Middle Ages Research Paper
During the Middle Ages, Jews were seen as the enemy by the Christians; they were thought of as the race that killed Christ. The Jewish people were oppressed during the Middle Ages mostly by Christians. Religion was taken very seriously in the past and for what the Christians believed the Jews were responsible for, they did not like them. Furthermore, the Jews were accused for causing the Black Plague by poisoning the wells. The Black Plague nearly whipped out one third of the world population. The Jews were also “accused of murdering Christian children in order to make matzoh for Passover” (Konop, Muller, & Risley). Moreover, the Jews were forced to live on a filthy island called Ghetto Nuova in Venice. In addition to all the oppressions, Jews were forced to follow many unfair laws. To start off, one regulation was made to force all Jews “to wear distinctive clothing,” (Alan), usually a yellow or a red hat and in some areas, they were required to wear a badge. In the Middle Ages, agriculture was the main way of generating money, and when the Jews were not allowed to own a Christian slave to assist them on their farms, there was no possible way for them to survive. Following, the Jewish were not permitted to take Christian pledges, “Thus, the only occupations available to them were those of artisans, traders, and money lenders,” (Konop, Muller, & Risley). Later in the Middle Ages, the relations between religions changed traumatically. For example, the type of anti-Semitism that existed in England during Shakespeare’s life was not as unreasonable as in the previous centuries. The Jews were now allowed to stay in the main city, even though the community that they were forced to stay in was now was one of “the strongest and wealthiest community in the Ghetto,” (Alan). All in all, sometimes religion and culture can blind us from the truth and some other times, it makes us hateful of others whom beliefs aren’t the same as ours.
Organized marriages have played a big role among different sorts of cultures in history. When we hear the term arranged marriage, we automatically think two parents trying to find a good match for their child. However, the reality of arranged marriages is not that. There are many types of arranged marriages. For example, there is a type that the person getting married can be involved and there is another type where the marriage is not about the couple but the two families.
Jews were also barred from owning land or from holding jobs that they desired and for which they qualified. Even under these constraints, Jews prospered and gained significant values as merchants throughout Europe. During the Middle Age, with the increased spread of Christianity, Jews were looked upon as “allied with Muslims” and many were killed (Carr; Shyovitz). Long before the twentieth century Holocaust, Jews were forced to live in closed communities, known as ghettos, without interacting with the outside world, but under strict regulations from the German authorities (“Ghetto”). Jewish isolation led to a greater increase of their religious background and, therefore, even greater persecution. In the seventeenth century, rulers of the European kingdoms valued the Jews because of their economic status and granted them citizenships. During the eighteenth
Arranged Marriages have been around since time can remember. An arranged marriage is a marital union between a man and a woman who were selected to be wedded together by a third party. Historically, arrange marriages were the main way to marry. In certain parts of the world, it is still the primary approach. There are two types of arrange marriages. The first is a traditional marriage where the children can, with strong objections, refuse to marry their soon to be spouse. In a forced marriage, the children have no say in the matter. Bread Givers shows an excellent representation of the pressures on children from their parents to be married against their will.
The Jews have been the only people accused of deicide and this caused hatred from Christians. During the diaspora, the Jews settled in the Mediterranean countries, although they settled as far away as Europe. Constant uprooting prevented the Jews from becoming agriculturalists and pastoralists, therefore they worked at trades. During the middle ages, the Jews made ornamental glass objects and worked at money lending. They were seen as prosperous and resented by the people of the countries where they settled. Resentment built against the Jews by the less prosperous people of the settled countries. The attitude of the Christian church was summed up, from our lecture, by John Chrysostom who wrote: “The Jews are the odious assassins of Christ and for killing God there is no expiation possible, no indulgence or pardon.” The churches were reluctant to help the Jews during the holocaust because of the long-standing hatred. The Jews caught in German-occupied areas after World War I had little help except for few organizations and many countries did
Many events were taking shape towards the end of the first century, and this is where Finkelstein finds it necessary to mark the start of the Jewish people in the so-called Dark Ages. In the year 1000, Jews were spread across the world in large and small communities from Spain and North Africa, all the way to the Byzantine Empire, which is now in modern day Turkey. Finkelstein particularly chooses this date to being with however, because of the establishing of the courts in this time period. Furthermore, this is where we now see Jews being forced to convert to Christianity or be killed. We see a great upsurge in the so-called need to reform all other religions until they are under Christianity, and Jews were the focus of much of this persecution.
The Jews in Europe were treated very poorly until a reform began in the late eighteenth century. The Jews lived in ghettos where they were not even considered citizens. The Jewish Enlightenment questioned this treatment.
Perhaps for no group of people were ‘the dark ages’ so aptly named as for the Jews. Over the span of one thousand years life changed wildly for the Jewish people and not in a positive way. At the start of the 5th Century the future looked bright but by the 15th century life was engulfed in darkness. This essay will investigate exactly how the legal position of the Jews was able to deteriorate so badly.
