CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CONDEMNATION OF KINGS AND CATHOLIC CLERGY WHO ARE NEGLIGENT IN THEIR STRUGGLE AGAINST CLANDESTINE JEWRY
As we were able to observe, the Holy Church laws of the 4th Council of Toledo should have finally destroyed the “Jewish Fifth Column” in Christian society. Its decisions would have been more effective, if the Jews had not always been from of old so skilled in politics and diplomacy and knowing how, through flattery, perfected false loyalty, false arguments and confidence-giving comedies, to deceive. In addition, they know how to sow discord among their opponents, in order to keep the upper hand. They ally themselves first with the one in order to destroy the other, then defeat their first allies with the aid of the other, and finally destroy them all. This was one of the great secrets of their victories, and the clergy and politicians of all mankind must bear this in mind, in order to protect themselves from such Machiavellian manoeuvres.
Another ground for their successes was their great courage to accommodate themselves to an unfortunate situation, their resolution to never surrender to their enemies and to combat the cowards in their own ranks, since the latter could make a transitory into a final defeat.
In the supreme hierarchy of Christianity there are such cowards. They are responsible for so many defeats and compromises in recent times and are cynical enough to conceal their cowardice and their egoism behind apparent clear and conciliatory arguments. It means nothing to them that their cowardice handed over entire peoples to Communist slavery, and they say to themselves: let us live comfortably at the expense of the beast, even if the peoples, whom we lead, perish! That is the supreme wisdom of their false prudence and compromises.
If the Jews had been like this, they would finally have been defeated in the Gothic kingdom, when Christianity brought defeat to them and triumphed at the 4th Council of Toledo. However, they did not think of surrendering – as today the cowards – they fought on with zeal and fanaticism and prepared the moment when they could conduct a new battle, in which they could triumph. With their accustomed tenacity they began to circumvent the laws, which the Holy Council of Toledo had passed in order to make them powerless, supported the rebellious spirit of the nobles against the King and worsened it through their intrigues. When hearts were sufficiently aroused, they then served as effective protagonists of the demands of the rebellious nobility.
If the King, Holy Church and the Visigoth nobility had been united, they could not have been conquered by the Jews. It was thus necessary to break this unity and to divide the enemy, in order to weaken him. This was not difficult, since the nobles frequently showed the tendency to rebel against the authority of the king. The Jews made use of this tendency, utilised the arising frictions in order to sharpen the struggles, and gradually attained their goal. At first they made efforts in order to obtain the protection of certain aristocrats, in order to circumvent the Toledo Church laws and the laws of the monarch. The nobles – deceived by the Jewish falsehood – had fallen into the trap and held them for valuable allies in their struggle against the King. For this the Jewish converts and their descendants were principally to be thanked, who pretended to be loyal Christians and who thus easier gained the confidence of the Visigoth aristocrats.
The Jewish historian Graetz comments: “These resolutions of the 4th Council of Toledo and the persecutions by Sisesand against the converted Jews do not appear to have been carried out with the planned strictness. The Spanish-Visigoth nobles took the Jews more and more under their protection and against them the royal authority had no power.”84 One thus sees that the converted Jews skilfully discovered the weak point of the Visigoth kingdom and effectively utilised it, just as they also understood a thousand years later in England how to conquer the nation, by their utilising the struggles of the parliamentary nobility against the King and sharpened these even more.
In the midst of increasing internal struggles, which began to weaken the heroic Visigoth kingdom dangerously, Chintila attained power. At the beginning of his period of government the 6th Council of Toledo85 took place. The lack of constancy by non-Jews in their struggle against the principal enemy was also chronic and made easier the latter’s successes, even in the case of the Catholic Visigoth monarchs, who were thus conscious of the threat of the Jews and who wished to exterminate them. Therefore the archbishops and bishops at the Council sought to prevent this evil. In Canon III it is stated:
“Through devoutness and superior power, the unbending falsehood of the Jews seemed to decrease, for through devotion to God, we know that the illustrious Christian prince in his zealous faith has resolved together with the priests of his realm, to make impossible from the start their violations of duty and not to allow non-Catholics to live in his kingdom... But for our caution and great watchfulness, with it our zeal and our labour – which often fall asleep – which must not be abandoned, we pass further edicts. We therefore announce with one heart and one soul – a unanimous judgment, which must please God and which we also simultaneously approve, with the approval and reflection of his nobles and aristocrats – that anyone who in future strives for supreme power in the kingdom will not become King if he does not promise, among other things, not to allow the Jews to dishonour this Catholic faith (i.e. the Jews apparently converted to Christianity), so that he in no way supports their faithlessness, or through neglect or greed86 gives way to violation of duty which leads to the abyss of faithlessness. He must therefore ensure that in the future he continues to stand firm, which in our time has required so much effort, for the good has no effect if it does not proceed with constancy. If he afterwards breaks his promise, may he be accursed in the presence of the eternal God, may he burn in everlasting fire and with him all priests or Christians who share his error. We add this and confirm the preceding determinations of the general Synod concerning the Jews, for we know that in this all necessary measures are laid down for the salvation of their souls. Therefore the appertaining prescriptions should be valid.”87
This polemic against the kings and Catholic clergy who would not participate in the struggle, not only against the open Jews, but also against the betrayal by Christians of Jewish origin, who were described as friendly to the Jews, could not be sharper. It is worthy of note that, while hitherto the condemnations and penalties of the Holy Church Councils only hit at bishops and priests who supported the Jews and were their accomplices, now also those priests were threatened with immediate excommunication who were not constant or were neglectful in the struggle for life and death which Holy Church conducted against clandestine Jewry. One thus sees that the Archbishops and Bishops of the Holy Councils not only exactly knew the faithlessness of the Jewish enemies, but also the weaknesses and the lack of constancy of the civil and clerical members of Christianity in such a just struggle.
It is strange that at this Council they still restricted themselves to combating the negligence of the priests without alluding to the Bishops. This is perhaps to be attributed to the circumstance that particularly the bishops passed those statutes and did not dare to include themselves among those who deserved this punishment. However, the negligence of the Prelates themselves in the time following must have been so serious that, at a later Council, they even proceeded with alarm and uttered severe penalties against the guilty, just as they had previously declared for godless and excommunicated those who supported the Jews to the harm of Christianity.
It is likewise worthy of note that in this law those are again mentioned who out of avarice or forgetfulness of duty gave way to the converted Jews. Without doubt the Simony briberies played a major role in the Jewish intrigues, which appears to be confirmed in Law IV in which among other things it is stated: “Therefore, whoever imitates Simon, the instigator of the Simonist heresy, in order to acquire Church offices, not in the usual way, but through gifts, offerings, etc.”88
The Jew Simon Magus introduced this policy of bribery into Holy Church, which was called Simony after him. In the course of centuries it could be proved that the converted Jews and their descendants, who already belonged to the priest class and the hierarchy of Holy Church, had learned very much from their predecessor Magus and bought Church dignities or on their side sold Church goods, as the Holy Inquisition and the Church authorities repeatedly revealed. Worthy of note is also the commentary of the Jewish historian Graetz concerning the command of King Chintila, which was greeted by the 6th Council of Toledo, to admit no non-Catholics in the Gothic kingdom. This statute is directed only against the Jews: “For the second time the Jews were compelled to emigrate, and the converts who had remained true to Judaism in their innermost hearts had to sign a confession and obligate themselves to practise the Catholic religion and follow it without reserve. But the confession of men whose sacred conviction was a matter of honour, could not be honest and it also was not. They resolutely hoped for better times, so that they could allow the mask to fall, and the constitution of the elected monarchy of the Visigoth kingdom made this possible to them. The present condition lasted only four years under the rulership of Chintila (638-642).89
The historian could not be clearer concerning the false Christianity of the converted Jews and the invalidity of their confessions and promises. Graetz further observes that the converted Jews broke their promise not to practise the Jewish rite in order to become honest Christians, and Chintila accordingly condemned them “to be burned or stoned.”
The historian Amador de los Rios shows the practical consequences of all these measures: However, notice must be taken that this immoderate severity of the lawmakers was not sufficient to suppress the impatience of the Jews. When fifteen years had passed and Recceswinth ruled, the Fathers saw themselves compelled to repeat the demand which obligated the elected King to swear “that he would defend the faith against Jewish faithlessness”. This occurred at the 8th Council of Toledo and is laid down in Canon X90. As Graetz has said, the Jews were successful after the death of Chintila in introducing, on grounds of the elected monarchy, a favourable change for their interests with the new King. Here we have another example of that chronic malady from which we Christians and also the pagans suffer: we are incapable in the face of this foe of maintaining a firm lasting conduct over several generations of rulers. With us Christians and also with the pagans the rulers strive so much for innovations that the edicts of their predecessor are always made useless and no united policy towards Jewry is possible. If the Jews without doubt also influence this change in policy, nevertheless our own inconstancy and our lack of tenacity is principally guilty of this.
During the period of rule by Recceswinth, the converted Jews and their descendants in Toledo handed to him a very interesting petition, in which they demanded of him: “Since the Kings Sisebutus and Chintila had compelled them to give up their law and they lived in all things like Christians, without deceit or cunning, he might allow them not to eat pork. They said that they begged this far more because their belly would not stand it, since it was not accustomed to such flesh, than from stings of conscience.”91It must, however, already be anticipated that centuries later, when the prosecution through the Inquisition threatened to exterminate clandestine Jewry, the Christians who were secret Jews had to eat pork very much to their sorrow, for the Inquisition and all the people in general suspected the Christian who ate no pork of being a secret Jew, even if he swore only to do this out of disinclination. From then up to today the clandestine Jewry abolished the religious statute of eating no such flesh, in order to arouse no suspicion among their neighbours. Therefore a Secret Jew eats everything today, and no one suspects that he is a Jew on grounds of his diet. Only one or two fanatics among the Jewish Christians still maintain this statute.
Unfortunately no effective barrier was erected so that the converted Jews and their descendants could not introduce themselves into the clergy. The more they joined themselves to it, all the more increased the cases of Simony, which grew to such frightening extent that the 8th Council of Toledo had to energetically fight this vice of Jewish origin. In its Canon III it is therefore stated that many “wished to buy the grace of the Holy Ghost for a shabby price, in order to fully receive the sublime Papal blessing and forgot Peter’s words to Simon Magus: ‘Thy money be cursed with thee, for thou wouldst have the gift of God for money.’”92 Upon this follow the punishments for this crime.
The Jewish historian Graetz writes that the King, when he noticed that the European nobles of the land showed protection to the Jews and allowed them to practice their Jewish religion in secret, “passed an edict which forbade all Christians to protect the secret Jews.” Whoever did not follow this command should be punished. And it is further stated: “These measures and statutes, however, had not the desired results.” “The secret Jews – or, as they were called officially, the Jew-Christians – could not force Judaism out of their heart. The Spanish Jews, threatened by the danger of death, had from of old exercised themselves in the art of remaining true to their religion in their most secret hearts and of evading the sharp gaze of their enemies. In addition, they celebrated the Jewish feasts in their houses and despised the festivals of the Church. In order to make an end to this condition, the representatives of the Church passed a law which was intended to take from these unfortunate people their home life. From now on they had to observe the Jewish and Christian festivals under the scrutiny of the clergy, since it was wished to compel them not to observe the Jewish festivals and to maintain the Christian.”93
Here the Jewish historian forgets all evasions and calls the Christians of Jewish origin by their name: secret Jews or Jew-Christians, i.e. Jews who practised the Jewish religion in secret. In addition, he quotes interesting feasts in their homes, since as apparent Christians they could not do this in ordinary synagogues. Simultaneously the famous historian, so respected in Jewish circles, explains the reason for the decision of the 9th Council of Toledo that the Jews should spend the Jewish and Christian festivals under scrutiny of the Catholic clergy.
In Canon 17 of the 9th Council of Toledo, to which Graetz openly refers, it is expressly stated: “The baptised Jews should spend the festivals with the bishops.” “The Jews baptised anywhere and at any time can assemble. But we determine that they must come together on the chief festivals laid down through the New Testament and on those days which were once sacred for them according to their ancient law, in the cities and public assemblies with the highest priests of God, so that the Pontifex learns their life and their faith and they become really converted.”94 In this law it becomes clear that the bishops of the Council doubted – and with good reason – the sincerity of the Christianity of the Jews converted to our holy faith.
After the death of Recceswinth, Wamba was elected as King. The Jews utilised anew the disunity of the nobility and attempted to alter the existing order to their favour. José Amador de los Rios mentions that the 10th Council of Toledo had almost ignored the Jews and comments: “The spiritual legislators perhaps believed in the honesty of the almost universal conversion of the Jews and hoped that, if they were all Christians, the internal struggle with them would find a happy end. But their hope was in vain. Scarcely had Wamba ascended the throne of Reccared than the rebellion of Hilderich and Paul gave them opportunity to reveal their secret grudges and to place themselves openly on the side of the rebels. As a result many Jewish families who had been expelled from the kingdom at the time of Sisebutus returned into the Visigoth kingdom and especially into the region of Gothic Gaul (Southern France) where the rebellion had its outlet. But the rebels were defeated in Nimes and destroyed, and several edicts were published for the punishment and penalising of the Jews. The latter were expelled anew in large numbers from Gothic Gaul.”95
The Jesuit Pater Mariana also confirms that, after the defeat of the rebels, “many edicts were passed against the Jews, who were expelled from the whole of Gothic Gaul.”96
The Jew Graetz gives us interesting details in this respect and reports that after the death of Recceswinth: “The Jews participated in a rebellion against his successor, Wamba (672-680). Count Hilderich, governor of the Spanish province of Septimania, refused to recognise the newly-elected king and hoisted the flag of rebellion. In order to obtain support and followers, he promised the converted Jews a place in his own province where they could freely practise their religion. The latter accepted the offer and followed him in great numbers. The rebellion of Hilderich in Nimes took on enormous extent, and at first the hope existed of an easy victory, but the rebels were finally destroyed. Wamba appeared with an army at Narbonne (France) and drove the Jews from the city.”97
However much one watches over the “Fifth Column”, it nevertheless always utilises the first opportunity to overthrow the government, which does not suit it. Once again it becomes clear that disputes and personal lust for power gave the Jews the opportunity of coming on top. Fortunately the rebellious Count in this case lost the battle and could not alter the existing order, which would have been disastrous for the Church. Thus Christianity triumphed fully over Jewry and its egoistic opportunist allies.
At the same tune, however, when the visible recognised foe was decisively conquered, the “Fifth Column” slowly gained ground. For the more the Jewish infiltration took roots in the bosom of the Church, Simony – an evil of Jewish origin – increased and the false converted Jews and their descendants in the clergy utilised it.
The 11th Council of Toledo, which took place during the period of rule under Wamba, laid special emphasis on the combating of Simony and made efforts to prevent the cunning, which is utilised by those, who wish to buy the “Bishops’ dignities” (offices) so desired by the Jews of the “Fifth Column”.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
THE CHURCH COMBATS SECRET JEWRY. EXCOMMUNICATION OF NEGLIGENT BISHOPS
Fifty years had passed since a great number of Jews in the Gothic kingdom had been converted to Christianity and three decades since the time when the historian Amador de los Rios spoke of an almost universal conversion. The kingdom of Reccared was nevertheless flooded and undermined by false Christians who secretly practised the Jewish religion and plotted in secret to destroy the Church and the State. In the year 681, when Ervigio entered the government, the situation was so serious that the high Catholic clergy and the monarch together worked out common civil and church laws in order to destroy the “Jewish Fifth Column” in Christianity. Everyone who, as a Christian, observed in secret the rites and customs of the Jews and supported these false Christians or concealed them in any kind of form – even without exception of the bishops who made themselves guilty of this crime – was severely punished. These laws were at first approved by the monarchs in collaboration with respected members of the clergy and later laid before the 12th Council of Toledo for approval. There these laws were approved as church authority by archbishops and bishops and were entered into the laws of the Synod mentioned.
In order to understand the basis of the canons, both of the Ecumenical as well as the provincial Holy Church Councils, which wished to solve the terrible Jewish problem and especially that of the “Fifth Column” in Christian society, one must bear in mind that both then as today no land tolerated that a group of foreigners might abuse the magnanimously given hospitality and betray the land in question, which had naively opened its doors to them, through espionage and sabotage.
Then these spies and saboteurs were without exception punished with death by all peoples, as also in general still in modern times. There is additionally the fact that the “Jewish Fifth Column” in Christian and pagan nations, besides carrying on espionage and sabotage, has also exercised and provoked in the course of centuries an inner attempt at conquest and has provoked civil wars which cost millions of men their lives, and which has murdered in their own house those who opened the frontiers to them, robbed them or attempted to enslave them. Undoubtedly the so-called Jewish colonies in the Christian and pagan lands are more dangerous and harmful for the states afflicted than the usual espionage and sabotage organisations. If the members of these organisations are punished without regard to race, religion or nationality, why should an exception be made to the most dangerous, harmful and criminal “Fifth Column”? What privilege do the Jews enjoy, that when they commit high treason, espionage or sabotage or plot against the people which houses them, they are forgiven and not punished like spies of other races and nationalities?
All peoples have a natural right of justified defence, and if a pair of alien immigrants violate the hospitality granted them, they bring these peoples into a dilemma of life and death. These disgraceful aliens are solely responsible for the measures which the betrayed, threatened people seizes upon against the “Fifth Column.”
