Living Letters of the Law: Ideas of the Jew in Medieval Christianity

Cohen, Jeremy. Living Letters of the Law: Ideas of the Jew in Medieval Christianity. University of California Press, 1999.

Jeremy Cohen's Living Letters of the Law: Ideas of the Jew in Medieval Christianity is a comprehensive examination of how medieval Christian theologians perceived and portrayed Jews and Judaism from the time of St. Augustine (354-430 CE) to Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274). The book begins with Augustine's influential doctrine of Jewish witness, which stated that Jews should be preserved in Christian society as living testimonies to the truth of Christianity. This concept became a foundational idea in medieval Christian thought about Jews. Cohen explains and traces how this Augustinian concept evolved and was adapted over the centuries, reflecting changes in medieval Christian self-understanding and its relationship to Judaism. He explores how Christian theologians constructed a "hermeneutical Jew" - an idealized, a-historical figure based on their interpretation of biblical texts, rather than on actual Jewish people and practices of their time.

Throughout this period, Cohen demonstrates how the idea of the Jew in Christian thought was intimately tied to broader issues of textual interpretation, anthropology, and the philosophy of history. A significant aspect of Cohen's work is his analysis of how the twelfth-century European encounter with Islam affected Christian views of Jews and the value placed on Augustine's concept of Jewish witness. He argues that this encounter with Islam led to a reevaluation of Augustine's concept of Jewish witness. Augustine had stated that Jews should be preserved in Christian society as living testimonies to the truth of Christianity. However, Cohen explains how the encounter with Islam complicated this view because Christians were now faced with another monotheistic religion that, like Judaism, rejected the divinity of Christ. He posits this led to more nuanced theological comparisons between the three faiths. All these important facts add much depth to this reviewer’s understanding of medieval interreligious dynamics. It shows how the introduction of a third major religious player in the European context led to shifts in theological, philosophical, and social perspectives on religious diversity and the relationships between faiths.

Cohen's work is highly regarded for its scholarly rigor and its ability to link medieval ideas about Jews to broader intellectual trends in Western history. I find that Living Letters of the Law provides valuable insights into the historical roots of Christian-Jewish relations and the development of antisemitism, making it a significant contribution to both medieval studies and interfaith understanding.

Constantine’s Sword: The Church and the Jews: A History

Carroll, James.  Constantine’s Sword: The Church and the Jews: A History. Houghton Mifflin Company, 2001.

In reading Carroll’s highly engaging narrative in which he juxtaposes events in his personal life story. He was a priest who left the priesthood after his belated discovery of the Christian Church’s complicity with the Nazi regime in the Holocaust. He takes his readers on a tour de force through the entire two-thousand-year story of how Rome has treated the Jews. I recognized from Carroll’s stunning focus and thesis, the direct ‘storyline in the sand’ that runs from the rule of Constantine (306-337 AD which encompassed Constantine's conversion to Christianity. This act transformed Christianity from a persecuted minority religion to the favored faith of the Roman state and had monumental effects in subsequent centuries of Constantine’s blending of imperial power with Christian symbols –in particular, the Cross. Carroll leads us on a centuries old trail that culminates in the highly controversial planting by Catholic Polish nuns of a huge Cross at Auschwitz in 1988. This led to ongoing clashes and tensions between Polish national identity (which is closely tied to Catholicism) and the Jewish experience of the Holocaust.  Carroll’s view of the importance of Constantine’s rule, makes clear that Christianity was transformed from a persecuted minority religion into the favored faith of the Roman state, and Constantine’s blending of imperial power with Christian symbols –in particular, the Cross, had monumental effects in subsequent centuries. 

We are left with Carroll’s clear clarion call for the Cross to “be reimagined, and deemphasized, as a Christian symbol”. As many history scholars of Jewish Christian history make clear, this fervent hope of Carroll would not only mean the complete abandonment of supersessionism, but the abandonment of the anti-Judaic passages in the New Testament – in other words, Carroll’s analysis is leading him to call for nothing less than a radical redefinition of Christian identity.

In conclusion, Carroll, as a ‘confessional writer’ finds a way to engage us and open our eyes to a history of early Christian – Jewish relations that helps to inform our understanding of the continuing surge in contemporary antisemitism today. Most importantly for this reviewer, it has led me to search out and read Jeremy Cohen’s Living Letters of the Law: Ideas of the Jew in Medieval Christianity. This is a highly acclaimed historical work which according to other scholars in this field, clarifies the loose parts of Carroll’s historical review of this 2000-year historical period. Most useful of all for me, at the conclusion of Constantine’s Sword, Carroll lays out an intriguing menu for dialogue in contemporary Jewish- Christian relations.