It is mentioned that the bishops tell the common folk that “the Jews have stolen your religion and yet the Jews live with you in your own land.” As a result, these words create violence as the common folk “rush out together in search of Jews, and when they find one they kill him.” The killings and violence committed during this time was also predominately recognized as acts of vengeance for many bishops and other Christians deem “the Jews as Christ-killers.” Again, this idea supports the notion that Jews created mischief and thus, the cruelty directed to them is understandable and
This caused a lot of controversy between the Jews and the Christians (Anti-Semitism). Laws were passed that made it hard for the Jews to partake in elements of public life (Medieval anti-Semitism). “They were forbidden from holding public office; from employing Christian servants; from doing business; from eating or having sex with Christians” (Medieval anti-Semitism). It was also even illegal for Jews to be seen in public during Christian Holy week. Violence against the Jews had begun to decrease by the 1500s, unfortunately though Jews still continued to endure persecution (Medieval anti-Semitism). “Jews still occasionally served as scapegoats, footing the blame for any problem or adversity” (Medieval anti-Semitism). The Jews were accused of many things. They were held accountable of being the ones responsible for the death of Jesus Christ, killing Christian children, causing natural catastrophes and were even accused to being the cause of the Plague that broke out in Europe in 1348 (“The Roots of the
When most people think of the Black Plague, the persecution of the Jews is not the first thing that enters into their mind. John Aberth, the author of The Black Death describes this unusual, unknown fact when he says “scapegoating of minority groups seems to be a common calling in times of crisis, and medieval Christian society during the Black Death was no exception” (Aberth 117). By saying this, Aberth is comparing the persecutions of the Jewish population during the Black Death to other judgments that have been laid upon minority groups throughout history. This pattern is very common during tragedies such as the plague because it is human nature, especially during this time period, to place blame on someone or something. But, why exactly did the blame of the Black Death fall on the European Jewish people’s shoulders? By focusing on the horrific treatment of Jewish people during the Plague, I will show that the Christians used the Plague to diminish their debt to the Jews, specifically by the murder of Jews throughout Europe.
The history of the Jewish people is one fraught with discrimination and persecution. No atrocity the Nazis did to the Jews in the Holocaust was original. In England in 1189, a bloody massacre of the Jews occurred for seemingly no reason. Later, the Fourth Lateran Council under Pope Innocent III required Jews to wear a badge so that all would know their race, and then had them put into walled, locked ghettos, where the Jewish community primarily remained until the middle of the eighteenth century. When the Black Death ravaged Europe in the medieval ages, many Europeans blamed the Jews (Taft 7). Yet, the one thing that could be more appalling than such brutal persecution could only be others’ failure and flat-out refusal to intervene. Such is the case with the non-Axis coutries of World War II; these nations failed miserably in their responsibility to grant basic human rights – even the right of life – to Jewish immigrants prior to World War II.
Arranged marriages are typically not practiced in the United States, however, they are still a part of other cultures. While arranged marriages are often seen as a barbaric or outdated practice, they can still be successful. It may not seem important to study arranged marriages since they are not widely practiced in modern America or other western cultures but some benefits of arranged marriages found could be used to lessen the negative image western civilizations have about cultures that continue the practice of arranged marriages. There are definitely drawbacks in the practice of arranged marriage but there are also benefits that are often overlooked.
Anti-Semitism and the desecration of the Jewish population have been in existence for nearly five thousand years. In the Elizabethan era, a question of anti-Semitism invariably arises. In William Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice, we find that one of the characters is the embodiment and expression of anti-Semitic attitude that is pervasive in Elizabethan society. "Anti-Semitism was an intricate part in Shakespeare's years. Jews were considered vile and scorned upon. Shakespeare presents Judaism as an 'unchangeable trait'" (Bloom 37). Shakespeare's age based their anti-Semitism on religious grounds because the Elizabethans inherited the fiction, fabricated by the early Church, that the Jews murdered Christ and were therefore in league with the devil and were actively working to subvert spread of Christianity. The religious grounds of this anti-Semitism means that if a Jew converted to Christianity, as Shylock is forced to do in The Merchant of Venice, then all will be forgiven as the repentant Jew is embraced by the arms of the all merciful Christian God of love. In fact, some Christian believed--as do some fundamentalist sects today--that the coming of the Kingdom of God was aided by converting the Jews to Christianity. Anti-Semitism in Shakespeare's time is portrayed in his masterpiece The Merchant of Venice.
These new Jews were even more different to the average German, and it did not help matters that they brought cholera to the country in 1892. In other words, these Jews were not hated because of their actual religious beliefs and actions, but because of Germans’ unwillingness to accept diversity. This lends itself to the wider debate of racial Anti-Semitism vs. religious Anti-Semitism. Due to the phrase Anti-Semitism being coined by a ‘secular Anti-Semite’, Wilhelm Marr, it is reasonable to conclude that the rational side of Anti-Semitism was perhaps more important a factor than the irrational side was. Due to the growing popularity of Darwinism and other such scientific theories, people began to believe in the superiority of the Aryan race. The move to scientific Anti-Semitism made it even more difficult for Jews to assimilate; they could be as German as they tried, but would always be treated differently because of their ancestry. Jews could not win either way, as they were told to become more like everyone else and when they did become upstanding members of German society, they were resented for it. Ultimately, Jews were not hated for what they believed or did, but simply because they were Jews. Anti-Semitism was just a symbol of right-wing ideology and a code word for all that was hated by conservative Germans, from socialism to liberalism, and ‘hatred of
The article begins by introducing general knowledge about arranged marriages in India. First is the proof of commonality. Arranged marriages are so customary that marriages not arranged
Arranged marriage in India is the traditional and well respected way of getting married. Majority of the elderly were married through someone, some not even being able to see each other till after the wedding ceremony. Now a day families are a bit more lenient about getting the approvals of both bride and groom before setting a wedding a day. In some parts of India, arrange marriages are still a business transaction or marrying of little children due to poverty. Arranged marriages are still very common in royalties and high caste people to practice maintaining their status.