A study of the 12th-century evolution of innovative anti-Jewish stereotypes and their impact on subsequent Western thought. The 12th century was a period of significant change and dislocation in the West; it witnessed the interaction of new societal circumstances and a prior ideational legacy, similar to events in the 19th-20th centuries. This interaction produced an innovative view of Jews which was fated to influence anti-Jewish perceptions up to the present. In the period of societal change, persecutory patterns emerged, directed at diverse societal outgroups, among them the Jews. The 12th-century stereotypes were permanently absorbed into the historic legacy of Christian anti-Jewish thinking. These stereotypes were based on a perception of Jewish hatred of Christianity and Christians, and that Jews commit acts of anti-Christian violence generated by this purported hatred (e.g. ritual murder, abuse of Christian symbols, moneylending abuses). The most pernicious anti-Jewish imagery involves stereotypes alleging mortal threats posed by Jews. States that every new stage in the evolution of anti-Jewish thinking is marked by dialectical interplay between a prior legacy of negative stereotypes and the realities of a new social context.

In the first new synthesis of medieval Jewish history to be published in ten years, Robert Chazan discusses the Jewish experience in Europe between AD 1000 and 1500. As well as being the story of medieval Jewry, the book also illuminates important aspects of majority life in Europe.

Based on two extant Jewish sources describing the pogroms in the Rhineland in 1096, the Mainz Anonymous and the Solomon bar Simson Chronicle, narrates the history of the massacre of Jews by the Crusaders and by burghers who joined them, in Mainz, Worms, Köln, and Speyer. The Pope, who conceived the Crusade, did not call for the massacre of Jews, nor did the secular authorities approve of it; it was Count Emicho's army that unleashed the murders. Clergymen and imperial officials, as well as some burghers, tried to protect the Jews, not always successfully. The revulsion toward Christianity, the readiness for martyrdom evinced by the Rhineland Jews, the mass suicides, and even the murder of their families by Jews themselves only incited the Crusaders to greater excesses. Despite the brutality of the massacres of 1096, the bulk of Ashkenazic Jewry survived them unharmed. Although later Jewish literature sometimes praised the Jews' behavior during the First Crusade, this pattern was not repeated in other disasters which befell European Jewry.

Examines three medieval Jewish accounts of the First Crusade massacres in the Rhine area: the "Mainz Anonymous, " the "Solomon bar Simson Chronicle, " and the "Eliezer bar Nathan Chronicle." Discerns five voices or perspectives in these narratives due to the fact that the "Solomon bar Simson Chronicle" is a compilation of several prior compositions. Suggests that the narratives were composed in order to provide important time-bound information (the course of events, apology of the Jews - both those who chose martyrdom and those who converted, etc.), as well as to address critical timeless issues (including guidance for the future, theodicy, "Kiddush Hashem, " etc.). Believes that the data provided by the two early narratives - the "Mainz Anonymous" and the Speyer-Worms-Mainz unit of the "Solomon bar Simson Chronicle" - are historically reliable, while the other narratives are less reliable. Concludes that the combination of time-bound and timeless concerns reflects an innovative style of historical writing and new views on the relationship between God, humanity, and history.

"This book re-evaluates the prevailing notion that Jews in medieval Christian Europe lived under an appalling regime of ecclesiastical limitation, governmental exploitation and expropriation, and unceasing popular violence. Robert Chazan argues that, while Jewish life in medieval Western Christendom was indeed beset with grave difficulties, it was nevertheless an environment rich in opportunities; the Jews of medieval Europe overcame obstacles, grew in number, explored innovative economic options, and fashioned enduring new forms of Jewish living. His research also provides a reconsideration of the legacy of medieval Jewish life, which is often depicted as equally destructive and projected as the underpinning of the twentieth-century catastrophes of antisemitism and the Holocaust. Dr Chazan's research proves that, although Jewish life in the medieval West laid the foundation for much Jewish suffering in the post-medieval world, it also stimulated considerable Jewish ingenuity, which lies at the root of impressive Jewish successes in the modern West"--

During the course of the twelfth century, increasing numbers of Jews migrated into western Christendom from Islamic lands. But western Christendom was both appealing and threatening to the Jewish immigrants. Indeed, western Christendom was entering a phase of intense missionizing activity, some of which was directed at the long-term Jewish residents of Europe and the Jewish newcomers. The writings of twelfth- and thirteenth-century leaders from southern France and northern Spain constitute the first evidence of Jewish anti-Christian polemics from within western Christendom. These leaders were fully cognizant of the core Christian thrusts, described them in detail for their co-religionists, and rebutted them carefully. This study recreates some of the clarification and rebuttal, and examines the techniques of persuasion adopted by the Jewish polemicists in order to reassure their Jewish readers of the truth of Judaism and the error of Christianity.