Kosher Wine in Medieval Provence and Languedoc – Production and Commerce∗

Pinchas ROTH Bar-IlanUniversity

KOSHER WINE IN MEDIEVAL PROVENCE AND LANGUEDOC – PRODUCTION AND COMMERCE∗

ABSTRACT

Responsa literature from southern France provides detailed information about the production of and commerce in kosher wine. Because the cases in medieval rabbinic sources were recorded for their legal significance rather than their economic importance, they can shed light on aspects of medieval life that escape the reach of histo- rians working with notarial or municipal documents. For example, piquette (pressed grapes mixed with water) was considered a low quality beverage, and is not mentioned in commercial records from the Middle Ages as much as wine is. However, Provençal rabbis devoted many discussions to the status of piquette in Jewish law. The responsa preserve detailed information about the ways in which kosher wine was produced on a commercial scale, and how it was marketed to kosher consumers in local and international markets. Read critically, these sources also demonstrate that the Jewish laity in medieval Provence and Languedoc were more conscientious in upholding the laws of kosher wine than is often assumed.

RÉSUMÉ

Les responsa du sud de la France fournissent des informations détaillées sur la production et le commerce de vin kašer. C’est pour leur intérêt juridique et non pour leur importance économique que les cas examinés ont été consignés dans les sources rabbiniques et, pour cette raison, ils éclairent des aspects de la vie médiévale qui échappent aux historiens travaillant sur des documents d’archives notariaux ou municipaux. On pourrait citer, à titre d’exemple, le cas de la piquette, fabriquée à partir de raisins pressés mélangés à de l’eau, qui, considérée comme une boisson de qualité inférieure, n’est pas autant mentionnée que le vin dans les registres com- merciaux. En revanche, les rabbins provençaux, qui s’intéressaient à son statut dans

∗ An earlier version of this paper was delivered at a workshop titled “Les acteurs écono- miques juifs médiévaux face à la Halakha: autour du vin et de la viticulture”, in Paris on 16 November 2015. My thanks to Juliette Sibon and Claude Denjean for organizing the workshop and for their comments, and to Judith Kogel, Simcha Emanuel and Menachem Butler for their help.

Revuedesétudesjuives,178(1-2),janvier-juin2019,pp.59-78. doi:10.2143/REJ.178.1.3286067 60 KOSHERWINEINMEDIEVALPROVENCEANDLANGUEDOC le droit juif, lui ont consacré de nombreuses discussions. Des informations précises concernant la production de vin kašer à l’échelle commerciale et sa distribution sur les marchés locaux et internationaux pour les consommateurs qui mangeaient kašer, ont également été conservées dans les responsa. Une lecture critique de ces sources prouve aussi que les juifs du Languedoc et de la Provence, à l’époque médiévale, étaient plus soucieux de respecter les lois du vin kašer que ce qu’on suppose sou- vent.

Rabbinic law imposes limitations on many aspects of food preparation and consumption. Medieval works devoted to those laws are replete with discussions regarding specific situations or circumstances, which threw the permis- sibility of certain food products into question. The laws pertaining to wine were particularly strict, due to wine’s multiple and significant roles as a staple of European diet, social lubricant and ritual instrument for both Juda- ism and Christianity. The wine of non-Jews was known as yennesekh, liba- tory wine, and was strictly forbidden. Even wine produced by and belonging to Jews could become forbidden if it was touched by a non-Jew.1 Like their co-religionists in the communities of Ashkenaz and northern France, the Jews of southern France lived mostly in wine-growing regions – the southern coast, from Roussillon to Marseilles, and the Rhône valley.2 But viticulture was only one of many agricultural pursuits in the Midi, and eco- nomically it was not especially significant.3 Almost every landowner owned a vineyard, and little need was felt to transport wine from one place to another because local wine was readily available. Export of wine was undeveloped, since most of the ports reached by ships from southern France were well sup- plied with local product.4 The Rhône, the major artery of river trade, flows

1. The laws of kosher wine can be found in Moses Maimonides’ MišnehTorah, Laws of Forbidden Foods, chapters 11-13, English translation in TheCodeofMaimonides–TheBook ofHoliness, trans. L. I. RABINOWITZ, P. GROSSMAN, New Haven 1965, p. 208-226. For a brief overview see S. ROSE, The Wine Trade in Medieval Europe 1000-1500, London 2011, p. 150-153. 2. H. SOLOVEITCHIK, CollectedEssays, vol. 1, Oxford 2013, p. 224-236. On the medieval Jewish communities of southern France, see I. TWERSKY, “Aspects of the Social and Cultural History of Provençal Jewry”, JournalofWorldHistory 11 (1968), p. 185-207 (reprinted in I. TWERSKY, StudiesinJewishLawandPhilosophy, New York 1982, p. 180-202); D. and C. IANCU, LesjuifsduMidi,unehistoiremillénaire, Avignon 1995; D. IANCU, Provincia Judaica. Dictionnaire de géographie historique des juifs en Provence médiévale, Leuven 2010. 3. L. STOUFF, RavitaillementetalimentationenProvenceaux XIVeetXVesiècles, Paris 1970, p. 86-96; F. BRAUDEL, TheIdentityofFrance, vol. 1, trans. S. REYNOLDS, London 1988, p. 45; N. PLACK,CommonLand,WineandtheFrenchRevolution:RuralSocietyandEcon- omyinSouthernFrance,c.1789-1820, Farnham (Surrey) 2009, p. 19-24. 4. R. DION, HistoiredelavigneetduvinenFrance, Paris 1990, p. 311-312; M. LACHIVER, Vins,vignesetvignerons.Histoireduvignoblefrançais, Paris 1988, p. 80-81; É. BARATIER, KOSHERWINEINMEDIEVALPROVENCEANDLANGUEDOC 61 from north to south, and although it was technically feasible to pull boats upstream, this was slow and difficult work.5 Land routes to the north were better suited to light, expensive goods and not to heavy barrels of wine.6 There is evidence that spiced wine from Montpellier reached royal courts in the north,7 but on the whole, the wine market was local and limited.8 According to rabbinic law, wine that was touched by a Gentile is forbidden, out of concern that while touching it the Gentile performed a religious act that dedicated the wine to his pagan religion.9 Wine used for pagan worship is not only forbidden for consumption by Jews. A Jew is also forbidden to derive any benefit from such wine – it may not be sold to Gen- tiles, since the Jew would then receive the benefit of the money he received for selling it. The economic pressures which bore down upon Jews in northern France and in Germany in their struggle to maintain the observance of ritual laws pertaining to wine, and which “deflected” Halakhah off its natural course (to use Soloveitchik’s term), did not exist to the same degree in southern

