Blood Libel Accusation Research Paper

They claimed that those of the Jewish faith were responsible for Jesus’ death, and therefore they were unable to be trusted. The expansion of Jewish communities infuriated the Christian society, pushing them towards their breaking point. In 1391, anti-Semitic violence broke out in Castile, and spread across many other areas in Spain such as Barcelona, Saragossa, and Valencia. Mobs entered the Jewish communities to burn synagogues, invade homes, rape the women, and kill the dominant Jewish rulers that were recognized. The Jews of Spain were given an ultimatum; evacuate, or convert to Christianity. Nearly half of them agreed to convert their faith, and they were baptized in order to show their true commitment to the Church. Those who converted were referred to as Conversos or “New Christians”. This ultimatum that those of the Jewish faith were given satisfied Christian societies, but it soon became apparent that the Conversos were not acting accordingly in respect to the Christian belief system. Although they attended church and participated in Christian traditions, behind closed doors, it was believed that they continued to practise the traditions, beliefs, and holy days outlined by the Jewish faith. They refrained from eating pork, and supposedly celebrated the Jewish Sabbath which lasted from Friday’s sundown until Saturday’s nightfall. This realization caused Christians to become furious, and those who had been deemed

Other religions blamed the Jews for 'Christ's' resurrection and were regarded as 'Christ killers'. As years and centuries have gone by, the Jews were still being blamed for unfortunate events that there wasn't even evidence for. Thirdly I would like to add that there had been centuries of persecution from the Nazis in particular; 1933-1939. In 1933

The peace the Jews experienced during this era after the exile continued for three hundred years. After this their problems were minimal up to the time of the Crusades. Because of the conflict between Christianity and Islam Jews suffered immeasurably, leading ultimately to two long centuries of persecution and expulsion. In the year 1095 a sermon was preached telling the Christians to regain control of the holy lands. Gangs would attack the Jewish communities, destroying their cities and torturing the people who lived in them. The Jews were such a threat because they did not believe in Jesus Christ a s the Son of God and were therefore non-Christian believers. A second wave of crusades emerged in 1146 and 1189. Riots against Jews even began to emerge through England. The crusades thus lead to Jews becoming the hated religious sect and they were cast out of almost every country throughout Europe. (2) Jews thus began to move and were forced into other countries, countries where they were also not wanted.

Along with this immigration, however, came prejudice and anti-Semitism. A popular accusation towards the Jews was that of the blood libel, which had been occurring in Europe since the Middle Ages, but reached the U.S. in the early 1900s. The blood libel was a rumor that Jews would kidnap and then murder Christians - often children - and use their blood in their holidays such as Passover (where they would use the blood to make matzah, or unleavened bread). The first documented case of the blood libel in the United States was in 1928 in Massena, New York, where the Jewish community was accused of a blood libel when a four-year-old girl went missing (although later, she was found alive) (“Blood libel”). Popular figures such as Henry Ford and Reverend Charles Coughlin began to speak out against the Jews, believing that they were the cause for the evil in the world and that they themselves were the cause of Nazism (Zola). Between the first and second World Wars leading up to the end of the Second World War, anti-Semitic acts increased as the U.S. became more involved with the war. From just 1940 to 1946, the

Relations between the Christians and Jews of medieval Europe were always influenced by their unequal social and economic statuses and the religious competition that existed between them. While the Jews served a purpose in the Christian religion, this purpose meant that the more populous Christians that had come to dominate Europe only tolerated the Jews. No premise of equality existed, and the Jews came to depend on relationships with lower-level rulers to secure their relative safety. Rumors persisted that Jews had poisoned wells, and the Jews were often the targets of violence that the Christians seemed exceedingly willing to deliver. Overall, life was better for the Christians and worse for the Jews, although this would be of no

In Jerusalem, Jesus was treated fairly by everyone, but Romans and Jews didn’t except him, so he had to be executed. This shows that Romans and Jews would kill anyone who was dangerous, or threatening. Till this day, Jesus is a major part of believe and religion.

Jews played a crucial role in their communities in medieval Europe so the growth in anti-sematic action can be seen as unexpected. Whilst Jews had always been considered as ‘other’ by their Christian neighbour tolerance existed. So what caused the shift to viewing Jews as traitors? The causes for anti-Semitism during the Latin Middle Ages were sudden large events, the Crusades and the Black Death, and ongoing concerns, Jew’s economic position. The primary cause was the Crusades as the First Crusade began a tradition of organised violence against the Jewish population of Europe, rationalised as an extension of the Christian mission.

According to the text of the Old Testament, Jewish authorities treated Jesus and his followers with hostility. Many Christians to this day, even though it has been proven not to be true, believe that Jesus’ crucifixion was a direct result of the Jewish people. Christian antisemitism was born from a misconception by Jesus’ followers that was then eternalized by being written in their bible. Christian antisemitism would continue onward through the Crusades in which the persecution of the Jewish people reached an all-time high in Europe, where communities were destroyed, Jewish people were killed, and others were expelled from their lands. Many stereotypes for Jewish people arose from this period because they were restricted to specific “inferior” occupations by the Christian authorities such as tax collectors and moneylenders. This early on compulsory requirement to wear a yellow star began in certain parts of Europe.

