Chapter XXIV: The Spanish Jews (1)

711–1492

Influence of the Semitic Race on Civilization--Enterprise of
the Ancient Jews--Their Eminent Talents--Their Power during
the Middle Ages--Their Universal Proscription--Their Condition
under the Moors of Spain--Their Extraordinary Attainments--Their
Devotion to Letters--Their Academies--Rabbis as Ambassadors
of the Khalifs--Learned Men--Poets, Physicians, Statesmen,
Philosophers--Maimonides: His Genius and His Works--His
Character--Preponderating Influence of the Spanish Jews
in Government and Society--Their Necessity to the Ruling
Classes--They are driven to Usury--Their Prosperity--They are
favored by Alfonso X. and Pedro el Cruel--Their Proficiency in
Medicine--Obligations of Mediæval and Modern Science to the
Jews--Their Wonderful Survival under Oppression--Their Exile
from the Peninsula--Their Sufferings--The Taint of Hebrew Blood
in the Aristocracy of Spain and Portugal.

The preponderance of Semitic influence is one of the most remarkable phenomena in the annals of human civilization. The progress of those nations, which in ancient times attained the highest rank of intellectual culture, is directly traceable to that influence. The success of the Semitic element in modifying the character of every people with which it had been brought in intimate contact, either by conquest or through commercial intercourse, is one of the most striking and instructive incidents of history. From the days when the Phœnicians controlled the trade of antiquity, profiting by their thorough knowledge of humanity, whose avarice they stimulated by the introduction of unknown luxuries, and whose fears they excited by the invention of portentous fables; through the Middle Ages, whose tyrants and inquisitors plundered and oppressed the Hebrew bankers and merchants of Europe, down to our time, when the Jew is not only the possessor of a large proportion of the wealth of the globe, but also a dominating force in the business community of every city and village of the Old and New Worlds, the enterprising genius of the Semitic race has been paramount in its control over the minds and the fortunes of men. And not merely in a mercantile but in a religious point of view is this influence manifest. The Scriptures and the Koran monopolize the pious reverence of the civilized world. The successors of Mohammed in Hindustan alone changed the faith of forty-one million souls. The most important dogmas of the Church, the leading maxims of kingly government, are of Semitic origin; the majority of the popular legends and tales which compose the folk-lore of France, Germany, Scandinavia, and Britain are indigenous to the Valley of the Nile or the plains of Arabia. Asiatic ideas, which dominated the comparatively insignificant geographical area of the continent of Europe whose appreciation of the advantages of literary and scientific investigation made it so conspicuous amidst mediæval ignorance, have maintained their power unshaken through many centuries. To the impulse thus imparted to letters, modern society owes a debt which it long repudiated, and which it is even now loath to acknowledge. Among those races which have exercised the greatest influence on human destiny that of the Hebrews is pre-eminently distinguished. From the earliest times of which history makes mention, the Jews have occupied an exalted place among civilized nations. They were among the first of traders, merchants, navigators. Neighbors of the Phœnicians, they imbibed the commercial spirit of that adventurous people, accompanied their expeditions, participated in their enterprises, shared their profits, and with them overcame the obstacles which invested the navigation of unknown and mysterious seas. They were not slow to recognize the immense commercial advantages to be obtained from the development of the boundless resources of the Spanish Peninsula, whence the Tyrian and Sidonian mariners brought such quantities of silver that their vessels could scarcely transport it, notwithstanding that the anchors, the most common utensils, and even the ballast, were composed of that precious metal.

