Tuesday, February 15, 2011
Comments on Merchant Links
When you have read the BBC article from the online resources, and if you read either of the other two which are linked to the blog, feel free to comment here. I'm curious to know what you already knew, number one, and what you think about the history here, whether or not it is new to you.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
I was completely unaware of the situation in England regarding Jews. Though I knew a bit about the Anglo-Saxon era, around 12th century, this national abolishment was very new to me. I think that the Christians were especially scared of any sort of change or difference in religion, and therefore wanted to accuse and prosecute Jews at any opportunity they had. All it took was a confident leader, like Cromwell, to initiate this integration and have two religious communities live peacefully. I would like to know, however, how long it took for this re-integration to occur considering there was a strict law for 366 years.
ReplyDelete(Also, how do we access the Gale Group links?)
I was also unaware of this particular instance of anti-Semitism. When I was in Israel two summers ago, I visited a Jewish Diaspora Museum that displayed the histories of Jewish populations all over the world. I remember being shocked by the amount of anti-Semitism and the geographic span of it, but I have never learned about the 366 years of discrimination against Jews in England until now.
ReplyDeleteI, too, was entirely unaware of the extent of anti-Semitism in England at the time of Shakespeare, and am very surprised to learn that 366 years went by between their expulsion and their re-admission. Moreover, I was about to ask the very foolish question of how Shakespeare could write a play involving a Jew when there were no Jews in England at the time, until I remembered that Venice is in Italy. Silly me :)
ReplyDeleteI, like everyone whose posted so far, had no idea that this event even occurred, and the fact that it's not more widely taught in history class disturbs me. The part of the text that caught my eye most was how Jews were readmitted as 'economically beneficial', seeing that the descendants of the Jews banned had turned Amsterdam into a wealthy and successful port community. It really ties into the history of Jews being exploited as sources of wealth, and at the same time being hated for the same reason. This will be interesting to learn as we begin reading the play, could that possibly a theme that it will explore?
ReplyDeleteI was aware of Europe’s long love-hate relationship with Jews, but not of the specifics in England, although none of what was described in the BBC article particularly surprised me. Jews have historically served as Europe’s scapegoats. Europeans were able to transfer their generalized frustrations with society onto Jews because they were so visibly different from Christians. It is human nature to attack those who are different, especially if those people inspire jealousy and resentment, as the Jews often did with their financial success. Jews frequently became merchants and bankers because those jobs (involving money-lending with interest) were condemned by the Bible and thus, not open to Christians, and because few other jobs were available to them. Many Jews became quite wealthy as a result, causing European countries to expel or to invite Jews based mainly on economic considerations.
ReplyDeleteDue to a video game that I played a few years back, I knew that William the Conqueror had encouraged the settlement of Jews in England. Furthermore, I was well aware of the fact that Christians had a vendetta against Jews for a long time regarding the issue of Jesus' murder. Supposedly, Jewish leaders at the time called for Jesus' murder because he was straying to far from tradition. Personally, I believe that even if it is the truth, it doesn't justify the kind of persecution they faced. In actuality it was simply an excuse to hate them; many other peoples were jealous of their high standing in society.
ReplyDeleteHowever, I was completely unaware of the fact they were formally banned for over 350 years. Perhaps it has been omitted from history textbooks because it sounds like something the Nazis would have done (Wait... who are the good guys again?). But I digress.
Furthermore, I think Tyler hit the nail on the head; one of the major themes will probably be about the love-hate relationship other peoples have with Jews.