“Production et exportation du vin du terroir de Marseille du XIIIe au XVIe siècle”, Bulletin philologiqueethistorique(jusqu’à1610) (1959), p. 239-249; E. LE ROY LADURIE, ThePeas- antsofLanguedoc, trans. J. DAY, Urbana 1974, p. 60-66. On a map of medieval wine export routes, southern France does not appear at all, T. UNWIN, WineandtheVine.AnHistorical GeographyofViticultureandtheWineTrade, London 1991, p. 183. 5. A certain amount of wine did travel in this direction, but it was only from the 14th century onwards that moving goods upriver became profitable. L. STOUFF, Latableprovençale. BoireetmangerenProvenceàlafinduMoyenÂge, Avignon 1996, p. 49-50; R.-H. BAUTIER, “La circulation fluviale dans la France médiévale”, in Recherches sur l’économie de la Francemédiévale.Actesdu112econgrèsnationaldessociétéssavantes(Lyon,1987),section d’histoire médiévale, Paris 1989, p. 32-33 (= id., Sur l’histoire économique de la France médiévale, Aldershot 1991, chapter V, p. 32-33). See also W. D. PADEN, TwoMedievalOccitan TollRegistersfromTarascon, Toronto 2016, p. 30-32. For the common trade routes of wine in western Europe, see P. SPUFFORD, PowerandProfit.TheMerchantinMedievalEurope, New York 2002, p. 294-295. 6. For a comparison of the costs of moving wine by land and by river during the 14th century, see H. DUBOIS, LesfoiresdeChalonetlecommercedanslavalléedelaSaôneàlafin duMoyenÂge(vers1280-vers1430), Paris 1976, p. 451-461. 7. See DION, Histoiredelavigne, p. 315; LACHIVER, Vins, p. 81-82; K. L. REYERSON, CommerceandSocietyinMontpellier:1250-1350, Ph.D. dissertation, Yale University 1974, p. 233: “These prestigious outlets for wine of the region of Montpellier prove the existence of an export trade in wine, the details of which escape analysis… The means of wine transport to Paris are… unknown.” 8. See also G. GALTIER, “Le vignoble et le vin dans le Languedoc oriental, de la fin du XIe siècle à la Guerre de cent ans”, in ÉtudesmédiévalesoffertesàAugustinFliche, Montpellier 1952, p. 101-122; W. PFEFFER, “Lifting a Glass”, in “Desensrassis”.Essaysinhonorof RupertT.Pickens, Amsterdam 2005, p. 529-542; ead., LeFestindutroubadour.Nourriture, sociétéetlittératureenOccitanie,1100-1500, Cahors 2016, p. 114-123. 9. Mishnah, Tractate Abhodah zarah 4; J. KARO, Šulhan arukh, Yoreh de῾ah, §§ 123-124. 62 KOSHERWINEINMEDIEVALPROVENCEANDLANGUEDOC

France.10 Nevertheless, the legal doctrines and rulings of rabbis in southern France were inextricably tied to the circumstances in which they lived and worked.11 The halakhic sources from the twelfth century – that is, from the earliest period of written evidence about rabbinic legal activity in southern France – say very little about wine.12 Thus, in the edition of responsa by Rabbi Abraham ben Isaac of Narbonne (d. 1158) published by Joseph Kafih in 1962, there is not a single original comment on the topic. All that can be found are citations by Rabbi Abraham from other scholars.13 But in sources from later periods, particularly from the late thirteenth- and fourteenth-cen- turies, a great deal of information about kosher wine can be found. This information provides a vital addition to the data about kosher wine that can be gleaned from medieval Latin notarial and civic records, since it illumi- nates the practical aspects of kosher wine production and trade that usually went unmentioned by contemporary record-keepers whose concern was generally financial.14

10. H. SOLOVEITCHIK, PrinciplesandPressures:JewishTradeinGentileWineintheMid- dleAges, Tel Aviv 2003; rev. ed., Jerusalem 2016 (Hebrew); id., WineinAshkenazinthe MiddleAges:YeynNesekh–AStudyintheHistoryofHalakhah, Jerusalem 2008 (Hebrew). For his use of the term “measurable deflection”, see id., “Can Halakhic Texts Talk History?”, AJSReview 3 (1978), p. 174-176 (id., CollectedEssays, vol. 1, Oxford 2013, p. 197-199); id., “Halakhah, Hermeneutics, and Martyrdom in Medieval Ashkenaz (Part I of II)”, Jewish Quarterly Review 94 (2004), p. 77-78 (id., Collected Essays, vol. II, Oxford 2014, p. 230-231). 11. P. ROTH, “Halakhah and Criticism in Southern France: R. David ben Saul on the Laws of Wine Made by Gentiles”, Tarbiz 83 (2015), p. 439-463 (Hebrew). 12. On the generally late development of halakhic literature in southern France, see A. REINER, “From France to Provence: The Assimilation of the Tosafists’ Innovations in the Provençal Talmudic Tradition”, JournalofJewishStudies 65 (2014), p. 77-87. Future research may reveal explanations for the specific lacuna of legal discussions about kosher wine before the late twelfth century. 13. It is noteworthy that several of the citations are from the commentary to tractate Abhodahzarah composed by Samuel ben Meir (Rashbam), providing proof that the Halakhists of southern France were aware of developments in the north, in the area of wine laws, from an early stage. Abraham of Narbonne’s use of Rashbam’s commentary to Babhabatra has been noted by several scholars, REINER, “From France to Provence”, p. 79-81. Rashbam’s commentary on Abhodahzarah is lost, but large sections of it are recoverable. H. GERSHUNI, “Peruš Rašbam le-massekhet Abhodahzarah pereq 1” [Rashbam’s Commentary on Tractate Abhodahzarah, Chapter 1], seminar paper (Hebrew University, http://daf-yomi.com/Data/ UploadedFiles/DY_Item/7940-sFile.doc [accessed Dec. 2018]). 14. Cf. PFEFFER, Lefestindutroubadour, p. 35-36. KOSHERWINEINMEDIEVALPROVENCEANDLANGUEDOC 63

Piquette

The earlier sources do contain several discussions of one particular aspect of wine production – namely, the drink made by mixing water with grapes that had already been pressed for wine.15 This drink is known in modern French as piquette,16 in Latin as vinumlymphatum17 and in Hebrew Even in Provence, where grapes and good wine were 18.(תמד) as temed plentiful, the poor were sometimes forced to resort to piquette.19 In fifteenth century Languedoc, about one third of the wine consumed by farm labour- ers was piquette.20 It was apparently more common in Provence than in Catalonia.21 This drink posed a number of issues for Jews. What blessing should be recited when drinking it – the blessing for wine, “Blessed art thou… who created the fruit of the vine”, or the generic blessing “who created every- thing with His word”?22 If a Christian was the one who poured the water over the grapes, were they disqualified?23 If a Christian’s piquette spilled onto the food of a Jew, was the food disqualified?24 Haym Soloveitchik

