The Jew in the Medieval World by Jacob R. MarcusReview by: Jacob S. MinkinIsis, Vol. 31, No. 2 (Apr., 1940), pp. 454-457Published by: The University of Chicago Press on behalf of The History of Science SocietyStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/225776 .

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454 ISIS, XXXI, 2

Diabetes and pernicious anemia have come under therapeutic control but many afflictions such as cancer and cardiac diseases still take their seemingly increasing toll in the face of remedial measures.

Surgery, with the aid of better methods of diagnosis and the use of X-ray, fluoroscope, and electrocardiograph and improved anesthetics, performs operations formerly impossible.

Human environment has been changing. Higher standards of living, especially among employed persons have become available due to educa- tion in matters of diet, wider availability of varied fruits and vegetables, better and more sanitary housing, shorter hours of labor, more recreation, more and better nursing services, and health education in home and school. Specific health hazards such as influenza-pneumonia have been studied with resulting improvements in typing the forms of the pneumonia bacillus and in the use of serums.

In the field of industrial hygiene great advances have been made in the elimination of hazards, the education in safety measures, and the discovery of unsuspected chemical dangers. The mixture of gin and gasoline by automobile drivers still takes an increasing toll. The control of this hazard is in the hands, to a large degree, of the police and auto insurance companies but not of their victims or those who insure them.

This report discusses the general mortality from all causes, the trend of longevity through the quarter of a century under review, the commu- nicable diseases of childhood, tuberculosis, influenza and pneumonia, cancer, cardiovascular-renal diseases, diabetes, puerperal diseases, typhoid and other diseases of special interest, and the external causes of death. Throiighout all the statistical records of these afflictions of mankind the influenza epidemic of I9I7-I9I8 imprints its immediate and subsequent influences in figures and graphs.

This record of disease in relation to a changing human environment is impressive and significant in volume, scope, extent, and skillful analysis.

CHARLES A. KOFOID.

Jacob R. Marcus.-The Jew in the Medieval World, A Source Book, 3I5-I79I. XXVI+504 p. The Union of American Hebrew Congregations, Cincinnati, I938. (Price $3.00).

The history of the Jewish people is written in the letters of many alphabets and in many lands. But few readers ever get beyond the report of the events that happened to the primary or first-hand sources themselves. Most people find it much more pleasant and convenient to rely on the knowledge of other men than delve into the records themselves and let the actors and their contemporaries tell their own story. This may be the easier way of reading history, but not always

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REVIEWS 455

the safer, for much may happen not only to spoil the effect, but distort the very picture one wants to get. Impersonal history may be the dream of the philosophers, but so far as is known, has never been attained. The personality of the historian not only affects his style, but colors and influences the facts and events he narrates. At least in history, distance does not lend enchantment. It was one of SHELLEY'S sayings, that every great historian is also a great poet, which is the reason why we have so much poetry and so little history in our text-books.

The impression has been created that sources make dull and uninteresting reading, intended for the professional scholar rather than for the lay reader. It is a popular prejudice, and those who had experience in the matter know that just the opposite is the fact. Because the digging up of primary sources involves a great deal of spade work and heavy research, it does not follow that the results must be dull and heavy. On the contrary, they often prove more vivid and striking than any touching-up can make them. When facts and events are allowed to speak for themselves, they speak with a tenfold force. What makes the biblical period of Israel's history so unforgettable an epic is the fact that the characters in that drama speak their own parts and tell their own story. It is a voice and not an echo that one hears, full of the power and passion of the events that created it.

There is no more moving chapter in Jewish history than that narrow, grim, gloomy and credulous period known as the Middle Ages. Unfortunately, for the Jews the Middle Ages lasted a much longer time than for the rest of the world, at least fifteen hundred years-from CONSTANTINE THE GREAT to the first democratic state of the French Revolution-if it can be said to have ended yet ! If the first period created and fashioned the character and personality of the Jew, the second may be said to have disciplined him and made him proof against any emergency. It is the period which reached its epic climax of suffering in the Crusades, the Black Death, the Inquisition and expulsion from Spain, a time in which the Jew was a citizen nowhere and a chattel every- where. With little variations, his status was the same in all lands, whether living under the shadow of the cross or the crescent, whether his oppressors were Christian kings or Moslem rulers. The Church exploited him for his religion, and the kings and emperors for his purse, but neither would allow him to be obliterated quite completely, for it was in their interests that he should be preserved.