The accounts of the reign of Solomon afford abundant evidence of the wealth and prosperity of the Hebrews. Their abilities and services were highly appreciated by the most enlightened governments of antiquity. They were invited by the Ptolemies to establish colonies on the banks of the Nile. They were often intrusted by the Roman emperors with the collection and disbursement of the imperial revenues. The Emperor Hadrian declared that during his travels in Egypt he had never met a Jew of that country who was not an expert mathematician. In the far Orient, where their ancestors had once been detained in ignominious captivity, they rose to be the confidential friends of powerful monarchs. They were known and welcomed in every seaport of the Mediterranean, and their thirst for gain even induced them to boldly encounter the perils of the barbarous countries of Europe. In all their social and political relations, they maintained their reputation for that mental superiority which is still one of the marked characteristics of the Hebrew race. All of the knowledge extant among contemporaneous nations--the secret lore of the Egyptians, imparted in mysterious temples under the shadow of the Pyramids; the hoary traditions of the Magi; the rich inheritance of classic antiquity; the argumentative skill acquired in the Museum of Alexandria and the philosophical schools of Athens--was the patrimony of the Jew. His curiosity was awakened by travel and by contact with a hundred different peoples included within the sphere of his commercial activity; his genius was developed and matured by studious industry; and the affluence resulting from his shrewdness enabled him to profit to the utmost by his unrivalled opportunities. No fact is better established than that the intellectual improvement of a nation, its progress in the arts, its scientific acquirements, its literary culture, have a direct and absolute dependence upon its material prosperity and the independent pecuniary circumstances of its scholars and learned men. While poverty is often an incentive to that perseverance which insures success, it is a condition which only affects individual and not national development. Without leisure, there can be no studies; without studies, no advance. Another factor of paramount importance in the evolution and maintenance of civilization, and one to which the Hebrew was deeply indebted, was the wide and varied experience derived from cosmopolitan habits and associations. This intercourse was facilitated by the easy and rapid means of international communication at the disposal of the Jewish trader. The Mediterranean, which washed the shores of three great continents, presented no obstacles to the enterprise of the Phœnicians, whose intimate connections with the Jews gave the latter advantages enjoyed by no other people; and the fabled monsters invented by those astute navigators to damp the ardor of other maritime adventurers, and which survive in the traditions of classic mythology, possessed no terrors for the allies and friends of the Tyrian merchants and sailors. No area of equal extent in the world offered so diversified and instructive a spectacle of human life and manners as the winding coast of that great inland sea. With its cities and its kingdoms, founded under different political conditions, living under different systems, governed by different laws, frequent and prolonged visits had early made the Jew familiar. To the audacious navigator who had sailed over the mysterious Ocean, far beyond the Pillars of Hercules, the coasting of the Mediterranean was a trifle. In subsequent times the military highways of the Roman Empire--whose construction, the first work after the invasion of a country destined to subjection, indicated the fate of its people, and insured their obedience with far more certainty than the fortified camps of the legions--afforded the Hebrew merchant easy access to the utmost limits of the vast region subject to imperial authority. But it was not only in lands generally accessible to commercial enterprise that the mercantile and intellectual activity of the Jew was displayed. With the periodical caravans he traversed the Arabian Peninsula, and braving the perils of the Desert--the stifling heat, the sand-storms, the robbers who thrived amidst its desolation--collected and distributed the precious commodities of Yemen. He penetrated to the centre of Ethiopia; his costume and his wares were known to the inhabitants of every city on the Red Sea and the Persian Gulf. The coast of Britain was visited by Jews long before the invasion of Cæsar. The restless, adventurous spirit, so universal that it became a national characteristic fostered through untold generations, and the extensive and profound acquaintance with the motives and the affairs of humanity which resulted from its exercise, is the principal secret of the prodigious and phenomenal development of the Hebrew mind. Other considerations of no less importance contributed largely to this result. In the estimation of those who strictly observed the precepts of the law, and to whom were committed the instruction of youth and the guidance of the community, idleness was considered one of the most despicable of vices. “Whoever,” say the learned rabbis, “does not teach his son some trade, rears him for a life of brigandage;” and the sedulous inculcation of this principle led to its universal adoption and practice, until its effects are to-day discernible in the habits of every individual of Hebrew extraction. In ancient times there was no industrial occupation whose requirements were unfamiliar to the Jewish artisan, no profession in which the scholars of that nation did not excel. The talents of the latter were often unprofitably employed in commentaries on the Talmud and whimsical interpretations of the Scriptures, whose texts were at times distorted to support some absurd and extravagant conception which the fruitless ingenuity of the doctors of the law, devoted to metaphysical subtleties, had invented. The Talmud was regarded with even greater reverence than the Pentateuch. Its diligent perusal was required as a duty; children were familiar with its maxims long before their minds were sufficiently developed to thoroughly comprehend them; and the mastery of this voluminous and incongruous compilation was regarded as the rarest and most desirable of mental accomplishments. From the study of this work was derived the partiality for mysticism, magic, and oneiromancy, topics which formed so large a proportion of ancient Hebrew literature, and which frequently dissipated the efforts of genius which might have been exercised in more practical and advantageous employments. In the Talmud, however, are also to be found the germs of medical science in which, from the remotest antiquity, the Jews were distinguished, and whose pursuit, thus sanctioned by an authority regarded as divine, became the favorite pursuit of that extraordinary people. Some of its ideas and principles had been learned from the Magi of Persia; others were borrowed from the Egyptian priesthood. The more numerous, and by far the most valuable, precepts of that science, however, were a portion of the inheritance transmitted by the noble school of the Ptolemies. With all were mingled not a few puerile superstitions which exalted the virtues of charms and amulets. The Bible gives many instances of diseases and their treatment, which in that age was the peculiar province of the Levites. The talents of the Hebrew thus early directed to medicine and botany arrived eventually at an extraordinary degree of development; and his adaptive ingenuity was revealed in the discovery and application of many indispensable drugs of the Materia Medica, and in the intelligent use of the instruments and caustics of the surgeon. In ancient Chaldea and Babylonia there were no physicians. The priesthood, as in the Middle Ages, enjoyed a monopoly of learning, which, so far as the practice of medicine was concerned, rested upon no more substantial foundation than the imposture of the charlatan. The cure of disease was effected by the exorcism of evil spirits; and such is the tenacity of venerable ideas and the lamentable credulity of the human mind that, through the influence of a certain class whose pecuniary interests are directly involved, this superstitious belief, with others equally absurd, still prevails among the members of educated communities even in our enlightened age. The difference between the fetichism of the African savage, the mediæval relic-cure, and the so-called Christian Science of modern days is one of degree and not of kind. In the infancy of civilization every malady was attributed to demoniacal possession. The Jews were the first to detect the true nature of disease and to realize the necessity for the employment of physical remedies, where heretofore, through the medium of spells and incantations, the aid of the supernatural alone had been invoked. By the adoption and application of rational principles, they revolutionized the theory and practice of medicine. Their attempts to thus partially emancipate the human mind from the degrading thraldom of superstition brought upon them the anathemas of the priesthood wherever these innovations were attempted. The wonder-workers of Pagan temples and the monkish custodians of Christian shrines saw with dismay their incomes decreasing as a consequence of the successful ministrations of the Hebrew practitioner. It was not without reason that the latter became an object of clerical animadversion, for the offerings annually bestowed by grateful credulity upon the custodians of some apocryphal relic of imaginary virtues not infrequently exceeded in value the revenues of a city. Much of the prejudice everywhere existing against the Jewish name is thus attributable to sacerdotal malevolence, originally excited by interference with material interests. But even in an age of ignorance homage was paid, however reluctantly, to the ascendency of intellectual power; and the Jews flourished in countries where the laws did not tolerate their presence and sovereigns were pledged by their coronation oaths to their destruction. Political necessity proved stronger than popular odium; and the strange anomaly of a proscribed race, whose existence was condemned by the civil and ecclesiastical codes alike, flourishing in the midst of implacable enemies was exhibited in every country of mediæval Europe. This peculiar condition was due to the dominating force of intellect alone. It is true that toleration was frequently purchased with gold; but the Jews were the sole depositaries of real knowledge, and without their wise and practical counsels the wheels of government could not be kept in motion. This indispensable necessity of maintaining in positions of honor and power a class whose nominal disabilities degraded them below the legal status of cattle was a result of the illiterate and priest-ridden state of the Dark Ages.