So did Holy Church and the Christian monarchs conceive things, and at several Councils – as we will see later – it is made clear that these criminals should be punished with death. But instead of passing in this case the customary and completely justified judgment, Holy Church and the Christian kings made an exception with the Jews and presented them with life a hundred times over. As a result they endangered their future and their right to live in peace and freedom in their own land. With such exceptionally good will a series of measures, instead of radically suppressing them, were seized upon in order to prevent the “Jewish Fifth Column” from being able to cause all too much harm and so that it did not injure the people which sheltered them. But since they were granted life, the measures were ineffective. Therefore the various Councils of the Church and the Papal Bulls passed a series of norms and laws, laying down, for example, that the Jews should wear a sign, so that they were distinguished from the other inhabitants of the land in which they lived. This should enable it to be easier to safeguard oneself from the revolutionary activity of the Jews against Church and State. These signs varied; they had to have a mark on their heads, they had to wear a special cap, a dress or another distinguishing mark.
In other cases it was ordered in the Church laws and the Papal Mandates that they must restrict themselves to certain parts of the city, so-called Ghettos, and that they might occupy no government or Church offices, which made it possible for them to continue their activity of conquest and their domination over the people which in unfortunate manner had opened its frontiers to them.
The backsliders were often executed, but in most cases these were spared their lives, and it was limited to confiscating their goods, to expelling them from the land or by applying lighter punishments, such as whipping, no longer customary today, which was then the practice in all lands of earth.
Since this dangerous “Fifth Column” again and again plotted against the Christian peoples and “Holy Church”, the Church attempted, instead of seeking the final way out and applying the death penalty – as all peoples do with professional spies and saboteurs – to suppress them by gentler methods, by removing their authority from the grown-ups and bringing the children into monasteries and honourable Christian families. In this manner they wished to attain that, after two or three generations, the threat from the “Fifth Column” would be eliminated, without carrying out mass executions of these masters of espionage, of sabotage and of betrayal.
However, it must be recognised that this extraordinary good-will by Holy Church, by Christian monarchs, and also by the high personages of the Islamic world, was of no avail. The repressive measures against the “Fifth Column” were not only hated, but the Jews also made use of countless subterfuges in order to evade the measures which tied their hands and which were intended to prevent them from doing too much evil. They made use of bribery and bought with gold the bad civil and church personages so that the latter caused the valid civil and Church laws to become dead letters, or they spun countless intrigues in order to free themselves from this control, which was intended to restrict their power. They called forth fresh revolts, plotted more and more dangerous conspiracies and abused the goodness of the Church and Christian peoples, until they were successful in modern times in breaking the chains which had prevented them from causing greater harm, in invading Christian society, and threatening it with complete destruction.
In order to grasp the justification of all Church laws which we investigate in this work and all measures to preserve the peoples from the conspiracy of these harmful aliens, we must recall all the preceding. We understand among this that Holy Church acted in no way cruelly – as the Jews assert – but in an extremely good-willed way with them. And perhaps this most extreme good-will was particularly responsible for the great progress that the Jews with their conquest and enslaving of the peoples could make, as is the case today in the unfortunate lands in which the totalitarian dictatorship of Jewish socialism rules. This is a catastrophic situation, which would have already come into existence many centuries before, if the Church had not at least carried out the precautionary measures which we will investigate in the ensuing chapters of this work.
After these justified elaborations concerning the defence of doctrine and policy which Holy Church followed in course of the centuries, we will now occupy ourselves with the corresponding statutes of the 12th Council of Toledo.
In the letter which the King laid before the Holy Synod it is stated as follows: “Hear, honourable Fathers and respected priests of the heavenly ministries... I come with tears in the eyes to your honourable paternal gathering, so that through the zeal of your court the earth will be freed from the infection of wickedness. Arise, I beg thee, arise, unmask the guilty, censure the repellent customs of the evildoers, show the whip of your zeal towards the faithless, and make an end to the bite of the arrogant, make easier the burden of the oppressed, and above all exterminate the Jewish pest thoroughly which each day reaches out more rapidly around itself (et, quod plus his omnibus est, judaeorum pestem quae in novam semper recrudescit insaniam radicitus exstirpate). Investigate also very thoroughly the laws, which you passed a short while ago against the falsity of the Jews, strengthen these laws still more and compile them in a statute, in order to bridle the blasphemy of the faithless.”98
It is interesting that, among the evil conditions which were brought to the notice of the Synod, the Jewish pest, which day by day increased in alarming measure, is held to be the worst.
In Canon IX of this Holy Council the laws approved against clandestine Jewry were confirmed, i.e. against the Jews who pretended to be Christians and who were described both by the monarchs as also by the Synods simply as Jews, since one was certain that, as descendants of the Jews, they secretly practised their Jewish religion. Of the law mentioned, which comprises the entire anti-Jewish legislation, we will repeat only the most interesting parts.
“Canon IX. Confirmation of the laws against the wickedness of the Jews (quae in judaeorum nequitiam promulgatae sunt) arranged according to the different titles as they are recorded in this law.”
“We have read the titles of the different laws which the famous prince has recently passed against the monstrous falsehood of the Jews and have approved them after strict examination. And since they were approved by the Synod with justice, they will be irrevocably applied in future against blasphemy. Among these fall...”99 Now follow the laws which, after their approval, belong to Law IX. On account of their importance we have emphasised the following statutes. In the first law it is mentioned that the great falsity of the Jews and their dark errors “become very subtle and they perfect themselves in their wicked art and in deceit.” For they pretended to be good Christians and always attempted to evade the laws which forbade to them their secret subterranean Judaism. In the IVth and Vth Canon the punishments for the secret Jews are cited who celebrate the Jewish rites and festivals, and who attempt to bring Christians away from their faith in Christ. Here it is not a question of the rites and ceremonies of an alien religion, but of punishing the false Christians who, in spite of their hypocrisy, still practised the Jewish religion in secret. The repressive measures were thus aimed at destroying the “Jewish Fifth Column” in the bosom of Holy Church and of the Christian State.
In the VIIth Canon, the Jews who pretended to be Christians are forbidden to practise the Jewish religious customs relating to meat. However, it is elaborated that the good Christians must eat no pork. One sees that these false Catholics still always deceived the clergy and the King with their apparent disinclination against pork.
In Canon IX the revolutionary activity against the Christian faith is forbidden and severe penalties laid upon malefactors. In addition, punishments are even provided for Christians who conceal the Jews or support them. Concerning this it is expressly stated: “If anyone hides them in his house or aids them to flee, he shall, if that is proved... receive a hundred lashes of the whip, his goods fall to the King, and he will be expelled forever from the land.” Thus those who supported the Jews or concealed them are punished in a terrible way. By this the bishops of the Council and the monarch himself wished to be rid of those who supported the Jews and their accomplices in the struggle against Christianity.
Without doubt more than ever today must effectiveness be given to these statutes of this Holy Law. For only thus can we hope to conquer the Jewish-Communist beast, which has success because the seeming Christians are ready to support the Jews and Communists and to make their victory easier.
Also in the Xth Law, without regard to class or position, punishments are ordained against those who support Jewry, and it is stated among other things: “When, therefore, a Christian of any origin, class or rank, man, woman, priest or layman, accepts a gift in order to help a Jew or Jewess against the law of Christ, or accepts any kind of present from them or their agents, or in return for any kind of gift does not guard and hold high the Commandments of the Law of Christ (simple passivity in the face of the foe), so... All who allow themselves to be bribed with a gift or conceal a fault of a Jew and do not exemplarily punish his wickedness, will be penalised by the statutes of the Holy Fathers in the decrees and must, if it is proved against them, pay double to the state treasury of the King of what they received from the Jew or Jewess.”100
As one sees, the Jews have always understood in a masterly way how to buy the Christians and Gentiles with gold, since the latter frequently suffered from a chronic avarice and sold themselves to the “Synagogue of Satan”.
The Israelite ambassadors and embassies in various lands of the world have handed over to archbishops and high dignitaries of the Catholic Church suspicious invitations and seduced them with an interesting, expense-free journey with a skilfully drawn-up route of travel, exactly as in the case of travels in the Soviet Union. This they do on the eve of the next Ecumenical Council and wish with this, as we have experienced, to buy support for their proposal condemning anti-Semitism, which the international Jews hold in readiness and which their agents of the “Fifth Column” intend to set through at the Council. We hope that this kind of bribery – gratis journeys to Palestine – fails and that no imitator of the Apostles commits the sin of Judas and sells himself for thirty pieces of silver.
Holy Church has always made efforts to find the motive which binds secret Jewry, the converts and their descendants. A reason lies in the Jewish books which these false Christians secretly read and whose doctrines were inherited from father to son. In Canon XI it is proposed to punish this offence severely, and it is ordered, among others, that the secret Jew, who is found with such books in his house or which are found on him, shall be marked on his head and upon the first occasion receive a hundred lashes of the whip. In addition, he must sign in the presence of witnesses that he will never again read such books or possess them. If he afterwards becomes back-sliding, his property shall be made responsible to the Baron, whom the King has appointed and he shall be expelled from the land. If a teacher is trapped thereby in spreading this error, and continued to teach what is forbidden, then he shall experience the same punishment as his pupils when they are older than twelve. If they are younger, they are not punished in this manner...”101
As one sees, the utmost effort was made in this regard, in order to prevent false Christians transmitting secret Judaism through instruction in their doctrine and secret books handed down from father to son. Simultaneously a vain attempt was made to prevent the guilty from backsliding and they were made to give before witnesses a formal written promise that they would not do it again. This promise was valueless, for the Jews have neither upon this nor upon other occasions kept their promises or solemn pacts, as the facts have proved in the ensuing years.
In Canon XIII it is ordered: “If a Jew, through cheating or deceit or from fear of losing his wealth, asserts that he keeps to the morals and laws of the Christians and fulfils the words according to the law of Christ and says he will retain his Christian servants because he is a Christian, so... we have reflected upon what manner he shall prove what he has said, so that from now on he may not cheat or hold back what he has said. Therefore we ordain that all Jews in the province of our kingdom can sell their Christian servants, as we have ordered in the preceding law. If they wish to keep them, they must declare themselves to be Christians as we have declared in this book. For we give them an opportunity not to further render themselves suspect and to wash themselves free of all doubts in the time of sixty days, from 1st February to 1st April of this year.” Accordingly, they are obligated through this law to go to the bishop of the province, and to promise openly before witnesses to give up all Jewish customs which they condemned, and that “they never more fall back into their old unbelief and maintain all other statutes which we explain in this chapter; that they under such circumstances confess and openly admit not to preserve in their heart the opposite of what they proclaim with their mouth, and not to hypocritically adopt Christianity outwardly and in their hearts preserve Judaism”... “And if one of them gives himself out as a Christian and, after the evidence mentioned and the oath, holds again to the law of the Jews, believes in it and thus breaks his promise and does not hold it, and has falsely spoken in God’s name, and falls back into the unbelief of the Jews, his goods are confiscated in favour of the King, he shall receive a hundred lashes of the whip, be marked on the head, and banished to the uttermost ends of the world.”102
With this determination, which belongs to the collection of laws mentioned that were approved and empowered in the Church Canon IX of the 12th Council of Toledo, the archbishops and bishops of the Holy Synod wished to prevent the secret Jews controlling Christian servants and gave them the opportunity of remaining Jews openly, without expropriating them. By the uttermost caution with which the Prelates and the King proceeded, it is clear that the Jews, in order to retain their Christian servants, pretended to be bound to the Christian faith whilst they remained Jews in secret and belonged to that destructive “Jewish Fifth Column” in Christianity. Therefore they were threatened with severe punishments if they were discovered in the act, and a vain attempt was made to attain the honest conversion of the Jews and their descendants, and to destroy the dangerous “Fifth Column”.
Unfortunately, neither Holy Church nor the Christian monarch could attain their goals. They only attained that the false Christians became more and more successful in concealing their subterranean Judaism based on their experience and because they knew that lack of reflection and lack of caution could betray them. As a result, they perfected their deceptive methods and in the course of centuries attained the greatest possible perfection in this art.
On the other hand, the Holy Synod already concerned itself with a problem which was intended to draw the attention of Christian and Mohammedan peoples: that the Jews should wear a special distinguishing mark that distinguished them from the rest of the people, so that the latter could protect themselves from their deceit and their revolutionary activity. Here the Holy Synod determined that they should be marked on the head. As a result they were perhaps distinguished in a more effective way as dangerous, secret Jews than they were later by other Christian and Mohammedan devices and lastly by the Nazi device of the renowned star of Judah on their clothing. They could remove their caps, their special dress or their stars, but only with difficulty the distinguishing mark on their heads. A similar determination would alarm us in the 20th century, if a Holy Church Council passed it. But whoever knows the deadly danger which this Jewish band of criminals has always represented for the rest of the world and still represents will be more tolerant and understand. These signs, which were used at different times, were an effective method, so that the false Christians of the “Jewish Fifth Column” were recognisable and the real disciples of Christ could protect themselves from their destructive activity. If we could recognise them at the time in our days, then it would not have been possible for them to commit so successfully their betrayal and deceit, through which so many peoples were handed over to murderous Communism.
We will come back again later to the Holy Council of Toledo. To the Laws which were approved through the Church Canon IX belong the Canons XIV and XV, which contain the wording for the conspiracy of Judaism and simultaneously the oath of loyalty to Christianity. Both were unfortunately used within the framework of an unfruitful attempt to secure the honesty of this false conversion.
In spite of all measures to prevent this, the Jew attempts, in every land which opens its gates to him, to exercise a rule over those who afforded him hospitality. Through Canon XVII it is attempted to make an end to a part of this activity by forbidding the Jews, among other things, to “have power over a Christian or control him” and ordering that they “in no manner command Christians, sell them, or have any kind of power over them.” For the Jews who overstep this law and also for the nobles and barons in public offices who violate it and give the Jews power over the Christians, penalties are ordered. Unfortunately, the Jews spurred on the rebellious spirit of the Visigoth nobles against the monarch, in order to secure their protection and thus made the efficacy of these laws largely worthless.
Another measure of the Holy Council for destruction of the “Fifth Column” is cited in Canon XVIII, which established a veritable espionage against Christians of Jewish descent within their very homes, by compelling their Christian servants to denounce their Jewish practices and offering them their freedom in exchange. In the law mentioned it is stated concerning the servants: “That at each time he who says and swears he is a Christian, and reveals the unbelief of his master and reveals his error, shall be set free.” Perhaps this measure for the destruction of clandestine Jewry in the bosom of Christian society was the most effective of all those previously cited. At that time it was logical that a servant who was almost a slave had interest in receiving freedom, if he revealed the secret Jewish practices of his masters who were only seeming Christians. In this respect the Prelates of the Holy Council really undertook a decisive step, for now the members of the “Fifth Column” in their own homes had to take heed before their own servants, who could any moment discover and report their secret Judaism. Unfortunately, the false Jewish Christians found ways and means in order to conceal their secret Judaism even in their own homes, and the measure was not sufficient in order to destroy the “Fifth Column”. Clandestine Jewry was only more resolute and concealed, as we shall see in later chapters.
BANISHING OF BISHOPS AND PRIESTS WHO GIVE POWER TO THE JEWS
This Holy Council concerned itself again with the condemnation of bishops and clergy who supported the Jews in a harmful way and manner. In addition it is stated in Canon XIX, which was approved in Church Law IX: “And when a bishop, priest or deacon provides a Jew with power, in order to somehow control the Church or to destroy the affairs of Christians, he must give so much of his property to the king as the Church affairs are worth which he entrusted to the Jew. If he has no property, in order to pay, he shall be expelled to the furthermost ends of the earth, so that he does repentance and realises his wicked act.”103
The Prelates of the Council also approved laws intended to prevent Christians of Jewish origin travelling from one city to another in order to secretly exercise their Jewish religion, when they were no longer subject to the control of the clergy where they currently were. Therefore it is stated in Canon XX: “When they travel from one place to another, they must reveal to the bishop, priest or burgomaster their place of arrival. They must not remove themselves from this priest, so that the latter can provide proof that they have not celebrated the Sabbath and have not maintained the customs of the Jews. They shall have no opportunity to preserve their error and to hide themselves in order to remain in it. For the same reason they should pay heed to the laws of Christianity”... It is further stated that when they pretend to travel from one place to another: “They must not leave the priests without permission, to whom they come, before the Sabbaths have passed and before the priests know that they do not observe the Sabbaths. And the priest of their place should write a letter to those of the other place through which these Jews come, in order both with the period of stay or also with the journeys, to avoid deceit. And they are instructed to carry this out exactly. If anyone does not follow our command, the bishop, priest or burgomaster of the place can order a hundred lashes of the whip. For we do not tolerate that they return home without the letters of the bishops or priests of the place which they visited. In the letters the days must be remarked, which they spent with the bishops of that city, how they have come there, when they leave it and have come home.”104
Without doubt the obligation was difficult for Christian servants to denounce their masters, who were also Christians but who practised the Jewish religion in secret, but it made it difficult for the secret Jews even to maintain in their homes the rites of the Sabbath and of the Jewish festivals. There therefore remained no other choice for them than to pretend a journey and to perform these rites in a secret unwatched-over place. After this cunning had been seen through, the Holy Council and the Christian monarch sought ways and means to control these journeys by secret Jews down to the last detail, in order to prevent that the official Christians as a result practised the Jewish religion. The Law XI perfects the preceding ones and renews the old law that the Jews must spend the Jewish feast days with a bishop or priest or – if that is not possible – with good Christians of the place, so “that they prove together with them that they are good Christians and live correctly.” In this manner they sought to deprive Christians of Jewish origin of even the smallest possibility of keeping the Jewish feast days, in order to see if they would in the long run become honest Christians and no longer adhere to secret Judaism.
CLERGY FORBIDDEN TO PROTECT THE JEWS
Through the Law XXIII the priests receive power, in order to carry out these laws, and the strict command is given them: “Not to protect the Jews or to cite grounds for their defence which give them the possibility of remaining with their error and their law.” Clearly the problem of the Judases among the clergy was already then so great that the approval of this law through the Holy Synod was also justified.
