It appears from the history of Philip, prior of St. Frideswide, of Oxford, that the Jews used then to mock publicly the lying fables of the priests.
The prior, when writing of the miracles performed by the body of that famous saint (which was preserved in his monastery), tells us that “whereas people flocked from all parts of the kingdom to worship St. Frideswide, and were cured by her of all manner of distempers; a certain Jew of Oxford called Eum Crescat, the son of Mossey, the Jew, of Wallingford, was so impudent as to laugh at her votaries, and tell them that he could cure their infirmities as well as the saint herself, and therefore hoped they would make him the same offerings. To prove which he would sometimes crook his fingers, and then pretend he had miraculously made them straight again; at other times he would halt like a cripple, and then in a few minutes skip and dance about, bidding the crowd observe how suddenly he had cured himself. Wherefore (the most devout amongst them wishing some exemplary judgment might befall him) St. Frideswide, no longer able to suffer his insolence, caused him suddenly to run mad and hang himself; which he did with his own girdle, in his father’s kitchen.” Upon which, says the historian, “he was, according to custom, conveyed in a cart to London, all the dogs of the city following his detestable corpse, and yelping in a most frightful manner.”
The Jews having experienced so much favour and protection from the first three Norman monarchs, were naturally led to hope that they had found in this country a permanent asylum from their persecutions. Under this impression, they had employed the season of their tranquillity in the acquirement of property. They were, however, soon made to experience the fallacy of their expectations; for with the accumulation of wealth their security vanished, and as their riches increased, so, in proportion, did their oppressions. From the period of this monarch’s death to the time of their expulsion, your histories abound with details of their hardships. A melancholy monotony pervades the history of those two hundred years. Indeed, the treatment which they received in this country, during that period, was of a nature more disgraceful than that they received in other parts of Europe; for while elsewhere, as in Spain and Germany, the monarchs generally exerted themselves to repress the hostility of the clergy and people, the English kings, scarcely one excepted, manifested as persecuting a spirit as any of their subjects. It would be as useless as it would be tedious, to notice each particular instance of cruelty and tyranny which is mentioned to have been exercised towards them, for there is scarcely a year without some records concerning them, and hardly a record which relates to them but furnishes some evidence of their sufferings. Taxes and contributions to an exorbitant amount, were continually imposed upon them at the mere will of the crown, and payment enforced by seizure of their properties, by imprisonment, and frequently by the infliction of the most cruel and wanton bodily torture. Crimes of every description—many of a nature the most absurd and groundless—were laid to their charge, and the severest penalties inflicted for them. Tumults were, on the most frivolous pretences, excited against them; their houses pillaged and burned, and hundreds of them massacred by the populace, without regard to either age or sex. That, under such an accumulation of misfortunes, the Jews should not only have continued to reside in England, but greatly to increase in numbers, cannot fail to excite wonder and surprise.
If Jews were the historians who handed down to us the accounts of their sufferings, we might doubt the veracity of their statements, or believe them greatly exaggerated. It is not, however, from themselves that much of my information is derived, for, as I have already stated in my last lecture, they did not bequeath us any annals of their own in this country; my information is derived principally from the testimony of Christian writers—from authorities which admit of no dispute.
With the reign of the usurper Stephen, the Jewish troubles commenced. He being solicitous to obtain the good-will of the clergy, the best means to compass such an end in those days was to inflict cruel injuries on the poor Jews; and as he gave up the sources of income which his predecessors had enjoyed—viz., the appropriation of the revenues of the vacant sees and benefices, he therefore fixed his avaricious eye upon the wealth of the Jews: and in the fifth year of his reign exacted a heavy fine, amounting to £2000, from the Jews residing in London, under pretence that some one of their body had been guilty of manslaughter.
The Empress Maud, to whom, as it was well said, “moderation in prosperity was a virtue unknown,”[1] during the eight months of her authority in England, compelled the Jews settled at Oxford to pay her an exchange of money. Stephen, upon coming again to the possession of power, followed the example of the empress, and required the Jews at the same place to give him three and a-half exchanges; threatening on default of immediate compliance to set fire to their houses. The Jews first attempted to evade the payment; the king, to show that he was in earnest, ordered the house of one of the richest of their body to be burned, and this command having been put into execution, the whole sum was forthwith produced.
[1] – Henry’s Britain, vol. v., p. 104.
In the ninth year of this reign, the Jews were for the first time accused of the crime of crucifying an infant—William by name. The circumstance in this instance is only shortly noticed by historians, and is stated to have taken place at Norwich; so that to the England of the middle ages are the Jews indebted for the many persecutions which they had to undergo in consequence of that foul calumny in different parts of the world. Various are the absurd reasons which were advanced to account for that base and false calumny which was subsequently brought against the unfortunate Jews, in various countries of their captivity.
Some asserted that the Jews required Christian blood for the celebration of the Passover. Another set of ignorant fanatics affirmed that they wanted it to put into their unleavened cakes at Easter. It was also gravely stated that the Jews used Christian blood to free them from an ill odour which it was supposed was common to them; others said that of Christian blood they made love potions; others that with it they stopped the blood at the circumcision of their children; others that it served as a remedy for the cure of secret diseases; others that it was required for the Jewish bride and bridegroom during the marriage ceremony; others that the Jewish priests were obliged to have their hands tinged with it when they pronounced the blessing in the synagogues; others that it helped Jewish women in childbirth, and promoted their recovery; others that the Jews used blood to make their sacrifices acceptable. But the most common story was, that the blood was used to anoint dying Jews; that at the point of death the rabbi anointed his departing brother, and secretly whispered into his ear these words—“If the Messiah on whom the Christians believe, be the promised, true Messiah, may the blood of this innocent murdered Christian help thee to eternal life!” “Pierius Valerianus assures us that the Jews purchase at a dear rate the blood of Christians, in order to raise up devils, and that by making it boil, they obtain answers to all their questions.”[1]
[1] – See Dr. M‘Caul’s excellent pamphlet, entitled “Reasons for believing that the Charge lately revived against the Jewish People is a baseless Falsehood,” p. 23; [Appendix E].