The cause of the universal prejudice existing against the Jews from time immemorial has been the subject of much speculation, but has never been definitely ascertained. That prejudice long antedates the Christian era. They were banished by the Egyptians, enslaved by the Persians, despised by the Greeks, persecuted by the Romans. So little were they esteemed by the latter, that during the wars with Hadrian four Jews were bartered for a modius of barley. A well-founded tradition, repeated time and again by classic historians, declared that they were expelled from Egypt for fear that the plague might be communicated by the loathsome diseases with which they were afflicted. In that country, as elsewhere subsequently, they were isolated from all other members of the community. Moses is designated by ancient writers as the “Chief of the Lepers.” It is well known that leprosy was first introduced into Italy by the soldiers of Pompey, who contracted it in Palestine. This awful malady was not only indigenous to the latter country, but was generally considered a morbid physiological condition peculiar to the Hebrew people, with whom, in fact, it was chronic and hereditary, and among whom it assumed its most malignant and appalling form.

The national customs of the Jews were regarded with peculiar abhorrence by the polished nations of antiquity. They practised human sacrifices. Tacitus says that they rendered distinguished homage to the ass, an animal sacred to the Phœnician goddess Astarte. A golden head of that animal was worshipped in their temples. The Bible repeatedly mentions the fact that they were debased and incorrigible idolaters. In Pagan Arabia they conformed to the religious customs of the country, shaved their heads, venerated the images of the Kaaba, and made the circuit of that shrine upon their knees. The idea of the Resurrection, which, with that of the Trinity, formed no part of the primitive belief of any Semitic race, but is a purely Aryan conception, they learned during the latter part of the Babylonian captivity. Its adoption was far from unanimous, however, for it was always repudiated by the Sadducees, reputed the most orthodox and precisian sect of the Hebrew nation. They sold their children into slavery. Their personal habits were indescribably filthy. It was believed by the African Christians that a peculiarly offensive odor, an evidence of Divine wrath provoked by the tragedy of the crucifixion, and which could only be removed by baptism, emanated from them. Hatred of everything non-Jewish was a ruling principle of their nature and conduct, and every country in which they were domiciled they betrayed, in turn, to the invader.

The moral and physical condition--that of a race of pariahs infected with foul distempers--which characterized them in ancient times presents a singular contrast to that under which they actually existed subsequently, and under which they exist to-day. They were not affected by the great epidemics which swept with devastating force over Europe during the Middle Ages, although they were as fully exposed to contagion as any of the nations which were decimated by them. Their immunity to many of the most serious ailments which afflict mankind is demonstrated by every table of medical statistics. Their longevity, unquestionably due to a strong constitution, is proverbial. Their average annual death-rate, in both Europe and America, is less than one-half that of persons of other nationalities subjected to the influence of similar conditions of climate, food, and occupation. Their freedom from criminality and pauperism is one of their most remarkable characteristics. Every lawyer knows how rarely a Jew is seen in courts of justice, either as a litigant, a malefactor, or a witness.

The propagation and improvement of a people under circumstances which indicated their speedy and inevitable extinction is one of the most curious problems in the annals of ethnology. Not only is it anomalous, but it is absolutely inexplicable under any scientific and logical hypothesis which can now be advanced. It would ordinarily be conceded that a race affected with congenital leprosy, whose habits were uncleanly, and whose members constantly intermarried, must certainly perish in a few generations. It would also not be denied that such a race would be especially liable to visitations by epidemics, and that its reduced capacity for resistance would induce an extraordinary fatality. Not so, however, with the Jews. They grew stronger by intermarriage. They threw off the disease which had once made them odious in the sight of men. The plague and the typhus which desolated the homes of their neighbors passed them by. They not only survived, but throve under persecution which would have exterminated any other branch of the human family. Their tenacity of life, the persistence of their institutions, the boundless power they wield in the commercial world, their versatility of character, their success in the most difficult undertakings, their national and religious organization maintained in the face of appalling obstacles, tend to confirm the ancient tradition that they are the Chosen People of God.