EXCOMMUNICATION OF NEGLIGENT BISHOPS
Canon XXIV is still more definite in this respect: “The priests of the Church must avoid falling into the sin, of leaving the peoples in their error... and therefore we add, in order to shake them out of their negligence, that a bishop who gives way to avarice or a bad idea and hesitates to fulfil these laws, if he knows their errors, their conceit and their folly and does not compel and punish them, will be banned for three months and must pay the King a pound in gold. If he does not possess this, he will be banned for six months, so that his negligence and weakness be punished. And we give every bishop who zealously serves God the power to check and restrain the error of those Jews and to correct their follies, and he does this in place of the negligent bishop and he completes what the other overlooked. If he does not do this, if he is negligent like the other bishop, fails to serve God zealously and is not conscientious, the King shall make good their error and punish them on account of their sin. The same which we have ordered for those bishops who are negligent in their task of correcting the error of the Jews, is valid also for all believers, priests, deacons, clergy...”105
When the Council approved this law in its sacred Canon IX, it was declared that it was not only deadly sin if one supported the Jews, but also if the bishop, priests or cleric is negligent in the fulfilment of his duties in the struggle against Jewry, and this deadly sin would be punished with the excommunication of the guilty. Here one could now ask: How many prelates and high dignitaries of the Church would be excommunicated today if Canon IX of the aforesaid Sacred Council were applied, since the committing of this deadly sin to support the Jews in any kind of form is so widespread among our present-day clergy?
In Canon XXVIII a very effective measure is ordered. The honesty of the Christian belief of Catholics of Jewish origin should not only be proved through the witness of the bishops, priests or burgomasters of the land, but also through the actions of the Christians themselves. It no longer suffices that they give the assurance of being honestly converted, but they must prove it through deeds. This law, however, deals even more strictly with Christians who, having already been unmasked as secret Jews and pardoned on demonstrating their repentance in words and deeds, were soon to be discovered again practising the Jewish religion. Concerning these recidivists it is stated in the law mentioned: “That one will never more pardon them and they should suffer punishment without any kind of sympathy, be it now the death penalty or a lesser one which they deserve.”106
When this Canon was approved by the Holy Council, the doctrine of the Catholic Church in this respect was also firmly laid down. For, although Our Lord God is ready to forgive every sinner before his death, it is quite another matter to hold that the Jews, who represent a constant threat for the Church and mankind, must be punished by the civil authorities on account of their crimes. It is not permissible for them, in order to escape their justified punishment, to quote Our Divine’s Saviour’s sublime doctrine concerning the forgiveness of one’s enemies, for He referred to forgiving the offences committed by one individual against another individual, not to the crimes or offences of an evildoer to the harm of society or of the nation.
The clergy who today stand in the service of Jewry, draw in this respect sophistical conclusions and attempt in a blasphemous way and manner to use the sublime teachings of love and forgiveness of Our Redeemer Jesus Christ, since they wish to prevent peoples threatened by Jewish enslavement from making use of their natural right to a just defence and from fighting against the criminal Jewish conspirators and allotting them a just punishment. Moreover, one should not forget the great authority that Holy Church has always given to the Councils of Toledo regarding the definition of ecclesiastical doctrine and regarding the measures taken against the Jews by the 12th Council; their vigour, as doctrine of Holy Church, is even greater in view of the fact that, in the year 683, a new Council of Toledo, number XIII, not only confirmed, in its Canon IX, the laws approved in the previous Synod, but also ordered that they should be eternally in force and constant, giving them the perennial character of a doctrine of the Church. To this end the aforesaid Canon IX of the 13th Council of Toledo says: “Although the synodal acts of the 12th Council of Toledo, which took place in the first year of government of our illustrious Prince Ervigio, were arranged and fixed by the unanimous judgment of our agreement in this royal city, we now add with firm resolve that these resolutions, as they are written or ordered, shall have eternal force and validity.”107
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
THE 16TH COUNCIL OF TOLEDO HOLDS THE DESTRUCTION OF THE “JEWISH FIFTH COLUMN” TO BE NECESSARY
As we have already said, the Visigoth kingdom, after the almost universal conversion of the Jews to Christianity, had to fight tenaciously against a far more dangerous kind of Judaism: clandestine Jewry. The efforts of the 12th and 13th Synods of Toledo to destroy this powerful block of Jews in the bosom of Holy Church had completely failed. The all-embracing, energetic anti-Jewish collection of laws, which were approved by both Councils, was ineffective to destroy the dangerous “Fifth Column,” since they did not have the effect that the Christians of Jewish origin gave up their secret Jewish practices and became true Christians. The proof of this is that ten years later, when Egica already ruled, the 16th Council of Toledo concerned itself anew with this fearful affair. Already in the first law it is stated:
“Canon I. In the face of the falsehood of the Jews. – Although there are countless judgements of the old Fathers concerning the falsehood of the Jews and in addition many new laws, nevertheless, as per the prophetic prediction relating to their stiffneckedness, the sin of Judah is written as with an iron pen on a diamond, harder than stone in its blindness and obstinacy. It is therefore very necessary that the wall of their unfaithfulness is combated through the machinations of the Catholic Church more thoroughly, so that they may either improve themselves against their will or be destroyed in such a way that they perish for ever by judgment of the Lord.”108 After clarifying this point of doctrine, the Holy Council enumerates in the canon cited additional measures that should be immediately applied against the Jews.
This definition of the doctrine of Holy Church against the Jews served centuries later as basis for the later Popes and Councils asserting the death penalty for the secret Jews in the bosom of Catholicism. For defence of these doctrines and of the policy of Holy Church we have already cited that all states of the Christian and pagan world have always approved similar measures against spies or saboteurs of hostile nations and they also still approve them today.
It has never occurred to anyone to criticise a government because it executes members of the “Fifth Column” and traitors to the country. The whole Jewish propaganda is, however, already directed against the Church, because they, like all other lands of the world, held the death penalty for the Jews in the bosom of Christian society as justified, who carried on espionage in Christian society and wished to destroy or conquer it. It is, of course, regrettable to kill a man. But if the peoples have the right to defend themselves, then Holy Church has it also, which defends not only herself but also the peoples who believe and trust in her, especially when we reflect that the Jews in the bosom of Holy Church not only organise an all-embracing network of the usual espionage and sabotage, but represent the most destructive “Fifth Column” in the same land, whose institutions they unfortunately also utilise. Thus without doubt action was taken against them on account of the State and for defence of Holy Church, whereby Holy Church and the Christian state directed themselves with one accord against them.
The ideal solution would be that the Jews voluntarily leave the land which generously accepted them and return to their homeland, that they should recognise the independence of every people, and not commit the crime of the worst espionage and sabotage as members of the most dangerous “Fifth Column” which has existed in the world. No one would then trouble them and the remaining nations could live in peace. If in addition they commit crimes for which the supreme penalties exist, they are solely responsible for the just punishment they have received for such crimes in the course of history. In addition, they have in fact their own land, which has been allotted to them in the Soviet Union and in Israel. During the centuries when they had no homeland, they could have behaved like other immigrants, lived in peace with the peoples and recognised the religions which they accepted. Then nothing would have happened to them. However, they betrayed the nations which allowed them hospitality, attempted to conquer them, to rob and destroy them, and did everything possible in order to destroy Christianity from its beginning 0nwards. They accepted it and attempted to disintegrate it from within through heresies. They gave impetus to the bloody Roman persecutions and furthered them. Through their crimes they called forth universal rejection and defence, not only from the side of the Church and Christian peoples, but also on the part of Islam and the peoples ruled by it.
The Jews themselves through their criminal, ungrateful and treacherous mode of action called forth the bloody repressive measures which the threatened peoples seized upon against them by making use of their right to justified defence. They complain about this repression but conceal the motives. It is the same as if the Romans, who wished to conquer Gaul and who had to mourn many thousands of dead in the battle, had been cynical enough to accuse the attacked Gauls of being murderers and persecutors of the Romans. Or if the Japanese, in the last war when they conquered China and suffered hundreds of thousands of losses, had possessed the insolence to describe the Chinese as murderers or persecutors of the Japanese. Then we could say: If the Romans had not fallen upon Gaul, they would also not have needed to lament that the Gauls killed thousands of Romans. And if the Japanese had not attacked China, they would also not have had to lament the death of their fellow-citizens.
While these and other peoples, however, have never struck upon the idea of lamenting over the losses and injuries which they suffered on grounds of their battles of conquest, the Jews for centuries have secretly and hypocritically begun the cruellest, most totalitarian and bloodiest war, and were cynical enough, to make a great outcry if religions or peoples justifiably defended themselves and killed Jews or robbed them of their freedom in order to prevent them from causing further harm. If Jews in the future wish not to bear the consequence of their stiff-necked, cruel universal struggle for conquest, they must abandon it. If they do not do this, they should at least be so brave and adapt themselves in a dignified way to the consequences as the other conqueror peoples of the world have done.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
THE 17TH COUNCIL OF TOLEDO PUNISHES THE JEWISH CONSPIRACIES WITH SLAVERY
In the year 694, when Ervigio still ruled, the widely-branched conspiracy of false Christians was discovered, who secretly practised the Jewish religion and who had many aims. On the one side they wished to bring the Church into disorder and conquer the throne, one the other side to betray the country and destroy the Visigoth state.
At that time St. Felix, the archbishop of Toledo, had summoned a new Council, in which participated all prelates of the kingdom and only some from Gallia Narbonensis, since a plague prevented the others from coming. When the Holy Synod was already assembled, it learned about and received proofs of the secret Jewish conspiracy which was instigating a revolution in all classes and was thus so dangerous for Christianity and the Christian state that the Holy Synod condemned it. The Holy Synod had assembled in the Church of Santa Leocadia de la Vega in Toledo, and St. Felix performed the presidency in this terrible struggle and was the new leader of Christianity against the Jews.
The protocols of this Holy Synod are one of the most valuable documents and give details concerning what the “Jewish Fifth Column” in the bosom of the Church and also in the realm of a Christian or pagan people is capable of doing. We hold this document to be important not only for Catholics, but also for all men of whatever people or whatever religion who have to compete with the threat of Jewish Imperialism.
Most interesting in this Council is Canon VIII, in which it is expressly stated: “Concerning the condemnation of the Jews. – And since it is known that the Jewish people with wickedness, blasphemy, and the shedding of the blood of Jesus Christ, in addition through the violation of the oath (because, among other things they had sworn to be true Christians and not to honour Judaism in secret) they are polluted, so that the wickedness has no end, they therefore must weep that they have committed such a serious, horrible sin, who on account of their wickedness wished not only to destroy the Church, but have also attempted with tyrannical bravado to ruin the fatherland and the nation, and had rejoiced because they held their time to have come, and to have caused harm to Catholics. Therefore must this cruel, astonishing arrogance be done penance with a still more cruel punishment. So must judgment against them be all the stricter, and whatever is established of infamy must be everywhere punished. In connection with other affairs we here at this Council have learned of their conspiracy. Thus not only on account of breaking their promise have they polluted, through belonging to their sects, the garb (tunica) of faith with which Holy Church had invested them with holy baptism, but wished also to gain control of the royal throne through the conspiracy. Since we have learned through their own confessions of this disastrous wickedness, they should be punished with irrevocable censure through the condemnation of our decree. Upon command, namely of our devout religious prince Egica, who serves the Lord zealously and is strong in Holy Faith, should not only the mocking of the cross of Christ but also the planned destruction of his people and country be avenged, against which they proceeded so cruelly. They shall proceed more strictly against them and their property be confiscated, which then falls into the state treasury. In addition they themselves, their women, children and other descendants in all provinces of Spain live in eternal servitude. They must leave their homeland, must be driven apart from one another and must serve whosoever the King so commands... Over their children of both sexes we shall dispose, so that, as soon as they are seven years old, they be separated from their parents and no relationship be allowed to them. Their own masters shall give them over to true Christians for education, so that the men marry with Christian women and conversely. As we had already said, it is allowed neither the parents nor the children to celebrate the ceremonies of Jewish superstition or to fall back upon any occasion again into unbelief.”109
As first commentary to this Holy Canon of the 17th Council we can make the assurance that, if this Synod of the Catholic Church had taken place in our time, both the archbishop St. Felix, who was president, as well as the entire Holy Council would have been condemned as Anti-Semites and Nazi war criminals by those cardinals and bishops who today more serve the “Synagogue of Satan” than Holy Church. These would impose censures and condemnations against those Catholics who defend the Church and their country against the Jewish threat. These Church dignitaries cause the real Catholics and patriots to be condemned and disapprove of attacks upon the Jews, which are by far milder than those of the Holy Council which was led by the renowned Saint Felix, the archbishop of Toledo, whom the Church has canonised. On the other hand, through the dangerous conspiracy which the converted Jews and their descendants instigated, it is clear that the false Christians and secret Jews could proceed successfully against the laws directed against them of the preceding Councils and were strong enough in order to organise such an extensive plot. In the face of the great danger, the Christian state and Church armed itself for defence and seized upon the most extreme measures, to enslave all Jews and to take away from them their seven-year old children, so that separated from their parents they received a Christian education and the possibility was removed from them of being attracted to the organisations of secret Jewry. By this it was wished to avoid that Judaism was passed on by parents to children, even if the parents in secret continued to be bound to Judaism. Thus it was wished to attain that in the following generations the “Fifth Column” of the false Christians, who secretly adhered to the “Synagogue of Satan” would be completely destroyed. The fact that the children of the new generation should marry as grown-ups with good Christians or Christian women, was doubtless intended to give a further guarantee that the third generation of “Fifth Column” in question would be completely destroyed and the descendants of the Jews would be honest Christians. As we will see later, however, this kind of attempt failed, for the non-identified secret Jews could again and again secretly introduce the Christian children of Jewish origin into Jewish customs.
On the other hand the skilled intrigues of the Jews broke through all plans of the Holy Council and again condemned to failure the strict measures which the Church and the very Christian Visigoth monarchy had seized upon in defence against the Jewish threat.
In the records of this Holy Council we find a very interesting fact, from which emerges already at that time, thus almost 1200 years ago, several Jewish revolts had broken out against the Christian kings. This fact is confirmed to us by King Egica in his letter to the Holy Synod: “On several places of the earth they (the Jews) rebelled against their Christian princes, who killed many of them, according to the just judgment of God.”110
With these revolts against the princes they had clearly only success, when after hundreds of years experience they understood that they had to make the Christian peoples themselves, even if unconsciously, into their allies. In addition, the Jewish leaders pretended to be Christians and appeared as redeemers of these peoples and organisers of liberal and democratic movements, to give the mass of the people the seductive promise that they would rule themselves and free them from the yoke of the monarchy.
One must bear in mind that the terrible punishments which the 17th Council uttered against the secret Jewish conspirators found application in the entire realm of rule of the Gothic kingdom, with exception of the province of Gallia Narbonensis. This district was “nearly depopulated” – as it is said in a letter from the prince – through a deadly epidemic and for other reasons. Therefore the Jews were to be allowed to live there as earlier “with all their property, under the duke of this land, so that they might be of use to the public income.”111 It is thus highly possible that the Duke of Gothic Gaul mentioned exerted pressure so that the Jews living in his district remained spared from the punishments imposed against the rest of the Jews in the kingdom by the Holy Council. As a result not only were these false Christians saved, but also many others from the affected districts fled from the threat of slavery and other punishments to Gallia Narbonensis. As a result the percentage of secret Jewish population in South France increased, where a second Judaea arose.
Admittedly they were only tolerated and protected in Gallia Narbonensis under the condition that they became honest Christians and did not secretly practise the Jewish religion. In other cases the severe punishments of the Holy Synod were applied to them. But, as was established in later centuries, these false Christians in no way gave up their Judaism and practised it so secretly that South France was famed in the Middle Ages as the most dangerous secret Jewish nest. The Jews skilfully pretended an apparent honest Christianity and erected in this region the headquarters of the destructive revolutionary heresy which by a hair’s breadth would have destroyed the Church and the whole of Christianity in the Middle Ages. From this the catastrophic consequences became clear, which leniency and good-will in the face of such an infamous enemy as Judaism represents brings with it.
The Jewish revolt which Egica energetically repressed, whereby he was supported by the severe penalties of the 17th council of Toledo, had increased in great measure and was close upon destroying the Christian state and replacing it through a Jewish one. In order to understand this, we must investigate some preceding events:
The Catholic writer Ricardo C. Albanes writes concerning the situation of the Jews in the Visigoth monarchy: “The Jews had increased as astonishingly in Gothic Spain as previously in ancient Egypt and here also gained great importance and wealth, so that they were valuable to the Visigoth conquerors. They particularly devoted themselves to trade, the arts and industry. Almost all doctors were Jews and there were also many Jewish lawyers. They chiefly had a monopoly in trade with the east, whereby their origin and language were very much to their favour. As important owners of businesses they had also many Christian servants, whom they treated badly. But the Jews gained control not only of the Gothic land, but did not cease where they could, from undermining the Christian faith. The fact that they supported the heretics, at first the Arians and later the Priscillians, and the activity of the Jew-Christians, made difficult the conflict between Christianity and Judaism in Spain, which led to both the Councils as well as the Kings themselves very soon seizing upon strict anti-Semitic measures.”112
Apart from this enormous power which they had gained, the policy of Holy Church and the Christian Kings of heaping with honours the Jews who had honestly been converted to Christianity, giving them valuable positions and even nobility titles, and opening to them the doors to the priestly office and high church posts, while at the same time prosecuting the false converts pitilessly – which, however, did not have the desired result of honestly converting them all –, had not the desired results. For then already they hypocritically pretended to be honestly converted, in order to have advantages and to obtain valuable positions which were given to the honestly converted. Thus they could more and more gain a foothold in the religious and political institutions of Christian society and obtain the highest power.
