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Jewish Legal Autonomy in the Middle Ages: An Unchallenged Institution?

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Zutot 2003

Part of the book series: Zutot: Perspectives on Jewish Culture ((ZUTO,volume 3))

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References

  1. J. Katz, Exclusiveness and Tolerance. Studies in Jewish-Gentile Relations in Medieval and Modern Times (London 1961) 53; in the Hebrew edition (Jerusalem 1961, 19993) 60ff.

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  2. bGit 88b; Tanchuma, Parashat mishpatim § 3, (Vilna 1832/33; repr. Jerusalem n.d.) 254; D. Hoffmann, Midrasch Tannaim zum Deuteronomium (Berlin 1908/9; repr. Tel Aviv 1962/63) 96 on Deut. 16:18; cf. M. Elon, Jewish Law. History, Sources, Principles, 3 vols (Jerusalem 19883) 14, n. 38; Katz, Exclusiveness and Tolerance, 53; idem, Tradition and Crisis. Jewish Society at the End of the Middle Ages. Translated and with an Afterword and a Bibliography by B. Cooperman (New York 1993) 82f., in the Hebrew edition (Jerusalem 1985/864) 122; L. Finkelstein, Jewish Self-Government in the Middle Ages (New York 19642) 156, n. 1.

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  3. Katz, Exclusiveness and Tolerance, 53.

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  5. Katz, Exclusiveness and Tolerance, 53; idem, Tradition and Crisis, 83 (quote).

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  7. Quoted according to the translation by Finkelstein, Jewish Self-Government, 155f.

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  12. On him see E.E. Urbach, Tosaphists: Their History, Writings and Methods, 2 vols (Jerusalem 19865) 209–212 (Hebrew).

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  13. Already Victor Aptowitzer (1871–1942) had mentioned the Duisburg bet tefillah in his Introductio ad Sefer Rabiah (Jerusalem 1938) 172 (Hebrew).

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  14. In the imperial town there was a king’s palatinate that could accommodate big conventions; in 1173 Friedrich Barbarossa (1152–1190) issued a privilege for two big fairs a year for Flanders cloth, each lasting two weeks. In the same year the king agreed upon a settlement with Count Philipp of Flanders to coin heavy pennies at the Cologne rate (Fuß) in Duisburg; here the ‘Hellweg’ as the most important east-west trading connection crossed the arterial road Rhine. Moreover, the presence of the king or his representatives and officials could grant Jews legal certainty; see W. Ring, ‘Duisburg’, in E. Keyser, ed., Rheinisches Städtebuch. Deutsches Städtebuch. Handbuch deutscher Geschichte 32 (Stuttgart 1956) 129–136.

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  16. Cf. Aptowitzer, Introductio, 173.

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  17. The term dayyane sedom is used by Rashi in his commentary on bSanh 98b to explain the names Chillak und Billak as names of the judges of Sodom; another four judges of Sodom, named according to their illegitimate deeds, are mentioned in bSanh 109b. The term is also found in the work of Isaac ben Moses, a student of R. Eliezer ben Joel ha-Levi (Sefer Or Zarua [Jerusalem 1967/68] I, nos 615 and 772), and R. Isaac’s student, the famous R. Meir ben Baruch of Rothenburg (Responsa [Prague 1608], ed. by M.A. Bloch and J. Sternberger [Budapest 1894] no. 907).

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  18. Neubauer and Stern, Berichte, 71f. (Hebrew), 206ff. (German). Ephraim ben Jacob also called the non-Jewish inhabitants of a town near Speyer anshe sedom (‘people of Sodom’, according to Gen. 19:4; ibid., 74f. [Hebrew], 211f. [German]).

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  19. The responsa were briefly summarised by Aptowitzer in his introductory volume and thus unknown to research up till now.

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  20. Finkelstein, Jewish Self-Government, 156, n. 1.

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  21. Ed. Horovitz-Rabin, second edition (repr. Jerusalem 1997) 246 (i.e. Mishpatim, massekhet de-neziqin, parashah 1, on Ex. 21:1).

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  22. Cf. Elon, Jewish Law I, 13, n. 33.

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  23. See for example jMeg III,2, 74a and jSanh IV,12, 23d/24a. Cf. G. Stemberger, Das klassische Judentum. Kultur und Geschichte der rabbinischen Zeit (München 1979) 71.

