Jean Connell Hof, John Friedman, and Robert Chazan. The Trial of the : Paris, 1240. Toronto: Pontifcal Institute of Mediaeval Studies, 2012. ix + 182 pp. $19.95, paper, ISBN 978-0-88844-303-8.

Reviewed by Piero Capelli

Published on H-Judaic (January, 2015)

Commissioned by Jason Kalman (Hebrew Union College - Jewish Institute of )

In June 1239, Pope Gregory IX prompted an lengthy ninety-two-page historical essay by investigation about the Talmud (papal bull Si vera Robert Chazan (“Trial, Condemnation, and Cen‐ sunt) at the behest of the French convert Nicolas sorship: The Talmud in Medieval Europe”) provid‐ Donin. The charges against the Talmud included ing historical background and context, Jean Con‐ the falsehood of its purported Mosaic origin and nell Hof’s translation of the Latin sources, and the fact that it contained against the John Friedman’s translation of the Hebrew liter‐ Christian religion, hostile statements against ary account of the trial. The introductory essay re‐ , illogicalities, and obscenities. The in‐ capitulates and updates the great amount of ex‐ vestigation culminated in the Paris trial of 1240, tremely important research that Chazan has dedi‐ which was followed by the confscation and burn‐ cated over more than four decades to the Paris tri‐ ing of large numbers of Talmudic manuscripts in al and to the Jewish presence in early Capetian 1241 (or 1242). Similar events followed until the France, starting from his pioneering Medieval discussion of 1248 between Pope Innocent IV and Jewry in Northern France: A Political and Social his legate in France, Odo of Châteauroux, when History, and until Reassessing Jewish Life in Me‐ the politics of the church about the Talmud start‐ dieval Europe, including in particular his essay ed shifting from overt persecution to rigorous “The Hebrew Report on the Trial of the Talmud: censorship. Information and Consolation.”[1] Chazan’s pre‐ A new volume in the series Mediaeval sentation and classifcation of the charges that Sources in Translation from the Pontifcal Insti‐ Donin leveled against the Talmud is the frst at‐ tute of Mediaeval Studies in Toronto ofers read‐ tempt at a systematic comparison between the ers the frst complete English translation of the Latin sources and the Hebrew account and to Latin and Hebrew sources for the 1240 Paris trial make sense of their relevant diferences. of the Talmud. The book consists of three parts: a H-Net Reviews

Some interesting aspects of the Talmud af‐ and played in the competition among faire seem not to have been granted adequate at‐ diferent political powers that was taking place on tention. The most surprising among the few the European scene in the mid-thirteenth century. events in Donin’s biography that we know for Louis IX’s being “very pious” (p. 89) does not com‐ sure—that is, the eleven years he spent after leav‐ pletely account for the fact that he was the only ing (or being expelled from) the Jewish communi‐ Western king to answer the pope’s call to investi‐ ty in 1225 and before being baptized by Gregory gate the Talmud. The events in Paris took place at IX in 1236—is given no relevance.[2] It is also the convergence of two distinct, even opposite, worth observing that the sources about the Paris political and social trends: on the one hand, Paris trial are the frst documents from northern Eu‐ was in the midst of a crisis of imperial power and rope where Jewish criticism against is based feudalism, which led to the church to attempt to on direct knowledge of the ; the redirect attention to the ideological invention of few earlier testimonies of such knowledge come new “other” enemies (heretics and ); on the from the Levant, Spain, and Provence (Sefer other hand, the new urban bourgeoisie of mer‐ Nestor ha-Komer “Book of Nestor the Priest,” chants and craftsmen—the very force disrupting tenth century), Ya‘aqov ben Re’uven’s Milhamot imperial power and feudalism—was not yet so ha- “The Wars of the Lord," twelfth century, strongly established as to evolve into a fully plu‐ and Me’ir of ’s Milhemet mitzwah "War ralist urban (or statal) society that could be inclu‐ by Commandment,” mid-thirteenth century).[3] sive of such “others” as the Jews. On the contrary, (Philippe Bobichon kindly informs me that his Jews were perceived as competitors in the feld of broad essay on MS Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, trade and fnance; therefore, the emerging bour‐ Hébr. 712—written not long after 1240 and con‐ geoisie granted support to the church’s anti-‐ taining both the Wikkuah Rabbenu Yehi’el "The ish policy.[6] of Our Yehiel" and an antholo‐ The English translation by Hof of the Latin gy of passages from the New Testament in Latin sources about the trial and its aftermath are most‐ transliterated into Hebrew script—is forthcoming ly contained in MS Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, in the series Bibliothèque de l’Ecole Pratique de Lat. 16558. For obvious reasons of space, this ex‐ Hautes Etudes.) Lastly, no mention is made of the cellent translation of the Latin sources (with due great attention that ’s commentaries on the indications and emendations of erroneous read‐ and the Talmud were granted during the de‐ ings in the manuscripts) does not include the most bate according to both the Latin sources and the important and still unpublished Latin document Hebrew account: the Paris trial was actually not related to the Paris trial: the Extractiones de Tal‐ just against the Talmud alone, but against the mut, a lengthy dossier (contained in MS Paris Lat. whole rabbinic canon, inclusive of Rashi’s com‐ 16558, f. 1a-211a) of Talmudic passages translat‐ mentaries.[4] ed into Latin that became the object of Christian The recent, extraordinary vitality of research criticism. This huge corpus, a crucial part of the in this realm is shown by the fact that the bibliog‐ sequence of intellectual and political events that raphy of the volume, though very rich and up-to- culminated in the Paris trial, is now fnally being date, is nonetheless already in need of some inte‐ investigated and edited through the research gration.[5] Another aspect of the whole issue that project on The Latin Talmud and Its Infuence on still lacks adequate consideration is the synergy Christian-Jewish Polemics (European Research between the church and the French state in the Council Consolidator Grant 2013) directed by Parisian afaire and its aftermath, as much as—in Alexander Fidora. general—the role that public anti-Jewish polemics

