Everyday Canvas

A Thirteenth Century Attack on the Jewish Community

Prompt: Pick a topic to discuss from this day in history on May 25th... or something that has happened in your world on May 25th.

https://www.onthisday.com/events/may/2

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1241 1st attack on the Jewish community of Frankfurt am Main, Germany


I picked this one up because, at the moment, I am reading a book, The Weight of Ink by Rachel Kadish.

It is about an old scholar in an English University who comes across, in an old London house hidden under a secret place under the stairs, a whole lot of letters, papers, and books written between the Rabbis of the 16th and 17th centuries, who escaped the Portuguese Inquisition. This novel goes back and forth between the year 2000 and 1660.

I knew the Jewish people were persecuted throughout the history but this looked like one of the earlier ones by about 700 years before World War II. I am not Jewish, by the way, and neither is the main character of the book I am in the process of reading.

I cannot believe how cruel man can be toward its own species. All religions were meant to bring order and peace to the humankind, but the way we handle them, using them as weapons against one another, is absolutely disgusting. I think no one ever should look down upon or badmouth any religion. This is the only way we can stop warring for the sake of religion, against any other religion.

In this case of the year 1241, the Mongol invasion and the rise of religiosity among the monks and the religious gave way to the rumors that the Jews were the omens bringing on the end of the world.

This is what I found on the subject on Wiki. Where this thing happened, a Jewish Ghetto was created later on. Then about a century later, the second attack to the same place occurred.

“The first Judenschlacht of 1241
In May 1241, a pogrom, known as the Judenschlacht (from the German; Slaughter of the Jews) took place in Frankfurt, brought on by conflicts over Jewish-Christian marriages and the enforced baptism of children of such marriages. The Erfurt Dominican Friars recorded that a few Christians and 180 Jews died during the pogrom. It also records that 24 Jews avoided death by accepting baptism, while under the protection of the city fathers. During the attacks, the synagogue was plundered and the Torah scrolls were destroyed. All of this occurred despite the fact that the Jews had been protected by the Holy Roman Emperor, Frederick II since 1236, and had a royal appointee running much of the city government.[3]

It seems possible that the Judenschlacht was organized rather than spontaneous. One reason presented is that the fighting lasted more than a day. Secondly, a fortified tower where 70 Jews had taken refuge was captured. Finally, a Jewish dirge records that archers attacked a rabbi and his pupils in their school. All three events imply a measure of planning and the presence of soldiers or a strong militia.

Exactly who may have been responsible for the Judenschlacht is unclear owing to the scarcity of sources. The theory that it was led by the Dominican Friars, who had a papal order to fight heresy, is questionable. Another theory is that the pogrom was actually an attack against the Staufer royal family, led by Frederick II.

Frederick II ordered an investigation into the Judenschlacht that lasted some years. In 1246 Conrad IV, on behalf of his father Frederick II, issued a document pardoning the citizens of Frankfurt. It declared a pardon without payment on damages because the pogrom occurred, "from carelessness rather than deliberation." The general pardon is an example of the weak political power of the Staufer dynasty in Frankfurt.”

More detailed information is also here, in:
http://www.judengasse.de/ehtml/E010.htm