> From: [log in to unmask]
> Organization: Arts
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Date sent: Fri, 11 Jul 1997 13:19:05 +0000
> Subject: Re: Lateran IV and the Jews
> Priority: normal
> Send reply to: [log in to unmask]
> On the issue of residential segregation: Jews voluntarily lived in separate
> quarters or neighbourhoods, if possible, well-before 1215. (See, e.g. the
> early 11thc charter in which the bishop offers the Jews a protected, walled
> area--in Mainz, I think--given in Robert Chazan, *Church, State and Jew in
> the Middle Ages*, which is not to hand.) Jews did so, because communal
> institutions and prohibitions required proximity (synagogue, ritual bath,
> etc., etc.); and, in human terms, because safety as well as community ethos
> meant living together. But as a step on the way to the non-voluntary
> ghetto, the Fourth Lateran, from the Christian perspective, encouraged the
> segregation of Jews in all aspects--personal, economic, sexual, political,
> even visual--i.e., their separation from the *populus Christianus*.
>
> Gary Dickson
> University of Edinburgh
>
>
>
Dear all (for this is not a reply for Gary, but rather a comment on
the ongoing Jewish discussion in general)
I can not say for certain whether anyone has explicitly condemned
the Catholic Church of racism in connection with the constitutions of
the IV Latheran Council, however, the overall feeling is that some
participants are trying to do so.
Now, I am not trying to say that the Church was free from
stereotypical thinking or even downright oppressive action towards
the Jews, but I would like to point out that it was the in the air
then (and in the following centuries right down to our days) to hate
Jews. Put in to the right context the measures taken by the Church
were not particularly harsh. On the contrary, we have also a plenty
of evidence where the churchmen were actually protecting the Jews.
I think that it is equally wrong to blame the Church of the medieval
hatred towards the Jews as it is to blame the Germans alone of what
happened to the Jews during the last war. I find it interesting that
people are still blaming the Germans as a collective of things done by
(some of their) fathers or grandfathers, and this happens in the
countries where the juridical principle of avenging sins of one person
to his relatives (vendetta) has been abondened centuries ago as a
barbaric practise. By this I do not suggest that we should forget the
Auschwitz, on the contrary. I only say that we should stop blaming
people as collectives, whether we are talking about the Germans or
medieval Church.
If one wants to find the guilty persons in the history, which is
somewhat dubious practise in my opinion, one should blame the common
tendency of the humankind to be unable to tolerate anything
different. I know that this message is more emotional than academic,
but that is the way I feel about this discussion. If I have
misunderstood the implications of others, I do apologise.
Jussi Hanska
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