80 Popes and Jews, 1095–1291
time they forget thy law’, or more clearly stated, thou shalt not destroy the Jews com-
pletely, so that the christians should never by any chance be able to forget Thy Law.... 75This addition was intended to explain that only Jews who had not conspired
against christianity were to be protected: ‘We wish, however, to place under the
protection of this decree only those (Jews) who have not presumed to plot against
the christian faith’.76 The quotation from Psalms, the use of the word ‘perfidy’
(‘Perfidia’), and the phrase ‘to plot against the christian faith’ were consistent with
innocent’s tendency to be more severe—as well as more colourful in his rhetoric—
than his forebears.77 he wanted to emphasize the church’s traditional teaching
that, despite their error in not accepting christ, the Jews had an important part to
play in christian society,78 but he also reflected and encouraged a growing suspi-
cion that Jews might want deliberately to harm the ‘societas christiana’ (‘christian
society’). it is not surprising therefore that his letters often appear more hostile to
Jews than those of his predecessors. Like them, he remained committed to the
Pauline and Patristic idea of protection.79
despite innocent’s re-issue of the ‘constitutio pro iudaeis’ near the end of his pon-
tificate, his successor honorius iii also re-issued it on his election in 1217.80 honorius
omitted the paragraph—added by innocent—at the beginning about Jewish perfidy,
but retained innocent’s last sentence granting protection only to Jews not plotting
against the christian faith.81 in 1235 Gregory iX again re-issued the ‘constitutio pro
iudaeis’, this time following papal calls the previous year for action against Muslims
in the holy Land—which were to result in the ‘Barons’ crusade’ of 1236.82
Next the ‘constitutio pro iudaeis’ was re-issued twice during the pontificate of
Gregory’s successor innocent iV. The first occasion, in 1246, was a response
to Jewish petitioning following a rebellion in Navarre that had forced Thibaut to
impose restrictions on the Jews. The second, in 1247, responded to allegations of
a ritual murder in Valréas about which Jews living in the province of Vienne had
protested.83 Thus, in the re-issue of the ‘constitutio pro iudaeis’ of 1247, innocent
75 innocent iii, ‘Licet perfidia Judeorum’, Grayzel, Vol. 1, p.92; Simonsohn, p.74: ‘Licet perfidia
Judeorum sit multipliciter improbanda, quia tamen per eos fides nostra veraciter comprobatur, non sunt
a fidelibus graviter opprimendi, dicente propheta; “Ne occideris eos ne quando obliviscantur legis tue”,
ac si diceretur appertius; ne deleveris omnino Judeos, ne forte christiani legis tue valeant oblivisci... ’.
76 innocent iii, ‘Licet perfidia Judeorum’, Grayzel, p.94; Simonsohn, p.75: ‘eos autem dumtaxat
hujus protectionis presidio volumus communiri, qui nihil machinari presumpserint in subversionem
fidei christiane.’
77 innocent iii, ‘Licet perfidia Judeorum’, Grayzel, p.94; Simonsohn, p.75: ‘qui nihil machinari
presumpserint in subversionem fidei christiane’.
78 dahan, La Polémique chrétienne contre le Judaisme, p.27; Bernhard Blumenkranz, Histoire des
Juifs en France, Vol. 1 (Toulouse, 1972), p.35; Jeremy cohen, Living Letters of the Law: Ideas of the Jew
in Medieval Christianity (Berkeley, 1999), pp.317–18.
79 for example, see innocent iii, ‘Mandatur ut inhibeant’ (1215–1216), Grayzel, Vol. 1, p.142;
Simonsohn, p.100.
80 Grayzel, Vol. 1, p.76, footnote 3.
81 honorius iii, ‘Sicut iudaeis’, Grayzel, Vol. 1, p.144; Simonsohn, p.102.
82 Gregory iX, ‘Sicut iudaeis’ (3 May 1235), Grayzel, Vol. 1, p.218; Simonsohn, pp.154–5; ‘rachel
suum videns’ (17 November 1234), Grayzel, Vol. 1, p.216; Simonsohn, pp.152–3; ‘Pravorum molestiis
eum’ (13 April 1235), Grayzel, Vol. 1, p.218; Simonsohn, pp.153–4. See Grayzel, Vol. 1, p.76, footnote 3.
83 innocent iV, ‘Sicut iudaeis’ (22 october 1246), Grayzel, Vol. 1, pp.260–2; Simonsohn, p.189;
‘Sicut iudaeis’ (9 July/June 1247), Grayzel, Vol. 1, p.274; Simonsohn, pp.192–3. See Grayzel, Vol. 1,
p.76, footnote 3.