The Hebrew, whatever his capacity or experience, was in the eye of the law immeasurably inferior to the most humble and ignorant of those who ruled him. He paid higher taxes than any one else. His testimony was not competent in a court of justice. He was excluded from the enjoyment of office. If, having become an apostate through force or policy, he addressed a word to one who was loyal to the faith and traditions of his people, even though of his own blood, he was condemned to slavery. He was not permitted to abstain from food which his ordinances declared unclean. The practice of the rite of circumcision, a rite pronounced by the rabbi more meritorious than all others, and enjoined by the Talmud, brought with it confiscation and death. The ancient national records--the books of the Law, the chronicles of bygone dynasties, the treatises of Hebrew physicians already prominent in the world of science--were diligently sought for and destroyed. Every effort was made to separate wives from their husbands and slaves from their masters, by the edict that the ceremony of baptism, when solicited by consort or bondsman, produced, according to circumstances, _ipso facto_, divorce or emancipation. All Jews were enrolled upon the public registers, and at stated times were mustered by the bishop. They were also required to report to the magistrate at every town they visited, to be examined as to their business and destination. The Seventeenth Council of Toledo, by a sweeping decree, seized the property of all the Jews in the kingdom and sentenced its owners, without exception, to absolute servitude. They were accused of practices alike revolting to humanity and subversive of morals,--of poisoning the sacramental elements, of the torture of children, of crimes against nature, of cannibalism. The ecclesiastical denunciations of offences concerning religion, such as the blasphemy of images and relics, the ridicule of orthodox tenets, the promulgation of the doctrines of the Talmud, and the soliciting of proselytes, were not less violent than those which reprobated the greatest enormities of which human frailty is susceptible. Every rank of society vied with the others in manifestations of hostility towards the despised race. The monarch, upon frivolous pretexts, confiscated their property and abandoned them to the violence of the populace. In the eyes of the ferocious noble, who scarcely acknowledged the superior dignity of his king, they were sources of wealth to be utilized as occasion or inclination demanded; and the levy of an excessive contribution was regarded as an act of especial leniency, when the last ducat might have been exacted with impunity. The Church never failed to pour out upon these victims of prejudice the full measure of ecclesiastical oppression and hatred, and no deed was more meritorious than the persecution of a Jew. But it was with the lower orders that the unfortunate Children of Israel fared the worst. Their wealth aroused the basest passions of the ignorant and fanatical rabble. To the malice incited by poverty and envy was added the animosity engendered by religious prejudice, which found expression in every kind of maltreatment and outrage. Although necessary to the state and indispensable to its political and financial prosperity, the Jew was precluded from claiming the protection of the very laws he assisted to administer. Deprived of this unquestionable right, he was unfitted by his constitution, his habits, and his traditions for armed resistance. Centuries of oppression had taught him to rely on pacific rather than on violent measures for the discomfiture of his enemies. None understood more thoroughly than he the secret springs of action which control the movements of mankind; and with its worst and most degrading characteristics, his experience, reaching through many troubled generations, had rendered him especially familiar. His practical and thorough acquaintance with every foible of human nature thus made him equal to the exigencies of every occasion. He dispensed his gold with unstinted liberality. Powerful nobles, everywhere, were in his pay. Ecclesiastics of eminent talents and reputed sanctity were not ashamed to accept his gifts, and, in return, to secretly and effectually protect his person and his interests. No efforts were spared to impress the sovereign with the extent of his attainments and the value of his services. The people, despite their prejudices, looked with awe and respect upon the members of a race who had visited lands whose very names were unknown to them, who conversed fluently in strange and guttural tongues, and who spread before their wondering and delighted eyes precious articles of merchandise of whose existence they had hitherto remained in ignorance.

Under such circumstances, however disadvantageous, the Jews, scattered throughout the countries of Europe, maintained from century to century the integrity of their social and religious organization. Their isolation was in many respects productive of personal safety and financial benefit. Exempted by their civil disabilities from exposure to the dangers of revolution, they escaped the penalties of unsuccessful treason and profited by the necessities of every faction. They alone of all classes flourished amidst the perils of internal disorder. By the liberal and judicious employment of money, they secured the favor of the party for the moment in power. Meanwhile the commerce of every country was almost exclusively under their control. No competition, of any importance, interposed to diminish their enormous profits. There was not a city, scarcely a hamlet, where the Hebrew was not sure of sympathy and assistance from his countrymen. With them his goods were secure. They afforded him valuable information. Their experience enabled him to obtain the highest prices for his wares, and the secret intelligence at their disposal gave him timely warning of the presence of danger and facilitated his escape. His cosmopolitan habits prevented national affiliations, and permitted him to immediately change his residence whenever it was required by personal considerations or commercial interests. He bought amber on the Baltic. He sold slaves in Constantinople. He exchanged the commodities of Spain for the furs of Russia and the pearls and incense of Yemen. In France he found a profitable market for jewels, spices, and cochineal. His intimate and extensive relations with the great emporiums of the Orient were one of the most important factors of his success. In that quarter of the world, enjoying the protection and confidence of the rulers of Persia, Babylonia, Syria, and Egypt, were to be found the most powerful and wealthy communities of the Hebrew nation. The omnipresent Jew had established a chain of trading stations across every continent, and even far beyond the most distant limits of civilization. This immense advantage was his alone; no competitor possessed, or could ever hope to obtain, such extraordinary mercantile facilities. From the depths of the mysterious East came the rare products which commanded fabulous prices in the European capitals,--costly tissues, gems, dyes, aromatics, porcelain,--articles which often brought far more than their weight in gold. The monopoly enjoyed by the shrewd importers enabled them to receive for their commodities sums which far exceeded their intrinsic value, and placed them beyond the reach of any excepting the most opulent.

