Elliott Horowitz, professor of Jewish History at Israel's Bar Illan University, offered a radical new perspective on Jewish violence against the image of "The Cross" during the Middle Ages in a speech yesterday in Rockefeller Center.
According to Horowitz, the increasing visibility of Christianity in the 11th century led to an increased hostility among Jews, which manifested itself in acts of disdain, such as "cross snatching," urination, and spitting on crosses.
During the medieval period the image of the cross as a religious and imperial symbol "penetrated the consciousness of God-fearing Jews, creating a passionate revulsion and a passionate attraction," Horowitz said.
Jews used Hebrew words meaning "abomination" and "disgusting thing" to refer specifically to the Christian cross. He compared this to the "fascination of the abomination" in Joseph Conrad's novel "Heart of Darkness."
Specific examples of Jewish violence in 567, 1096, and 1268 AD, show that this tradition spanned the Middle Ages, he said.
According to Horowitz, these acts were part of a long-standing tradition of martyrdom among Jews. Every act of defiance mentioned by Horowitz led to the brutal death of the Jew who committed the act.
If a Jew knew he was about to die, he would defy his Christian persecutors in a "full expression of what one normally only fantasized about," such as spitting on the hated cross, he said.
"Urination was not an act of revenge, such as a desperate Jewish prisoner during WWII assassinating a Nazi leader, but rather a total denial of the opposing religion [Christianity]," he said.
In the question period following Horowitz's speech, one audience member asked if "A Chronicle of Urination" would be a more appropriate title for this lecture.
Horowitz said that he did not disagree with this comment and that his purpose in giving this speech was to decensor or "de-sanitize" Jewish history, which had been distorted by Holocaust era historians who were "trying not to feed the fires of anti-Semitism."
Horowitz, who according to Religion Professor Susannah Heschel, is legendary in the field of Jewish Studies, works to reveal the neglected areas of Jewish social and religious history.
He has written articles on the effects of coffee in Jewish life, the evolution of the Jewish wedding, the Jewish male beard.