15. LACHIVER, Vins,VignesetVignerons, p. 222-223; A. L. MARTIN, “The Baptism of Wine”, Gastronomica 3 (2003), p. 21-30 (esp. p. 29, n. 8). 16. In medieval French, according to Jewish sources: bufet. D. S. BLONDHEIM, “Contribu- tion à la lexicographie française d’après des sources rabbiniques”, Romania 39 (1910), p. 151-153. 17. Or tempra. STOUFF, Ravitaillement, p. 83-84. 18. I. LOEW, DieFloradesJuden, vol. I, Vienna 1926, p. 94-95; S. LIEBERMAN, Tosefta ki-fešuṭah, vol. I, New York 1955, p. 194 (Demai 1:2). 19. STOUFF, Ravitaillement, p. 99. 20. LE ROY LADURIE, ThePeasantsofLanguedoc, p. 43. 21. J.-P. BÉNÉZET, “Vin et alcool dans les apothicaireries médiévales des pays du Sud”, Revued’histoiredelapharmacie 89 (2001), p. 477-488 (at p. 479). 22. Ms. Jerusalem, Israel National Library, Heb. 8°90, fol. 119r: “A case occurred in Béziers of a non-Jew who poured water into the dried grapes and stems of a Jew, on behalf of the Jew, to make piquette. They permitted it all, because they were not so stringent with piquette because they do not recite the blessing ‘who created the fruit of the vine’ over it. (מעשה היה בבדרש בגוי שזרק מים בתוך החרצנים והזגים של ישראל לצורך ”.Rabad wrote the same ישראל לעשות תמדים והתירו הכל משום דלא גזרו כל כך בתמד כיון דאין מברכין עליו בורא פרי הגפן וכן כת' הראב"ד ז"ל). 23. ABRAHAM BEN DAVID OF POSQUIÈRES, Tešubhotu-pesaqim[Responsa and Rulings], ed. J. KAFIH, Jerusalem 1964, p. 142, responsum 71 (henceforth Tešubhotu-pesaqim). 24. Ms. Jerusalem, Israel National Library, Heb. 8°90, fol. 119r: “A case of a Jew – the piquette of a non-Jew fell onto his wheat and gave it the flavor of wine. The sages asked whether the wheat was forbidden or not. Some forbade it, but the majority permitted it even (עו' מעשה בישראל שנפלו על חטים שלו מתמד של גוים ונתנו בהם טעם יין ושאלו .”for consumption החכמים אם החטים אסורים אם לאו ויש שאסרו. ורבו המתירין אפי' באכילה מיהא דאמ' בפסחי' דבתמד של פורצני אין תורת יין לגבי מעשר ואם נגע גוי בתמד של פורצני ישראל מזה הטעם גם כן דאין מברכין עליו בורא פרי הגפן וכיון שכן הוא אין להחמיר בתמד שלהן ואעפ"י שהחרצנים תוך שנים עשר חדש הרי שנתערב בין יין ומים ביין בנותן טעם ושמא זה הטעם קיוהא בעלמא כדאמרינ' בשמרים). 64 KOSHERWINEINMEDIEVALPROVENCEANDLANGUEDOC noted in passing that such questions were discussed primarily by halakhists from Provence and Spain, and that northern European rabbis did not relate to the problem of Gentile intervention in the preparation of piquette.25 A fascinating discussion of this topic is found among the responsa of Rabad, Rabbi Abraham ben David of Posquières (d. 1198).26 From his responsum we learn that Rabad’s father-in-law, the aforementioned Rabbi Abraham of Narbonne, had already expressed his opinion on the matter.27 My master asked about a Gentile who poured water into marc – should we compare this to wine that a Gentile diluted with water, which would then be forbidden, or not? Here is the opinion of my father-in-law: if the marc is such that from three measures [of water] it would produce four measures [of piquette], or if the wine increases the amount of water, then it carries the rule of wine diluted by a Gentile [and is forbidden]. But the last dregs, when even the measure of water [poured in] does not emerge from the skins, [we] are lenient about them and they are permitted. And [Rabbi Abraham of Narbonne] brought proof for his words. I agreed with him on this, and I will now add and subtract from his words.

Despite this ostensibly congenial introduction, Rabad was in fact deeply uncomfortable with his father-in-law’s position. As he proceeded to explain, Abraham of Narbonne held to a strict definition of wine as containing no more than 75% water, meaning that a beverage with a higher quotient of water was no longer considered wine at all but simply water. Such a watered- down beverage would not demand the blessing over wine, but it was also exempt from the limitations of yennesekh and it could be handled freely by non-Jews. Rabad voiced his opposition in strong emotional terms:28 My soul shudders29 at his ruling. For, if he is correct, from now on the Gentile will go and pour water into our marc and he will serve us from jugs and we will drink, and we will become almost a single nation.

25. SOLOVEITCHIK, WineinAshkenaz, p. 77. 26. I. TWERSKY, RabadofPosquières, Philadelphia 1980. 27. Tešubhotu-pesaqim, p. 94-95, responsum 29. See TWERSKY, RabadofPosquières, p. 9-10. 28. Tešubhotu-pesaqim, ibid. but it should ,חוללת ,The manuscript (Jerusalem, Kafih ms. 85, fol. 75r) reads: ḥolelet .29 as found in Temimde῾im, Lemberg 1812 (first ,סוללת ,be corrected (very slightly) to solelet published in Tumat yešarim, Venice 1622), no. 83 and in Ba‘ale asufot, ms. Moscow is found in several midrashim (Genesis נפשו סוללת Guenzburg 73, fol. 60v. The expression Rabbah, ed. J. THEODOR and H. ALBECK, Berlin 1912-1936, p. 535; LeviticusRabbah, ed. M. Margulies, Jerusalem 1953-1960, p. 65; MidrašTehillim 11:5) and has been interpreted E. BEN YEHUDAH, ACompleteDictionaryofAncientand) סלד as equivalent to the Hebrew ,Cf. Tešubhotu-pesaqim .(סלל ModernHebrew, vol. 8, Tel Aviv 1948-1959, p. 4072, s.v. 5 p. 94, n. 6; SOLOVEITCHIK, Principles, p. 109, n. 56 (rev. ed., p. 110, n. 59). KOSHERWINEINMEDIEVALPROVENCEANDLANGUEDOC 65

Against this lenient position, Rabad presented his own more limited ruling – non-Jews could participate in the preparation of piquette by pouring the water onto the grapes, since this was an early stage of preparation that did not involve actual physical contact with the grapes. However, they could not actually touch the grapeskins by removing them from the cuve until they were truly inedible, “and they are like molded clay”. They also were barred from diluting the wine just prior to its consumption, since this would be considered serving the wine. Over the course of the thirteenth century, a more limited approach became prevalent among southern French decisors which allowed a Christian to add the water to the first batch of piquette (temedri’šon) if he did so with the help of a Jew, and to subsequent batches on his own without Jewish involvement. This was the position taken by Elazar of Tarascon in the second half of the thirteenth century, although he conceded that his own teacher, David ha-Levi, required Jewish participation even in later batches.30 Jacob ben Moses of Bagnols, writing in Avignon during the second half of the fourteenth century, was familiar with this position but was less enthusiastic about it:31 For a non-Jew to throw water into the grapeskins to make piquette, Rabad wrote in a responsum that it is permitted with any piquette… And there are those who forbid it because one should veer away from prohibitions, and post factum it is permitted. It is good to be stringent about the first batch, and that is the popular practice. With the help of a Jew, even the first batch is permitted abinitio because it is not really the same as wine diluted by a Gentile. There are also those who are stringent and require the help of a Jew for all the batches. Whoever wants to be stringent by following the stringent opinion can do so. We have recorded all the opinions that have been voiced about piquette, and the enlightened person will choose the straight and good path.

Jacob ben Moses plotted the spectrum of opinions – from Rabad’s lenient position which permitted Gentile preparation of all kinds of piquette, to the stringent position that required Jewish participation in all kinds of piquette. Most people apparently followed the intermediate position, voiced by Elazar of Tarascon, which distinguished between the first batch that presumably contained a higher proportion of wine and therefore required Jewish involvement, and subsequent batches that did not. Jacob himself seemed to be nudg- ing his readers away from this practice towards the more stringent position.

30. ELAZAR OF TARASCON, Halachic Decisions and Responsum (!), ed. D. HOLZER, Jerusalem 1981, p. 91-92, sec. 46. See also ibid., p. 83, sec. 29. 31. JACOB BEN MOSES, Ḥibburissurwe-heter(Composition about Permitted and Forbidden Things), ed. M. Y. BLAU, Brooklyn 1989, p. 126. 66 KOSHERWINEINMEDIEVALPROVENCEANDLANGUEDOC

Piquette plays an important role in halakhic discourse in medieval Provence and Languedoc. It also seems to have been a sensitive topic – many people wanted to remove it entirely from the legal category of wine and to entrust its preparation entirely into Christian hands, while Rabad and Jacob of Bagnols both used emotionally evocative language (“my soul shudders”, “the enlightened person will choose the straight and good path”) to exhort people to treat it with the same sense of ritual danger that they were supposed to feel about wine.32 It emerges that piquette was widely consumed, but that it lacked the cultural cachet of full-bodied wine. It fell between the cracks of the halakhic definition of wine, and many Jews – including rabbis – were content to let it remain there. For others, their ritual instinct, to use Jacob Katz’s term, was offended by the idea that a beverage which looked like wine and tasted like wine could be prepared by Christians but drunk freely by Jews, even if it was not a high quality product.33 Non- Jewish wine remained, for virtually all Jews, a potent symbol of the fear of religious intermingling, while opinions were divided over which beverages were worthy of such potency.