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Friedman provides the English translation of ately further: wayyiqra’... ha- r. Yehi’el hu’ lev‐ Wikkuah Rabbenu Yehi’el, the Hebrew literary ac‐ ado “and he summoned Rabbi Yehiel by himself”). count of the trial, with succinct notes. The well- The controversial issue of the textual trans‐ known elegy Sha’ali Serufah Ba-esh (Ask, o thou mission of the Wikkuah is granted no attention in who have been burnt in fre) by Me’ir of Rothen‐ the book. No mention is made of the aforemen‐ burg (not Rothenbergas, mistakenly repeated on tioned MS Paris Hébr. 712, the most ancient wit‐ pages 23 and 169), on the burning of the Talmud ness to the text, and the one transcribed (with which followed the trial, is also translated in an many errors) by Samuel Grünbaum for his edition appendix. From a rhetorical and stylistic perspec‐ (1873), whose text is translated by Friedman. tive, the Wikkuah Rabbenu Yehi’el is an exceed‐ Chazan mentions three manuscripts and points ingly difcult text, packed with melitzah, “elegant out that MSS Paris and Moscow (Rossiiskaia Gosu‐ language”; Friedman’s efort at translating is thus darstvennaya Biblioteka, Günzburg 1390) do not all the more to be appreciated. Friedman’s trans‐ difer greatly from Donin’s charges against the lation is also the frst complete one in any modern Talmud and Yehi’el’s answers. The textual wit‐ language, after a faulty one by Morris Braude nesses of the Wikkuah are actually seven (I am ( on Trial: Three Public Religious Dis‐ presently working on a critical edition) and the putations between Christians and Jews in the Paris and Moscow MSS are nonetheless quite di‐ Thirteenth and Fifteenth Centuries), Hyam Macco‐ vergent as to the procedure of the trial and vari‐ by’s unhelpful summary ( on Trial: Jew‐ ous other details (for instance, King Louis IX nev‐ ish-Christian Disputations in the ), er attended the debate according to MS Paris, and a partial French translation by Henri Kahn whereas two passages of the Moscow MS seem to and Alex Klein (“Le ‘brûlement’ du Talmud en suggest that in some instances he might have Place de Grève: 750 ans”).[7] This part of the book been present[9]). The passage from 46:1 flls therefore a serious scholarly void. discussed in the Wikkuah (p. 147n194) can only Some shortcomings in the translation have al‐ be understood in view of a joke in early French ready been signaled for future reprints by Daniel (la‘az) contained in Rashi’s commen‐ J. Lasker in Journal of .[8] Here are tary to the bibical verse, sarcastically quoted by a couple more. About the tradition of Mary “the Donin, reported in the Paris MS (as in all the other dresser of women’s hair,” i.e., (p. ones), but not transcribed in Grünbaum’s edition 137n25), it is worth calling attention to the pun in due to its foul language, and thus absent from the Hebrew text, where the epithet megaddelah, Friedman’s translation, too.[10] “hairdresser,” is also an assonant, derogatory de‐ This volume is an excellent and up-to-date formation of Latin Magdalena. At the beginning tool (especially convenient for classes) on the of the judicial hearing, the Hebrew li-qro’ ehad Paris Talmud trial and its aftermath and on Jew‐ ahuz min ha-arba‘ah, referred to Donin, is ren‐ ish-Christian polemics in the Middle Ages in gen‐ dered as “to read aloud one percent of the Tal‐ eral, for both an academic and a nonacademic mud” (i.e., the four Divisions of the Babylonian readership. In particular, we still have much to ) (p. 128), whereas it is much more likely learn from research on the events of 1240 and the to mean “to summon to testimony [only] one tak‐ related Hebrew account. en from the four,” where the “four” are the Notes present in the court and mentioned by their names only a few lines above, and the “one” is [1]. Robert Chazan, Medieval Jewry in North‐ Rabbi Yehi’el, the only rabbi who spoke on behalf ern France: A Political and Social History (Balti‐ of the Talmud during the trial (as stated immedi‐ more, MD: Johns Hopkins Press, 1973);