This position gave them hope of being able to conduct to victory a well prepared revolt, in order to destroy the Christian state and to replace it with a Jewish one. In addition they secured at the right time the military support of powerful Jewish centres in North Africa, which should fall upon the Iberian peninsula, when the general revolt of the false Christians, who practised the Jewish religion in secret, broke out.
The renowned Spanish historian Marcelino Menendez Pelayo declares the following: “Since they wished to spread Christianity more rapidly and to establish peace between the two races, the 12th and 13th Council of Toledo permitted the Jews really unusual privileges (Plena mentis intentione), elevated them to nobles and freed them from the head tax. However, all was in vain. The Jew-Christians (Christians, who were secret Jews), who were rich and numerous under Egica, plotted against the security of the State... Danger threatened. This King and the 17th Council of Toledo took refuge in a last hard resort, confiscated the property of the Jews, declared them to be slaves and took away from them the children, that they might be brought up as Christians.”113
One can already discern how the Jews for twelve centuries have laughed at the noble efforts of Christians for peace and unity between the different races, in order to utilise this devout striving and to gain valuable positions, which permit them to destroy the Christian society and to subject the people which naively opened to them its frontiers. Today they still successfully utilise the noble wish for unity of the peoples and brotherhood of the races with similar infamous aims.
The renowned Dutch historian Reinhardt Dozy provides interesting details concerning the conspiracy investigated by us, which on the other side are also confirmed by the Jewish-Spanish Encyclopaedia authorised by Jewry. This historian writes about the Jews in the Gothic kingdom: “Towards 694, seven years before Spain was conquered by the Musulmans, they planned a general revolt together with their brothers in belief on the other side of the Straits of Gibraltar, where several Berber tribes practised the Jewish religion and those expelled from Spain took refuge. Probably it was intended that the revolt should break out in several places at once, when the Jews from Africa had landed on the Spanish coast. But before it came to this the government was given knowledge of the plot. King Egica at once seized upon the necessary measures. Later he called a Council in Toledo and instructed his spiritual and worldly leaders concerning the punishable plans of the Jews and ordered them to punish this accursed race. Some Jews were sent to trial, and it was revealed that through the plot Spain was to be made into a Jewish state. The Bishops foamed with rage and alarm and condemned all Jews to the loss of their property and of their freedom. The king intended to hand them over to the Christians as slaves, indeed even to those who had previously been slaves of the Jews and who were emancipated by the king...”114
This is a typical example of how the “Jewish Fifth Column” proceeds against the nations which has accepted them.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
CHRISTIAN-JEWISH RECONCILIATION. PRELUDE TO COLLAPSE
After the death of Egica there occurred what so often happens to Christian and pagan states: the new rulers forgot to follow the wise policy of their predecessors further, and attempted to introduce all possible kinds of innovations, which in a short time nullified the years of conscientious work – the result of great experience. One of the reasons for the superiority of the Jewish devices, in comparison to our own, was that they have understood how to conduct over centuries a unified definite policy towards those whom they regard as their foes. On the other hand neither we Christians nor the pagans were capable of carrying out a constant policy towards Jewry lasting more than two or three generations, even if it was so arranged and founded on the basic right of self defence.
Witiza, the son of Egica, who followed him on the throne, began to nullify everything which his father had done, both the good as well as the bad. He was a very passionate man who in fact inclined to worldly contentment, but at first had good intentions and ascended the throne with the wonderful wish to forgive all enemies of his father and to attain the unity of his subjects. In the Chronicle of Pacense, Witiza is described as a conciliatory man who wished to make good past injustice and who went so far as to burn documents falsified in favour of the state treasury.
The false Jewish Christians, who then lived in arduous slavery, after their monstrous conspiracy had failed, saw in the conciliatory intentions and the just striving for unity of the realm, which they attributed to Witiza, the means of freeing themselves from the terrible punishment and of regaining their lost influence. They attained that he release them from the sorrowful servitude and – at least for the moment – placed them equal with the rest of his subjects. Witiza fell into the trap like others and believed the Jewish problem could be solved through Christian-Jewish reconciliation, which, on the foundation of mutual respect, equal rights, greater understanding and even brotherly and friendly coexistence of Christians and Jews, would make an end to a century-long struggle and would secure the internal peace of the kingdom.
Such reconciliation can be a wonderful, desirable solution, but is only possible when both sides really wish it. But if the one side acts in good faith and sacrifices for reconciliation its justified defence, it destroys its own means of defence and must trust powerlessly in the honesty of the other side. The latter on the contrary only utilises the magnanimous conduct of its former opponent and awaits the moment to give it its death thrust. Then the apparent reconciliation and the false brotherhood are only a prelude to death, or at least to collapse.
This has always occurred when Christians and pagans allow themselves to be deceived by the skilled diplomatic manoeuvres of the Jews and believed in their friendship and loyalty. For the Jews unfortunately only utilise these subtle requests in order to disarm those whom they secretly regard in their deepest hearts always as deadly foes, in order then, when they have once been lulled asleep through the aromatic nectar of friendship and brotherhood and are disarmed, to easily enslave or destroy them. The Jews have always followed the norm, if they are weak or dangerously threatened, of giving themselves out as friends of their foes, in order to be able to easier rule them. Unfortunately, they have had success with this manoeuvre in the course of centuries and still also today.
Jewish diplomacy is classic: In order to arouse sympathy, they describe the persecutions, slavery and murders, which their people has suffered, in the blackest colours, but carefully conceal the motives through which they themselves called forth these persecutions. If they have been successful in inoculating pity, they attempt to transform it into sympathy. Accordingly they fight without pause, in order to attain all possible advantages on grounds of this pity and sympathy. These advantages have always been directed at destroying the defence erected against them by Christian or pagan clergy or civil authorities, so that the Jews can set their plans for conquest over the unfortunate state into fact, which has naively destroyed the walls which earlier rulers had erected for defence against Jewish conquest.
Gradually, the Jews gain greater influence in the land through this manoeuvre, which affords them hospitality, and they go from being the persecuted to become merciless persecutors of the real patriots, who attempt to defend their religion or their land against the rule and destruction of the undesired aliens, until the Jews finally rule or destroy the Christian or pagan state, always according to what is planned.
Thus it also occurred under the rule of Witiza. At first the Jews were successful in arousing his pity and inoculating him with sympathy, so that he freed them from the hard servitude which the 17th Council of Toledo and King Egica had imposed upon them as defence against their plans of conquest. The defence of Holy Church and of the Visigoth monarchy against Jewish imperialism was thus demolished. Witiza placed them equal with the Christians as brothers, in order to later go still further, as is revealed by the renowned Chronicles of the 13th century, which were written by the Archbishop Roderich (Rodericus Toletanus, “De rebus Hispaniae”) and Bishop Lucas de Tuy (“Chronicle of Lucas Tudensis”). Here it is described to us that, when the Jews had once gained the sympathy of the monarch, the latter protected and favoured them and allotted them greater honours than the churches and prelates.
As one sees they were successful, after their liberation and the granting to them of equal rights, in occupying higher positions than the prelates and Churches. All these measures naturally aroused the dissatisfaction of the Christians and clergy who zealously defend the Church. It is well possible that this increasing resistance finally influenced Witiza to strengthen the position of his new Jewish allies. As the Bishop Lucas de Tuy writes in his Chronicle, he caused those to be summoned back whom the Councils and the previous kings had banished from the Gothic kingdom. These returned in great number into their new promised land, in order to enlarge and strengthen their growing power in the Visigoth kingdom.115
The historian of the previous century, José Amador de los Rios, who is known on account of his skilled defence of the Jews, admits, however, that Witiza, in relation to the Jews, undertook exactly the opposite of what his father and his predecessors had done: At a new national Council Witiza revoked the old Church laws and the laws which had been enthusiastically accepted by the nation, in order not to have to confess to the Catholic faith. He released those baptised from their oath, and finally placed many members of this despised race in high positions. The consequence of these tumultuous incomprehensible measures was soon to be seen. In a short time the Jews had attained a really dangerous predominance and utilised all opportunities for their advantage. And perhaps out of revenge they welded new plans and secretly prepared to avenge themselves also for the humiliation under the Visigoth rule.116 This historian, whom no one can accuse of Anti-semitism and who in general is regarded by the Jewish historians as reliable source, has described to us with few words the terrible consequences which the policy of King Witiza, with its enticements to free the repressed Jews and later to attain the Christian-Jewish reconciliation and the reconciliation of both peoples – at the beginning of his period of government – had for Christians.
The Jesuit father Juan de Mariana, a historian of the 16th century, writes concerning the terrible transformation of Witiza: “Witiza in fact at first seemed a good prince, who wished to return to innocence and to suppress wickedness. He lifted the exile which his father had imposed upon many, and as this were not enough, he gave them back their property, their dignities and offices. In addition he ordered the documents and trial records to be burned, so that no trace might remain of the crimes and disgrace which they had been accused of and for which they had been condemned in that unruly time. This would have been a good beginning, if things had proceeded further and everything had not altered. It is very difficult to tame unbridleness and power with reason, virtue and moderation. The first step to chaos was made when he listened to flatterers.” The Jesuit historian reports in the following concerning all the unskilled dispositions of Witiza, which he had approved by this obscurantist Council of which Amador de los Rios speaks. The commentary of Father Mariana concerning the laws, which openly allowed the Jews to return to Spain, is worthy of note: “In particular – contrary to the old determinations – it was allowed the Jews to return to Spain and to live there. From that time onwards everything came into disorder and began to decay.”117
It is only natural that everything fell into disorder and went awry when the Jews were left government offices and the expelled Jews allowed to return. This occurred almost always in the course of history when Christians or pagans magnanimously extended the hand of friendship to the Jews and allowed them influence and power. For far removed from thanking this gesture of great-heartedness, the Jews have turned everything into an upheaval and cast into the abyss, to use the apt expression of Father Mariana.
The Catholic historian Ricardo C. Albanés describes the transformation in Witiza in the following manner: “The energetic Egica had understood how to hold within bounds the rebelliousness of the Jews and the plots against the state by the Moslems. But his son and successor Witiza (700-710) became, after a brief period of praiseworthy conduct, a despotic and deeply blasphemous monarch. He threw himself into the arms of the Jews, provided them with honours and public offices...”118
We find an impressive description of the lamentable perversity of Witiza in the valuable chronicle from the 9th century, which is known as the “Chronicon Moissiacense”. The black swamp of vice is described, into which Witiza and his court plunged, and it is asserted that a harem was erected in his place. In order to legalise this situation, he allowed polygamy in his kingdom and permitted – to the horror of all Christianity – even the Christian clergy to have several women. This condition is described in the brief “Chronicle of Sebastian de Salamanca”, who asserts in addition that Witiza furiously attacked the clergy who opposed his enormities. He even went so far as to dissolve Councils and to prevent by force that the Holy Church Laws were observed and placed himself openly against the Church.119
But Witiza did not only dissolve a Council which condemned him, but also caused a new one to be called by the clergy who followed him unconditionally, which – as the Bishop Lucas de Tuy in his mediaeval chronicle, the renowned Jewish historian Juan de Mariana and other no less renowned chroniclers and historians report – took place in the church of Saint Peter and Paul in Toledo, in the city quarter, in which a Benedictine monastery was found. This Council approved the errors against the traditional doctrine of the Church and was therefore in fact a heretical Council, whose laws were illegal.
As the chroniclers and historians mentioned assert, at this heretical Council at first the doctrine and the canons of Holy Church were contradicted, which condemned the Jews and which commanded Christians, and in fact particularly the clergy, under threat of ban, to neither support the Jews nor to be neglectful in their struggle against them. At the heretical Council, in contradiction to the preceding, protective statutes were passed for the Jews and the return approved of those expelled under earlier kings. In addition monogamy was abolished and even the clergy allowed to have not only one but several wives. The records of the heretical Council were lost. Through the chroniclers mentioned we have only knowledge of some matters regulated there. Various chroniclers of the Middle Ages even assert that Witiza became furious because his Holiness the Pope disapproved of his outrages, refused him obedience and called forth a scandalous schism, which, in order to lend this division validity, was authorised by the heretical Council in question.120
The clergy faithful to Holy Church were so severely persecuted that many finally abandoned the monarch out of cowardice or convenience. Father Mariana writes, among other things, the following: At that time Gunderico, the successor of Felix, was archbishop of Toledo, who would have been a personage of great spiritual gifts and qualities, if he had had the courage to combat such great wickedness. There are people who in fact are displeased by wickedness, but who are not courageous enough to oppose him who commits it. In addition there remained still various priests who held high and kept pure the memory of the preceding time and did not approve of the excesses of Witiza. These he had persecuted and tortured in all ways until they were of his will, as happened with Sinderedo, the successor of Gunderico, who went with the current of the time and was so subservient to the king, that Oppas, the brother or – as others assert – the son of Witiza, was replaced by the Church in Seville, where he was archbishop and sent to Toledo. As a result a new disorder arose; for it was against the Church laws that in this city two prelates should simultaneously be in office.121
In this as in many other cases, it was possible for the Jews through the pity which later became sympathy and pro-Semitism – under the pretence of an apparent reconciliation or Christian-Jewish brotherhood – to first free themselves from servitude and later to influence the monarch, so that he allowed them high government posts. With this as also with other affairs these facts go with the disorder and perversity of the Christian State, the upward rise of evil and the persecution of the defenders of Church and nation together. Unfortunately at the time of Witiza there was no Saint Athanasius, Saint John Chrysostom or Saint Felix who could have saved the situation. On the contrary the archbishops and bishops were more concerned to live comfortably than to fulfil their duty, and they finally submitted themselves to the tyrant and went with the times. Such a situation had to lead to a terrible catastrophe for Christian society and the Visigoth church, which after a short time was subjected to a bloody devastating struggle.
The situation which we investigate here, is particularly important because it is so similar to the present situation. Holy Church is threatened with annihilation by Communism, Freemasonry and Jewry and unfortunately nowhere appears a new Saint Athanasius, Saint Cyril of Alexandria or Saint Felix in order to save the situation. The wicked concern themselves with destroying the defence of the Church, to alter its rites, to bind the hands of the Christians and to hand them over as in the past to Jewish imperialism. The good are cowardly, for at the moment it is still not clear which cardinals or prelates will effectively defend Holy Church and mankind, which today more than ever are threatened by Jewish imperialism and its Communist revolution.
We recommend ourselves zealously to our Lord God, that he may send in this as in other cases a new St. Athanasius or St. Bernhard to save the Church, Christianity and mankind from the terrible catastrophe which threatens them.
The high dignitaries of the Church must bring before their eyes that they, if they go with the times and vacillate like the higher clergy at the time of Witiza, are just as responsible for the catastrophe which then falls upon the Christian world as the Jews themselves. They are then as guilty as the majority of those prelates and clergy who, in the last days of the Visigoth kingdom, through their cowardice and love of comfort, made easier the cruel destruction of Christianity on the frontiers of the kingdom, which the Musulmans conquered with the effective and decisive support of the “Jewish Fifth Column”.
The government of Witiza is another classic example of what happens to a nation which the Jews wish to destroy and which, lulled asleep and deceived by the apparent wish of founding the Christian-Jewish reconciliation, the unity of peoples, the equality of men and similar ideals which are too beautiful to be honest, concede to the Jews, who are out for destruction and conquest, high positions in the nation. History shows us that in such cases the Jews spread immorality and perversion by all attainable means, for it is relatively easy to destroy a land weakened by these two vices, because it cannot properly defend itself. It is a strange coincidence that even in the case of the Gothic kingdom, when Witiza conceded to the Jews high positions in the government and society, all possible perversions and immoralities spread out there and even the king and his closest advisors did not remain spared by this. This king abandoned himself to ignoble Jewish counsellors and advisors.
The perverted morals which distinguished the government of Witiza and the short rule of Roderich, are described to us vividly by the Jesuit Father Mariana: “Everything consisted in banqueting with rare foods and wines which consumed the energies, and in perverted immorality, for which the nobles gave an example; and the majority of the peoples lived immoderately and disgracefully. They were suited to make revolts, but very unskilled in the art of reaching for arms and acting resolutely against the foe. The government and the high esteem which had been attained through bravery and effort, went down in superfluity and contentment – as usual. All strictness and effort, through which they had grown great in war and peace, perished through the vices, which also destroyed military discipline, so that there was then nothing more perverted than morals in Spain, and the people as nowhere else was to be had for a gift.”122 The commentary of the cautious historian José Amador de los Rios to these lines is also very interesting: “ It is impossible to read these lines, which we take from a very highly regarded historian, without attaining the conviction that a people reduced to such a state stood on the brink of a great catastrophe. No noble, great-hearted feelings had survived this violent storm. Everything was mocked and disgracefully slandered. These crimes and errors had to be atoned for and punished. And only a few years passed before the places of pleasure were soaked with Visigoth blood and the palaces were consumed by Musulman fire, which the effeminate successors of Ataulf had built.”123
We must allude to two important coincidences: First there was then in Christianity no more perverted society than that of the Gothic kingdom. This coincides with the fact that in Christianity there was also no other kingdom where the Jews had such great influence. For the rest remained true to the traditional doctrine of the Church and continued to fight more or less against Jewry. Secondly such perversity came about particularly when the chains were removed from the Jews, which had prevented them from doing evil, and they obtained high positions in the Visigoth society.
