Just as the papacy’s wish simultaneously to protect and to restrict Jews is apparent in
the increase during the High Middle Ages of papal letters concerning the crusades,
the wearing of distinctive clothing, regulations on interaction with Christians, and the
forbidding of Jews from holding public office, so it is also obvious in relation to all
Jewish financial transactions with Christians, and in particular with regard to the
Church’s collection of tithes and regulations concerning usury. Yet by contrast, they
had little to say about clergy who pawned vestments, ornaments, and vessels to Jews.1
By the late Middle Ages money-lending had become the most economically
important occupation for Jews, and often included money-changing.2 Although in
Rome in particular Jewish banking was extremely important, most Roman Jews
were artisans: spinners, tailors, dyers, hatters, tinsmiths, armourers, shoemakers, and
saddlers, as well as businessmen, doctors, lawyers, and rabbis.3
THe PAPACY, Jews, And TiTHes
we possess a number of letters in which twelfth-century popes attempted to regu-
late business transactions with Jews and in particular to ensure that when Jews
obtained property which had once belonged to Christians they would continue to
pay the same tithes and first fruits from those lands and possessions as had their
former Christian holders. so, for example, in a letter of unknown date but written
sometime between 1144 and 1145, Lucius ii (1144–1145) confirmed to Rainer,
bishop of Rimini, and his successors the privileges of the Church of Rimini, which
included Christian and Jewish revenues from the seashore.4
Papal concern that Jews pay the tithe became particularly apparent during
the pontificate of Alexander iii. since in the twelfth century the tithe had often
become the mainstay of Church finances in many parts of medieval europe, the
papacy came to insist that Jews pay the tithe when they acquired property that had
once belonged to Christians and which would therefore have been liable to such
taxation.5 in a landmark letter issued sometime between 1159 and 1170, deemed
important enough by later canonists to be included in the Liber extra, Alexander
1 shlomo simonsohn, The Apostolic See and the Jews. History (Toronto, 1991), p.187.
2 simonsohn, The Apostolic See and the Jews. History, p.410; p.414.
3 simonsohn, The Apostolic See and the Jews. History, p.415.
4 Lucius ii, ‘in eminenti’ (21 May 1144), Simonsohn, pp.45–6.
5 simonsohn, The Apostolic See and the Jews. History, pp.180–5.4
Jews and Money