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The Shadow Of The Cross
Michael Hilton
The Cross In Jewish Memory
In September 1989 the Jerusalem Post contained a report from a family who recently visited Auschwitz, and described their shock and horror at finding one area they visited overshadowed by an eight foot high cross. The writer recalled his childhood in Poland where crosses were carried in front of funeral processions and people were expected to kneel as the procession passed. As a Jewish child, he had tried to avoid such events: later he had survived the terrors of the Nazi era: but now what does he see on visiting Auschwitz? A cross.
This story describes a deep seated fear of the cross quite common among contemporary Jews. It is rarely spoken of, but it does exist. As a community rabbi, I often come across elderly Jews who have decided to join the synagogue in order to ensure that they have a Jewish funeral. When discussing the matter with them, I frequently find that they are quite terrified by the possibility that a Christian funeral will be arranged for them: when asked what it is about a Christian funeral that disturbs them, they often reply "The Cross".
Because of the dose relations today between Jewish organisations and many Churches, I have often attended mixed-faith conferences or retreats held in Church houses or retreat centres. It is not infrequent at such events for Jews quietly to express the thought that they find it disturbing to encounter large images of the cross, or small crosses hanging on bedroom walls. Again, they may often be unable to explain such fears, but they are clearly deep-seated.
A similar story is told by Rev. E.H. Flannery, in the introduction to his book The Anquish of the Jews. He describes walking in New York City at Christmas in the company of a young Jewish couple. The Grand Central Building shone with a large illuminated cross. Flannery writes:
Glacing over her shoulder, the young lady — ordinarily well disposed toward Christians — declared "That cross makes me shudder. It is like an evil presence".
The Cross In Jewish History
What is it about a cross which can cause such fear? The tale of the Jewish family visiting Auschwitz gives us a due: for the Jew for many centuries the cross was a symbol of terror and persecution. In our own time we think of the swastika adopted by the Nazis as the principal anti-Jewish symbol; but in earlier times it was the cross. The contemporary stories I have recounted show that the terror of the cross has not yet vanished from Jewish life.
The history of anti-Semitism and Christian persecution of Jews is a long and sad one, and ft is not my intention here to recap or evento summa-rise that history. The interested reader can consult any standard History of the Jews, or Leon Poliakov's specialist 4-volume work The History of anti-Semitism. From the histories there are two major events particularly relevant to our subject — the first is the crusades, and the second the Spanish Inquisition.
The Crusades
The Crusaders went out from their various lands on expeditions ostensibly to recover the Holy Land from the infidel Muslims, — but on many occasions the greatest and the first task of the expedition was to massacre Jews on the way. Often the troops were unruly, and took to looting and slaughter: the governing powers did not in fact order such activities, but were powerless to prevent them. The massacres were clearly mob actions, reinforced by religious fanaticism. From January to July of 1096, it is estimated that up to 10,000 Jews died, probably a quarter to a third of the Jewish population of Germany and Northern France at that time. When the Crusaders captured Jerusalem on July 15th 1099, a terrible massacre ensued: the first act of the new Christian rulers of the city was to set fire to the synagogue — with the Jews inside.
The cross was the Crusaders' symbol, appearing in the surviving pictures and statues on their shields and on their tunics. Jewish Chroniclers of the Crusader period use the term "evil sign" for the cross.
The Medieval Period
There are many other surviving examples from Medieval Christendom of this "evil sign". Roland de Corneille, in Christians and Jews, describes a Romanesque cross acquired by the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City — a cross made in 1280 from the Abbey at Bury St. Edmunds (England). On the cross there are 108 figures and over 60 texts in Latin and Greek. The texts are mainly devoted to vilifying and mocking the Jews, using phrases such as "Jews-Christ's assassins".
Moving forward to the fourteenth century, one finds at that period many anti-Semitic mystery plays. For example, the Bavarian Alsfelder Passionspiel contains a crucifixion scene which continues for over 700 lines of verse, in which the torturers invent ever new sufferings, while the Jews present rejoice and mock Jesus in every conceivable fashion. In sermons, treatises, and art at that time, the Crucifixion was depicted in bloody and overpowering detail — and it is the Jews who inflict the suffering.
The Inquisition
The term "Inquisition" is the name given to a special permanent tribunal of the medieval Catholic Church, established to investigate and combat heresy. The Spanish Inquisition began in 1481, and its principal object was the persecution of those who lived openly as Christians, but secretly as Jews. The Spanish Inquisition continued for 350 years, claiming its last victim in 1826.
The rules of the Inquisition were devised to exclude all witnesses who were likely to be of any use to the prisoner, and the evidence admitted was flimsy in the extreme — mere regard for personal cleanliness might be sufficient to convict a man of Judaism or Islam, and so cost him his life. Torture was frequently used to elicit confessions, and torture to death was not unusual.
The sentences of the Inquisition were announced at the so-called Act of Faith (auto-de-fe): there public ceremonies would take place in the main square of a city on principal feast-days. The proceedings would be opened by a procession led by a cross, and followed by the clergy of the City. Behind marched the condemned prisoners, many of whom had to wear a long yellow robe, traversed by a black cross. Those condemned to be burned wore in addition pictures of demons thrusting the heretic into hell. Following a long sermon of abuse, the sentences would be pronounced and then carried out. For those who were burned, it was considered a high religious duty to set fire to the pyre, and it was often carried out by visiting Princes. In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, the auto-de-fe carne to be a great public spectacle in Spain and Portugal, competing in popular appeal with bullfights. During the total period of the Inquisition in Spain, the number burned was 31, 912, while the number who "repented" and who received lesser punishments was 291,450.
The Challenge Today:
Why should the excesses of the past matter today? In 1993 we shall be celebrating 100 years of the inter-faith movement, and a great deal of hard work has indeed been done to break down the barriers and prejudices which affected so many people of faith in past ages. But prejudice is not quickly eradicated among the people. Rabbi Dr. Jonathan Sacks (who is to become Chief Rabbi of Britain and the Commonwealth this year) was asked in a recent BBC interview "Why do you think there is an increase in anti-semitism in Britain today?" He confessed himself puzzled. "I really don't know" he said. But then he added:
To some extent Christianity and Islam find it difficult to conceive of a world in which Jews possess integrity. Despite the great efforts of interfaith dialogue we still don't seem to have moved to that point where it is obvious that Jews have rights to be Jews. As long as that kind of religious prejudice exists at the grass roots, possibilities to anti-Semitism are always there.
Rabbi Sacks did not mention that just as there are many Christians who retain the old ideas, so there are many Jews today who retain those old fears. Only a deep understanding can lead to a real reconciliation.
Michael Hilton is Rabbi of Menorah Synagogue, Cheshire Reform Congregation, Manchester, England. He takes an active part in Jewish-Christian dialogue and has published (with Gordian Marshall OP) The Gospels and Rabbinic Judaism, SCM Press, London.