Buying grapes

One problem that arose was defining the stage at which the material becomes “wine” for Halakhic purposes.34 If a non-Jew touched grapes growing on a tree, that touch did not render the grapes forbidden. What about grapes that are picked from the vines by Christians and then poured into vats? What about after those grapes had been pressed but before they were fermented? At what stage did they become susceptible to Gentile touch? The law on this question was not entirely clear, but the Jews of northern France would usually buy pressed grapes, in the vat, from Gentiles. Their rabbis justified their practice, ruling that the liquid became wine only after it was removed from the pressing vat.35 In the south, however, this lenient

32. On the sense of danger and disgust as a legal consideration in medieval rulings on kosher wine, see E. HOROWITZ, “Tosaphists and Taboo: A Review of Haym Soloveitchik’s Yeinam”, AJSReview 29 (2005), p. 355-360. 33. J. KATZ, TheShabbesGoy.AStudyinHalakhicFlexibility, trans. Y. LERNER, Phila- delphia 1989, p. 230-241. 34. SOLOVEITCHIK, “Can Halakhic Texts Talk History?”, p. 153-196. 35. SOLOVEITCHIK, WineinAshkenaz, p. 204-207; AHARON HA-KOHEN, Orḥotḥayyim, part 2, ed. M. SCHLESINGER, Berlin 1902, p. 248-249. The responsum by Isaac of Dampierre (in HAÏM BEN ISAAC OR ZARU‘A, Responsa, ed. M. AVITAN, Jerusalem 2002, p. 164-166, no. 174) KOSHERWINEINMEDIEVALPROVENCEANDLANGUEDOC 67 position was rejected by many Halakhists. A particularly vehement expression of this opposition is found in the tract by David ben Saul, the famous anti-Maimonist who critiqued a summary of the laws of wine penned by another southern rabbi:36 You wrote that a pressed vat bought from a gentile, when the key and seal are held [by the Jewish customer] from the time of pressing or when he stops watching it, is permitted. Therefore whoever buys a pressed vat from a gentile must cover it with a sheet and seal it. I was highly surprised by this, that you permit buying a pressed closed vat from a gentile if only he does not stop watching it or covers it with his seal. And I wonder – who watched it until today, when a gentile was pressing it? With all due respect to our rabbi, this custom was only when it was pressed by a Jew… Certainly, when buying a pressed vat from a gentile, there is no doubt that it is all forbidden, and you, sir, should not say it…

Archival documents reflect the fact that most Jews in southern France did not purchase pressed grapes from Gentiles, since traces of such sales are noticeably absent from the records.37 Jews either grew the grapes themselves, or purchased them before they were pressed. Several responsa deal with questions arising from this situation, since transporting the unpressed grapes to the home of the Jew in a container used for non-kosher wine could create problems.38 This combination of information from Hebrew and Latin sources makes it clear that a significant portion of the Jewish community in Provence and Languedoc refrained from buying pressed grapes, even though their brethren in the north considered this to be permissible.

Commercial production

Not every Jewish household was able to produce its own wine, and many families purchased ready-made wine. Production of kosher wine on a commercial scale required special precautions from the earliest stages, but there reveals the misgivings that Isaac and other northern French rabbis felt about this permissive custom, but they did not attempt to curtail it. 36. Ms. Paris, BNF, hébreu 1391, fol. 142r-v. On David ben Saul and his tract on wine law, see D. J. SILVER, MaimonideanCriticismandtheMaimonideanControversy1180-1240, Lei- den 1965, p. 155; ROTH, “Halakhah and Criticism in Southern France”. 37. STOUFF, Ravitaillement, p. 97; K. L. REYERSON, Business,BankingandFinancein MedievalMontpellier, Toronto 1985, p. 53-54; M. WERNHAM, LacommunautéjuivedeSalon- de-Provence, Toronto 1987, p. 95-101; J. SIBON, LesJuifsdeMarseilleauXIVesiècle, Paris 2011, p. 182-184. 38. Ms. Oxford, [catal. Neubauer] 2343, fol. 142v-143r (a question from Uzès that involved Solomon ibn Ayyub of Béziers). 68 KOSHERWINEINMEDIEVALPROVENCEANDLANGUEDOC is evidence that some entrepreneurs were prepared to do what it took to sell wine that could legitimately be described as kosher. Rabbi Isaac Kimhi, an important rabbinic authority in fourteenth-century Provence, was asked about the following case by Yedaiah ben Samuel (whose vernacular name was Bonet de Lunel): A Gentile purchased the crops of a village named Mont Hagout39 for a fixed period from our lord the Pope. The buyer appointed two Jews to gather his share of the crops and the grape harvest, and they were to receive 1/12 share for their efforts. He also required them to prepare the wine from the harvest in purity, since he planned to sell it to Jews. Later, things changed, and the agent placed the taxes and crops under his hands and appointed a Gentile over them. The appointee left the Jews in charge of collecting and pressing the wine for him, as they had agreed to do for the buyer. The Jews did their work and prepared the wine in purity, and placed it in a cellar in the manor that was custo- marily held and ruled by the buyer. The key and the seal for the cellar were in their hands, and the key to the door opening onto the public road was in the hands of a Gentile there. They also placed one barrel of their own wine in that cellar.40

Yedaiah voiced his concern that the precautions taken by the Jews were insufficient, because there was no Jewish guard watching over the cellar. He emphasized that no Jews lived in the village, and therefore the Christian official controlling the manor would have had ample opportunity to enter the cellar, even though the Jews had locked it. This concern was strength- ened by the fact that the official owned the grapes, and that the Jews were actually his employees. However the Jewish winemakers claimed that, in fact, they had purchased the grapes from the official and therefore the wine belonged to them. They had originally declared that the wine belonged to the official because if it had been known that it belonged to Jews, they claimed, the villagers would not have paid their tax as carefully as they did when they believed it was owed to the Pope’s official. Isaac Kimhi was

39. Dr. Juliette Sibon has suggested that this village is to be identified as Montaigu, near Valréas. נכרי אחד קנה מחצר אדננו האפיפיור תבואות כפר :Ms. Paris, BNF, hébr eu 1391, fol . 41v .40 אחד נקרא מונט הגוט לזמן מה אותו הקונה הפקיד תחתיו שני ישראלים ללקט ולקבל בעדו אותן התבואות והבצור אשר יגיע אליו מדין הקנייה ההיא לחלק ידוע בעבור טרחם חלק אחד משנים עשר גם התנה עמהם שיטהרו לו היין היוצא משם באשר כונתו למכרו לישראל אחר כן נתגלגל הדבר והסוכן שם אותם המסים והתבואות תחת ידו ומנה נכרי אחד עליהם אותו הממונה העמיד על עמדם הישראלים שילקטו ושיטהרו היין בעדו כאשר התנו לעשות בעד הקונה אותו הישראלים עשו מלאכתם וטהרו היין ושמוהו באוצר בבית החצר אשר מהדרך הנהוג להיות הקונה שליט עליו ומחזיק בו והיה מפתח וחותם בבית האוצר בידם אך מפתח פתח רשות הרבים היתה ביד גוי שם הוסיפו שמו באותו בית האוצר חבית אחת מלאה יין משלהם .היה מוחזק בידינו KOSHERWINEINMEDIEVALPROVENCEANDLANGUEDOC 69 convinced by their claim and confirmed that the wine produced in the village was kosher. The two Jews in this story were apparently experienced vintners who used their expertise and their knowledge of Jewish law to set up an enterprise for kosher wine production. Yedaiah de Lunel, who may have been a rabbi or a learned layman, questioned the veracity of the claims made by the wine’s producers. The legal discussion thus provides insight not only into the production process of mass-produced kosher wine in the Middle Ages, but also valuable information about some of the ways in which such a product was received by its potential consumers.