Twelve hundred years after these events, the methods of Jews have still remained essentially the same. They wish to overthrow authority in the USA, England, and other western states and therefore spread immorality and perversion there. Many patriotic writers have accused the Jews as being principal agents of white slavery, of trading with heroin and the dissemination of pornographic, destructive theatres and cinemas. All this harms the American, English and French youth and the other lands, whose decline Jewry has resolved upon. As one sees, the methods have little altered in twelve hundred years.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
THE JEWS BETRAY THEIR MOST LOYAL FRIENDS
Witiza, who threw himself into the arms of the Jews and surrounded himself with Jewish advisors, filled the measures of madness in that he – according to our opinion – followed a suicidal policy. As some assert, under the pretence of being peace-loving and in the opinion of others in order to be able easier to suppress the opponents of his absurd policy, who from day to day increased in number and strength, he had weapons turned into ploughshares and the walls of many cities with their powerful fortresses levelled to the ground, which would have made difficult the invasion by the Musulmans. Meanwhile, the Jews betrayed their truest friend Witiza and aided the invasion from North Africa, in order to destroy the Christian state and if possible the entire European Christianity forever.
The Archbishop Rodericus Toletanus and Bishop Lucas de Tuy describe, in their above-mentioned chronicles, how the government of Witiza tore down the city walls, destroyed the fortresses and had the weapons transformed into ploughs.124
Marcelino Menendez Pelayo, the renowned Spanish historian of the previous century, writes concerning the treachery of the Jews: “The indigenous population would have been able to show resistance to the handful of Arabs who crossed the Straits, but Witiza had disarmed them, levelled the towers to the ground and had the lances turned into harrows.”125 While the Visigoth kingdom disarmed under the influence of the Jewish advisors and friends of Witiza, dismantled its defence and destroyed its war power, the Jews encouraged the Musulmans to fall upon the Christian kingdom and to destroy it. Great preparations were made in North Africa for this.
Into the land which the Jews wished to destroy they introduced pacifism, and into the land which should serve them as a tool to destroy the other, a warlike spirit. These classical tactics the Jews have applied in the course of centuries in different states and use them today with a perfection, in which they have attained experience in the course of centuries. It is worthy of note that at the present time the Jews preach – directly or with the help of freemasonic or theosophical organisations, Socialist and Communist parties, secret infiltration in different Christian churches, press, radio, and television controlled by them – Pacifism and disarmament in the free world, while in the Soviet Union and the other states under the totalitarian dictatorship they incite the peoples to war. While towards the end of the last war the USA and England disarmed in a dangerous way, they handed over to Communism vitally important positions, simultaneously destroyed the basic defence of these two great powers, and even traitorously betrayed to the Soviet Union and other Communist lands armed to the teeth the very weapons which they had stolen from the other countries. The “Fifth Column” has controlled the governments in Washington including atomic and rocket secrets. The tactics are fundamentally the same as twelve hundred years ago.
If the American and English people do not open their eyes at the right time and diminish the power of the “Jewish Fifth Column” in their states, they will soon find their lands desolated and ruled by a Bolshevist-Jewish horde, who will enslave them, as it did more than twelve centuries ago with the Christian Visigoth kingdom. It is curious to observe that the Jews always use the same tactics down to the last details.
In the USA we have witnessed in different places the fulfilment of the words of the Bible passage “weapons shall be turned into ploughshares.” But this sublime ideal is only capable of being carried out if “all” disputing parties do it simultaneously. Today the Jews utilise it, as twelve hundred years ago, in order to introduce Pacifism and disarmament into the lands whose decline they plan, i.e., the peoples of the world, who still do not live under their totalitarian Communist dictatorship. For in the Socialist states where they have already erected this dictatorship, which serves for enslaving the free world, they have in no way transformed their weapons into ploughshares, but created the most gigantic destructive armaments industry of all times. Thus on one side the peoples of the Free World are lulled asleep with pacifistic sermons, immorality and disunity, which the “Jewish Fifth Column” carries on. However, on the other side of the Iron Curtain the destructive invasion is prepared, which will suppress the free peoples after its victory, if they allow the traitorous “Fifth Column” of the Jews in their land to exist further, which makes easier the victory of Communism at a given hour, as it also at a suitable moment made easier the destruction of the Christian state of the Visigoths.
Around the year 709 the dissatisfaction of the nobility and of the people with Witiza had become so great that his position became untenable. At this moment the Jews gave us a new lesson in their high politics. A method was used which after twelve centuries has been very successfully perfected. When they believe their cause is lost, they allow before the defeat elements to appear in the enemy camp, so that afterwards, when his victory is unavoidable, these Jews fight always to remain on top and, if possible, to reach the head of the new government. So it is the same whichever side wins, they are always masters of the situation. With scientific mystery they apply the principle that the sole way to guess a card is that of placing them all simultaneously.
This was one of the great secrets of the constant victory of Jewish imperialism in the course of centuries and as a result the Jews arrived at world domination. Therefore all religious and political leaders of mankind should be conscious of this classic manoeuvre of high Jewish policy (diplomacy) in order to meet the deceit in advance and not to fall into the trap.
When the cause of the protector and true friend Witiza was practically lost, the Jews had no scruples about betraying him, in order at the right time to conquer decisive positions in the enemy camp, which made it possible for them to control him after the victory. The following details for which we have to thank the energetic research of the learned historian Ricardo C. Albanés, are very informative: “This degeneration and despotism called forth a great dissatisfaction, which since the beginning of the year 710 burdened the dynasty of Witiza. The renowned Eudon, a Jew – so it is asserted – who concealed his race, placed himself at the head of the Spanish or Roman party, since he was threatened through the reintroduction of the burdening racial law abolished by Recceswinth, and gained control of Witiza by means of a rapid and skilfully carried out plot. In an assembly (Roman Senate) the rebels conceived the idea of electing Roderich, the grandson of the great Recceswinth, to whom the Roman Spaniards had so much to thank, because he abolished the hated Gothic privileges (which had subjugated the Spanish-Latin race conquered by the Goths) as King. Roderich, who led a homely life, rejected the crown which the plotters offered him, but finally gave way and accepted the throne. He at once rewarded Eudon and appointed him as Conde de los Notarios, i.e., as minister of state, who possessed the full royal confidence.126
After the conspiracy was successful, the agreement of the majority of the powerful of the Visigoth kingdom, who were already dissatisfied, apparently legalised the rule of Roderich.
On the other hand Witiza died a natural death soon after his fall, so some assert, but according to others, cruelly tortured by Roderigo who had his eyes cut out. This last version is probable if one bears in mind that Witiza also had the eyes of Roderigo’s father cut out a couple of years before and had him murdered. Witiza thus had nothing good to expect of the son of Teodofredos, who was tortured in the described manner and way.
In this manner international Jewry repaid the great good deeds of Witiza, who not only released the Jew-Christians of the kingdom from slavery, but also called back the Jews from exile, allowed them all to freely practise the Jewish religion, appointed them to high positions and displayed complete trust in them in relation to Christian-Jewish reconciliation and the brotherhood of the peoples.
For the Jewish imperialists the friendship of Christians or pagans is only a means, in order to have advantages which make easier the task of Jewry to destroy its foes through the destruction of their inner defence and to conquer the remaining peoples. All in all they also finally betray and in a cruel manner and way the simpletons who throw themselves into their arms or unconsciously join in their game. Woe to the wretches who allow themselves to be deceived through the proofs of friendship and the countless examples for the tragic end of those who childishly believed in such friendship and allowed themselves to be bluffed through such proven diplomacy.
The decisive influence which the Jew Eudon, the minister of state of King Roderich, must have had on this man, who did not even wish to be king and only agreed after the repeated visits of the Jews, is easily understandable. For in the first place the originator of a new political situation has at least for a time influence accordingly, and there is no sign that the weak Roderich, who had also given himself up to vice and debauchery, would have attempted to shatter the power of his minister of state. On the other side the policy of Roderich was already so suicidal that it clearly was influenced by those who planned his destruction and hence the destruction of Christianity with the declining Visigoth kingdom. The favourable influence which Relayo, the leader of the royal guard, might have been able to exert is not to be traced, and it is clear that others determined the policy of the weak monarch, who transferred the command over a part of his army to the archbishop Oppas. The latter was not only a close relative of Witiza’s, but also his right hand in the leadership of the catastrophic church policy of the monarch. In addition King Roderich, particularly as the Musulmans with aid of the Jews undertook the invasion of the kingdom from the south, was occasioned to undertake a campaign in the north to conquer the Basque land, which the Goths had never been able to conquer.
The historian Ricardo C. Albanés alludes to the fact that Tarik ben-Ziyad in those days was able to push forward the front by four thousand Saracens up to present-day North Morocco and he goes on: “At that time the traitorous Count Julan, the governor of Ceuta and one of the conspirators, surrendered to him this valuable key position to the Straits of Gibraltar, encouraged him to immediately move over to Spain, and offered himself as leader. At the court in Toledo these events were attributed no importance and they were shelved as risky enterprise, which could easily be prevented by Teodomiro, the duke of Bética (Andalusia). On the contrary, the king was even persuaded to move with his army to Northern Spain, in order to conquer the land of the Basques, which even the most mighty Gothic monarchs had not succeeded in doing. And to make this mobilisation final, Pamplona rebelled – caused through the intrigues and the gold of the powerful old Jewish organisation in this city. Meanwhile Tarik at the head of the Berbers crossed over the Straits of Gibraltar and defeated the armies of the loyal Teodomiro in the Bética. This war-skilled general then wrote the famous letter to Roderich – which was found in the Basque land – in which he anxiously begged for help.”127
When the sons of Witiza and the treacherous archbishop Oppas had already concluded a secret alliance with the Jews and Musulmans, Roderich committed the deadly fault of transferring to them the command over an important part of the army, which was to supply the decisive battle against the invading Musulmans. On the eve of the battle, which the Spaniards call the Guadalete, the sons of Witiza treated with the Gothic nobles and the Jewish conspirators. This is reported in the Arabic Chronicle “Abjar Machmua” and laid in the mouth of the nobles: “This son of a dog, Roderich, has gained power over our kingdom, although he does not belong to our kingly family and is rather one of our lowly. These tribes from Africa do not come in order to settle in our land but solely and only in order to get plunder. When they have attained their intention, they will withdraw again and leave us alone. Let us flee in the moment of struggle, and this misery will be conquered.128
The twelve thousand Musulmans sent by Tarik fought on the next day against the hundred thousand of Roderich, the Christians led by archbishop Oppas and by the sons of Witiza. The battle naturally developed favourably for the Visigoths. But at a convenient moment the traitorous archbishop and the two sons of Witiza did not flee but went over with their armies to the Islamic side and destroyed – as the Arab Chronicler “Al-Makkari” reports – the rest of the troops who had remained loyal to King Roderich.129
As most historians assert, Roderich lost his life in this decisive battle. In different regions of Spain the memory still lives on today of the treachery of archbishop Oppas, who, as worthy imitator of Judas Iscariot, betrayed Christ and Holy Church and worked decisively with the latter’s enemies for the destruction of Christianity in the once glittering Visigoth kingdom. As a great friend of the Jews, like his relative Witiza, he finally betrayed, together with the Jews, his country and the Church in a fateful way. The Jews now utilised the almighty power of pagan Rome.
Unfortunately in the present time there are in the upper clergy many who act exactly in the same way as archbishop Oppas and in secret alliance with Jewry make easier the successes of Communism and of Freemasonry, while hampering the clergy as well as the worldly leaders who defend Holy Church or their country, which are threatened by Jewish imperialism and its Freemasonic or Communist revolutions, exactly as the archbishop Oppas attacked in the back the army of Rodrigos, who defended Christianity in these decisive moments.
May our Lord Jesus stand by Holy Church and mankind against the treachery of the Oppases of the 20th century!
In the Spanish Encyclopaedia “Espasa Calpe” there is a report based on Christian Chronicles concerning the treachery of archbishop Oppas: “After the troops of Tarik had been reinforced through 5,000 Berbers – whom Murza had mustered – many Jews and the Christian supporters of Witiza (a total of about 25,000 against 40,000) took on the battle. This lasted two days, and on the first day the Visigoths were at au advantage, because the Berbers had no cavalry. Then Sisberto and Oppas committed treachery and went over to the enemy. Although the centre of the army under the king fought bravely, it was defeated (19th and 20th June 711).”130
Concerning the treachery of the archbishop Oppas, who lost a great empire for Christianity, the Jesuit historian of the 16th century, Juan de Mariana, reports. He describes how this prelate at first aided the sons of Witiza in the preparations for the black conspiracy, and then he writes about the role which Oppas played in the decisive battle: “The victory was doubtful almost the entire day, undecided. Only the Moors showed weakness, and it appeared as if they wished to turn back and flee, when – oh, unbelievable wickedness! – the archbishop Oppas, who until then had kept concealed his treachery – as he intended – suddenly went over to the side of the enemy with his men. He joined forces with Julian, who had gathered around him a great number of Goths, and attacked our men at their weakest place. The latter were astonished at such a great treachery and were too exhausted by the fight to withstand this new onslaught, so that they could easily be defeated and driven to flight.”131
It is only natural that there are differences in the figures given by Christian and Musulman historians for both armies. But without doubt the Christian army was in all cases numerically larger than the Saracen and only through the betrayal of Archbishop Oppas and the conspiracy principally directed by the “Jewish Fifth Column” could such a great kingdom be conquered so quickly by a small army. With justice King Roderich scarcely attached importance to the Islamic army, for this consisted only of a small contingent of the invading army. But he did not reckon with the secretly planned treachery and also not with the extraordinary power of the “Jewish Fifth Column,” which – as we shall later prove – played a decisive role in this struggle. May with God’s will the nations of the free world learn from history and, if they also hold themselves far stronger than the nations ruled by Communism, they should nevertheless still keep before their eyes that in a war all their calculations could be fatefully false, if one permits the “Jewish Fifth Column” to secretly undermine the free states. For at the given moment they can bring the defence to a complete collapse and aid Communism to an easy victory.
In order to complete these proofs for the destruction of a Christian state more than twelve hundred years ago and its responsibility through the “Jewish Fifth Column” by the foes of Christianity, we will quote different historical evidence by Christians, Musulmans and Jews, from which it is revealed with certainty that the Jews in the Gothic kingdom and outside it stood in close connection with the Musulman invasion and supported it in different ways. All sources which we quote are undisputed and originate from respected chroniclers and historians. In addition, it is improbable that in the midst of this centuries-long deadly war between Christians and Musulmans both parties would have united in blaming the Jews for the betrayal of the state in which they lived. The Jewish authors are, however, likewise of one opinion with that previously quoted concerning this historical event.
The renowned Marcelino Menendez Pelayo, the world-renowned historian of the past century, writes the following: “It is proved that the Jews living in Spain infamously supported the invasion of the Arabs and opened to them the gates of the most important cities.”132
Reinhart Dozy, the Dutch historian descended from the Huguenots, who enjoyed such high regard in the last century, gives in his masterwork “History of the Musulmans in Spain” a series of details from which is revealed that the Jews gave the Saracens valuable aid and made easier to them the conquest of the Gothic kingdom.133
Dr. Abraham Leo Sachar, the American Jewish historian and director of the Hillel Foundation for the Universities in the USA, stresses among other things, in his work “History of the Jews,” that Arab armies had crossed over the Straits separating them from Spain and taken control of the land. In so doing the decadent position of the Visigoth kingdom and also without doubt the sympathetic conduct of the Jews were of value.134
The Committee for Jewish education of the United Synagogues, which has its seat in New York, officially published the work of Deborah Pessin “The Jewish People,” in which it is stated: “In the year 711 Spain was conquered by the Musulmans, and the Jews greeted them with jubilation. From the lands to which they had fled, they returned to Spain. They stormed towards the conquerors and helped them to capture the cities.”135 This official Jewish publication briefly summarises the activity of the Jews, which is proved to reveal two aspects: On the one side the Jews in North Africa, who had emigrated from Spain a century before, joined together with the invading Musulman armies. On the other side the Jewish inhabitants of the Gothic kingdom, the “Fifth Column”, opened the gates of the kingdom to the invaders and destroyed the defence from within.
The Jewish-German historian Josef Kastein writes in his work “Geschichte und Schicksal der Judan” (History and Destiny of the Jews), which he dedicated with deep respect to Albert Einstein: “The Berbers helped the Arab movement with their expansion to Spain, while the Jews supported the enterprise with money and men. In 711 the Berbers led by Tarik crossed the Straits and took Andalusia, The Jews provided pickets and garrisons for the district.”136
This Jewish historian thus reveals to us the valuable fact that the Jews financially supported the invasion and conquest of the Visigoth kingdom.
The Jewish historian Graetz mentions that the Jews in North Africa and in Spain were active in the conquest of the Visigoth kingdom through the Musulmans and states further: “After the battle of Jerez (July 711) and the death of Rodrigo, the last king of the Goths, the victorious Arabs advanced further, and everywhere they were supported by the Jews. In every conquered city the Musulman generals could leave behind a small garrison of their own troops, for they needed their men in order to subject the land. Therefore they authorised the Jews with guarding the captured places. Thus the Jews, who had once lived in servitude, became masters over Cordoba, Malaga and many other cities.”137
The rabbi S. Raisin alludes to the fact that the invasion in Gothic Spain was carried out by an army “of twelve thousand Jews and Moors”, which was led by a Jew converted to Islam, the son of Cahenas, a heroine who belonged to a Jewish Berber tribe and was the mother of Tarik-es-Saids. It is then further revealed: “In the battle of Jerez (711) the Visigoth king Rodrigo was defeated by one of the generals of Cahenas Tarif-es-Said”, a Jew of the tribe of Simon. “Therefore the island was given the name Tarifa. He was the first Moor who trod upon Spanish soil.”138
It is strange that this rabbi, although he writes that Tarik-es-Said had gone over to the Mohammedan faith, calls him a Jew of the tribe of Simon. Whoever knows how to value the conversion of the Jews to another religion can easily explain this, for, apart from rare exceptions, these conversions were always false.
The Arab historians mention in their Chronicles that the Jews assisted in the invasion and conquest of the Visigoth kingdom. In a Chronicle consisting of a collection of traditions, which was compiled in the 11th century and is known as “Abjar Machmua”, among other things the conspiracy of the Jews against Rodrigo is mentioned.
