Johannes Pfefferkorn

Johannes (Josef) Pfefferkorn (1469 – 1523) was a Jewish-German Catholic theologian and writer who converted from Judaism.cite web
url=http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/view.jsp?artid=246&letter=P
title=PFEFFERKORN, JOHANN (JOSEPH)
first=Gotthard
last=Deutsch
authorlink=Gotthard Deutsch
coauthors=Frederick T. Haneman
publisher=Jewish Encyclopedia] [cite book
title=Divided Souls: Converts from Judaism in Germany, 1500-1750
first=Elisheva
last=Carlebach
pages=p. 52
year=2001
publisher=Yale University Press
isbn=0300084102] Pfefferkorn actively preached against the Jews and attempted to destroy copies of the "Talmud", and engaged in a long running pamphleteering campaign against and with Johann Reuchlin.

Born a Jew, possibly in Nuremberg,cite web
url=http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/11786a.htm
title=Johannes Pfefferkorn
publisher=Catholic Encyclopedia
year=1913
accessdate=2007-02-19] Pfefferkorn moved to Cologne after many years of wandering. After committing a burglary, he was imprisoned and released in 1504. He converted to Christianity in 1505 and was baptized together with his family.

Anti-Jewish writings

Pfefferkorn became an assistant to the prior of the Dominican friar order at Cologne, Jacob van Hoogstraaten, and under the auspices of the Dominicans published several libelous pamphlets in which he tried to demonstrate that Jewish religious writings were hostile to Christianity. Pfefferkorn had a limited knowledge of the subject. [http://www.sacred-texts.com/jud/t10/ht117.htm Reuchlin, Pfefferkorn, and the Talmud in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries] in "The Babylonian Talmud. The History of the Talmud" translated by MICHAEL L. RODKINSON. Book 10 Vol. I Chapter XIV (1918) p.76]

In "Der Judenspiegel" (Cologne, 1507), he demanded that the Jews should give up the practice of usury, work for their living, attend Christian sermons, and do away with the Books of the Talmud. On the other hand, he condemned the persecution of the Jews as an obstacle to their conversion, and, in "Warnungsspiegel", defended them against charges of murdering Christian children for ritual purposes. In a pamphlet, "Warnungsspiegel", he pretended to be a friend of the Jews, and desired to introduce Christianity among them for their own good. He urged them to convince the Christian world that the Jews do not need Christian blood for their religious rites and advocated seizing the "Talmud" by force from them. "The causes which hinder the Jews from becoming Christians," he wrote, "are three: first, usury; second, because they are not compelled to attend Christian churches to hear the sermons; and third, because they honor the "Talmud"."

Bitterly opposed by the Jews on account of this work, he virulently attacked them in: "Wie die blinden Jüden ihr Ostern halten" (1508); "Judenbeicht" (1508); and "Judenfeind" (1509). In his third pamphlet he contradicted what he had written earlier and insisted that every Jew considers it a good deed to kill, or at least to mock, a Christian; therefore he deemed it the duty of all true Christians to expel the Jews from all Christian lands; if the law should forbid such a deed, they do not need to obey it: "It is the duty of the people to ask permission of the rulers to take from the Jews all their books except the Bible...." He preached that Jewish children should be taken away from their parents and educated as Catholics. In conclusion he wrote: "Who afflicts the Jews is doing the will of God, and who seeks their benefit will incur damnation."

In the fourth pamphlet, Pfefferkorn declared that the only way to get rid of the Jews was either to expel or enslave them; the first thing to be done was to collect all the copies of the "Talmud" found among the Jews and to burn them.

Against Hebrew books

Convinced that the principal source of the obduracy of the Jews lay in their books, he tried to have them seized and destroyed. He obtained from several Dominican convents recommendations to Kunigunde, the sister of the Emperor Maximilian, and through her influence to the emperor himself. On 19 August 1509, Maximilian, who already had expelled the Jews from his own domains of Styria, Carinthia, and Carniola, ordered the Jews to deliver to Pfefferkorn all books opposing Christianity; or the destruction any Hebrew book except the Hebrew Bible (Old Testament). Pfefferkorn began the work of confiscation at Frankfort-on-the-Main, or possibly Magdeburg; thence he went to Worms, Mainz, Bingen, Lorch, Lahnstein, and Deutz.

