The Christian Argument Against the Jews (Adversus Judaeos): A Brief Overview of the Ancient Christian Origins of Anti-Semitism

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ADVERSUS JUDAEOS


Rejection of the Jews, Election of the Gentiles

Why was the temple made desolate? Was it on account of the ancient fabrication of the calf? Or was it on account of the idolatry of the people? Was it for the blood of the prophets? Was it for the adultery and fornication of Israel? By no means, for in all these transgressions they always found pardon open to them. But it was because they killed the Son of their Benefactor, for He is coeternal with the Father. [Hipp. C. Jud. 7]

Hippolytus c. 220 CE

Deicide

If someone had killed your son. could you stand the sight of him or the sound of his greeting? Wouldn't you try to get away from him as if he were an evil demon; as if he were the Devil himself? The Jews killed the Son of your Master......... Will you so dishonor Him as to respect and cultivate His Murderers, the men who crucified Him? [Chry. Or. C. Jud. I, 7]

John Chrysostum C. 390 CE

Sibling Rivalry

Today the glory has passed front the people of Israel and they stand among the nations ashamed, as Cain was, at their unnatural deed. [Eph. Rhy. C. Jud. 8)

Jewish Dispora and Suffering

You can hear the wailing and lamentations of each of the prophets, wailing and lamenting characteristically over the calamities which will overtake the Jewish people because of their impiety to Him who had been foretold. How their Kingdom . . . would be utterly destroyed after their sin against Christ; how their Father's law would he abrogated, they themselves deprived of their ancient worship, robbed of the independence of their forefathers, and made slaves of their enemies instead of free men. How their royal metropolis would be burned with fire, their. .. holy altar undergo flames and extreme desolation, their city be inhabited no longer by its old possessors, but by races of other stock, while they would be dispersed among the Gentiles throughout the whole world with never a hope of any cessation of evil or breathing space from trouble (Euseb;D. E. I, 1]

Eusebius c. 340 CE

Sign of a Curse

For the circumcision according to the flesh; which is from Abraham, was given for a sign, that you may be separated from other nations and from us, and that you alone may suffer that which you now justly suffer, and that your land may be desolate and your cities burned with fire, and that strangers may eat your fruit in your; presence and not one of you may go up to Jerusalem.'

Justin Martyr C. 160 CE

Rejection and Substitution

It is because you killed Christ. It is became you stretched out your hand against the Lord. It is because you shed the precious blood, that there is now no restoration, no mercy anymore and no defense. Long ago your audacity was directed against servants, against Moses, Isaiah and Jeremiah. If there was wickedness then, as yet the wont of all crimes had not been dared. But now you have eclipsed everything in the past and through your madness against Christ, you have committed the ultimate transgression. This is why you are being punished worse now than in the past. . . . If this were not the case God would not have turned his back on you so completely. . . But if it appears that He has utterly abandoned you; it is evident from this anger and abandonment that He is showing even to the most shameless that the One who was murdered was not a common lawbreaker, but was the very Lawgiver Himself, and the Cause, present among us, of innumerable blessings. Thus you who sinned against Him are in a state of dishonor and disgrace, while we who worship Him, though we once were less honored than any of you [i.e., as gentile pagans), are now established through the grace of God in a more respected position than any of you and in greater honor. [Chry. Or. C. Jud. VI, 2-3)

John Chrysostum c. 390 CE

Debauched, Animal Jews

I know that many people hold a high regard for the Jews and consider their way of life worthy of respect at the present time. This is why I am hurrying to pull up this fatal notion by the roots. . . . A place where a whore stands on display is a whorehouse. What is more, the synagogue is not only a whorehouse and a theater; it is also a den of thieves and a haunt of wild ....... not the cave of a wild animal merely, but of an unclean wild animals . . . . The Jews have no conception of [spiritual] things at all, but living for the lower nature, all agog for the here and now, no better disposed than pigs or goats, they live by the rule of debauchery and inordinate gluttony. Only one thing they understand: to gorge themselves and to get drunk. [Chry. Or. C. Jud. I, 3,4; PG 48, 847, 848]

John Chrysostum C. 390 CE

Fit for Slaughter

When animals have been fattened by having all they want to eat, they get stubborn and hard to manage. . . . Another prophet intimates the same thing when he says "Israel ran about madly like a heifer stung by a gadfly" and still another calls her "an untrained calf." When animals are unfit for work, they ate marked for slaughter, and this is the very thing which the Jews have experienced. By making themselves unfit for work, they have become ready for slaughter. This is why Christ said, "Ask for my enemies, who did not want me to reign over them, bring them here and slay them before me." [Chry. Or C. Jud. 1.2; PG 48, 846)

John Chrysostum C. 390 CE

Selections taken from: Ruether, Rosemary Radford. Faith and Fratricide: The Theological Roots of Anti-Semitism. 1974.