Domestic trade

The next step, after the production of kosher wine, was its sale to Jewish consumers. In order to transport the wine from the vineyard to retailers or customers, the wine needed to be protected. According to the Talmud, wine requires a seal within a seal (ḥotambe-tokhḥotam) in order to be considered protected from non-Jewish touch.41 However, Rabad pointed out that this was a reasonable solution for a Jew storing his own wine on the premises of a non-Jew. The Jew would recognize his own seal, and if it had been disturbed, he would hold the non-Jewish supervisor responsible. By contrast, when wine was being delivered from one place to another, the receiver would not be the person who had first applied the seal and therefore he would not be able to discern whether the seal had been tampered with or not. Knowing this, the non-Jewish middleman would feel confident that his interference would not be discovered. For this reason, wine deliveries required a seal with Hebrew letters, which a Gentile would not be able to reproduce and which any Jew would recognize if it was tampered with.42 Perhaps the Hebrew letters were stamped onto a seal of dough, as described in the following passage:43

41. Babylonian Talmud, Abhodahzarah 31a. 42. OrḥotḤayyim, yennesekh, par. 29; Tešubhotu-pesaqim, p. 69. For a possible example of such a seal from medieval England, see C. ROTH, “A Medieval Anglo-Jewish Seal?”, TransactionsoftheJewishHistoricalSocietyofEngland 17 (1951-1952), p. 283-286. מעשה בא בבדירש באחד :Ms. Jerusalem, Israel National Library, Heb. 90, fol. 119r .43 ששלח יין ביד גוי והיה החותם בצק ונתקלקל החותם והתירו היין דתלינן שמא עכברים אכלו הבצק וקלקלו החותם כדאמ' בההי' פולמוסא דפתיח חביתא טובא דאמרינ' דפתיח לשום ממונא אמרינן אדעתא דממונא פתיח דתלינן לקולא הכא נמי תלינן לקולא בעכברים או בדבר אחר כיון דחזינן בההוא גברא דאכלו העכ־ The account is also found in Ba‘aleasufot, fol. 57r (and from there: Šilṭegibborim .ברים הבצק 70 KOSHERWINEINMEDIEVALPROVENCEANDLANGUEDOC

There was a case in Béziers of someone who sent wine in the hands of a Gen- tile. The seal was made of dough, and it was ruined, and they permitted the wine because perhaps mice ate the dough and ruined the seal…

Once the wine had been properly sealed, it could be handled freely by non-Jews. However, such involvement, if it continued after the seal had been broken and the wine poured out, would again disqualify the product for Jewish consumption. Purveyors of kosher wine could easily fall afoul of this rule. Rabad may have been referring to a merchant who sold kosher wine to Jews when he described a Gentile who worked as a hawker:44 I believe it is forbidden to place wine in a cup in the hand of a Gentile who announces, to show it and to let people taste it. As soon as he touches it, it becomes yennesekh, and when he announces and shows it, the Jew benefits from yennesekh.

Apparently, the Jew gave a cup of his wine to a non-Jewish advertiser, who stood with it in the street, offering it to passersby to inspect, smell and taste.45 We can probably assume that the potential customers to whom the hawker was offering the wine were not Jewish, since a Jew would probably not taste the wine offered to him by a Gentile. It is possible that a Jew would look at the wine that was being shown to him, and make his choice based on appearance alone. In any case, we find a Jewish wine retailer, who sold either to Jews or to Christians or both populations, who sought the services of an advertiser in order to boost his sales. His scheme was disqualified by Rabad. Since the wine held by the Christian hawker was forbidden because he was holding it, any benefit accruing from that wine – including any customers who came to the store because of the advertising campaign – was forbidden. In the case of the hawker, it remains unclear whether the prospective clientele was specifically Jewish, or Christians and Jews alike. In other cases, however, the reality of a wine store catering to Jewish and Christian customers alike emerges unequivocally.46 A particularly detailed example is on Alfasi, Abhodahzarah fol. 11b); MENACHEM MEIRI, Betha-BeḥirahonAbhodahzarah, ed. A. SOFER, Jerusalem 1964, p. 285. כת' הראב"ד ז"ל נראה :OrḥotḤayyim, yennesekh, par. 32; Tešubhotu-pesaqim, p. 72 .44 שאסור לתת יין בכלי ביד גוי המכריז להראות ולהטעימו שהרי מכיון שיגע בו נעשה יין נסך, וכשמכריז .ומראהו נהנה הישראל מיין נסך 45. On the crieursdevin, who stood outside taverns with jugs of wine to tempt passersby, see LeLivredesmétiers, ed. R. DE LESPINASSE, F. BONNARDOT, Paris 1889, I:V:II (p. 21). On medieval advertising, see A. COWELL, “Advertising, Rhetoric, and Literature: A Medieval Response to Contemporary Theory”, PoeticsToday 22 (2001), p. 795-827; D. ALEXANDRE- BIDON, “À cor et à cri”, Communications 90 (2012), p. 17-34. 46. See, for example, A. SCHREMER, “History, Halakha and Religious Identity in the Halakhic Discourse of Rabbanic Sages in Medieval Aškenaz”, Zion 81 (2016), p. 57-61; id., KOSHERWINEINMEDIEVALPROVENCEANDLANGUEDOC 71 the following account, from a halakhic responsum from thirteenth-century Provence: Another responsum which I sent and brought to the sages of Carpentras about a case that came before me in Courthézon about a city that is near to…47 to be asked before the Great Sanhedrin. A case came before us about a wine cellar… jointly owned by a Jew and a Gentile. We would come and go several times a day, since there is not a set time for drinking. We opened a barrel to sell to Jews and to Gentiles and to anyone who wanted to buy. The guard would sit and guard the store half the night. When it came time to rest, he closed the door that opened onto the public road and locked it, taking the key with him while he went to lie down in another house. He left all the barrels without any mark except the key in his hand. At sunrise we awoke and found the shop open and the door ajar. We inspected the entire cellar and did not find any moisture under any of the barrels. Nevertheless, we were concerned of non-Jewish thieves (who might have touched the wine). But the possibility of non-Jewish touch is not enough to prohibit any benefit from the wine, so we permitted its benefit but forbade its consumption.48

The writer went on to ask the sages of Carpentras to permit the wine not only for benefit (i.e., to allow the Jewish owner to profit from it by selling it to non-Jews) but also for consumption by Jews. His attempt was successful: In this matter of Rabbi Eligal49, there was agreement among all the sages who were in Carpentras at the time. Namely, R. Mordechai ben Yehosefiah and R. Abraham the Elder of Carpentras and R. Abraham ben Isaac of the Mountain (Montpellier) and R. Haïm of Carcassonne and other notables with them.50