These Jews joined together on the eve of the decisive battle in the Visigoth camp with the sons of Witiza and the dissatisfied Gothic nobles. Still further details are known about the complicity of the Jews living in Spain, for, as it is stated, the Musulmans, if many Jews lived in a city, leave the guarding to the latter, together with a company of Musulmans, while the main army moved on. In other cases they entrusted the guarding of conquered cities solely to the Jews, without leaving behind an Islamic detachment. Thus it is stated in the Arab Chronicle mentioned, concerning the capture of Cordoba: “Moguits assembled the Jews in Cordoba and entrusted them with the guarding of the city”, and concerning Seville, “Muza entrusted the guarding of the city to the Jews.” The same is reported of Elvira (Granada) and other cities.139
The Saracen historian Al-Makkari gives us no less interesting details concerning this matter and writes concerning the invading Musulmans: “They usually assembled the Jews with some Musulmans in the fortresses and authorised them with the guarding of the cities, so that the rest of the troops could move on to other places.”140
The Islamic Chronicler Abn-el-Athir provides us with various details in his Chronicle “El Kamel” concerning the Musulman invasion in the Gothic kingdom and the Jewish complicity in this. These details are also later confirmed by the Musulman historian “Ibn-Kahldoun” born in Tunis in 1332 in his renowned “History of the Berbers”. From him we take over the following details, because it is of great importance, in order to make clear what the Jews understand by Christian-Jewish reconciliation or brotherhood.
Ibn-Khaldoun bases himself upon Ibn-el-Athir and writes that, after the Musulmans had captured Toledo, “the remaining detachments conquered the other cities to which they had been sent, and that Tarik left behind in Toledo Jews with one or others of his companions and used them...”141
And what happened to the Christian civil population when the latter was delivered to the Jews?
Can it be possible that the Christian-Jewish reconciliation and friendship, which the Jews betrayed, as we have already sufficiently proved, now when they had already bound their victims, served to allow mildness and tolerance to govern?
The Chronicle of Bishop Lucas de Tuy provides us with revealing details in this respect. The representation of the events is later repeated by almost all Toledo historians. When the Visigoth capital was occupied by Tarik-ben-Zeyad, “the Christians left the city, in order to celebrate in the nearby Basilica of Santa Leocadia the passion of the Saviour on Palm Sunday (715). The Jews utilised their absence, delivered the throne of Leovigild and Reccared to the Musulmans, and the Christians were murdered partly in the open air and partly in the Basilica itself.”142
The Jewish historian Graetz gives a version, which agrees with the preceding. He writes, that, when Tarik appeared before Toledo, this city was guarded by a small garrison and that, “while the Christians prayed in the church for the salvation of their land and their religion, the Jews opened the gates to the victorious Arabs on Palm Sunday 712, received them with applause and thus avenged the misery, which they had had to suffer in the course of a century at the time of Reccared and Sisebutus.”143Naturally this Jewish historian does not mention the murders of Christians, which then followed and which the Bishop Lucas de Tuy expressly describes in his Chronicle and the majority of the ancient historians from Toledo. For this there exists an interesting case of precedence: Approximately a century before, the Byzantine Emperor Heraclius had urged the Visigoth monarchs to drive the Jews from Spain since their presence in Christian states represented a danger for the latter’s existence. He quotes the fact that the Jews “bought 80,000 captive Christians from Cosroes, whom they killed without pity.”144 Unfortunately Sisebutus in no way exterminated the dangerous deadly “Fifth Column” at its root, but had the Jews choose between expulsion and conversion. As a result he caused the majority to apparently convert themselves to Christianity and thus made the “Jewish Fifth Column” in the Christian State into a “Fifth Column” in the church itself, as a result of which they became still more dangerous.
Without doubt Musulmans and Jews must have participated in the murders of Christians, even if on the one side the mildness and tolerance of the Arab conquerors in Spain is even recognised by Jewish writers, and on the other side the facts prove that the Jews always, when they could satisfy their hatred on the Christians, organised murders and then had them carried out by the pagans in Rome. On the other side a victorious heresy or revolution led by Jewry has often degenerated into murder of Christians, not to speak of Jewish-Communist revolutions of our days, where mass murders are the order of the day.
In face of the recognised tolerance of the victorious Arabs in Spain and of the facts which we investigate, one can easily imagine who were the chief instigators of the massacre of Christians in the subjugated Gothic kingdom.
However this may be, one thing is clear: The Christian-Jewish policy of reconciliation, which Witiza began in the Visigoth kingdom, had catastrophic consequences, for in the long run it brought the destruction of a Christian state, the loss of the independence of the country and even cruel murder of countless Christians.
In conclusion we will quote what the great friend of the Jews, José Amador de los Rios, who cannot be accused of Antisemitism, writes about the Musulman invasion: “And how in the meantime did the Jewish people behave? Did it perhaps arm for defence of its chosen fatherland? Or did it remain neutral in the midst of such devastations when no resistance could be offered further against the onward storm of the victors? The love of one’s country, i.e., the love of the earth, where one was born and gratitude for the last Statutes of the Goth Kings certainly ought to have occasioned that people to put together all its powers with those of the Visigoth nation, in order to ward off the foreign invasion, and also at the same time to open its gold coffers, in order to satisfy the urgent needs of the state. But against these reflections stood the ancient hatred and the lively memory of a disgraceful past. On the other side the situation brought to the Jews as a people which had its home in all corners of earth, their general and special interests, their customs and a permanently erroneous mode of life, the wish and striving for what was new, while their powerful religious fanaticism impelled them to turn against their hated hosts as enemies of their faith, in order to hasten their destruction and ruin. Thus the Musulman conquest on the entire Iberian peninsula was furthered and spread. Noble cities, in which the wealthy Jewish race was represented in great number and which would without doubt have cost the armies of Tarik and Muzas much blood, were handed over to them by the Jews, who later expected them and joined in brotherhood with the Africans.”145
Finally we will quote two very interesting details, which the official monumental work of Jewry, the Jewish-Spanish Encyclopaedia, makes. Under the word “Espana” (Spain) it is expressly stated: “It is undisputed that Muza, who in spite of the convincing demands of the party of Witiza was still unresolved to send his armies to Spain, decided finally only upon the secret information of the Spanish Jews who reported to the Emir concerning the military incapacity of the crown, the ruinous condition of the castles, the exhausted state treasury and the embitterment of the nobility and of the people at the general oppression.” Then it is stated further: “On 19th July 711, Tarik146annihilated the Visigoths in the battle of Jana, or on the Guadalete, in which Rodrigo apparently lost his life. At this historic encounter one saw many Jews from North Africa fight on the side of the victor. Immediately their Spanish fellow believers rebelled everywhere, and placed themselves at the disposal of Tarik and Muza...”147
In this chapter, we wished to provide an idea of how, twelve hundred years ago, Jewish imperialism and its “Fifth Column” in the bosom of the Church destroyed a Christian state. But we can give the assurance that experience in twelve centuries has helped Jewish Imperialism and its “Fifth Column” to perfect their methods down to the last detail.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
THE CHURCH COUNCILS FIGHT JEWRY
In face of the repeated false conversions of the Jews to Christianity, Holy Church attempted to seize upon various precautionary measures, which were approved at the individual Councils.
The Council of Agde – a city in South Gaul – which took place in the year 506 under the protection of Saint Caesarius, the primate of the province of Arles, and was tolerated by Alaric, ordered the following: “Law 34. Concerning the acceptance of Jews who wish to be converted. Since the falsehood of the Jews often breaks out again, they shall, if they wish to be converted to Catholic law, be catechism pupils for eight months, and if it is revealed that they come in purity of faith, they shall be baptised after this period”...148 The facts show, however, that this term of trial had no value for the guarantee of the honesty of their confessions.
At the Trulanian Council, in the year 692, which is authoritative as a supplementary Council to the 5th and 6th Ecumenical Councils, it was announced that the heresy of Nestorius was renewing Jewish godlessness, and in Canon 1 it is stated: “We also simultaneously recognise the doctrine which two hundred divine fathers spread in Ephesus, who prosecuted the foolish division of Nestorius as deviating from the divine destiny, who declared that Jesus Christ was a man for himself, and thus renewed the Jewish blasphemy.” In Canon XI the priests were threatened with deposition if they maintained close relations with the Jews. Thus one sees that in such distant times the clergy who entered into dangerous friendships with the Jews were a veritable nightmare for Holy Church and it was necessary to order punishments – even the deposing of Jew-friendly clergy. Concerning this it is stated in Canon XI: “No priest or layman shall eat the Matzo of the Jews, maintain intimate relationship with them, visit them when they are ill, receive medicines from them, or bathe in their company. Whoever acts against this statute, will be deposed if he is a priest and if layman expelled from the Church.”149
Through this measure, Holy Church did not turn away from its Christian neighbourly love, which it has always fought for, with, among other things, the noble custom of visiting the sick. The universally proven fact was known to the prelates of this Holy Council that the Jews always even utilised the most magnanimous works of Christian neighbourly love in order to gain influence upon the Christians and to undermine our holy religion. Thus the prelates regrettably saw themselves compelled to forbid everything which could have led to dangerous friendship between Christians and Jews and brought the Christians into the danger of being delivered to the ancient wolves. Undoubtedly Holy Church was in the right when it threatened the clergy with deposition and the Jew-friendly laymen with exclusion from the Church, for these intimacies are, the closer they become, proven to be always to have been a deadly danger for Christianity. What would happen if this Holy Church Canon were applied to the present day clergy, who are so intimate with the Jews and closely befriended and are united with them in those so-called Jewish-Christian brotherhoods? If this canon were applied to them, one would advance a great step forward with the salvation of the Church from the deadly sabotage of the “Jewish Fifth Column” in the clergy.
THE 2ND ECUMENICAL COUNCIL OF NICAEA (787) AND THE SECRET JEWS
The plague of the false Christians, who were Jews in secret, had become so dangerous for Christianity at the end of the 8th century and especially after the Visigoth kingdom had fallen into the hands of the Musulmans, that it was resolved at the 2nd Ecumenical Council of Nicaea that it was to be preferred that the Christians who secretly practised the Jewish religion, should be Jews openly and not false Christians. The anti-Christian activity of the Jews in the bosom of Holy Church, who soon spread revolutionary heresies, conspired against the Kings, or made agreements with the Musulmans and delivered the Christian states to them, had called forth such grave concern in Christianity, that Holy Church preferred to see that they were known publicly as Jews and were not false Christians. Thus the Church preferred to have the enemy outside and not in its own ranks. The measures passed by the Holy Synod in this sense could not have been bolder. But unfortunately the great advantages were already known to the Jews, which they possessed through their infiltration into the bosom of the Church and Christian society.
In Canon VIII of the 2nd Ecumenical Council of Nicaea it was expressly stated: “And because some Jews pretended to be Christians, but remained Jews in secret and celebrate the Sabbath, we dispose that they be not admitted to the Communion, prayer or to the Church, but live as real Jews, do not baptise their children, and it shall not be allowed to them to buy or to own slaves. But if someone is converted in purity and honesty... then shall he and his sons be admitted and baptised, whereby caution is commanded that he does not allow himself to be again led astray. But if they do not conduct themselves so, they shall not be admitted.”150
The Ecumenical Council mentioned by us also condemned the heresy of the Iconoclasts. For the Jews there is nothing more hateful than the Catholic images of saints, which they describe as pictures of idols. Always when they had influence on a certain realm of Christianity, they have therefore attempted to abolish these images. The heresy of the iconoclasts was instigated by the Jews, for the false converts lived pleasantly with a Christianity without images, since it cost them effort to show the latter even the simplest honour. But practical as they are, they have nevertheless, when it was to their advantage, and in order not to offend the feelings of the Christian population, had to tolerate the cult of Saints and even decorated their dwellings with such images.
According to the Church historian Juan Tejada y Ramiro, a Jewish conjurer incited the Iconoclastic ideas with the Byzantine Emperor Leo the Isaurian. This monarch accepted these tendencies with great fanaticism and for a start had the image of our Lord Jesus Christ pulled down, which had been arranged high over the gate of Constantinople. According to this learned collector of Church canons, this image “was worshipped by the people to the embitterment of the Jews for many years.”151
At the Ecumenical Council mentioned by us measures were taken against heresy, among others, the deposing of those bishops, priests or deacons was ordered, who concealed the books with iconoclastic ideas. Thus it is ordered in Canon IX: “All the childish mockeries, harmful deviations and writings, which are falsely directed against the venerable images of Saints, shall be handed over to the Bishop of Constantinople so that they may be placed with the books of other heretics. But if anyone conceals these things, he shall, whether bishop, priest or deacon, be deposed, and if he is monk or layman, excommunicated.”152
Holy Church proceeded not only against the secret Jews and heretics, but also very energetically against the bishops and other clergy who supported the heresy and Jewry.
When the destructive activity of the “Fifth Column” increased, the defence of Holy Church was driven more and more to extremes. Already at this Holy Ecumenical Council of Nicaea, those bishops and clergy are threatened with deposition, who simply conceal the heretical books. What punishment then do the high clergy of the present day deserve, who not only conceal Freemasonic or Communist books, but actively collaborate, so that the Freemasonic and Communist heresies can destroy Christianity.
However, we come back to the iconoclastic Emperor Leo the Isaurian. In this connection it is worthy of note that the Jews experienced the same with him as with Martin Luther. At first he allied himself with them against the orthodoxy. But when he recognised the enormous danger which they represented for his kingdom, he attempted to evade this danger. He therefore seized upon the same lamentable methods as the Catholics and compelled the Jews to be converted to Christianity. He laid before them the choice of being converted or severely punished.
Concerning the honesty of this new general conversion of the Jews in Greece, the Balkans, a part of Asia Minor and the remaining regions of the Byzantine kingdom, the Jewish historian Graetz writes the following: “Leo the Isaurian, a farmer’s son, whose attention the Jews and Arabs directed to the idolatrous cult of saintly images (icons) which was practised in the churches, therefore fought to eliminate these images. Since he was accused by the clergy before the ignorant masses, who revered these holy images, of being a heretic and Jew, Leo again began to take his orthodoxy seriously and persecuted the heretics and Jews. He ordered in a decree, that all Jews of the Byzantine kingdom and of the mountains of Asia Minor, under threat of severe punishments, should accept the Christianity of the Greek Church (723). Many Jews fitted themselves into this Edict and allowed themselves to be baptised against their will. They were thus less constant than the mountain dwellers, who in order to remain true to their conviction, assembled in their house of prayer, set it on fire and perished in the flames. The Jews who allowed themselves to be baptised were of the opinion that the storm would soon pass and he would then allow them to return to Judaism. Therefore they certainly converted themselves outwardly to Christianity, but in secret they held to the Jewish rites...” And the renowned Jewish historian closes with the following, very interesting comment: “Thus the Jews of the Byzantine kingdom vanished before the constant persecutions and for a time they remained concealed from the eyes of history.”153
This vanishing on the part of Jewry, in order to remain hidden from the eyes of history – to use this fortunately chosen expression of Graetz’s – was always the most dangerous thing in the affair, since they grew from a visible “Fifth Column into a secret force, an invisible power, which is more difficult to combat as such. In the course of time the Balkans were completely undermined by this secret power and were later to become the most dangerous centre of the secret sects of the Cathars and later of the treacherous “Fifth Column,” which delivered the Christian kingdom to the Mohammedan Turks. In modern times the Balkans had become a breeding ground for the conspiratorial and terror organisations which had such great influence on the unleashing of the world war of 1914-1918. We will see later still how a similar vanishing act by Jewry, in order to remain concealed from the eyes of history, took place in the whole of France, England, Russia, Spain, Portugal, in isolated districts of Italy, Germany and other Christian countries, and in the long run had catastrophic consequences for these nations and the rest of mankind. Concerning the terrible struggle by Holy Church and the Christian monarchs against Jewry in France, we allow the Jewish historian Graetz to speak, who cannot be accused of antisemitism, and who is so respected in Jewish circles. He writes concerning King Sisismund of Burgundy: “This king was the first (in France) to set up barriers between Christians and Jews. He confirmed the resolution of the Council of Epaone, which took place under the presidency of the bloodthirsty Bishop Avitus, and at which it was even forbidden to laymen to participate in Jewish banquets (517). The hostility towards the Jews gradually spread from Burgundy to the other French provinces. Already at the 3rd and 4th Councils of Orleans (388 and 545) strict determinations were passed against them... At the Council of Macon (581) several resolutions were determined and the Jews allotted a subordinate position in society. They were forbidden to be judges and tax-collectors, and they were excluded from all positions which would have given them power over the Christian population. They were compelled to show the Christian priests the highest deference... Although King Chilperic was not very favourable to the Catholic clergy, he nevertheless followed the example of Avitus. He also forced the Jews in his kingdom to be baptised, and he personally went to the baptismal font as Father of the newly-converted. However, he was satisfied with the mere appearance of conversion, and he was not hostile to the Jews, when they continued to celebrate the Sabbath and followed the Jewish Laws.”154
This was a deplorable error on the part of this monarch who on the one side pressed the Jews to be converted and even served them as baptismal Father, but on the other side permitted the new Christians to continue to practise the Jewish religion in secret. Thus he furthered the creation and strengthening of this secret power, which was to call forth in France in the coming centuries so much disunity and revolutions.