But the enterprise of the Jew was not confined to the importation and distribution of luxuries. He furnished society with every species of merchandise, from the crown of the monarch to the sandals of the beggar. The law forbade him to be seated by an ecclesiastic without the latter’s invitation, but the bishop was compelled to purchase of him the sacerdotal vestments in which his race was anathematized; and the sacred furniture of the altar, including even the crucifix, the significant emblem of the Passion, was sold to the cathedral chapter by the descendants of those who had enacted the tragedy of Golgotha, and had trafficked in the body and blood of our Saviour. The Jews of Provence paid their tribute to the Church in wax, and provided the tapers used in the ceremonies of great religious festivals. The vessels destined for the celebration of the mass were frequently disposed of to Jewish merchants by dishonest custodians; and this sacrilegious trade became at one time so notorious and shameless in France as to call forth the indignant denunciation of the Holy See. The pawning of objects consecrated to Christian worship for loans ostensibly contracted for the benefit of the Church was one of the most flagrant abuses of ecclesiastical authority in mediæval times. These pledges, often forfeited, became the property of the lender, and the clergy were constantly subjected to the scandal arising from their exposure for sale in the shops and public markets. It was no unusual circumstance in those days for the greater part of the sacred plate of an entire diocese to be temporarily in the hands of Jewish usurers. It was, moreover, a matter of common notoriety that the families of wealthy Jewish brokers daily drank from golden chalices in which once had been offered the holy sacramental wine of the mass.

The confidence reposed by all classes in the Hebrews, despite the universal and ineradicable prejudice entertained against their nationality, affords undeniable proof of their integrity. Their financial capacity and experience procured for them the office of receiver of royal taxes in countries where public sentiment was absolutely opposed to their toleration. Their fitness for this important and responsible post was emphasized not only by their abilities, but by the fact that their prosperous circumstances were, in a measure, a guaranty of their honesty, their wealth removing the principal incentive to peculation. The most bigoted Christians eagerly sought their services in the management of property and the settlement of estates; and to their sagacity and wisdom was frequently committed the solution of the difficult problems relating to the methods of taxation and enforced contribution adopted by both the Crown and the Church. During the Middle Ages, every court in Europe patronized the Hebrew physician. His practice, while by no means free from the prevailing charlatanism of the time, embodied many principles of the healing art still recognized as sound, and represented all that was then known of medical science.

In literary culture, as in commercial ability and scientific acquirements, the mediæval Jew of Christian Europe had no rivals. It was an extraordinary circumstance when a sovereign could even read, in an age when one of the greatest princes in Europe was invested with the title of Beauclerc because he could write his own name legibly, a remarkable distinction in an era of almost universal ignorance. Such accomplishments, when they did exist in any community, were almost entirely confined to the clerical profession, and, even among its members, were far from being generally diffused. The officiating priest had, ordinarily, sufficient education to enable him to stumble through the pages of his missal. In the monastic establishments, where the opportunity afforded by solitude and leisure permitted, and even encouraged, the cultivation of letters, the talents of able men were too often wasted in frivolous and unprofitable pursuits. While such unpromising conditions prevailed among the higher classes, the state of the populace was incredibly degraded. The latter naturally looked to its spiritual advisers for instruction and guidance, and the evil influence of the Church was everywhere significantly disclosed by the crowds of stupid and fanatical devotees who listened with awe and rapture to the incoherent harangues of monkish zealots, or, bowed upon their faces, grovelled in the mire before the idolatrous shrine of some spurious saint.