“Jewish Wine with Christian Help: The Halakhic Complexities of Jewish-Christian Co-operation in Medieval France” (published online: https://www.academia.edu/30704345/Jewish_ Wine_with_Christian_Help_The_Halakhic_Complexities_of_Jewish-Christian_Co-operation_ in_Medieval_France [accessed Dec. 2018]). 47. The manuscript is torn here. עוד תשובה אחרת ששלחתי והבאתי לחכמי :Ms. Oxford, [cat. Neubauer] 2343, fol. 143r-v .48 עיר קרפנטרש י"ע במעשה שבא לידי בקורטשון לעיר שרואה ושומעת וקרובה לב... לישאל לסנדרי גדולה במעשה שבא לידינו באוצר של יין במסתפק ... שבין ישראל לגוי שחלקוה במשיכה והיינו יוצאין ונכנסין בו בכל יום כמה פעמים ... להסתפק משום דאין קבע לשתיה ופתחנו חבית אחת למכור לישראל ולגוים ולכל שרוצה לקנות והיה השומר יושב ומשמר בחנות עד חצי הלילה והגיע עת לשכב וסגר הדלת שפתוח לרשות הרבים ונעלו ומפתחו בידו והלך לו לשכב בבית אחר והניח כל החביות בלא סימן זולתי המפתח שלקח בידו וכמו השחר עלה קמנו ונתעודד ומצאנו החנות פתוחה והדלת מוסרת מצידה והוצרכנו לבדוק פני כל המרתף ולא מצאנו שום לחלוח בעולם תחת אחת מכל החביות. ואעפ"כ איכא למיחש משום גנבי .וחששנו לגנבי גוים וספק מגע גוי אינו אוסר בהנאה והתרנוהו בהנאה ואסרנוהו בשתיה 49. The reading is uncertain, and this name is otherwise unattested. 50. Some of these figures can be identified. Mordechai ben Yehosefiah: Y. ENGELBERG COHEN, Machazik Emunah, The Reinforcer of the Faith: Rabbi Mordechai ben Joseph’s PolemicalWork, Ph.D. dissertation, New York University, 2003. Abraham ben Isaac of Mont- pellier: ABRAHAM MIN HA-HAR, Peruš (commentary on Talmud), ed. M. J. BLAU, New York 1962-1975. 72 KOSHERWINEINMEDIEVALPROVENCEANDLANGUEDOC

They permitted the wine for consumption on the basis of convincing proofs from the Talmud and on the evidence described above.51

This case provides valuable information about the measures taken by merchants to ensure that the wine they sold would be considered kosher. We see the use of a guard during the day and part of the night, a locked door and also (in another section of the responsum) the addition of water to the wine barrels. Adding water to the barrels was practiced by many Jewish households, as mentioned earlier, but this case proves that it was common in commercial settings as well.

International trade

Business ventures for the sale of kosher wine, with the necessary precautions being taken to ensure its remaining kosher, existed not only for local sale of wine within Provence but also on an international scale.52 A case discussed by Rabbi Mordechai Kimhi (father of Isaac Kimhi) provides valuable information about one such venture:53 Regarding a Jew who partnered with a Gentile to buy kosher wine and transport it by sea. They placed the wine in wooden barrels with planks over their tops, and stopped up the bungholes on the top and the gaps in the sides with taps, sealed them with tar, and placed erased paper on top of the tar. They wrote – half on the paper and half on the side of the barrel – the word “kosher”. He (the Jew) went with them (on the boat) to guard his merchandise… The boat sailed out to sea, and the Jew did not have enough bread to eat. At a port, he got off to purchase provisions for himself. When he returned to the boat, (he found that) it had already sailed away. He was forced to follow it on land, a distance of eight days travel. You wrote to me, my friend, that some of the sages of the city forbid this wine (since it was left unguarded on the boat for those eight days), and others permit it because the Torah is careful about the money of Israel – since the wine had a double seal.

ועל זה המעשה דר' מרי' איגול הסכימו כל :Ms. Oxford, [cat. Neubauer] 2343, fol. 144r .51 החכמים שהיו בקרפואראש בזמן ההוא, ואלו הן ר' מרדכי בן הר' יוספיה ז"ל ור' אברהם הזקן מקרפנט־ ראש ור' אברהם בהר' יצחק ז"ל מהה"ר ור' חיים מקרקשונה ונכבדים אחרים עמהם והתירו היין בשתיה This ruling was alluded to in .על פי ראיות נכבדות שהביאו מהתלמוד ועל פי הראיות שכתבנו לעיל the late 14th century by Jacob ben Moses of Bagnols, Ḥibburissurwe-heter, p. 122. 52. SIBON, LesJuifsdeMarseille, p. 185-186 (export of kosher wine from Marseilles to Barcelona, Algiers and Majorca). 53. Ms. Paris, BNF, hébreu 1391, fol. 135v (published by I. LÉVI, “Un recueil de consulta- tions inédites de rabbins de la France méridionale”, Revue des études juives 39 [1899], p. 231-232). KOSHERWINEINMEDIEVALPROVENCEANDLANGUEDOC 73

Here we find a Jewish-Christian partnership for the export and sale of kosher wine, which involved the Jewish partner accompanying the shipment to ascertain its care.54 The port to which the wine was being transported is not named in the responsum, but it must have been along the western Medi- terranean coast, since the Jew was able to catch up with the boat within eight days of land travel. The question was sent to Mordechai Kimhi by Samuel Sulami, a Talmudist and businessman who was active in Narbonne and Perpignan.55 However, from a nostalgic reference made by Kimhi in his responsum to Narbonne, it seems that neither he nor Sulami resided in Nar- bonne at the time of writing the responsum.56 Possibly, the correspondence happened towards the end of Kimhi’s life, after the 1306 expulsion, when Jews no longer lived in Narbonne.57 Most likely, Sulami sent his question from Perpignan, and it was from Perpignan that the boat took its cargo of kosher wine – probably to a Spanish port.58 As spelled out in Sulami’s question, the barrels of kosher wine were prepared for the sea voyage with great care – each of them received an extra wooden top, and all the openings in the barrel were plugged up with taps, tar, and kosher signs. Elsewhere in the responsum it emerges that a small amount of honey was added to each barrel, in accordance with a ruling of Maimonides that adding honey to the wine would protect it from Gentile touch.59 Despite all of this, some of the authorities in Perpignan questioned the kosher status of the wine because it did not have a Jewish guard at all

54. Similarly: SIBON, LesJuifsdeMarseille, p. 183. On partnership for importing wine, see also PADEN, TwoMedievalOccitanTollRegisters, p. 101-102. 55. On Samuel Sulami see E. RENAN, “Les rabbins français du commencement du quator- izième siècle”, in HistoirelittérairedelaFrance, vol. 27, Paris 1877, p. 700-701; H. GROSS, GalliaJudaica.DictionnairegéographiquedelaFranced’aprèslessourcesrabbiniques, Paris 1897, p. 431-433; A.S. HALKIN, “Why Was Levi ben Hayyim Hounded?”, Proceedings oftheAmericanAcademyforJewishResearch 34 (1966), p. 65-76; T. MARVIN, “A Heretic from a Good Family? A New Look at Why Levi b. Abraham b. Ḥayim was Hounded”, AJS Review 41 (2017), p. 178-179, n. 10. 56. ROTH, “Halakhah and Criticism”, p. 444-445. 57. J. RÉGNÉ, ÉtudesurlaconditiondesJuifsdeNarbonne, Narbonne 1912; C. BALASSE, 1306–L’expulsiondesjuifsduroyaumedeFrance, Brussels 2008. A question from Nar- bonne, probably addressed to Solomon ibn Adret (Rashba), describes wine barrels: “they were sealed and closed, and then the seal was covered with tar. All of the taps were sealed and tarred. Then they were entrusted to a non-Jew” (Ms. New York, Jewish Theological Seminary of America, 1422, fol. 42r). The questioner was concerned that the non-Jew would still be able to insert a knife or a nail between the slats of the barrel, in order to allow some of the wine to drip out. 58. For another responsum about kosher wine sent from Perpignan to Spain, see SOLOMON IBN ADRET, Responsa, ed. A. ZALEZNIK, vol. 3, Jerusalem 1997-2005, no. 238. 59. MAIMONIDES, Mišneh Torah, Laws of Forbidden Foods 11:10 (trans. RABINOWITZ- GROSSMAN, p. 210); ROTH, “Halakhah and Criticism”, p. 452-453. 74 KOSHERWINEINMEDIEVALPROVENCEANDLANGUEDOC times. This concern reflected the practice of early medieval Germany (10th century), before Rashi and his descendants the Tosafists introduced a more lenient approach.60 Municipal regulations in the cities of southern France imposed limitations and tariffs on the importing of wine, in order to protect local vintners.61 They policed the measurements used for selling wine,62 the prices charged for wine,63 and the names of the cellars that could be proclaimed by wine- criers.64 By the same token, there is evidence that Jewish communal authorities in Spain supervised the sale of kosher wine.65 However, their concern was with the price and quality of the wine. The responsa discussed here reflect the involvement of local Halakhists in affirming or questioning the Halakhic status of the wine.