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  24. Finkelstein, Jewish Self-Government, 153–156.

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  25. Finkelstein, Jewish Self-Government, 150, suggested that the taqqanah was ‘probably a direct result of the Second Crusade’. Rabbenu Tam was attacked by crusaders and saved only by circumstances that bordered on the miraculous; cf. Urbach, Tosaphists, 63–66.

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  27. E. Jacobi, ‘Der Prozess im Decretum Gratiani und bei den ältesten Dekretisten’, Zeitschrift der Savigny-Stiftung für Rechtsgeschichte. Kanonistische Abteilung 3=34 (1913) 223–343, esp. 235f.; cf. Kisch, ‘Between Jewish and Christian Courts’ 106 n. 63.

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  28. I.M. Ta-Shema, Talmudic Commentary in Europe and North Africa. Literary History II (Jerusalem 20002) 99ff. (Hebrew).

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  29. A. Reiner, ‘Rabbenu Tam and the Hegemony of the French Talmudic School in the 12th Century’ (unpubl. paper, based on his PhD thesis Rabbenu Tam and His Contemporaries: Relationships, Influences and Methods of Interpretation of the Talmud [The Hebrew University, Jerusalem 2002] [Hebrew]). I thank Rami Reiner for putting his paper at my disposal and discussing some questions with me.

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  30. On these scholars, see S. Salfeld and A. Bein, ‘Mainz’, in GJ I, 173–223, esp. 198ff.

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  31. On him see Urbach, Tosaphists, 388–411; on the identification see B.E. Klein, Wohltat und Hochverrat. Kurfürst Ernst von Köln, Juda bar Chajjim und die Juden im Alten Reich. Netiva. Wege deutsch-jüdischer Geschichte und Kultur 5 (Hildesheim/Zürich/New York 2003), 380, n. 18.

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  32. Responsa by Meir of Rothenburg (Cremona 1556/57; repr. Jerusalem 1985/86) no. 190. Possibly this story alludes to the similarity of the titles. The archbishop (here in Hebrew hegmon) was commonly called episcopos, literally translated from the Greek’ supervisor’; analogously the supreme parnas (leader) of Jewish communities in cathedral towns was called episcopus Judaeorum, attested for the first time in Cologne 1153-57.

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  33. Y. Guggenheim, ‘FrA suis paribus et non aliis iudicentur. Jüdische Gerichtsbarkeit, ihre Kontrolle durch die christliche Herrschaft und die obersten rabi gemeiner Judenschafft im heilgen Reich’, in Ch. Cluse, et al., eds, Jüdische Gemeinden und ihr christlicher Kontext in kulturräumlich vergleichender Betrachtung von der Spätantike bis zum 18. Jahrhundert. Forschungen zur Geschichte der Juden, Abt. A: Abhandlungen 13 (Hannover 2003), 405–439, esp. 405f.

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  34. Kisch (Relations, 85) assumes by mistake that these taqqanot ‘re-emphasised’ the prohibition of recourse to non-Jewish courts by Jewish litigants.

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  35. Finkelstein, Jewish Self-Government, 241.

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  36. In full detail Klein, Wohltat und Hochverrat, 376–400. The rule of R. Eleazar of Worms was henceforth quoted in the rabbinic collected editions under the term din massor, penalty law of the traitor.

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  37. Klein, Wohltat und Hochverrat, 382, n. 25.

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  38. Kisch, Jews in Medieval Germany, 101ff., and idem, ‘Between Jewish and Christian Courts’, 91f.; cf. Guggenheim, Gerichtsbarkeit, 407.

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  39. Ibid., 437.

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  40. For example Elon, Jewish Law, 13f.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Universität Duisburg-Essen, Duisburg-Essen, Germany

    Birgit E. Klein

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  1. Universiteit van Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands

    Shlomo Berger  & Irene Zwiep  & 

  2. Salomon Ludwig Steinheim-Institut an, Universität Duisburg-Essen, Germany

    Michael Brocke

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Klein, B.E. (2004). Jewish Legal Autonomy in the Middle Ages: An Unchallenged Institution?. In: Berger, S., Brocke, M., Zwiep, I. (eds) Zutot 2003. Zutot: Perspectives on Jewish Culture, vol 3. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/1-4020-2628-5_14

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/1-4020-2628-5_14

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