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During

A. C.

1144,

& feq.

mer much greater, and the manner of it even more dreadful' (T) and as for the latter, they only made a fhew of Christianity till the storm was over, and relapfed all into Judaifm by the next year. The bishop of Spires, more humane than the reft, not only protected those that took refuge under him, but caufed fome of their perfecutors to be hanged. The Bavarian annalists give us a still more dreadful account of those in their country m, of whom they tell us above 12,000 were flain; and all agree that the number of those that perished in other parts of Germany was almost infinite.

THIS was the first crusade; the next, which was publishthe fecond ed 50 years after, might have proved no lefs violent against crufade, them, (it being promoted with great zeal and fuccefs along the Rhine, by the hermit Rodolphus, who was charged with the care of it: the common cry of the preachers being then, that they must exterminate all the enemies of Chrift within their own territories, before they went to feek new ones in foreign parts) had not this pulpit eloquence alarmed them time enough to give them an opportunity of retiring to Nuremberg, and other principal cities, where they met with a kind reception and a protection from the emperor. It must be owned, however, that that hermit's perfecuting doctrine was difpleafing to many Christian bishops and others, and

1 Vid. Addit. ad LAMBERT SCHAFFNABURG. PISTOR. Hist. Germ. tom. iii. ad. A. C. 1089. BERTHOLD. CONSTANT. Append. ad. Herm. ap. WURSTIS, tom. i. p. 375. Hift. Trevor. ap. DACHER. fpecil. tom. xii. p. 236. m AVENTIN. Annal. Bofor, lib. .v. p. 361.

(T) Thefe inform us that there were no less than 1400 burnt at Mentz, and that the diforder which happened on that occafion, was the caufe of one half of that city being reduced to afhes. Thofe of Worms went to beg the bishop's protection, who refufed to grant it, unless they turned Chriftians; and as the people were very eager, they gave them fo little time to deliberate, that the most intimidated of them immediately accepted of bap

tifm; whilst others, more defperate, put an end to their own lives. Much the fame was done at Triers, or Treves, where the very women, at the fight of the coming crufaders, murdered their own children; telling them that it was much better thus to difpatch and fend them into Abraham's bosom, than to leave them to the mercy of the Chriftians. Others loading themselves with ftones, flung themselves and them into the Rhine (9).

(9) Vid. Hift. Germ. & al. fup. citat.

that

that St. Bernard did in particular write a letter to the archbishop of Mentz, in which he highly condemned it, and was for having that fiery zealot sent back to his folitude". Ne- Protected vertheless, the flame was spread far and near by his trumpetby the em ers, not only in Germany, but in most other parts of Europe, peror. and vaft multitudes were maffacred by the Chriftians, befides a much greater number, if we may believe the Jewish chronologers; who being driven into defpair by the cruelties they were made to undergo, made away with themselves. We are now come to the end of the 11th century, which was clofed with those butcheries in moft parts of Europe, and with a fuller account of which our readers will eafily difpenfe, whilst we now take a view of their more peaceable and flourishing state in the eaft, during the 12th century.

THE author whom we have followed, and whofe character Benjamin the reader will fee in the margin (V), tells us that he found feve- of Tude

" BERN. Epift. 133. tom. i. & feq.

(V) We fhall, for want of a better guide, be chiefly obliged for the account of the Jews, during this 12th century, both in the east and weit, to the noted traveller of their nation Ben jamin, firnamed of Tudela, a city in Navarre, his native place, and often quoted in this chap. ter; who tells us that he had visited most of these parts. But we have had occafion before now to observe that he is, in the main, a very fabulous writer, and hath not fcrupled to interlard his account with many abfurd and incredible ftories, to raise the credit of his nation. He hath even invented new countries, and mentioned kingdoms and cities, and places not then in being and to others he afcribes many ridiculous particulars, fcarce worth mention ing after him. We fhall however, give our readers an in

:

ral

• GANTZ TZEMACH. p. 133,

ftance or two by way of fam-
ple to the reft, which we defign
to pass by.