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Robert Chazan, Reassessing Jewish Life in Me‐ in History, Religion, Art and Litera‐ dieval Europe (Cambridge: Cambridge University ture, ed. Marcel Poorthuis, Schwartz, and Press, 2010); and Robert Chazan, “The Hebrew Re‐ Turner (Leiden: Brill, 2009), 181-199. port on the Trial of the Talmud: Information and [7]. Morris Braude, Conscience on Trial: Three Consolation,” in Le brûlement du Talmud Public Religious Disputations between Christians 1242-1244, ed. Gilbert Dahan and Élie Nicolas and Jews in the Thirteenth and Fifteenth Centuries (Paris: Les Éditions De Cerf, 1999), 79-93. (New York: Exposition Press, 1952); Hyam Macco‐ [2]. See my “Nicolas Donin, the Talmud Trial by, Judaism on Trial: Jewish-Christian Disputa‐ of 1240, and the Struggles between Church and tions in the Middle Ages (London: The Littman Li‐ States in Medieval Europe” (forthcoming). brary of Jewish Civilization, 1982); and Henri [3]. See Robert Chazan, Fashioning Jewish Kahn and Alex Klein, “Le ‘brûlement’ du Talmud Identity in Medieval Western Christendom (Cam‐ en Place de Grève: 750 ans,” Kountrass 46 (1994): bridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), 5-27. 281-297. [8]. Daniel J. Lasker, review of The Trial of the [4]. See my “Rashi nella controversia parigina Talmud, Paris 1240, translated by Jean Connell sul Talmud del 1240,” in “Ricercare la sapienza di Hof and John Friedman, Journal of Jewish Stud‐ tutti gli antichi” (Sir 39,1): Miscellanea in onore di ies 64, no. 2 (2013): 403-409. Gian Luigi Prato, ed. Marcello Milani and Marco [9]. F. 84a, li-fne ha-melekh “before the king”; Zappella (Bologna: Dehoniane, 2013), 441-448. f. 86a, waytzaw ha-melekh la‘asot ken “the king [5]. On the anti-Jewish riots of 1236 in west‐ commanded to do so.” ern France, see John V. Tolan, “Lachrymabilem [10]. See my “Editing Thirteenth-Century judeorum questionem: La brève histoire de la Polemical Texts,” Henoch (forthcoming). communauté juive de Bretagne au XIIIe siècle,” in Hommes, cultures et paysage de l'Antiquité à la période moderne: Mélanges oferts à Jean Peyras, ed. Isabelle Pimouguet-Pédarros, Monique Clavel- Levêque, and Fatima Ouachour (Rennes: Presses Universitaires de Rennes, 2013), 417-432. On Tal‐ mudic passages on Virgin Mary and the relation between the Paris trial and political promotion of Marian worship, see William Chester ’s im‐ portant “Marian Devotion and the Talmud Trial of 1240,” in Religionsgespräche im Mittelalter, ed. Bernard Lewis and Friedrich Niewöhner (Wies‐ baden: Harrassowitz, 1992), 61-76. [6]. See André Tuilier, “La condamnation du Talmud par les maîtres universitaires parisiens, ses causes et ses conséquences politiques et idéologiques,” in Le brûlement du Talmud, 59-78. See also Daniela Müller’s preliminary “Die Pariser Verfahren gegen den Talmud von 1240 und 1248 im Kontext von Papsttum und Französischem Königtum,” in Interaction between Judaism and

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Citation: Piero Capelli. Review of Hof, Jean Connell, John Friedman, and Robert Chazan. The Trial of the Talmud: Paris, 1240. H-Judaic, H-Net Reviews. January, 2015.

URL: https://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=39555

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