The Jewish Roots of Christianity
— A Landmarks of Faith Seminar —
Lecture #3b Audio
Constantine, the Crusades, and Other Anti-Judaisms
See notes below. (Sections in parentheses are covered in the longer form of this seminar and in the book version: available in print and on Kindle.)Lecture #3b:
Or click here for more listening options at Internet Archive.
__________________________
Lecture #3b Notes
Strappado: A method of torture in which the victim’s hands were tied behind the back, after which he was hoisted up by his wrists, and then dropped.
Rack: A wooden table on which the victim’s feet were tied at one end, and his hands at the other. These were then stretched apart until the joints were dislocated.
Marranos: Jews who converted under pressure to Christianity. Ferdinand and Isabella: The king and queen of Spain who instituted the Inquisition there. In 1492, they expelled 150,000 Jews from Spain.
Ghetto: A separate, walled section of a city in which Jews were forced to live.
THE PROTESTANT REFORMATION
John Calvin: Leader of the Protestant Reformation in Switzerland.
Martin Luther: Leader of the Protestant Reformation in Europe.
Luther’s seven point program against the Jews:
- 1) Burn their synagogues,
- 2) Destroy their homes,
- 3) Take away their prayer books and Rabbinical writings,
- 4) Forbid their rabbis to teach,
- 5) Take away their passports and traveling privileges,
- 6) Take away their cash and valuables (‘to stop them from usury’),
- 7) Put their youth to hard labor. (“On the Jews and their Lies,” 1542)
Anabaptists: The so-called “radical reformers” who taught adult (believers’) baptism. They also led riots against the Jews.
(Thirty Years’ War (1618-1648): Fought between Protestants and Catholics in Europe. One of the most destructive wars in history. One fifth of the population of Europe was destroyed. After the war, toleration of the Jews increased.)
RUSSIA AND POLAND
Ivan the Terrible (1530-1584): Infamous Russian Czar who ordered the Jews of Russia to convert to Christianity or be drowned.
Chmielnicki Massacres: Massacre of more than 100,000 Jews by Polish peasants from 1648-1657.
Pale of Settlement: Jews in Russia were restricted to this area by Catherine II.
Pogroms: Attacks against Jews that were supported by the Russian government.
Protocols of the Elders of Zion: A fictional account of a series of secret meetings of Jewish leaders planning to take over the world. It gave rise to many Jewish conspiracy theories.
GERMANY
Racial Anti-Semitism: Based on the biological theory of evolution. Claimed that the Jews were inferior and a threat to German racial purity.
Der Sturmer: An anti-Semitic newspaper with a banner that read: “The Jews are our misfortune.”
The Aryan Race: The supposedly superior racial group which included most Germans.
The Thousand-Year Reich: A secularized and paganized version of the Christian present-day Millennium belief. The Nazis claimed they would rule for a thousand years.
John 8:44: “You are of your father the devil.”
Matt. 27:25: “His blood be on us and our children.”
Struma: A ship carrying 769 Jewish refugees that was torpedoed in the Black Sea (1942).
S.S. St. Louis: A ship carrying 937 Jewish refugees that was turned back from Cuba and the U.S. (1939).
Third Reich: The Nazis’ name for their empire that they hoped would last 1,000 years.
First Reich: The Holy Roman Empire of Western Europe (800-1806). This was an extension of the life of the western half of Constantine’s Byzantine Empire.