Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 13.djvu/447

 ISRAEL 431 their isolation from being voluntary became compulsory; from the 13th century onwards they were obliged to wear, as a distinctive mark (more necessary in the East than in the West), a round or square yellow badge on their breast. 1 The difference of religion elicited a well-marked religious hate with oft repeated deadly outbreaks, especially during the period of the crusades, and afterwards when the Black Death was raging (1348-50). Practical consequences like these the church of course did not countenance ; the popes set themselves against persecutions of the Jews, 2 but with imperfect success. The popular aversion rested by no means exclusively on religious considerations ; worldly motives were also present. The Jews of that period had in a still higher degree than now the control of financial affairs in their hands ; and they used it without scruple. The church herself had unintentionally given them a monopoly of the money market, by forbidding Christians to take interest. 3 In this way the Jews became rich indeed, but at the same time made themselves still more repugnant to the Christian population than they previously were by reason of their religion. i Having, according to the later mediaeval system, no rights in the Christian state, the Jews were tolerated only in those territories where the sovereign in the exercise of free favour accorded them protection. This protection was granted them in many quarters, but never for nothing ; numerous and various taxes, which could be raised or changed in a perfectly arbitrary way, were exacted in exchange. But in countries where the feeling of nation ality attained to a vigorous development, the spirit of tolera tion was speedily exhausted ; the Jews were expelled by the act of the state. England was the first kingdom in which this occurred (1290); France followed in 1395, Spain and Portugal in 1492 and 1495. In this way it came about that the Holy Roman Empire, Germany, Italy, and adjoining districts, became the chief abode of the Jews. 4 In the anarchy which here prevailed they could best maintain their separate attitude, and if they were expelled from one locality they readily found refuge in some other. The emperor had indeed the right of extirpating them altogether (with the exception of a small number to be left as a memorial) ; but, in the first place, he had in various ways given up this right to the states of the empire, and, moreover, his pecuniary resources were so small that he could not afford to want the tax which the Jews as his &quot; cervi cameras &quot; paid him for protecting their persons and property. In spite of many savage persecutions the Jews maintained their ground, especially in those parts of Germany where the political confusion was greatest. They even succeeded in 1 Comp. Du Gauge, s. v. &quot; Judsei&quot; ; also Renter, Gesch. d. Auf- Marungim Mittelalter, i. 154 sqq. In spite of all the legal restrictions laid upon them, the Jews still continued to have great influence -with the princes, and more especially with the popes, of the Middle Ages. 2 Deer., ii. 23, 8, 9. Alexander II. omnibus episcopis Hispanioe : Dispar. , . est Judsoorum et Sarracenorum causa ; in illos eiiim, qui Christianos persequuntur et ex urbibus et propriis sedibus pellunt, juste pugnatur, hi vero ubique servire parati sunt. 8 Decretal. Greg. v. 19, 18. Innocent III. in name of the Lateran Council : Quanto amplius Christiana religio ab exactione compescitur usurarum, tanto graving super his Judseorum perfidia insolescit, ita quod brevi tempore Christianorum exhauriunt facultates. Volentes igitur in hac parte prospicere Christianis, ne a Juclaeis immaniter aggraventur, synodal! decreto statuimus, ut, si de ctetero quocunque prsetextu Judsei a Christianis graves immoderatasve usuras extorserint, Christianorum eis participium subtrahatur, donee de immoderato gravamine satisfecerint competenter. . . . Principibus autem injun- gimns, ut propter hoc non sint Christianis infesti, sed potius a tanto gravamine studeant cohibere Judscos. 4 The Polish Jews are German Jews who migrated in the Middle Ages to Poland, but have maintained to the present day their German speech, a mediaeval south-Prankish dialect, of course greatly corrupted. In Russian &quot;German.&quot; and &quot;Jew&quot; mean the same thing. maintaining a kind of autonomy by means of an arrange ment in virtue of which civil processes which they had against each other were decided by their own rabbins in accordance with the law of the Talmud. 5 The Jews, through their having on the one hand separated themselves and on the other hand been excluded on religious grounds from the Gentiles, gained an internal solidarity and solidity which has hitherto enabled them to survive all the attacks of time, The hostility of the Middle Ages involved them in no danger ; the greatest peril has been brought upon them by modern times, along with permission and increasing inducements to abandon their separate position. It is worth while to recall on this point the opinion of Spinoza, who was well able to form a competent judgment (Tract. Theol. polit., c. 4, ad fin.}: &quot;That the Jews have maintained themselves so long in spite of their dispersed and disorganized condition is not. at all to be wondered at, when it is considered how they separated themselves from all other nationalities in such a way as to bring upon themselves the hatred of all, and that not only by external rites contrary to those of other nations, but also by the sign of circumcision which they maintain most religiously. Experience shows that their conservation is due in a great degree to the very hatred which they have incurred. When the king of Spain compelled the Jews either to accept the national religion or to go into banish ment, very many of them accepted the Roman Catholic faith, and in virtue of this received all the privileges of Spanish subjects, and were declared eligible for every honour ; the consequence was that a process of absorption began immediately, and in a short time neither trace nor memory of them survived. Quite different was the history of those whom the king of Portugal compelled to accept the creed of his nation ; although converted, they continued to live apart from the rest of their fellow subjects, having been declared unfit for any dignity. So great importance do I attach to the sign of circumcision also in this connexion that I am persuaded that il ic sufficient by itself to main tain the separate existence of the nation for ever.&quot; The persistency of the race may of course prove a harder thing to overcome than Spinoza has supposed, but nevertheless he will be found to have spoken truly in declaring that the so-called emancipation of the Jews must inevitably lead to the extinction of Judaism wherever the process is extended beyond the political to the social sphere. For the accom plishment of this centuries may be required. See JEWS. Historical Sources. For all that precedes the time of Alexander Histori- the Old Testament is tlie only native authority. Among foreign C al sources, besides the stone of Mesha, the Assyrian inscriptions hold sources. the first rank ; for the chronology they are of decisive importance. The Egyptian inscriptions on the other hand are of slight value. Besides these, mention must be made of the notices contained in the Chronicon of Eusebius, and in the Contra Apioncm of Josephus (Manetho and Berosus). For the period between Alexander and the destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans we have Daniel, with tho commentary of Jerome, the Apocrypha, the Pseudepigraphic writers, and the NewTestament, besides Philo and Josephus, in otherwords, the entire body of the Grecian Jewish literature that has reached us. Hebrew or Aramaic literature of this period we have none ; the writings of the rabbins are to be used only with the greatest caution as sources for the history of past times, and always only as supple mentary to the Grecian authorities. The foreign sources which re quire to bo consulted for the Hellenistic and Roman periods are brought together in Clinton s Fasti; recently there have been added a great variety of coins and very numerous inscriptions (Le Bas and Waddington). For the period of the Palestinian patriarchate there are the church fathers, Origen, Eusebius, Jerome, and Epiphanius besides the law-books. But here the first place belongs to the rabbinical authorities, although it is an arduous task to extract from such a chaos the data of historical value which it contains. Genu inely historical works are the Megillath Taanith, the Seder Olam Rabba, and the Seder Olam Zutra. For the history of the Jews in the diaspora there are of course no special sources. (J. WE.) 5 Stobbe, Die Juden in Deutschl. u-dkr. d. Mittdalt., Brunsw., 1866.