Jews were constantly wondering “how could our lives get any worse?” Unfortunately, their lives got a lot worse. By the peak of the Plague (when the death toll reached the millions), everyone across Europe portrayed a Jew as a demon. They wore Satan’s face with long black horns, and had a curly, ominous beard. Jews made a large anti-christ image. To make matters worst, bad rumors about Jews spread around as quick as a snap. Angry priests said that Jews kidnapped and tortured Christian children in part of their efforts to kill off Christians. Though the gossip was not true, people ate up the rumors and spread it even farther around Europe. Eventually, Christians decided that the Plague occurred because they let Jews live in their midst. So - their response? The Christians decided to kill Jews in return, and thus: the massacres began. It was estimated that only twenty percent of Jews died from the Plague, while eight percent died from execution. The Jewish population almost disappeared by the year 1390. In Frankfurt, Germany the Jewish population started at 19,000 and then lowered to 10 people by the end of the Plague. In 1267, “the council of Vienna forbade purchases of meat from Jews on the ground that it was likely to be poisoned”. Now Jews were the ones losing money, and Christians were profiting from the massacres. In Vienna, Jews died so quickly, a new cemetery was built. Back at Strasbourg, two thousand Jews were murdered in hope to find gold on their backs (because they were perceived as rich men). In Mainz, the Jews rebelled against the Christians but failed terribly. The Jews killed 200 Christians, but the Christians retaliated by killing more than 12,000 Jews. The famous “Trial at Chillon”, in September 1346, said that Jews poisoned certain wells at Neustadt. Despite being innocent, the Jews were tortured. In Hansa, spring 1350: “Jews walled up alive in their houses and left to die of

Like the Holocaust in the 1930s-1940s, Jews during this time were treated with brutality. Manchester describes it as, “Jewry was luckier - slightly luckier - than blacks. If the pogroms of the time are less infamous than the Holocaust, it is only because anti-Semites then lacked twentieth-century technology” (35). In the year 1492, the Spanish had regained control of Spain. The rule of Spain was now under King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella. They were not fond of Jews in their nation. The Jews in Spain were given three months to convert to christianity or to leave. After seeing what the Spanish were doing in Spain, the king of Portugal ordered the expulsion of all Portuguese Jews. Any Jews who wouldn’t leave or were slow to leave were massacred. Around four thousand Lisbon Jews were killed during a single night in 1506. Only three years later persecution of Jews in Germany began. Jews throughout history have been treated badly but during the medieval period it was especially hard if you were a Jew.

In Europe the crusades sometimes turned their fury against Jews,murdered the entire community.This is important because it shows how they would take their anger out.They had also left a bitter legacy of religious hatred behind them both Muslims and Christians had committed awful horror in their name of religion.

As the first crusade began to take shape in 1095, Christians and Jews had an abrasive, or challenging, relationship. While there was nothing in the papal program that was explicitly anti-Jewish, Christians had long had a negative perception of Jews. To the acolytes of Christ, followers of the Torah were, “…Enemies of the Christian faith, regarded as responsible for Christ’s death on the cross” (Tyerman 30). To blame a group of people for the death of a beloved spiritual leader, is to cause friction between two followings. If this was the reason for the hatred of Jews, what

Imperial persecution became wholesale throughout the Empire. Initially the Jewish community was the instigators of this persecution of Christians. The book of Acts outlines several incidents involving such persecution. During the decade of 60 A.D., periods of Roman persecution occurred, however this persecution was sporadic. For example, Nero was ruler of the Roman Empire, under his reign Rome was set on fire and burnt to the ground. Christians became the scapegoat for this cowardly act. Tasitus wrote that perhaps Nero himself started the blaze, as an excuse to persecute the Christians. Nero’s acts of persecution were contained within the confines of Rome.

Kamen notes the ambiguous pressure on Jews, as despite the anti-semitism of contemporary Europe, the ‘Aragonese crown protected the Jews and conversos firmly, rejecting all attacks on them‘ and how any existing anti-Semetic legislation went unenforced (Kamen 15). Even after Ferdinand and Isabella initiated their reign in 1474, the monarchs were ‘never personally anti-Semitic’ and their intervention in domestic politics demonstrated an ‘impressive picture of the monarchy protecting its jews’ (Kamen, 16). In actuality, the inception of the Inquisition and the subsequent expulsion of the Jewish population was prompted by the actions of ‘Judaizers’, who were made up of conversos who had attempted to persuade newly assimilated Christians to return to their original Jewish faith. The efforts of these Judaizers concerned the crown and as a result the Inquisition was officially founded on September 27, 1480 as a means of regulating the the disruptive and disobedient conversos.

As if that were not enough, “Between 1648 and 1658, in organized massacres called pogroms, over 700 Jewish communities were destroyed. Jewish deaths numbered in the hundreds of thousands” (Esposito 107). Finally I learned of the Spanish Inquisition where Jews were once again treated as something separate from humanity. “Many were tortured and burned at the stake. The Jews were expelled from Spain in 1492” (Esposito 108). They endured this suffering for no crime they committed. They endured this suffering because of their faith. It is unfathomable to me. The Jews have a long history of violence against them and of others trying to eradicate them, a history that I was not fully aware of until this class.