In the midst of the darkness which obscured the face of the mediæval world, Hebrew learning emitted a small but brilliant ray of light. Priestly tyranny and popular odium prevented the regeneration of the masses, which, under different auspices, might readily have been accomplished. The erudition of the early rabbis, remarkable even at the present time, was, in the age in which they flourished, absolutely phenomenal. Their superior intelligence and extensive acquirements caused them to be universally branded as wizards and enchanters. Men shunned all intercourse with them, and even feared to encounter them upon the highways. No greater tribute could be paid to their knowledge and ability than the ecclesiastical decrees launched against the Jews at the very time when their talents were employed in directing the financial affairs of the Church. In spite of his indispensable usefulness to government and society, the proscribed Hebrew was always under the ban of the law and lived in a state of constant apprehension. Princes claimed and exercised the privilege of absolute ownership of all the Jews and their property in their dominions. Even such an enlightened sovereign as the Emperor Frederick II. published a sweeping edict reducing the Jews of his realms to servitude, and declaring their wealth forfeited to the state. In England, near the end of the thirteenth century, every Jew in the kingdom was arrested and held in durance until a ransom of twelve thousand pounds had been extorted. Three years afterwards all their property was taken, and they were expelled from the country. The bishop often received, as a token of royal esteem, the present of the Jews of his diocese. This singular prerogative, which was neither based upon prescriptive custom, former enslavement, nor any claim excepting that of force, was first exerted in France; and the enormous profits resulting from its application led to its general adoption by all the Christian sovereigns of Europe. The Jew, by the stringent restrictions of savage laws, was degraded below the level of humanity. The owner of a beast was entitled to fixed legal compensation for its death, but no penalty was enacted and no damages could be claimed for the murder of a Jew. If maltreated, no evidence could be received against his assailant. The Jews of Toulouse, who, tradition declared, had surrendered the city to the Moors, were condemned each year on that anniversary to furnish one of their number to receive a box on the ear at the cathedral door. One of the oldest and most respectable of the community was always selected; the blow was usually given with a mailed hand, and the victim not infrequently died from the effects of it. During Passion Week, the active persecution of the accursed sect was considered so meritorious as to be almost equivalent to the performance of a religious duty. At that time no Hebrew could appear in the street without endangering his life. On Good Friday, in the year 1016, an earthquake destroyed many of the houses in Rome. Pope Benedict VIII., having learned that at the time of its occurrence the Jews were worshipping in their synagogue, and attributing the catastrophe to their influence, caused a great number to be massacred. At all times they were exposed to the contumely of adults and the petty persecutions of children. The isolated quarter in every community, to which their residence was restricted, and separated from the dwellings of orthodox Christians to prevent contamination, is to-day, in nearly all the cities of Europe, still known by its once distinctive name; although, in most instances, its Jewish population has disappeared. It was also a common pastime of the mob to stone the houses of the Jews, and, as the latter were not permitted to defend themselves, all large towns resounded with tumult and disorder during the celebration of the most sacred festival of Christendom. Upon every occasion, these unfortunates were pursued and baited like wild animals; always with the tacit connivance, often with the open encouragement, of the authorities. Their intimate relations with the countries of the East offered substantial grounds for the belief that they introduced leprosy into France, Spain, and England,--a disease whose general dissemination has ordinarily been credited to the Crusades, but whose existence in France as early as the sixth century must be attributed to some anterior agency. The undoubted Oriental origin of this malady pointed strongly to the itinerant Jewish merchants as responsible for its appearance in Western Europe; while its loathsome and incurable character tended to increase the popular odium with which those suspected of infecting a portion of the human race hitherto exempt from this affliction were universally regarded.

Every precaution which could have a tendency to maintain the social and domestic ostracism that popular intolerance had placed upon the Jew was enforced by civil and ecclesiastical authority. He could not legally marry a Christian, inherit real property, hold slaves. In royal donations, where, without warrant of right or pretence of ancient custom, he was deprived of his liberty and his possessions, his person was thereafter attached to the glebe. He was forbidden the exercise of many of the most profitable mechanical arts in which he excelled. Christians could not eat or drink with him, visit his house, listen to his conversation, or learn his language. The priesthood considered the integrity of the doctrines which were at once the foundation and the instruments of their power as of far greater importance than the material comfort and intellectual improvement of their parishioners. They were quick to recognize the peril with which ecclesiastical institutions would be threatened if exposed to the logic and sarcasm of Hebrew criticism. The necessities of society could not, as yet, permit the extermination of the Jews, but their practical isolation was imperatively demanded by considerations of prudence, and by the just apprehension that the toleration of social intimacy would eventually result in the emancipation of the masses from ignorance, and the consequent disintegration of the Church. The Dominican and Franciscan Orders were the sworn enemies of the Jew from the very day of their organization. The Inquisition was introduced into Spain for the express purpose of plundering the rich Jews of Aragon. The efforts of the Papacy were assisted by the policy of the more bigoted of the rabbis, who saw, with no less apprehension than their Christian oppressors, the diffusion of liberal ideas which threatened their own authority and importance. Under such discouraging conditions had the Jews maintained their national existence, the purity of their religion, the perpetuation of their customs, the permanence of their laws amidst the anarchy, corruption, and intolerance of mediæval Europe.

The origin of this strange people is absolutely unknown. Their roving propensity probably dates from the very foundation of the race, as the words Hebrew and pilgrim are derived from the same root. No question, however, can exist concerning their Semitic affiliations. Their geographical distribution was extensive in very early times. The most ancient collection of myths extant describes their migrations. They were numerous in China during the third century before Christ. Profoundly superstitious, implicit believers in omens, idolaters while professing monotheism, the facile dupes of wizards and magicians, the simplest phenomena of nature were always, in their eyes, invested with a mysterious or an astrological significance. Even their division into tribes has been traced by Dozy to a cabalistic association with the twelve signs of the zodiac.

The Israelites are first noticed in history as a horde of vagabond herdsmen in Mesopotamia. Oppressed by powerful neighbors, repeatedly enslaved, and reduced to those depths of moral degradation incident only to long-continued servitude, they still succeeded in preserving inviolate the principles of their religious and social organization. They were almost universally considered as outcasts, with whom it was contamination to associate. But in all their adversity their peculiar theocratic belief confirmed their resolution and sustained their hopes. They were the Chosen People of God. His Spirit was ever with them, speaking through the voices of their teachers, directing the councils of their rulers, illuminating the Holy of Holies of the Tabernacle, hovering about the Ark with its golden cherubim. They had the Divine assurance that one day their troubles would end, that the scattered members of their race would be again united, that they would inherit the kingdoms and possess the riches of the earth. Their arrogant exclusiveness was unconsciously, but none the less diligently, fostered by the prejudices and regulations of the countries within whose borders they fixed their residence. In each city they were confined to a certain quarter, within whose precincts Christian men were little disposed, and Christian women absolutely forbidden, to enter. The use of a distinctive costume, popularly regarded as a badge of ignominy, was imposed upon them. They were not allowed to marry outside their sect. The minute and innumerable restrictions of Hindu caste were not more rigid or vexatious than those ordinances which regulated the intercourse of Jew and Christian during the Middle Ages. The enforcement of these social distinctions, as well as the inexorable requirements of the laws, increased the isolation of the Jews in every community. In this manner their unity was preserved, and the extraordinary vitality which characterized their existence in all its phases was promoted.

