Europe, the Jews, and the Muslims

A popular email sent around bring an article supposedly written for a Spanish newspaper titled "All European Life Died In Auschwitz". You can read about it here, along with a discussion about its veracity.

The general idea is that Europeans made a mistake by killing Jews in the Holocaust and then replacing them with the Muslims. This article supposes both that the Holocaust was the major persecution of Jews throughout European history and that Muslims came to work instead of the "missing Jews". I am not sure both assumptions are correct. Throughout the centuries the Jews have experienced and lived through expulsions and pogroms.

I recently read "A History of the Jews in Medieval France" by Simon Schwarzfuchs, and it occurred to me that this comparison can go much deeper.

Louis IX is, according to Wikipedia, "often considered the model of the ideal Christian monarch". For the Jews he spelled the end of Jewish life in France. Among other things he completely banned interest-bearing loans, a Jewish profession at the time, and more importantly, he banned Jewish books.

After interest-bearing loans were banned, a French Jew wrote the king, trying to convince him to go back on his decision. The letter apparently never reached the king, but I think it's quite interesting to see what arguments were used. The world cannot survive without loans, wrote the Jewish scholar, and even the king himself and his nobles had needed loans for matter of state. Since it was a needed evil, it would be better for the Jews to do it, as they are not sinning against their religion by doing so. In any case, he pointed out, Christians also give interest-bearing loans, and offer a much higher interest rate.

The banning of the Talmud and other Jewish books came about after Nicholas Donin of La Rochelle, a Jewish convert to Christianity, wrote up arguments against it. Some of his arguments are, again, quite interesting: The Jews were accused of thinking the Talmud more important than the Bible, letting their children learn the Talmud instead of the Torah. They think their rabbis and scholars are more important than then prophets, and believe they can change the laws of the Torah. This lets them define their commandments as they want. The Talmud was also accused of encouraging Jews to hate Christians.

The Talmud was put on trial and found to be at fault. In 1244, twenty four wagon loads of hand-written Jewish books were burned in Paris. For years later, any Jewish book found was confiscated. This practically wiped out Jewish learning in France for centuries.

Louis IX was beatified to the applause of his people and became Saint Louis.

The Jews of 13th century France were persecuted, but in today's Europe interest-bearing loans are considered essential for economic life and in matters of religion most people don't think the holy scriptures should be read and understood literally. Nobody would accuse the Jews of not sticking to their religion if they say homosexuals shouldn't be put to death exactly as it says in the Bible.

In fact, it is the Muslims who do say that and it is the Muslims who still think interest-bearing loans are a sin. The Muslims adhere, on these points, to the same ideology espoused by Saint Louis. In this sense, the Muslims now demand from Europe what Europe has demanded from its Jews so long ago.

As the article I brought above says: What a terrible mistake was made by miserable Europe.