Concerning this conversion of the Jews at the time of Chilperic, St. Gregory the Bishop of Tours reports to us – who with full right is called the father of French history – that among those compulsorily converted belonged Priscus – the royal treasurer, an office which today corresponds to that of chancellor of the exchequer155 – who, because he refused to be converted, was imprisoned and was later murdered by another converted Jew. The latter in turn was killed by a relative of the former royal chancellor of the exchequer.156 The case of Priscus was a hard blow for the Jews, who preferred to have one of themselves as state treasurer, in order to thus exert a decisive influence upon the Christian monarchs and utilise the reputation of the Jews and false Jewish Christians as good financiers. Concerning Clotaire II and the Holy Council of Paris, Graetz writes: “The last kings of the Merovingians were always more fanatical in their hatred towards the Jews. Clotaire II, who ruled over the whole of France, was, however, regarded as a model of religious devoutness. He approved the resolutions of the Council of Paris, which excluded the Jews from authoritative offices and from the army.” (615)157
Here Graetz not only uses the traditional method of sullying the memory of the rulers who acted against the Jewish danger, but also then expresses a great truth: that a Christian, the more fanatical he is, must also be against the Jews (the Jews describe a Christian as fanatical, who defends his religion and his fatherland). This is nothing extraordinary, if one reflects that the Jews are the chief enemies of Christianity and of the human race and understands, that the defenders of the Church, of the fatherland or of mankind, must also energetically oppose the greatest enemy, if they do not wish to be subjected in defence. Therefore, the great father of the Church, Saint Jerome has said that, if it were necessary to abhor the Jews and Judaism in order to be a good Christian, then he would do it in exemplary form. Only the false Christians, who secretly practise the Jewish religion, will not recognise this traditional doctrine of the Church and attempt to make us believe that it is a sin to oppose the Jews and their satanic imperialism, in order as a result to cripple the defence of the Church and Christian people.
In connection with this bitter struggle between Holy Church and the Synagogue, the Rabbi Jakob S. Raisin writes that, even in Gaul during the time of Clovis who destroyed Arianism, Bishop Avitus stirred up the masses on Ascension Day to destroy the Synagogue.158 We have already seen that the Jewish historian Graetz describes this prelate as a “bloodthirsty bishop”.
As one sees, this Holy Synod also wished to avoid that secret Jewry continued to exist, which could also have been avoided if it had been attained that the Christians of Jewish origin had not been introduced into Jewry. In order to avoid this, the Holy Council suspended the punishment of confiscation of property against the transgressors. One sees that the prelates of the Council knew the problems well.
The Jewish historian Josef Kastein affirms in connection with the then hard struggle between Holy Church and the Jews: “The Christian Church, be it now in Italy or Gaul, in France or Spain, declared war on Jewry.”160 In our time Holy Church would doubtless have been condemned by the accomplices of the Synagogue in the ranks of Christianity on account of race hatred or anti-Semitism. The zealous and passionate Rabbi Raisin reports how then, later in Toulouse, three times a year, at first all Jews of the city and afterwards only their rabbis were whipped through the streets, “under the pretext that the Jews had once attempted to deliver the city to the Moors.”161
This attempt by the “Jewish Fifth Column” in France is very well known, which, just as with the “Jewish Fifth Column” in the Gothic kingdom, wished to deliver this other Christian kingdom to the Musulmans. Luckily Charles Martell condemned this criminal attempt to failure forever. After the Christian murders in Spain, the alarm of the inhabitants of Toulouse against the Jews is understandable. It is very regrettable that the Jews therefore had to accept a whipping several times a year. But one must reflect that in all nations of the world not only whipping but the death penalty exists for this kind of betrayal.
With Dagobert I, the Merovingian monarchy attained its highest peak. Its possessions stretched from the Elbe to the Pyrenees and from the Atlantic up to the frontiers of Bohemia and Hungary. Dagobert I, the son of Clotaire II, had, as long as he was not of age, Arnulf, the Bishop of Metz, as guardian, and then left important government offices to highly respected Saints recognised by the Church, as for example, St. Ovanus, whom he made chancellor of Neustria and who later became Bishop of Rouen, and St. Eloy, whom he appointed state treasurer, and who was chosen as bishop of Noyon when he withdrew from the world.
The situation of Christianity in this realm was extremely serious, for it was completely permeated by false Christians, whose hypocrisy Chilperic had tolerated, as we already described. Dagobert I led a disorderly sexual life, and his renowned counsellors could not prevent him from doing this. But on the other side he recognised – perhaps on account of the education taught him and upon the advice of these holy men – the danger which the Jews represented in his realm of rule. Many then pretended to be Christians and therefore he attempted to apply a radical method: In the year 629 he passed a decree, in which it was stated that the Jews in the kingdom must be converted by a fixed day honestly to Christianity or be regarded as enemies and be condemned to death.
Dagobert interpreted the problem thus, because he regarded the Jews as enemies, which rested upon the centuries-old truth of how Saint Paul himself, with divine insight, described them as enemies of all men. The most serious thing about the matter was that they were once again given the possibility in France and South Germany of escaping with their skins. This cardinal error was made centuries later by all Christian monarchs, for the Jews always swore and promised, in order to save themselves, to be in future honest true Christians and simultaneously concealed with still greater skill their secret Judaism. It would have been better if Dagobert had expelled them in masses – in the same way every harmful foreign conspirator is expelled from the land, whose hospitality he betrays – and thus had given them the possibility to be honestly converted to Christianity in other lands. Thus would France and Germany have freed themselves from the terrible “Fifth Column” and the destructive secret power, which has finally controlled the whole of France to the harm of Christianity and of the French.
Jewry again vanished once more for a time from the surface, in order in dangerous form in all realms of the Frankish kingdom, in the clergy and at the court, to gain admittance, and called forth years later the terrible decline of Christianity at the time of Louis (Ludwig) the Pious.
In conclusion let us say something about the origin of the German Jews, whose blond hair and blue eyes stand in contrast to the other types of Jews. Graetz explains the origin of the Jews in South Germany in the following way: “A large number of German soldiers took part with the legions in the destruction of the temple of Jerusalem. Many of them chose from the great number of captives the most beautiful women and took them with them to the banks of the Rhine and Maine. The children of these unions were half Jews and half Germans and were introduced by their mothers to Judaism, for their father raised no objections in this regard.”162 If one reflects that the apparent conversions of the Jews to Christianity began in the German possessions of the Merovingians already at the time of Chilperic and Dagobert I, one will understand, that the “Jewish Fifth Column” in Germany already existed a very remote time ago, and that therefore the Nazis committed the gravest fault when they believed all secret branches of Jewry could be identified through a genealogical investigation of only three generations.
CHAPTER TWENTY
AN ATTEMPT TO BRING THE HOLY ROMAN GERMANIC EMPIRE UNDER JEWISH RULE
The following facts are of great importance for the religious and political leaders of all times, for Jewry, especially its clandestine form, represents a concealed power, whose danger under certain circumstances is not discernible even for the most talented leaders in its whole extent. Thus the skilled diplomacy of the synagogue can occasion them to commit faults which could have catastrophic consequences for their nation and often for the entire world.
What happened to one of the greatest political geniuses of the Christian era should draw the attention of all those leaders or personages who, underestimating the wickedness and danger of the Jews and attracted by the monetary advantages so alluringly offered to their collaborators, start playing with fire and believe they will not get themselves burned. In this they are perhaps influenced by that natural tendency to regard themselves as all-powerful, a trait so often found – and often with good reason – among the great men of mankind.
Charlemagne, who built up again the western Roman Empire and protected Holy Church, who gave an impetus to science, the arts and trade, and was one of the most important political geniuses of all times had, however, one weakness: He was subjected to the skilled deceit and diplomacy of Jewry, which utilised in its favour the characteristic wish of the grandson of Charles Martel for unity of the peoples and races, his inborn sympathy with the oppressed and persecuted and the correct desire on the other side of the monarch, to enlarge and strengthen his kingdom through the extension of trade. Thus he released the beast which the Merovingians, with good reason and insight, had laid in chains, and gave back to it freedom of movement, without taking into regard that as a result he violated the canons of Holy Church, to whom on the other side he conceded all possible advantages.
With their skill tested in the course of centuries the Jews understood how to arouse the inborn sympathy of the Emperor for the oppressed, and attained that he allowed them all possible freedoms. As usual they were able to transform this pity into sympathy and to convince him that the greatness of the kingdom could only be secured with their economic power, and that again could be achieved with the development of a flourishing trade. Since the Jews had then almost a monopoly, they convinced the Emperor of the utility of using them to extend the trade of the Holy Empire to the whole world. One can easily imagine how attractive such a prospect was at a time when the nobility devoted itself exclusively to the art of war, the slaves cultivated the land, and the Jews or secret Jewish Christians were almost the sole ones who carried on trading activity.
Concerning the new policy of Charles the Great in the face of the Jews, the Jewish historian Graetz confirms: “Although Charlemagne was a protector of the church and helped to establish the supremacy of the Papacy, and Pope Hadrian, a contemporary of the Emperor, was absolutely no friend of the Jews and had repeatedly summoned the Spanish bishops to ensure that the Christians did not have relations with the Jews and pagans, Charlemagne in no way shared the prejudices of the clergy towards the Jews. Against all statutes of the Church and the resolutions of the Councils the first Frank Emperor favoured the Jews in his kingdom... The Jews were in that time the principal representatives of world trade. While the nobles turned to war affairs, the plebs to crafts, and the farmers and slaves turned to agriculture, the Jews were not allowed to perform military service and possessed no hired land, but directed their attention to the import and export of goods and slaves, so that the favour of Charlemagne was in certain respect a privilege for the trading folk.”163
The Jewish historian Josef Kastein writes about Charlemagne: “He knew exactly how to evaluate the Jews as a principal support of international trade. Their connections stretched from France as far as India and China. Their communities in the whole world functioned as agencies. They knew many languages in an admirable way and were astonishingly well suited as linking-parts between East and West.”164
If the Jewish historians elaborate their possibilities so emphatically to us today, then one can easily imagine how they introduced their plans to Charlemagne in order to gain his support.
But they not only attained this support in trade, but also applied their traditional tactics and attempted, when they had once attained this position, to conquer a further one, afterwards the next, later another, etc. The Jew Sedechias became confiding doctor of the Emperor, as a result of which the Jews gained admittance to the court, and one soon sees them there in important posts of the diplomatic service of Charlemagne. The latter sent Isaak the Jew as ambassador to the court of Harun al Raschids165, under whose government the Caliphate of Baghdad reached its highest point. On the other side the Caliph was justly alarmed at the increasing power of Jewry in the Islamic lands and undertook defensive measures against this. Among other things he compelled the Jews to wear a sign which distinguished them from the Musulmans. These measures stood in unmistakeable contradiction to the protection which the Christian Emperor granted them.166
The Jew Graetz asserts that the protection of Charlemagne made easier the appearance of the Jews in North Germany and their penetration into the Slavic lands.
The activity of the Jews at the time of Charlemagne shows us how the Jews applied new tactics, which consisted in conducting themselves well and serving the Christian monarch loyally, so that the latter removed the chains which hampered them in their freedom of movement and then gradually gained high positions in the Christian state. At that time they withheld themselves from all revolutionary activity, as long as the genial powerful monarch lived, who would doubtless have overthrown them at the first false step, enjoyed in the meantime the Imperial protection, and gained more and more in power, in order at the suitable moment to carry out the treacherous blow. This occurred after the death of the Emperor, when a mediocre, weak-willed, irresolute and easily influenced man followed him on the throne.
When Charlemagne died, his son Ludwig (Louis) succeeded him, who, on account of his extreme piety during his first years of rule, received the surname of the Pious. Unfortunately, he was an untalented, weak-willed man, who easily fell into the hands of flatterers and those who knew how to handle him.
When he ascended the throne, he began to expel his half-brothers and later the ministers of his father from the land. He had the eyes cut out of Bernhard, the king of Italy, who had risen against him. All these facts show that the so-called piety of the monarch did not extend as far as it appeared.
When his first wife died, he married Judith, who appeared at the court with a retinue of Jews and, as the new Empress, exerted, together with the royal chancellor (treasurer) Bernhard, a decisive influence upon the monarch. The latter allowed declared Jews and Christians of Jewish origin at the court, which is not further to be wondered at, if one reflects that he had seen from youth onwards how his father protected the Jews and entrusted high offices to them.
If now Christian, anti-Jewish leaders with insuperable energy had not fought against the Jewish beast, the Holy Roman German Empire would perhaps have been subjected eleven centuries ago to Jewish Imperialism. If this kingdom had fallen, which was the mightiest of the then world, Jewry would perhaps have been successful in conquering the whole earth in a short time.
The Rabbi Jakob S. Raisin writes about Ludwig the Pious: “Ludwig the Pious (814-40) went still further than his father. He informed the bishops, abbots, counts, prefects, governors and others, that the Jews stood under the protection of the Emperor and might be disturbed neither in the practising of their religion nor in their business trade.” He then enumerates further privileges, which Ludwig allowed the Jews, and it is further stated: “And since the Jews made no business on the Sabbath, the market day was transferred to Sunday. Ludwig also appointed a special judge for the defence of the Jews against the intolerance of the clergy.” And concerning the struggle of Agobard, the archbishop of Lyon, and St. Bernhard, the archbishop of Vienna, against the Jews, the zealous Rabbi says: “The reaction of the Church to the measures of Ludwig to lift certain legal restrictions laid on the Jews, found expression through Agobard, the archbishop of Lyons (779-840), who, together with St. Bernhard, the archbishop of Vienna, deposed the Emperor, who on his side deposed them. In four letters to the king they complained about these people (the Jews), ‘who invested themselves with the Curse as with a dress’, and boasted of being highly valued by the king and by the nobility, so that on the other side the women observed the Sabbath with the Jews, worked on Sunday, shared their fast foods, and that the Jews not only concerted the pagan slaves, but in their capacity as tax-collectors bribed the fanners and seduced them to confess to Judaism, by their lessening these taxes or excusing them therefrom.”168 As one sees, the Jews utilised to a great extent the protection of the Emperor and of the nobility and even their position as tax collectors, in order to press the Christian peoples to confess to Judaism and to give up their own belief. Then without doubt the Synagogue wished to rule the peoples through conversion at the gate. The methods have been different at different times and in the individual lands, but the purpose was always the same, i.e. the conquest and ruling of the peoples who naively tolerated the Jews in their realm.
St. Bernhard, the archbishop of Vienna, and Agobard, the archbishop of Lyon, fought in common this struggle for life and death. For those who wish to investigate the Jewish problem, Agobard’s book against the Jews makes interesting reading, and was written with the valuable cooperation of St. Bernhard of Vienna.
The Jewish historian Josef Kastein writes, that Ludwig the Pious “took not only individual Jews but entire communities under his personal protection and allowed them rights and a Magister Judaeorum, who was to ensure that these rights were respected.”169
In order to provide ourselves with a better idea of the serious position of Christianity under this disastrous government, we once again allow the highly-regarded Jewish historian Heinrich Graetz to speak. He writes concerning the conduct of the Emperor towards the Jews: “He took them under his special protection and defended them against the injustices of the barons and of the clergy. They had the right of dwelling everywhere in the kingdom. In spite of countless laws that forbade this, they could not only employ Christian workers but also import slaves. The clergy were forbidden to baptise the slaves of the Jews and to give them the possibility of regaining their freedom. On their account the market was changed from Saturday to Sunday... In addition they were freed from the severe fire and water tests. They were also tax collectors and had through this privilege a great power over the Christians, even if this was also contrary to the Church Canons.”170
These facts reveal to us in what measure the Jews had dominance in the Holy Roman Empire. For on the one side the Christians were subjected to the then customary fire and water tests, while the Jews had the special privilege of being freed therefrom. Since the Christians at that time celebrated Sunday very strictly, the market was held on Saturday, and it was unheard of that things then went so far to grant the Jews the pleasure of changing market day from Saturday to Sunday, so that they and not the Christians could celebrate their festival. Not once in the world of today, so favourably inclined to Jewry, have things come to this.
This proves who the real rulers at the Court of Ludwig and Judith were, where the worst of all the Jews were also even tax-collectors and utilised this valuable position, in order to economically oppress the farmers and to occasion them to deny Christianity and to take on Judaism, by their either putting into effect or lessening the oppressive tax burdens. Now it was the Jews who attempted to compel the true Christians in a Christian monarchy to give up their belief. The roles had been changed in a couple of years of philosemitic policy.
This regrettable situation was already prepared at the time of Charlemagne himself through the contact and living-together of Jews and Christians. This is revealed to us by the lamentations of Pope Stephen III, whom the learned Jewish historian Josef Kastein quotes literally: “Pope Stephen III had made a complaint to the bishop of Narbonne in south France: “with great sorrow and deadly anxiety we have heard that the Jews... have in a Christian land the same rights as the Christians and possess Allodial goods in the city and suburbs, which they describe as their city. Christian men and women live under the same roof with these traitors and defile their soul day and night through blasphemies.”171
Pope Stephen III described the Jews as traitors and with this hit a sore place. In our days he would have been destined, if he still lived, to be condemned on account of race hatred and antisemitism. On the other hand, we must, in order to understand another motive for the lament of the Pope, explain that then interest on loans had to be paid for family goods, with exception of the Allodial goods, which were a real privilege of some nobles, but which the Jews possessed in Narbonne, while the Christian people did not have such privileges.