In no part of Europe had their influence exhibited such constant, marked, and permanent effects as in the Spanish Peninsula. On its coast, with which their ancestors had long been familiar, and where archæological research has placed the Tarshish of Holy Writ, the establishment of the Hebrew is of such high antiquity that history has failed to record it; and it may not unreasonably be assumed that it antedated the Christian era by at least a thousand years. The turbulent and perfidious character of the Hebrew sectaries caused them to be regarded with apprehension by the Romans. In the time of Hadrian, their old and powerful families were distributed, as a measure of public safety, among the most widely separated provinces of the empire. The fact is well ascertained that the Spanish Jews were rich and numerous in the fifth century, and then practically controlled the commerce and the financial resources of the country. Even at that early period they were renowned for their intellectual accomplishments, their extensive literature, their dexterity in the mechanical employments, the assiduity with which they pursued the most abstruse branches of science, and their proficiency in those practical arts which tend to the amelioration of the condition of the human race and the prolongation of the term of human life. As has been mentioned in a previous chapter, although occasionally pursued by royal avarice and clerical animosity, the Jews did not experience in Spain the full effects of that hatred which seemed to be their unhappy birthright until the accession of Reccared, the first orthodox sovereign of the Visigothic dynasty. From the latter part of the sixth century, the malice accumulated in the church and the cloister through ages of alternate restraint and forbearance was unmercifully wreaked upon them. The Visigothic Code is largely taken up with the statement of their disabilities, the denunciation of their customs, the enumeration of their offences, and the description of the penalties to be inflicted by the avenging magistrate. The paternal character of the ecclesiastical legislation, then and long afterwards in the ascendant in the Councils, scrutinized with jealous vigilance not only the public actions of the offensive sectaries, but invaded with brutal violence the sacred privacy of domestic life. The celebration of all national religious festivals was prohibited. A Jew could not be a witness against a Christian; intermarriage of the two races was declared null and void, and all issue of such unions were subject to seizure by the clergy, to be reared and educated in monastic institutions; circumcision was declared illegal; and the grotesque cruelty of the law which enforced the use of pork as food violated without cause or excuse a rational prejudice of the Jew, established by Divine command and confirmed by the unbroken practice of countless generations of his kinsmen. The observance of these savage and unreasonable regulations was enforced by penalties of corresponding severity. The culprit was usually burned alive; in cases where it seemed that leniency might be properly exercised, he was stoned to death. The constant and systematic evasion of these laws, which even priestly malevolence hesitated to enforce, was the consequence of their extreme rigor. Many circumstances then, as subsequently, intervened to mitigate the condition of the Jews; the necessities of the state, the jealousy of the nobles, the venal and corrupt disposition of the clergy, who were often the first to violate the ordinances which they themselves had been instrumental in having enacted, were all enlisted, from time to time, in securing for the objects of popular hatred a temporary and precarious indulgence.

Under the Visigothic domination, as a rule, the policy of the government was decidedly hostile. The opulent were, as is usual in such cases, considered the most guilty; and thousands were seized, despoiled, and murdered on no other provocation than the evidences of prosperity and the imprudent and ostentatious exhibition of their wealth. In the Council, which chose the sovereign, ecclesiasticism always preponderated; and through its influence a clause was early inserted in the coronation oath which bound the king to suffer no other religion but the Roman Catholic in his dominions. Powerful protectors, whose services were purchased by the lavish distribution of bribes, averted the storm for the time; but about the beginning of the seventh century public opinion declined to be longer conciliated, and a frightful persecution was begun. An immense number, amounting, it is said, to ninety thousand, apostatized and publicly received the rite of baptism. Multitudes, who preferred banishment to renunciation of their faith, fled to France, Italy, and other countries. Such extreme measures drove the suffering Israelites to resistance, but their hereditary cowardice and their total want of organization rendered their exertions hopeless, and produced no result but an aggravation of their misfortunes.