Christian consumption of kosher wine

In each of these cases, private entrepreneurs invested considerable care and expense in preserving the kosher status of their wine so that it could be sold to Jews. Christians were involved in each of these enterprises. Perhaps it was simply a sound investment in their eyes. However, some Christians were interested in kosher wine as consumers and not just as investors. Isaac Kimhi described a Jewish tax farmer making efforts to supply the Christians in his town with their own wine, “so that they will not buy wine from the Jewish merchants, making it twice as expensive as it already is”.66 Accord- ing to Rashba, in a responsum that he sent to Perpignan, Christians preferred

60. BARUCH BEN ISAAC, Seferha-terumah, section 183; SOLOVEITCHIK, WineinAshkenaz, p. 261-265. 61. R. LIMOUZIN-LAMOTHE, LacommunedeToulouseetlessourcesdesonhistoire, Tou- louse 1932, p. 261-263; F.R.P. AKEHURST, TheCostumad’Agen, Turnhout 2010, p. 51 and 87. On legal regulation of the wine trade in medieval France, see ROSE, TheWineTrade, p. 39-58. 62. LIMOUZIN-LAMOTHE, LacommunedeToulouse, p. 266. 63. E. BONDURAND, LescoutumesdeLunel, Paris 1886, p. 56. 64. LIMOUZIN-LAMOTHE, LacommunedeToulouse, p. 438-439. 65. Y. T. ASSIS, JewishEconomyintheMedievalCrownofAragon,1213-1327, Leiden 1997, p. 97; J. P. HABA, “Los judíos y el vino en España, siglos XI-XV: una geografía histórica”, Cuadernosdegeografía 75 (2004), p. 17-41; M. BLASCO ORELLANA, C. LLEAL GALCERÁN, J. R. MAGDALENA NOM DE DÉU and M. Á. MOTIS DOLADER, Capítulosdelasisa delvinodelaaljamajudíadeZaragoza(1462-1466), Zaragoza 2010; T. ALEIXANDRE SEGURA, Créditoyendeudamientorural:lacirculacióndelcapitaljudíoenlaGironadelsiglo XIV (1348-1391), Ph.D. dissertation, Universitat de València, 2015, p. 211. 66. Ms. Paris, BNF, hébreu 1391, fol. 82r. KOSHERWINEINMEDIEVALPROVENCEANDLANGUEDOC 75

Jewish wine to every type of wine produced by non-Jews.67 This seems to be borne out by a case from Capestang:68 A ruling from Capestang came before our rabbi. A gentile produced his wine “in purity” (that is, according to the laws of kašrut) in the home of a Jew. After some time, the gentile came asking for his wine. The Jew took from the wine in the kosher barrel. The Jew made a mistake, and did not clean (hikhšir) the gentile’s vessel, and he poured from the vessel in front of the barrel where the wine spills out into the vessel.

The Christian in Capestang had placed an advance order of wine with the Jew, but in picking up his order he made no attempt to preserve the kosher status of the wine. Why then had he gone to the trouble of buying kosher wine from a Jew? Apparently, not because he was planning to sell it (the description reflects a small purchase, not wholesale) as kosher wine, but simply for his own personal consumption. That this was a widespread phenomenon is evidenced by the fact that several Provençal towns in the fourteenth century passed laws forbidding Christians from drinking Jewish wine.69 In some situations, the wine that Christians bought from Jews was not actually kosher wine, nor was it marketed as such. As we have seen, Jewish tax farmers sometimes bought the rights to the harvest and produced wine that was not, for the most part, intended for the Jewish market.70 A third

67. IBN ADRET, Responsa 5:120 (for the superscription to Perpignan, see Ms. Oxford, [cat. Neubauer] 2365, fol. 153r; Ms. London, British Library, [catal.] 570, fol. 284r). באתה הוראה אחת מקבשטאיין לפני הרב רבנו נכרי אחד שטהר :Ms. Moscow 73, fol. 56r .68 יינו בביתו של ישראל ואחר זמן בא הנכרי לבקש את יינו והוציא הישראל מן היין שבחבית כשר ושגג הישראל ולא הכשיר כלי הגוי וערה מכלי אל כלי מכלי שלפני החבית שהיה נופל מן היין שבחבית בכלי .שלפניו 69. STOUFF, La table provençale, p. 64. The more general phenomenon of Christians purchasing and consuming Jewish food was a source of much concern for the medieval Church and municipal authorities. See W. C. JORDAN, “Problems of the Meat Market of Béziers 1240-1247”, Revuedesétudesjuives 135 (1976), p. 31-49; I. RESNICK, “Dietary Laws in Medieval Christian-Jewish Polemics: a Survey”, Studies in Christian-Jewish Relations 6 (2011) (http://ejournals.bc.edu/ojs/index.php/scjr/article/view/1801 [accessed Dec. 2018]); D. M. FREIDENREICH, “Sharing Meals with Non-Christians in Canon Law Commentaries, circa 1160-1260: A Case Study in Legal Development”, MedievalEncoun- ters 14 (2008), p. 41-77; id., ForeignersandtheirFood:ConstructingOthernessinJewish, Christian,andIslamicLaw, Berkeley 2011; id., “Food-Related Interactions Among Chris- tians, Muslims, and Jews in High and Late Medieval Latin Christendom”, HistoryCompass 11 (2013), p. 957-966. 70. See above. See also SIBON, LesJuifsdeMarseille, p. 150-151; C. CASTELLANI, “Le rôle économique de la communauté juive de Carpentras au début du XVe siècle”, AnnalesESC 27 (1972), p. 607. On taxation of the wine harvest in Provence, see STOUFF, Ravitaillementet alimentation, p. 91-96; M. ZERNER, Lecadastre,lepouvoiretlaterre:leComtatVenaissin pontificalaudébutduXVesiècle, Rome 1993, p. 540-542. On tax-farming by Jews in medieval 76 KOSHERWINEINMEDIEVALPROVENCEANDLANGUEDOC source explicitly discusses, and neutralizes, the problem implied by this practice:71 The question was asked before the Rabbi – Those who buy the wine tax, is it permissible or not? He permitted it for the same reason that payment for Sabbath work is permitted when bundled [with weekday work]. Similarly here, it is bundled with the other taxes. Alternatively, it is as if the king has a share in all the cellars, and a gentile says to a Jew “Pay the tax for me”, and there is no trace of a prohibition here.

