connection between the two families.^23 Women, on the other hand, chose
their co-mothers from among their close friends. This gendered difference is
certainly a statement on the roles of men and women in medieval society.
When parents had to choose co-parents for their children, they considered the
social benefits these connections would create and strengthen. While they did
not expect the co-parent to take charge of the newborn’s religious education
(although this was officially one of their duties), they did hope for an economic
agreement with their co-parents or at least for the promise of future prospects.
Alliances like co-parenting should be viewed as a strategy for building part-
nerships and associations between different strata of medieval society.^24
These findings have been reinforced by the research of two anthropolo-
gists—Sidney Mintz and Eric Wolf—who studied co-parenting practices (com-
padrazgo) in Puerto Rico. Wolf studied people in rural, lower-class society and
discovered that they preferred to honor close friends and family members, feel-
ing that they could turn to each other for help and support. Mintz studied peo-
ple in urban, middle-class society and found that they, like medieval Christian
urbanites, preferred to honor people one step above them in social rank. I will
return to their findings at the end of the chapter.^25
Before we compare medieval Jewish and Christian ceremonies, one more
word about the relative functions of baptism and circumcision is in order. Bap-
tism and circumcision were viewed as analogous in the medieval context. This
idea resonates in passages found in Sefer Niz·ah·on Vetus, where baptism and
its validity are discussed. The author argues that if Christian baptism is based
on Jesus’ baptism, then
they should have imitated that baptism in all its particulars. In fact, however, Jesus
and John were baptized in the Jordan, which consists of fresh water, while they
are baptized in drawn water to this day. Furthermore, just as they derive the re-
quirements of baptism from Jesus’ behavior, i.e., from the fact that he was bap-
tized himself, in the same manner they should derive the requirement of cir-
cumcision, for Jesus and John were both circumcised.^26
The link between the two ceremonies is mentioned in Christian sources as
well. Wolfram von Eschenbach (1170–1217), the author of the thirteenth-
century novel Willelhalm, has one of his heroes say: “The baptism of Jews in-
cludes a peculiar custom: they perform it by cutting.”^27 As both ceremonies
are birth rituals, the speaker presents them as essentially the same ceremony, in
spite of the different customs attached to them. The connection between both
rituals is also portrayed in medieval art. For example a drawing in a thirteenth-
century Bible moraliséefrom France (figure 1) depicts the circumcision of the
Jews by Joshua in Gilgal, after the crossing of the Jordan (Josh. 5), as a kind of
adult baptism.^28
In medieval Christian Europe, the comparison between the two rites had
immediate implications. The two rituals identified and signified Jews and