While these events were transpiring in the Visigothic kingdom, Mohammedan conquest had spread from Central Arabia to the western extremity of the African continent. Before its irresistible force, the activity of the Berber savage and the discipline of the Roman veteran had alike been humbled in the dust. The dangerous proximity of the Moslem outposts at the south had more than once aroused the apprehensions of the proud and luxurious sovereigns of Spain. But their efforts had been directed rather to the indulgence of their passions and the extirpation of heresy than to the fortification of the frontiers of the kingdom against the ambition of an unknown and underrated foe. The Jews, however, fully realized the gravity of the situation, and were only too willing to promote the designs of an enemy whose success, they were convinced, would enure to their own advantage and security. Numerous considerations of profound significance impelled them to this course. They themselves and the Arabs were derived from a common origin. Both sprang from the same branch of the great human family. Many of their customs were identical; their traditions denote a similar source; their languages vary but little in construction and pronunciation, and have been so slightly modified by the vicissitudes of centuries that the Hebrew rabbi and the Bedouin sheik of to-day can readily communicate with each other by means of their respective idioms. Both nations had for centuries been accustomed to a pastoral life on the vast plains of Asia, where the illimitable monotony of the landscape, the unbroken stillness of immense solitudes, the magnificent spectacle of the unclouded heavens glowing with the most gorgeous constellations of the firmament, have always impressed upon the nations subject to these potent and omnipresent influences the conviction of the unity of God. The caravans that issued from the Desert exchanged the precious commodities of that region for the wares manufactured and imported by the Hebrews of Alexandria, Damascus, and Antioch. Although in the early ages of Islam the Jews were often harshly treated, the Arabs were quick to perceive the advantages to be obtained from their commercial experience and literary knowledge. As Hebrew enterprise was instrumental in opening to the world the lucrative and important trade of the Arabian Peninsula, so Hebrew genius disclosed to the descendants of Ishmael the capacity of their own tongue, which until then had found no permanent mode of expression. The first book which appeared in the Arabic language was written by Javaich, a Syrian Jew. It was the translation of a medical work by a famous practitioner of Alexandria, and the practical character of the subject not only indicates the serious nature of early Hebrew research, but also becomes a matter of curious significance when the subsequent interest and proficiency of Arab scholars in everything concerning the scientific acquirements of that profession are considered.

The impulse thus early exerted by Jewish culture upon the Arab intellect was eventually productive of the most extraordinary results. The scholars soon surpassed their instructors in the extent and profundity of their knowledge. The Arab mind assimilated, with wonderful ease and insatiable avidity, the useful and valuable information afforded it, while its critical faculty enabled it to reject what it intuitively perceived to be spurious. In all the countries subject to the Khalifates of Mecca and Damascus, the Hebrew opened to the Moslem conqueror the avenues of literature and science. He was treated by the Mohammedan princes with far more consideration and justice than he had ever experienced under Pagan or Christian domination. His synagogues were erected in the shadow of Moslem minarets. His academies became famous as centres of learning. The works of Grecian philosophers, the fragmentary treasures of Alexandrian erudition, were, through his efforts, made familiar to the studious of the great Mohammedan capitals. In the distribution of literary patronage the Jews were the most distinguished recipients of royal munificence. In proportion to the eminence they attained in the province of letters, their political power and financial prosperity increased. They enjoyed the familiar confidence of the monarch, when his favorite councillors dared not venture without a summons into his presence. They amassed great fortunes in the various branches of trade and industry. Their mercantile occupations brought them frequently in contact with their fellow-sectaries, who, in other parts of the world, maintained under the weighty sceptre of cruel and bigoted sovereigns an existence fraught with danger and hardship.

These facts were well known to the Spanish Jews who had, amidst the multiplied catastrophes afflicting their race, survived the effects of Visigothic tyranny. Notwithstanding the successive persecutions of which they had been the object, they were still numerous in the Peninsula. The phenomenal vitality of a people which, from time immemorial, has preserved its integrity under the most adverse conditions, enabled it to defy the malice of courts and the edicts of councils whose office and pastime was the pitiless extirpation of heresy. The Jews flourished in defiance of bloodthirsty laws. In many ways they evaded the effects of proscription. Thousands apostatized. Multitudes secretly purchased immunity by means of the arts of corruption. Of those who had gone into exile, the majority quickly returned and took up their residence in other provinces, where, unknown to the populace, and often with the venal connivance of civil officials and prelates, they were permitted to pursue their avocations in comparative security. The Israelitish element was so preponderant in Toledo, Lucena, and Granada, at the time of the Moorish invasion, that they were known as Jewish cities. This large population formed a separate state, an _imperium in imperio_, whose members, exasperated by the memory of intolerable suffering and sustained by the hope of retribution, were ready to embrace the first opportunity to avenge the oppression of centuries. Thus the fatal policy of the Visigoths--weak, violent, and corrupt--had introduced an organized, powerful, unscrupulous, and vindictive enemy into every province and city of their tottering empire. With their African brethren the Jews of Spain maintained an intimate and frequent correspondence. Numbers of the latter had sought a refuge beyond the sea, as their descendants did, under similar circumstances, seven centuries afterwards. The settlements of the Mauritanian coast swarmed with indigenous or exiled Hebrews, attracted thither by the superior facilities they offered to commercial pursuits. All of these shrewd and intelligent traders were perfectly familiar with the condition of the Visigothic monarchy; with its apparent splendor and actual decay; with the political and social disorganization pervading every department of the state and every rank of society; with the tyranny of the King; with the universal disaffection of the nobles; with the grasping avarice of the clergy, whose exactions spared neither the plenty of the rich nor the starving wretchedness of the poor; with the weakness of the army, whose soldiers, subsisting by pillage, had neither weapons to arm nor officers to command them; with the abject misery of the people, who, protected by none and plundered by all, insecure in the pursuit of every employment, a constant prey to licensed brigandage, with no recollection of the past but the bitter reminiscence of unprovoked and repeated injury, with no hope of the future save in the intervention of a more powerful, perhaps a more ruthless, oppressor, were certain of tranquillity only in the silence and oblivion of the grave.