antisemitic parties gained five seats in the German
Reichstag.
1892
Edouard Drumont founded the French newspaper La
Libre Parole to popularize his antisemitism.
1893
Antisemitic parties won sixteen seats in the
German Reichstag.
Theodor Fritsch published his "Antisemitism Chatechism"
in Germany.
1894
The trial and court-martial of the French
officer Alfred Dreyfus (a Jew) for treason was later proven to
have been caused by high-ranking antisemitic army officers and
people in the war ministry who forged documents. The Dreyfus
Affair caused antisemitic riots in France.
1899
Houston Stewart Chamberlain published his work
"The Foundations of the Nineteenth Century". He carried
Gobineau's racial theory to its logical conclusion
proclaiming Germans as the master race and urging a crusade
against all Jews.
1900 - 1910
Hundreds of pogroms against the Jews were
initiated and supported by the Czar's Black Hundreds in
Russia and Ukraine. A short version of the
"Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion" was published
by Pavolackai Krushevan in his newspaper Znamya in St.
Petersburg. The acceptance of this forgery by the Czar's
secret police even by Christians here and later in other
countries proved how Christian anti-Judaism had predispositioned
the people to believe the weirdest antisemitic propaganda. S. A.
Nilus published the whole text of the Protocols in the third
edition of his book, "The Great in the Small", in St.
Petersburg. G. Butmi published his version of the Protocols,
"The Enemies of the Human Race", in St. Petersburg
(four editions in two years).(See also 1917 and 1937).
1911
Werner Sombart published his book, "The Jew
and Modern Capitalism". He claimed that Judaism and
capitalism are practically synonymous. He stated:
"Intellectual interests and intellectual skill are more
strongly developed in him [the Jew] than physical (manual)
powers. (Compare 1881 where Duhring had stated the exact
opposite).
1914
Anti-Jewish laws were abolished so that Jews
could fight for Holy Mother Russia in WW I.
1915
Grand Duke Sergei, Commander-in-Chief of the
Russian armies decreed the relocation of all Jews from the Pale
fearing they would side with the Germans. 600,000 were forcibly
transported to the interior of Russia. About 100,000 of them died
from exposure and starvation.
1918 - 1920
Up to 200,000 Jews suffered violent death during
Russia's fratricidal civil war and the Russo-Polish war in
1920. It was mainly in Ukraine, but there was also mass murder of
Jews in Minsk, Pinsk and Vilna by the Polish army (documented by
the US government) and in Yekaterinburg, Siberia. In July 1919
over 2,000 Jews were slaughtered by the "White" army
under Admiral Kolchak. Jews were accused by the Bolshewiks of
being capitalists and opposed to them, and by Whites to be Reds
and Communists. They suffered more by the Whites, though, who
made no difference between them and the Reds. Lenin outlawed
pogroms, but the better treatment Jews received from the Reds
gave Whites more "proof" that Jews were communists.
Terrible tortures and slaughters of Jews happened in Ukraine
under General Denikin whose White army in South Russia was armed
and financed mainly by the Allies, chiefly the British.
In the Balfour Declaration the British Foreign Secretary declared
Palestine to be the "national home" for the Jews. The
Arab nations protested. The "Protocols of
the Learned Elders of Zion" was first published in
England.
In riots in Berlin and Munich Jews were blamed for Germany losing
the war.
1920 - 1921
Gottfried zer Beek (Ludwig Müller)
published the Protocols in German. It reached six editions.
Müller's version became the official version of the
Nazis in 1929. The Protocols were also published in France, the
United States and Poland.
The "Return to Normalcy" revived the Ku Klux Klan in
the United States and restrictions of all sorts were imposed on
people of "Hebrew descent".
Hitler made his first important speech against the Jews on Aug.
13, urging to take away all their rights.
Approximately 1,450,000 Jews had immigrated to the United States
over a period of about 30 years. To stem the immigration
President Harding and the Congress rewrote the laws limiting
immigration by nationality per year to three percent of the
number of people of that nationality already in the U.S. as of
the 1910 census. Another severe restriction of immigration was
legislated in 1924.
1925
Hitler published his Mein Kampf: "If, with
the help of his Marxist creed, the Jew is victorious over the
other peoples of the world, his crown will be the funeral wreath
of humanity...Today I believe that I am acting in accordance with
the will of the Almighty Creator: by defending myself against the
Jew, I am fighting for the work of the Lord."
1926 - 1933
Pogroms continued in the USSR, Poland, Rumania,
Hungary, Greece and Mexico. In Germany Jewish cemeteries and
synagogues were desecrated.
1933
Hitler came to power in Germany. Jews were
barred from civil service, legal professions and universities,
were not allowed to teach in schools and could not be editors of
newspapers.
1934
Anti-Jewish groups formed throughout Canada.
Antisemitism was blatent in many magazines and newspapers.
1935
Jews lost their citizenship in Germany.
1936
Palestinians rebelled against Zionism and the
British decision to offer the Jews Arab lands. By 1939 half a
million Jews were settled in Palestine. The British tried to
block the flow of immigration and to deal with Jewish
paramilitary organizations.
In the Stalin purges in the USSR many Jews lost their lives.
Cardinal Hloud, the Primate of Poland, in a pastoral letter urged
Catholics to boycott Jewish businesses.
1937
The Concentration Camps of Sachsenhausen,
Buchenwald und Lichtenburg were established in Germany.
All Jewish teachers lost their jobs in Italy. Jewish children
were segregated. The Protocols were
published in Italian and widely circulated.
1938
During the night of November 9-10 some 7,000
Jewish shops and businesses were looted, most synagogues burned
and 91 Jews killed in Germany. About 30,000 richer Jews were
taken to concentration camps. Later most of them were freed and
given emigration papers after all their possessions had been
confiscated. A few hundred-thousand Jews were able to emigrate
from Germany, Austria, Bohemia and Moravia by turning all they
had over to the Nazis. Jews were barred from public life, from
schools and universities. They had to wear yellow badges in the
form of the Star of David on their clothing at all times. They
were accused of every evil under the sun and always in fear of
being beaten up or even killed on the streets.
1939 - 1941
The beginning of WW II brought a change from
emigration policies to extermination. Thousands of Jews were
rounded up by the SS (Einsatzkommandos) behind the advancing
German front and shot or brought to Concentration Camps in
Poland. The Gestapo (Geheime Staatspolizei) rounded up Jews,
Gipsys, Jehovah's Witnesses, Communists, homosexuals and
others and put them into camps.
1942
On Jan. 20 a conference of sixteen high-ranking
Nazi officials in Berlin-Wannsee planned the "final
solution", the complete extermination of European
Jewry.
1942 - 1945
Almost six million Jews, among them about one
million children, were killed in special extermination camps, all
situated in Poland, which was occupied by the German army. The
most prominent of these camps was Auschwitz.
"Holocaust" is a biblical term which means burnt
offering. The Jewish people refer to this most devastating event
in their history as the Sho'ah.
Many churches in Germany supported Hitler as a national hero.
Some resisted him. But Christianity as a whole failed miserably
in resisting the evil done to the Jews and other minorities. And
when Jewish refugees knocked on the doors of the nations opposed
to the Nazis, they were rejected. All over the western world the
churches were rather silent when the Jews needed help and were
eventually slaughtered. The Holocaust is, therefore, also the
culmination of the Christian anti-Judaism of the centuries. Their
own anti-Jewish teaching paralyzed Christians to act
appropriately, when secular, pagan and anti-Christian forces took
over the language of the anti-Judaism of the Christian Church and
brought it to its deadly conclusion.
In the beginning was the anti-Judaic word - in the end the
Final Solution.