Through the help of the Elector and Archbishop of Mainz, Uriel von Gemmingen, the Jews asked the emperor to appoint a commission to investigate Pfefferkorn's accusations. A new imperial mandate of 10 November 1509, gave the direction of the whole affair to Uriel von Gemmingen, with orders to secure opinions from the Universities of Mainz, Cologne, Erfurt, and Heidelberg, from the inquisitor Jakob Hochstraten of Cologne, from the priest Victor von Carben, and from Johann Reuchlin. Pfefferkorn, in order to vindicate his action and to gain still further the good will of the emperor, wrote "In Lob und Eer dem allerdurchleuchtigsten grossmechtigsten Fürsten und Herrn Maximilian" (Cologne, 1510). In April he was again at Frankfort, and with the delegate of the Elector of Mainz and Professor Hermann Ortlieb, he undertook a new confiscation.

Hochstraten and the Universities of Mainz and Cologne decided in October 1510 against the Jewish books. Reuchlin declared that only those books obviously offensive (as the "Nizachon" and "Toldoth Jeschu") would be destroyed. The elector sent all the answers received at the end of October to the emperor through Pfefferkorn. Reuchlin reported in favor of the Jews, and on May 23, 1510, the emperor suspended his edict of 10 November 1509, and the books were returned to the Jews on June 6.

Battle of pamphlets

The ensuing battle of pamphlets between Pfefferkorn and Reuchlin reflected the struggle between the Dominicans and the humanists. Thus informed of Reuchlin's vote Pfefferkorn was greatly excited, and answered with "Handspiegel" (Mainz, 1511), in which he attacked Reuchlin unmercifully. Reuchlin complained to the Emperor Maximilian, and answered Pfefferkorn's attack with his "Augenspiegel", against which Pfefferkorn published his "Brandspiegel". In June 1513, both parties were silenced by the emperor. Pfefferkorn however published in 1514 a new polemic, "Sturmglock", against both the Jews and Reuchlin. During the controversy between Reuchlin and the theologians of Cologne, Pfefferkorn was assailed in the "Epistolæ obscurorum virorum" by the young Humanists who espoused Reuchlin's cause. He replied with "Beschirmung", or "Defensio J. Pepericorni contra famosas et criminales obscurorum virorum epistolas" (Cologne, 1516), "Streitbüchlein" (1517). In 1520, Pope Leo X declared Reuchlin guilty with a condemnation of "Augenspiegel", and Pfefferkorn wrote as an expression of his triumph "Ein mitleidliche Klag" (Cologne, 1521).

Diarmaid MacCulloch writes in his book "" (2003) [Diarmaid MacCulloch: "Reformation: A History". New York: Penguin Books Ltd. (2004) p. 665] that Desiderius Erasmus was another opponent of Pfefferkorn, on the grounds that he was a converted Jew and therefore could not be trusted.

Works

*"Der Judenspiegel" ("Speculum Adhortationis Judaicæ ad Christum"), Nuremberg, 1507
*"Der Warnungsspiegel" ("The Mirror of Warning"), year?
*"Die Judenbeicht" ("Libellus de Judaica Confessione sive Sabbate Afflictionis cum Figuris"), Cologne, 1508
*"Das Osterbuch" ("Narratio de Ratione Pascha Celebrandi Inter Judæos Recepta"), Cologne and Augsburg, 1509
*"Der Judenfeind" ("Hostis Judæorum"), ib. 1509
*"In Lib und Ehren dem Kaiser Maximilian" ("In Laudem et Honorem Illustrissimi Imperatoris Maximiliani"), Cologne, 1510
*"Handspiegel" (Mayence, 1511)
*"Der Brandspiegel" (Cologne, 1513)
*"Die Sturmglocke" (ib. 1514)
*"Streitbüchlein Wider Reuchlin und Seine Jünger" ("Defensio Contra Famosas et Criminales Obscurorum Virorum Epistolas" (Cologne, 1516)
*"Eine Mitleidige Clag Gegen den Ungläubigen Reuchlin" (1521)

ee also

*Reformation

References

*catholic
*jewishEncyclopedia

External links

* [http://www.sacred-texts.com/jud/t10/ht117.htm Reuchlin, Pfefferkorn, and the Talmud in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries] at sacred-texts.com
* [http://www.ccel.org/s/schaff/encyc/encyc09/htm/iv.vii.cxc.htm Reuchlin] at Christian Classics Ethereal Library at Calvin College
* [http://rhineriver.blogspot.com/2005/04/minorities-in-imperial-tradition.html Minorities in the Imperial Tradition]
*CathEncy|wstitle=Johannes Pfefferkorn