And yet, in this grim, narrow and almost incredible life, the Jew was not a passive victim, but developed a world of his own which was not without its compensations. What the world would not give him, he took for himself. He expanded the walls of his ghetto till it included

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456 ISIS, XXXI, 2

almost every variety of intellectual and spiritual endeavor. Scientists, scholars, thinkers and poets were there, and saints and dreamers, too, who played the game of pseudo-Messiahs. Since the Jew had no standing in the world, he created a little world of his own, in many respects a unique and remarkable world, with a community organization able to enforce obedience without police, courts, jails or armies, and a universal language which was understood where Jews happened to live. It is this which makes the Jew in the medieval world so interesting and fascinating a character and, despite his suffering, the quaintest figure in the world.

Prof. MARCUS has rendered this part of Jewish history a distinct service by compiling, for the first time in the English language, a source book which makes the position of the Jew in the medieval world intelligible by letting the dramatis personae and their contemporaries speak for themselves without any attempt at editing or embellishing them. The material is abundant, covering at least a dozen languages and dialects with as many countries. It was a herculean task, requiring great industry, discriminating judgment, and a keen perception to distinguish between what is vital and what is trivial. That the author has acquitted himself well of his task and given us a source-book of the Jew in the Medieval World which has all the earmarks of a unified and connected story, readable throughout, is something for which both students and lay readers will be grateful to him.

In such a book, a pioneer work of its kind, one should not look for perfection. One should rather be thankful for what had been done and look for improvement and corrections to the second edition, of which the book is eminently deserving. It is, however, regrettable that the author should have ignored reference to Hebrew material in his suggested readings for advanced students. The writer has in mind S. BERNFELD'S

source-book for the persecutions of the Jews during the Middle Ages, Ned Shel D'maot, in three volumes, S. DUBNOW's great work on the history of Hasidism, S. A. HORODEZKY on the same subject, and DAvID KAHANA and BALABAN on the Shabbatian and Frankist sects. Other such omissions might easily be duplicated. It cannot be that these standard works escaped the author's attention, or is it because of his lack of faith in the advanced students' ability to follow a Hebrew text ?

There are other omissions which are more deplorable, since thereby the reader is denied acquaintance with perhaps the most charming treatment of their respective subjects. The writer has reference to such books as ISRAEL ZANGWILL' " Dreamers of the Ghetto," "Jewish

Mysticism," by J. ABELSON, and JOSEF KASTEIN'S " History and Destiny

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REVIEWS 457

of the Jews;" the latter, although tendencious, nevertheless, makes admirable reading.

The reviewer was surprised to find that no mention was made by the author of URIEL DA COSTA, perhaps one of the most interesting and picturesque figures of the seventeenth century, a Marrano Jew who returned to the synagogue, which he afterwards defied, was thrice excommunicated for heresy, and in the end committed suicide. Not only has a considerable literature grown up about him in the Latin, Hebrew, German and English languages, but KARL GUTZKOW, a German dramatist of nearly a hundred years ago, devoted to him one of his most touching plays which enjoyed unusual vogue in the Germany of the pre-Hitler days. URIEL ACOSTA, or DA COSTA, himself left behind an autobiography, " An Example of a Human Life," which, written in I640, when death by his own hand was staring in his face, was first discovered and published by PHILIP LIMBORCH in I 687, and translated into English by THOMAS WHISTON in I740. Although short sketches of the life and times of URIEL ACOSTA appeared a good many years ago, the most definitive work on the subject was done by CARL GEBHARDT

in his " Die Schriften des URIEL DA COSTA," Amsterdam, I922. JOSEF

KASTEIN s" URIEL DA COSTA, Berlin, I932, is the most recent biography of the Amsterdam heretic-philosopher. That in view of the popularity of the subject and the interest it created Dr. MARCUS should have completely ignored it, is an omission greatly to be deplored.

For the division and organization of the book, it may be said that the material is divided into three main sections: the first section, dealing with the relation of the State to the Jew, reflecting the latter's civil and political status in the medieval world ; the second section, dealing with the influence of the Church upon the life of the Jew and his well-being; and the third section, which contains four subdivisions, treats of the life of the Jew in its various aspects, including, " Jewish Self-Government," " Jewish Sects, Mystics, and Messiahs," " Jewish Notables," and " The Inner Life of the Jew."

In conclusion it should be stated that every chapter is introduced by a brief, but comprehensive narrative, written with clarity and understanding, detailing the facts and situations with which the particular source-material is dealing. Dr. MARCUS has written a book which should find favor with many classes of readers, lay as well as expert.

New York. JACOB S. MINKIN.

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