Anti-Semitism

Early History

Pagan anti-Semitism was largely cultural rather than religious, though it provided the basis for Christian anti-Semitism. It appears to have arisen in Alexandria, the most advanced city of the Hellenized world outside of Greece, where Jews constituted 40% of the population and competed with Egyptians for power and privilege. An organized massacre of Jews (pogrom) took place in 38 C.E. in Alexandria with the justification that Jews were unpatriotic and did not worship the same gods as others. Jews refused to acknowledge the gods of others, did not engage in sacrifices or send gifts to their temples, and practiced marriage and kept to themselves. These cultural practices provided justification for anti-Semitism during the pagan period. Examples of antipathy to Jews and Judaism during ancient times include the story in the biblical Book of Exodus of the Egyptian pha-raoh ordering all newborn Hebrew boys to be drowned in the Nile. Greek rulers desecrated the Temple and banned Jewish religious practices, such as circumcision, Sabbath observance, study of Jewish religious books, and so on. Many pagan Greek and Roman writers exhibited prejudice toward Jews and their religion in their works.

The Rise of Christianity

Jews have lived as a religious minority in Christian and Muslim lands since the Roman Empire [Page 24]became Christian. Christianity and Islam have both portrayed Jews as those who rejected God's truth. Christians and Muslims have, over the centuries, alternately lived in peace with Jews and persecuted them.

With the emergence of Christianity, both Christians and Jews vied for followers. However, after the Roman Empire became Christian, Jews were increasingly persecuted. Prejudice against Jews in the Roman Empire was formalized in 438, when the Code of Theodosius II established Roman Catholic Christianity as the only legal religion in the Roman Empire. The Justinian Code a century later stripped Jews of many of their rights, and church councils throughout the sixth and seventh centuries, including the Council of Orleans, further enforced anti-Jewish provisions. These restrictions began as early as 305, when, in Elvira (now Granada), a Spanish town in Andalusia, the first known laws against Jews of any church council appeared. Christian women were forbidden to marry Jews unless the Jews first converted to Catholicism. Jews were forbidden to extend hospitality to Catholics. Jews could not keep Catholic Christian concubines and were forbidden to bless the fields of Catholics. In 589, in Catholic Spain, the Third Council of Toledo ordered that children born of marriage between Jews and Catholics be baptized by force. By the Twelfth Council of Toledo (682), a policy of forced conversion of all Jews was initiated. Thousands fled, and thousands of others converted to Roman Catholicism.

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