Of this nature is what he tells
us of the city of Pethora, the
refidence of Balaam, faid by
Mofes to have been near the
river Euphrates (10), and where
our traveller tells us was ftill
standing the tower in which he
lived, and which had been
built by his magic art; and the
fynagogue, pretended to have
been built by Ezra, upon his
leaving Babylon to return into
Judea, with the rest of the cap-
tivity; as if that great Jewish
leader would spend his time in
building fuch places in Babylon
for his brethren, when he was
going to lead them thence back
into their own land. Another
of his fynagogues he mentions
in a city built by Omar, one of
the firit and most fuccefsful
Khalifs, at the foot of Mount

(10) See Numb. xxii. & feq. See alfo Anc. Hift, vel, ii, p. 128. & feq. & notes,

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Jews in the caft.

B. XVI. la's cha- ral confiderable fynagogues, and a great number of Jews, radler and who lived there at their ease, and enjoyed the liberty of their travels. religion unmolested P. That of Bafforah, mentioned in the laft note, and fituated in an island of the Tygris, had 4000 Jews; that of Almozal answering to the ancient Nineveh, and built of its old materials, had 7000 more. In this laft he found Zacheus, a prince descended from the house of David, and Beren al Pherec, a famed astronomer, who affociated himself as a kind of chaplain to king Zin-Aldin (W). Paffing thro' Rebo both, in his way to Bagdad, he found 2000 fettled there, and 500 at Karchemish, famed for the defeat of Pharoah Necho, and fituate on the banks of the Euphrates. Pundebita, or as he writes it, Pum-beditha, once fo famed, as we have feen, tho' much funk from its pristine grandeur, and then named Aliobari, or Elnebar, had still a few doctors, tho' almost forsaken, and about Prince of 2000 Jews, fome of whom applied themselves to the study of the the capti- law. It fhewed still the tomb of Boftenai, a prince of the captivity, wity's who had married a daughter of the king of Perfia, and those of tomb, and two celebrated doctors, and the two fynagogues they had built

P ITINERAR. P. 59, & feq.

we have followed in this chapter, we fhall tick to this laft, and begin, as we have hitherto done, with the eaftern parts, and thofe in particular there which lie along the Euphrates.

(W) It may seem strange that a Jewish aftronomer should be chaplain to a Mohammedan prince, for fuch was Zin-Aldin above-mentioned, who was bro ther to Nor-Aldin king of Sy ria, whom the Moslems reve renced not only as a grand con

Ararat (11), where the ark
refted, and with the remains of
of which he built a ftately
mofque; as if those materials,
fuppofing them to have lafted
ever fince the flood, could be
fit for fuch an edifice. Befides,
that city did not stand at the
foot of Ararat, but on the
mouth of the Tigris, and feems
defigned to prevent the Perfi-
ans from failing into India thro'
the Perfie gulph, and was
called Balfora, or Bafforah.
These are fome of the abfurdi-
ties with which he hath blend-queror, but as one of their
ed the relation we are speaking greateft faints. But if we con-
of, but which hinder not its fider how apt the generality of
giving us the beft general idea the Jews were to temporize,
of the ftate of the Jewish na- either thro' fear, or for their
tion that can be had during this own interest, we shall not be fur:
century. However, as the route prized to find that aftro-
great
which he took from Europe thi- nomer fo compliable to the re-
ther is contrary to the method ligion of his prince (12).

was

(11) Itinerar. p. 59, & feq. (12) Vid, Bajnag, ub. fup. l. ix. c. 8. § 4.

before

before their death. The academy of Sora, once fo famed for other antibeing the refidence of feveral Jewish chiefs, of the lineage of quities. David, as well as for the number of its scholars, and learned profeffors, had likewife lost most of its ancient glory; and the fame he fays alfo of that of Nahardea, whofe fchools were all demolished, and the doctors retired into the west (X). We have given an account of this desertion in fpeaking of the foregoing century; nevertheless, tho' those parts had now neither academies nor learned rabbies, the Jews were still very numerous there; and our author tells us he found no less than 10,000 of them at Obkeray; which city he pretends had been built by king Fechoniah, during the Babylonish captivity.