The End of an Era

During the late fifteenth century, the social and religious conditions of the Jewish communities in Provence deteriorated significantly, and large numbers of Jews converted to Christianity.72 Particularly after 1492, when the Jews of Spain were expelled and those of Provence remained essentially the only surviving Jewish communities in western Europe, they found themselves isolated and disheartened. Their moribund situation was reflected in the fact that kosher wine became much more difficult to produce or purchase, and many Jews – including those who considered themselves scru- pulous in their religious observance – consumed non-Jewish wine. Rabbi Judah ibn Shushan, who reached Provence after leaving his native Spain

Iberia, see A. MACKAY, “Popular Movements and Pogroms in Fifteenth-Century Castile”, PastandPresent 55 (1972), p. 56-57; id., “The Problems of a Jewish Tax-Farmer”, Michael: OntheHistoryoftheJewsintheDiaspora 11 (1989), p. 159-167; T. F. RUIZ, “Trading with the ‘Other’: Economic Exchanges between Muslims, Jews, and Christians in Late Medieval Northern Castile”, in MedievalSpain–Culture,ConflictandCoexistence:StudiesinHonour ofAngusMacKay, ed. R. COLLINS, A. GOODMAN, Basingstoke 2002, p. 66-67; B. LEROY, The JewsofNavarreintheLateMiddleAges, Jerusalem 1985, p. 94-97; M. D. MEYERSON, “The Economic Life of the Jews of Murviedro in the Fifteenth Century”, in InIberiaandBeyond: HispanicJewsbetweenCultures, ed. B. D. COOPERMAN, Newark 1998, p. 67-95 (esp. 69-74); id., JewsinanIberianFrontierKingdom:Society,EconomyandPoliticsinMorvedre,1248- 1391, Leiden 2004, p. 49-51; id., AJewishRenaissanceinFifteenth-CenturySpain, Princeton 2004, p. 119-129. In Catalonia, Jews never played a major role in tax-collecting, but some tax-farming by Jews can be found. Y. T. ASSIS, The Jews of Santa Coloma de Queralt, Jerusalem 1988, p. 104-106; D. ROMANO, “Bonastruc Benveniste: The Last Jewish Tax Collector in Spain (Gerona 1492)”, in JewsandConversosattheTimeoftheExpulsion, ed. Y. T. A SSIS, Y. KAPLAN, Jerusalem 1999 (Hebrew), p. 85-95. נשאלה שאלה לפני הרב אותן שלוקחין מכס היין מותר או לא והיה :Ms Moscow, fol. 56r-v .71 מתיר מטעם שמותר שכירות שבת בהבלעה והכא נמי נבלע הוא עם שאר המכס אי נמי דהוה ליה כמי The .שיש למלך חלק בכל האוצרות וגוי אמר לישראל פרע לי בשבילי המכס ואין בכאן שום חשש אסור rabbi whose ruling is quoted was Gershom ben Solomon of Béziers, whose work Sefer ha-Šalman is now lost. For a citation of this ruling in the name of Sefer ha-Šalman, see SAMUEL BEN MESHULAM GIRONDI, Ohelmo‘ed,Issurwe-heter, derekh 10. 72. D. IANCU-AGOU, Les Juifs en Provence (1475-1501): de l’insertion à l’expulsion, Marseille 1981. KOSHERWINEINMEDIEVALPROVENCEANDLANGUEDOC 77 around 1490, was taken aback by this situation, which he described in an unpublished work on the laws of ritual blessings:73 After being thrown around by my sin, pushed from my home, poured from one jug to another, I was brought to the land of Provence. I saw that most of the Jewish masses there are lax in observing the food prohibitions, such as non- Jewish cheese and milk, and the wines of non-Jews, and they blame it on their troubles and the distractions of the times.

Ibn Shushan did not berate the Provençal Jews for their religious laxity, although it clearly disturbed him. There was, however, one point that both- ered him sufficiently that he was spurred to discuss it at length. According to his account, this point was also one on which the Jews he met in Provence had a great deal to say. The question was whether or not to recite the blessing for wine over the non-kosher wine that was used by the local Jews. Twelfth-century authorities, including Maimonides and Rabad, had been divided in their opinions on the propriety of reciting blessings over forbidden food. In his code of Jewish law, Moses Maimonides wrote that the regu- lar food blessings should not be recited over foods whose consumption is forbidden.74 Rabad, who glossed Maimonides’ code, declared this ruling to be “a great mistake”, and argued that the blessings ought to be recited. Only the communal zimmun (invitation) to recite Grace after the Meal is dis- pensed with in a meal of forbidden foods.75 Ibn Shushan described the range of practices he encountered in Provence:76 Some of them recite the blessings for wine, both before and after (drinking). Others do not recite the blessings at all. Some use it for qidduš (Sabbath eve ceremony) and habhdala (ritual for the end of the Sabbath) and for the circum- cision blessing, and the other matters that are preceded by wine.

Ibn Shushan’s description captures aptly the complexity of the situation that Provençal Jews found themselves in during the closing years of the fifteenth century. They remained committed to performing the rituals and upholding the rules of their religion, but their reduced numbers and circumstances did not allow them to maintain the kosher wine trade that had existed

73. Ms. Jerusalem, Israel National Library, Heb. 8°1998, fol. 17r; published by A. HAVATSELET, “Birkot ha-nehenin le-Rabbi Yehudah ben Šušan” (Blessings over Food by Rabbi Judah ben Shushan), Moriah 12:7-9 (1983), p. 62. For a description of the manuscript, see C. SIRAT and M. BEIT-ARIÉ, Manuscritsmédiévauxencaractèreshébraïquesportantdesindicationsdedate jusqu’à1540, vol. III, Paris 1972-1986, no. 44. 74. MAIMONIDES, MišnehTorah, Laws of Blessings 1, 19; TheCodeofMaimonides–The BookofLove, trans. M. KELLNER, New Haven 2004, p. 124-125. 75. ABRAHAM BEN DAVID OF POSQUIÈRES, Hassagotha-RabadonMišnehTorah, Laws of Blessings 1, 19. 76. Ms. Jerusalem 1998, fol. 17r-17v. 78 KOSHERWINEINMEDIEVALPROVENCEANDLANGUEDOC in previous generations. Fully cognizant of their transgressive situation, and without a glimmer of heterodoxy, they debated how best to incorporate it into the Jewish legal system to which they still felt committed.

Conclusions

The array of previously unpublished Hebrew sources presented here fleshes out in rich detail the significance of the term vinumjudaicum found in contracts and documents from medieval Provence.77 These sources demonstrate the vitality of the kosher wine trade in southern France during the Middle Ages, and the ingenuity displayed by entrepreneurs – Jewish and Christian – seeking to profit from that trade. They also reflect the awareness of rabbinic decisors to the economic stakes in the questions that they were asked to answer.78 In contrast to the common stereotype of southern French Jews as lax in their observance of the rules and limitations on kosher wine, there is a wide variety of evidence pointing to a high level of observance among Jewish laypeople.79 That observance covers the range of situations, from private practice within the home to large-scale commercial ventures. While there presumably were individual Jews in Provence and elsewhere who were lax in their avoidance of non-kosher wine, or who ignored the laws of kosher wine outright, the communal norm was unequivocally within the bounds of Jewish law. Recognizing this widespread observance, which David Malkiel has similarly demonstrated in relation to late medieval Italian Jews, should spur us to rethink the cultural and religious differences between Jews of northern Europe and those of the Mediterranean.80

Pinchas ROTH [email protected]

77. SIBON, LesJuifsdeMarseille, p. 180-186. 78. J. KATZ, ExclusivenessandTolerance:StudiesinJewish-GentileRelationsinMedieval andModernTimes, Oxford 1961, p. 24-36; id., “Reflections on the Relationship between Religion and Economics”, Tarbiz 60 (1991), p. 99-111 (Hebrew). 79. SOLOVEITCHIK, CollectedEssays, vol. I, p. 272-274; CollectedEssays, vol. II, p. 36, 283-293. This attitude is a mirror image of the so-called “Sephardic mystique”: I. SCHORSCH, “The Myth of Sephardic Supremacy”, LeoBaeckInstituteYearBook 34 (1989), p. 47-66; D. MALKIEL, ReconstructingAshkenaz.TheHumanFaceofFranco-GermanJewry,1000-1250, Stanford 2009, p. 234-261; J. M. EFRON, GermanJewryandtheAllureoftheSephardic, Princeton 2016. 80. D. MALKIEL, “Gentile Wine and Italian Exceptionalism”, JournalofJewishStudies 68 (2017), p. 346-368.