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MEDIEVAL JUDAISM In a review of a Jews in Antiquity by Baile, Martha Himmelfarb writes, Bible does not minimize the Jews subjection to local or distant lords. But, like Salo Baron before him, he strives mightily to dispel the picture of Jewish, medieval life as one long tale of suffering and learning. Hence the emphasis upon the considerable influence in high governing circles and the significant degree of control over day-to-day life enjoyed by many pre-modern Jewish communities. Hence, too, the attention to the very active political struggles within those communities. Normalization of Jewish political life, in this sense at least, did not have to wait for the rise of Zionism (Himmelfarb, 1994, 107). According to Himmelfarb, Baile gathers a body of references to Jewish wealth in antiquity, wealth that he insists would have created anti-Jewish feelings.
Yet given the silence of the ancient sources, it is hard to imagine that writers would have emphasized the role of economic factors in antiquity if it were not for the significant role played by the activities of the Jews as moneylenders and merchants in the development of anti-Semitism in medieval Europe. Another striking example of the problematic use of a model drawn from the Christian Middle Ages is an emphasis on an economic cause for popular animosity toward the Jews. Medieval sources neglect to mention such a cause, but ancient historians are rarely interested in economic causes. A clear observation (rather than stereotype) of Jews throughout history reveals that while the Jewish people inhabit all socioeconomic levels, they tend to be successful at whatever they do. It doesnt happen just because theyre Jewish and therefore chosen, it happens because practicing, committed Jews know all their traditional history-its part of Jewish parents responsibility to teach their children to continue the Jewish tradition and commitment: These commandments that I give you today are to be upon your hearts. Impress them on your children.
Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates (Deuteronomy 6: 6 - 9, NIV). More is known today about the Jewish philosophy of the time than of specific Jewish life.
Though there was a verbal battle between two Islamic philosophers, Avicenna and al-Ghanzali, regarding the validity of the Neoplatonism theory of Gods relationship with and distance from mankind in general and individuals in particular. The premier Jewish philosopher of the era, Maimonides, was highly gifted. He had gained knowledge of the Talmud, philosophy, astronomy, mathematics, and medicine. After his father and brother died, he took up the practice of medicine as a means of earning a livelihood. In time he became physician in the court of Saladin, and an Arabic historian states that Richard the Lionhearted offered him a similar position in London, which he declined (Shapiro, 1993). In addition, Maimonides produced many important rabbinical and philosophical writings, as well as a number of medical works that reveal him to have had an understanding of medicine far in advance of his times.
His writings are generally accepted by Orthodox Jews and form part of the Orthodox synagogue service. His principal philosophical work is the More Nebuhim (1190; Guide for the Perplexed). His object, and this became the main object of medieval Jewish philosophy, was to unify faith with reason, and to reconcile Judaism with the teachings of Aristotle, whom Maimonides admired above all philosophers. By definition, if Maimonides supported the philosophy of Aristotle, he was opposed to the growing doctrine of Neoplatonism.
The Jewish people of the Middle Ages were generally on the high end of their respective levels, as they tend to be at any point in history. There is evidence of growing anti-Semitism, but the term could well be simply a misnomer for jealousy and envy. 328
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Research essay sample on Anti Semitism Middle Ages