FROM thence he came to Bagdad, where Moftanged who Jews at then reigned, tho' but two years, was a great lover and fa- Bagdad vourer of the Jews, and had a great number of them in his favoured. fervice. He was perfectly well acquainted with the Hebrew, could readily write it, and had gained fome knowledge of their law. There were however, not above 1000 Jews in that city, tho' fome have enlarged it to many thoufands, a thing very common among Jewish writers; but whatever their number might be, they had, he says, 28 fynagogues, and ten tribunals or courts, at the head of which were ten of the most confiderable of their nation, who applied themselves to the affairs of it, and were stiled the ten Idle men, over whom was the chief or prince of the captivity. The person who then enjoyed that dignity was ftiled by them lord, and by the Moflems, the fon of David, he being, according to our author, lineally defcended from that holy monarch'. His authority extended itself over all the Jews under the dominion of the Khalif, prince of the faithful, and from the province of Syria quite eastward to the Iron gates, and as far as India (Y).

Ibid p. 62, & feq.

(X) This laft was then only famed for a fynagogue, which its fuperftitious inhabitants had built of ftones, earth, and other materials brought from Jerufalem (13).

(Y) He farther tells us that this chief was looked upon as a kind of fovereign, to whom

r Ibid p. 72, & feq.

THE

even the Mohammedans were
obliged to rife and bow as he
paffed, under the penalty of re-
ceiving 100 lafhes. He had
100 guards that escorted him
when he went to vifit the Kha-
lif, and a herald cried before
him, prepare the ways of the lord
the fon of David. The moft re-

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Not inde

pendent of the

monarchs.

THE Jewish rabbies who pretend that those eastern chiefs were independant of any other monarchs, and retained ftill the power of life and death, have left no stone unturned to prove that favourite point; infomuch that Origen himself believed that those Affyrian monarchs under whom they lived, being contented with their fubjection and dependence, allowed them to govern their people, according to their own laws, and to inflict even death on the guilty, and proved it not only from the apocryphal book of Sufanna against Africanus, but from more recent inftances, under the Roman emperors, after the destruction of the temple by Titus . He hath been followed by others both ancient and modern, who pretend they had a power to raise a tribute on the nation, and to punish the recufants as well as other criminals with death '. We shall not repeat here what we have formerly faid on the fubject of the fceptre departing from Judah long before this time, nor on the unlikelihood that conquerors fhould grant such an extensive power to the conquered, notwithstanding

s Epift. ad African. p. 144. 1 t Vid. int. al. SULPIT. SEVER. Hift. lib. xi. c. 2. Druf. not. p. 279. * Anc. Hift. vol. x. p. 629.

mote places of the Jewish na-
tion were obliged to receive
their teachers from him, by the
impofition of his hands. The
Jewish merchants likewife le-
vied a kind of toll in their fairs,
and paid a fort of tribute to
him; the remoteft provinces
were wont to fend him fome
forts of refreshments and other
prefents; befides all which, he
had his own patrimony, and
fome lands allotted to him, to
help him to keep up his gran-
deur, to fupply his table, main-
tain the poor, and fupport fome
hofpitals for his nation.

He was however obliged to
buy this grandeur and his pri-
vileges, by a tribute paid to the
Khalif, and by large prefents,
which he made to his officers;
which plainly fhews, that if there
was really a chief of the capti-
vity fill in being in this 12th
century, and who ftill lived in

fuch fplendor (though what we have faid of the perfecutions they underwent in the preceding century, would induce one to believe our Jew hath greatly exaggerated the matter, and hath rather defcribed his ftate according to what he formerly was, when they enjoyed more peace and favour) yet was theirs but a borrowed or rather bought dignity, depending on the pleafure of the monarchs under whom they lived, and fubject to fuch a tribute as they thought fit to impofe upon them : so that the Jews have no great reafon to boast of having still their princes of the house of David, and who ftill enjoy the regal dignity. But it is fill more likely, that this dignity, fmall and dependent as it was, had been abolished in the preceding century, as we have already fhewn.

the

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