262 Popes and Jews, 1095–1291
that there were ‘synagogues for the wicked’, communes of usurers and extor
tioners, in every city throughout France.97 Furthermore, we have seen how in the
work of nicholas Maniacutius, as in many other writings of the period, there was
a deliberate traditional contrasting of ‘synagoga’ and ‘ecclesia’. This method of
contrasting the Church/Christians as ‘Ecclesia’, and Judaism/Jews as ‘Synagoga’
continued to be used throughout the high Middle Ages both in art and in written
texts.98
Indeed ‘Synagoga’ was regularly compared unfavourably with ‘Ecclesia’ in count
less expressions of medieval art which personified them as two women. From the
eleventh century onwards that opposition was emphasized: ‘Synagoga’ appeared
veiled, because blinded to the truth of Christianity; ‘Ecclesia’ triumphant.99
Increasingly ‘Synagoga’ was portrayed not merely as a representative of old Testa
ment doctrine to be fulfilled by the new Testament but as a symbol of contem
porary Jews despised for denying Christ and rejecting Christiantity.100 The use of
the word ‘synagogue’ in papal letters to describe the places of worship of both her
etics and Jews further reinforced the idea that both were enemies of the Christian
faith.101 Yet on the few occasions when popes emphasized Jews as enemies this sat
97 The phrase used is ‘synagogas malignantium’. See Mansi, Vol. 22 col. 851; Grayzel, Vol. 1,
p.306. See James Parkes, The Jew in the Medieval Community: A Study of his Political and Economic
Situation (london, 1938), pp.284–5; Kenneth Stow, ‘Papal and royal Attitudes toward Jewish
lending in the Thirteenth Century’, American Jewish Society Review 6 (1981), 178–9; Grayzel, Vol. 1,
p.306, footnote 3. The Church increasingly feared that communes of usurers were wrecking the eccle
siastical system of jurisdiction by establishing their own courts in defiance of local bishops. See Mansi,
Vol. 22, cols 851–2; Mansi, Vol. 24, col. 4.
98 Champagne, The Relationship between the Papacy and the Jews in Twelfth-Century Rome, p.68.
99 ruth Mellinkoff, Outcasts: Signs of Otherness in Northern European Art of the Late Middle Ages
(Berkeley, los Angeles, oxford, 1993), pp.48–51.
100 Mellinkoff, Outcasts, p.64.
101 references by Bernard of Clairvaux to heretical assemblies in the south of France—which he
described as ‘synagogues’—were repeated by honorius III in a letter of 1219 addressed to William
bishop of Chalons who was about to embark on a crusade in the south of France. See honorius III,
‘Ad colligendum zizania’ (1 April 1219), Horoy 3, col. 185; Bernard of Clairvaux, Opera Sancti
Bernardi 8, ed. leclercq, Talbot, rochais, p.125. I have only given a few instances of the use of
‘synagogue’ here, but the fact that it was widespread means that the vocabulary should be considered
significant. For a summary of papal ‘policy’ and the Jews, see Kenneth Stow, The ‘1007 Anonymous’ and
Papal Sovereignty: Jewish Perceptions of the Papacy and Papal Policy in the High Middle Ages (Cincinnati,
1984), pp.1–48; newman, Jewish Influence on Christian Reform Movements, p.195, footnote 2. In the
correspondence of John XXII we get a few more insights into language. In a letter of 1213 to William,
bishop of Paris, John XXII ordered him to ensure that the churchmen, monasteries, and convents in
France make proper provision for a certain John Salvati, a cleric and convert from Judaism and a
scholar in hebrew and Aramaic, who wanted to translate books from these languages into latin and
to instruct Christians in these languages so that they might in turn convert others. See John XXII,
‘Cum sicut’ (24 February 1319), Grayzel, Vol. 2, p.307; Simonsohn, pp.310–11. In 1322 John XXII
referred to the ‘blindness of Judaism’ and ordered them to enquire into those guilty, accused, or sus
pected of heresy and also against converted Jews who subsequently either clearly or apparently
apostazised. See John XXII, ‘Ex parte vestra’ (3 July 1322), Grayzel, Vol. 2, pp.325–6; Simonsohn,
p.334. In 1326 John XXII asked the bishop of Paris for a report on the situation regarding hebrew,
Greek, Arabic, and Chaldaic studies in the university of Paris. See John XXII, ‘Cupientes ut’ (25 July
1326), Grayzel, Vol. 2, p.332; Simonsohn, p.347. And in 1331 in a letter to the abbot of the Cistercian
monastery at ChalonsurSaône John XXII referred to the fact that it had once been generally believed
that lepers and certain Jews deserved to have secular justice condemn them to the stake. See John
XXII, ‘Porrecta nobis’ (18/19 october 1331), Grayzel, Vol. 2, pp.339–40; Simonsohn, pp.365–6.