Graetz reveals that the chief reason for the protection which the Jews enjoyed, was that “the Empress Judith, the second wife of Ludwig, was very favourable to the Jews. The beautiful clever woman, whom her friends admired, just as her enemies hated her, had a great respect for the ancient Jewish heroes. When the learned Abbot of Fulda, Rhabanus Maurus, wished to win her favour, he could find no more effective means than to dedicate to her his works on the biblical books of Esther and Judith and to compare her with these two Jewish heroines. The Empress and her friends and probably also the state treasurer Bernhard, who in reality ruled the kingdom, became protectors of the Jews, since the latter were descended from the patriarchs and prophets. ‘They must be honoured for this reason’, she said to her friends at the court, and her opinion was supported by the Emperor.”172
But as usual the protection of the Jews and Semitophilism turns into the domination of the Jews over the Christians and to anti-Christian activity. The additional report by Graetz is very illuminating in this respect: “Learned Christians delighted in the writings of the Jewish historian Joseph and of the Jewish philosopher Philo and preferred their works to those of the Apostles. Well-educated court ladies openly confessed that they valued higher the founder of the Jewish Law than of the Christian Law (i.e. Moses higher than Christ). They went so far as to beg a blessing from the Jews. The Jews had free access to the court and direct contact with the Emperor and his confidants. The relatives of the Emperor gave the Jews valuable presents, in order to show them their favour and respect. And since such distinctions were granted them in the highest circles, it was only natural that towards Jews of the Frankish kingdom, which also comprised Germany and Italy, far-reaching tolerance was practised, as perhaps in no other time in their history. The hated church laws were quietly annulled. The Jews were allowed to build synagogues, to openly speak to Christians about Judaism, and even to assert that ‘they were descendants of the patriarchs’, ‘the race of the righteous’ (i.e. Christ) and ‘the sons of the Prophets’. Without fear they could give expression to their opinions concerning Christianity, the miracles of the Saints, the relics and the cult of the holy images. The Christians attended the Synagogues and were attracted by the method of how the Jews practised worship of God and they took in even more the tectures of the Jewish preachers (Darshanim) than the sermons of the clergy, even if the Darshanim were hardly in the position to reveal the deep content of Judaism.”173
“The clergy were then not ashamed to take over their explanations of the Holy Scriptures from the Jews. The Abbot Rhabanus Maurus of Fulda admitted that he had learned much from the Jews, which he used in his commentary on the Bible dedicated to Ludwig the German – who afterwards became Emperor. As a consequence of these marks of favour towards the Jews at the Court, many Christians felt themselves drawn to Judaism and regarded it as the true religion.”174
This description by the highly regarded Jewish historian Graetz makes clear to us that the present day arguments – that, for example, the Jews are untouchable, because they are descended from the Patriarchs and more of the like – with which they attempt to deceive the Christians and wish to prevent them defending themselves against the Satanic Imperialism of the Synagogue, are the same which the Jews used centuries ago for similar purposes, who then infamously fought to destroy Christianity and to bring the Holy Roman German Empire under Jewish rule. The tricks, subtle deceptions or Jewish fairy tales, as Saint Paul would say, are still always the same after eleven centuries.
But our Lord Jesus saved Holy Church once again from the Jewish falsehood and such desolation. This time it was the Paladine Abogard, the archbishop of Lyons and later his pupil and imitator in the episcopal see, Amolon. They fought for the salvation of the Church from Jewry.
In a recently published official work of the Jewish-Argentinian society, Agobard and Amolon, the two archbishops of Lyons, are described as fathers of Antisemitism in the Middle Ages.175 This accusation seems terrible, since the Jews attribute to Mediaeval antisemitism the greatest harm to Jewry which a Christian mind can imagine.
This welcome reaction is commented upon by the classical Jewish historian Graetz, as follows: “Those who held firmly to the discipline of the Church, saw in the violation of the Church laws, in the favour shown to the Jews and in the freedoms allowed to them, the downfall of Christianity. Envy and hatred were at the back of this righteousness. The protectors of the Jews at the court with the Empress at their head were hated by the Church party... The advocate of Church righteousness and of hatred for the Jews of the then time was the restless enthusiastic Archbishop of Lyon, Agobard, whom the Church has canonised.176 He slandered the Empress Judith, rebelled against the Emperor and drove the princes to rebellion... The bishop wished to restrict the freedom of the Jews and to bring them back to the low position which they occupied under the Merovingians.”177
Graetz further writes, that the struggle of the Archbishop Agobard against the Jews lasted many years and as its basis “had the maintenance and defence of the Church Laws against the Jews, so that he directed his attention to the representatives of the Church party at the court, of whom he knew that they were enemies of the Empress and of her Jewish favourites. He urged them to influence the Emperor, so that he would restrict the freedom of the Jews. Apparently they also proposed something similar to the Emperor. But simultaneously the friends of the Jews at the Court sought for new ways and means, in order to spoil the plans of the clergy.” And Graetz continues: “Agobard gave anti-Jewish sermons and ordered his flock to break off every connection with the Jews, to carry on no business with them and not to enter into their service. Fortunately the protectors at the court supported the Jews actively and condemned the intentions of the fanatical clergy to failure. As soon as they learned of his activity, they had themselves protective letters (indiculi) written by the Emperor and sent them, provided with his seal, to the Bishop in which he was ordered, upon threat of severe penalties, to cease his anti-Jewish sermons. In the year 828 a second letter went to the governor of the district of Lyon, which requested him to allow the Jews to enjoy every possible support. Agobard did not heed these letters and added contemptuously that the Imperial edict was certainly forged and could not be true.”178
The worthy archbishop Agobard fought ceaselessly. He directed letters to all inhabitants of the Bishopric and requested them to participate actively in the struggle against the Jews. He aided the rebellion against the Emperor and Judith and, with the support of the sons of Ludwig from the first marriage, he fought bitterly to save the Holy Empire and Christianity from the ruin threatening them.
The authorised historian Graetz comments on the conduct of Agobard as follows: “Although the deep hatred of Agobard for the Jews must be regarded as having sprung principally from his own feelings, one cannot deny that he acted completely in accord with the Church doctrines. He referred himself simply to the assertions of the Apostles and the Church Laws. The inviolable decrees of the Councils were also on his side. Agobard was in his dark hatred strictly orthodox, while the Emperor Ludwig with his tolerance tended to heresy. Agobard, however, did not risk openly asserting this. He rather more hinted at that he found it difficult to believe that the Emperor would betray the Church in favour of the Jews. His complaints found an echo in the hearts of the Church princes.”179
This commentary of Graetz’s concerning the true teaching of the Church existing over many centuries in relation to the Jews, could not be more balanced and more realistic, even if these lines were written by the renowned historian in the previous century, when the “Synagogue of Satan” was still not in the position, as today, to attempt the complete falsification of the true Catholic teaching with regard to the Jews. But one sees clearly that Graetz had already essentially grasped the problem. He was one of the most important men of Jewry of his time. His historic works, especially the works which we quote, had an enormous influence upon the Jewish organisations and their leaders.
In addition it was universally evident that the Church laws and anti-Jewish resolutions of the Holy Ecumenical and provincial councils were the chief hindrance for the traitors in the Church itself, which her principal enemies, the Jews, furthered. For whoever made such attempts, had to reckon upon being deposed, with excommunication and the other penalties laid down in the Holy Church Canons. Hence it was the chief concern of the new traitors to remove this troublesome hindrance. But how was it possible to abolish with one blow the thousand-year-old Church Laws, the Papal Bulls and the teachings of the Church Fathers? How were these to be abolished so that the secret Jewish clergy could serve their Jewish masters without fear of being deposed and excommunicated and even attempt to falsify the doctrine of the Church in relation to the Jews, and as a result to promote its final defeat and the victory of its century old foe?
In the course of centuries the Jews and their “Fifth Column” in the clergy have repeatedly made the attempt to abolish the anti-Jewish Laws and to achieve that the Papal Bulls and the anti-Jewish theses of the Church Fathers should not fall under these laws. They have for this purpose, always according to the given possibilities, taken the most diverse paths. At the beginning of this century they have utilised the praiseworthy wish of Pope Pius X to summarise the most important Church Law determinations in one Codex; for in the turbulent time of the first world war of 1914-18 all attention was directed to the apocalyptic struggle and so they attained that from the Church legal Codex the voluminous collection of Laws was excluded which represented the most effective defence of Holy Church against the secret Jewish infiltration and its destructive activity in the bosom of this institution. It is noteworthy that this occurred a few years after the Jewish historian Graetz, – the oracle of the then Jewish leaders – wrote the previously quoted lines. As a result it becomes evident that the anti-Jewish Church Legislation was the chief hindrance for attempts to bring Catholicism as well as the Holy Empire under Jewish rule. On the other hand it is clearly revealed in the Church Law Codex mentioned, that fundamentally the old Church legislation has not been altered. But in actual praxis the anti-Jewish and anti-heretical Laws were carefully left out, which represented the best defence of the Church against the centuries-old enemy. This differentiating, painfully exact omission, must certainly have been undertaken by a person very interested in the matter, who without doubt stood in the service of the organisation which from this veritable purging of anti-Jewish and anti-heretical laws, which took away from Holy Church a defence which it had built up in hundreds of years of experience, drew such great advantages. It is generally known that Pope Pius X did not work out the Codex himself, but left its editing to committees, whose presidency was conducted by Cardinal Gasparri and to whom without doubt those joined themselves, who undertook so carefully the suspicious editing of the Laws. If, as a result, the anti-Jewish Church Laws of the Holy Councils still remained in force (for the old Synods’ legislation was still valid despite the omissions of the Codex), the omission of the Holy Church Laws which ordered severe punishments and deposing for clergy and Church dignitaries, nevertheless made it possible at the time of Pius XI for that Jew-friendly association of clergy and laymen to be founded, whose heretical theses were only the prelude for those of present-day priests and church dignitaries in the service of the Synagogue of Satan.”
Another method which Jewry and its “Fifth Column” have always used again in the course of centuries, in order to cause the vanishing of Bulls and anti-Jewish theses of the Church Fathers, was the organisation of heretical movements, which did not recognise the doctrine of Holy Church and asserted that the Holy Bible is the sole source of revelation. Put briefly, these heretics make the assurance – as we will investigate later – that not tradition but only the Holy Scriptures are the source of revelation. These kinds of heretical movements, which – as we shall still see – were led by Jewry, began in the 11th century and were repeatedly combated by the orthodoxy, until in the 16th century Protestantism conducted these theses to success, abolished tradition as doctrine and source of revelation and recognised only the Holy Bible as such. The Jews, who in most cases directed and influenced these movements, were in reality concerned with eliminating the Holy Church Laws of the Ecumenical Councils, the Papal Bulls and the doctrine of the Church Fathers, who condemn Jewry and its accomplices in the clergy, as doctrine of the Church and source of the truth revealed by God. For if this defence were destroyed, the Jews in the higher clergy could carry out unpunished their treacherous disintegrating activity. But today they are exposed to the danger on grounds of these Church traditions, which they wish to abolish at every price as source of divine revelation, of being discovered and condemned. As one sees, the struggle of the clergy in service of Jewry which has lasted nine centuries has very deep roots and should solve for them the problem of destroying the Church unpunished or being able to cause it in priestly garb the greatest injuries and to favour Jewry and its revolutionary movements, without needing to fear the judgments or threat of deposition laid down in the Church Laws, Bulls and the doctrine of the Fathers. Naturally they cloak their offence against tradition in flattering, seemingly righteous arguments, which do not allow the poison of these manoeuvres to be discerned. Among other things, they say that the Church must adapt itself to the new times and fight with progress for Christian unity. These are great truths with which we are all perfectly in agreement. But we cannot accept what is being attempted under this pretence, viz. the destruction of the best defence of Holy Church, which could preserve it through centuries from the cunning of its most infamous and stiff-necked foes.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
THE COUNCIL OF MEAUX COMBATS OPEN AND SECRET JEWS
In the face of the deadly danger that threatened the Church and the new western Roman Empire, several archbishops and bishops assembled in the year 829 in Lyon. At this gathering they were concerned – as the Jewish historian Graetz reports – with “humbling the Jews and threatening their peaceful existence. They (the Bishops) also discussed how the Emperor could best be influenced, so that he made appropriate decisions. It was resolved at the assemblies to write a letter to the Emperor which would draw his attention to how godless and dangerous the favouring of the Jews was and to enumerate individually the privileges which should be taken from them (in the year 829). The letter, in its still preserved form, is signed by three Bishops and has as its heading: ‘Concerning the superstition of the Jews.’ Agobard wrote the foreword and in it elaborated his position in the struggle. Accordingly he accuses not only the Jews, but also makes their friends responsible for the evil. The Jews, he says, have become bold through the support of the influential, who believed they were not really so bad and were valued by the Emperor.” And he reports further: “From the standpoint of belief and of the Church Canons, the argument of Agobard and the other Bishops is irrefutable, and the Emperor Ludwig the Pious should, on the basis of such logic, have exterminated the Jews completely and utterly. But fortunately he felt himself not to be interested, perhaps because he knew the character of Agobard or because the letter with the complaint did not even come into his hands. The fear of Agobard that the letter could be intercepted by the friends of the Jews at court was certainly well founded.”180
It is thus certainly highly possible that the theft of this letter through the Jews was decisive in this struggle. Jews usually prevent complaints against them penetratingto the highest religious or civil authorities. If then the secret Jewish infiltration intercepts a complaint on the way or cripples its effect, it thus nevertheless at all events attains its aim in other ways.
One of the most important facts in the process of the Judaisation of the Holy Roman German Empire was the conversion of one of the Christian Semitophilic bishops to Judaism, who enjoyed a great confidence at the court of the Emperor and was one of his chief advisors. Concerning these prelates, the Jewish historian Graetz writes: “The Emperor had promoted him and, in order to always have him at his side, he made him into his confessor.”181 The struggle became even more terrible, for under the intimate advisors of the Emperor, who promoted his absurd Semitophilic policy, were found bishops of Holy Church. Also in our days there are those who support the interests of the Jewish enemies of Christianity.
But the case of Bodo was gravest of all. Many clergy of that time served, although they apparently remained of the true faith, the interests of the “Synagogue of Satan”, as a result of which they without doubt caused greatest harm. They must certainly have held themselves to be very powerful, in order to allow themselves the luxury of introducing one of their most influential men, the confessor of the Emperor, who publicly boasted of denying Christianity, of confessing Judaism and proclaiming that this was the true religion.
Concerning the effect of this devastating blow at the Christian people, Graetz writes: “The conversion (to Judaism) of Bishop Bodo, who up to then occupied a high position, then aroused great attention. In Chronicles it is reported of this event, as if it were an extraordinary phenomenon. The event had without doubt special accompanying circumstances and struck devout Christians a heavy blow.”182
We have not sufficient material at our disposal, in order to reveal whether it was a matter of a secret Jewish Bishop, who completed his theatrical conversion for propaganda purposes and wished to strike a blow which should hasten the decline of morals and the attempt at a Judaisation of the Empire, or whether it was really a Bishop who fell away through dangerous Semitophilism, became rebellious and admitted to Judaism. Whatever the truth may be then, it is nevertheless undeniable that, with the difficult situation of Holy Church in the Holy Roman Germanic Empire, the event must have been extremely harmful for Christianity. If Charlemagne had risen again and could have seen the catastrophic consequences of the unchaining of the beast - which the Church Canons had placed in chains – but which he had freed out of pity for the oppressed Jews and from the wish to make their valuable services of use for the Empire, he would have been able to recognise that he had fallen victim to the skilled deceit of those who have proven themselves as the most skilled swindlers in the world. All religious and political leaders should thus draw a lesson from this painfully rich tragedy; for if the Jews, with their skilled diplomacy, could deceive one of the greatest political geniuses, then it is not further remarkable that, with their traditional tactics of manipulating the desire of every virtuous man to show human pity, to protect the oppressed, or to defend the sublime demand for equality of peoples and races, they were able to deceive and outwit in the course of history the good faith of many popes, kings and political or religious leaders of mankind, and are still able to do this today. Only the absolute knowledge of Jewish wickedness and their traditional tactics of deceit can keep awake the good against the Jewish lies, of which Saint Paul warned us in his wisdom. Only thus can the danger be diminished that the good fall into the net of the masters of lies and distortion.
In the face of this catastrophic situation, the tireless courageous Archbishop Agobard took part in a conspiracy against the Empress Judith and supported Ludwig’s sons from his first marriage in their struggle to dethrone the disastrous Emperor. Agobard was deposed as archbishop and the Empire fell into a succession of civil wars, in which now one, now the other side was victorious. The death of Ludwig, however, gave Jewry a decisive blow, but the heroic archbishop also died without having experienced the victory and the success of his struggle.
The new policy of Ludwig, who was falsely named the Pious, and who placed the Jews under the protection of the crown, had catastrophic consequences for mankind; for in the ensuing centuries it was imitated by many Christian kings, who gave the foe protection in the midst of his terrible conspiracies. They bore in mind thereby that the Jews are very useful as tax-collectors, in addition contribute in difficult times to balancing the budget through loans, that they are a decisive factor for the progress of trade and with their punctual payment of taxes effectively contribute to maintaining the state capacity. Admittedly they instigate conspiracies, spread heresies and rebellions, but the mediaeval monarchy held itself to be strong enough to be able to overcome this danger. The monarchy and the nobility of the Middle Ages were also really so powerful that they were able to achieve this for a long time. However, the moment came when the descendants of those optimistic kings and aristocrats had to bitterly lament the faults of their forefathers and the whole of mankind still suffers under this today.
When Ludwig died, the Empire fell to pieces and was divided among his four sons. As was to be expected, the Jewish dominance existed only in the realm of Charles the Bald, Judith’s son, who had inherited from her the sympathy for the Jews, even if he did not go too far in this respect. But different Jews had additional influence at the court, among others, Zede Kish, the physician of the king and particularly a favourite whom the monarch called “my faithful Judas” on account of his political services. The Jew Graetz makes a remarkable observation about South Europe at that time: “South Europe, which was disturbed by anarchy and ruled by a fanatical clergy, was not a suitable ground for the development of Jewry.”183
The dominance of Jewry in France was in addition in every respect such a serious danger for Christianity that Amolon, the new bishop of Lyon, took in hand the defence of the Church and the peoples and continued the struggle of his teacher and predecessor Agobard. Amolon could count thereby on the support of the greatest part of the bishops, including that of the rebellious Hincmar, the bishop of Rheims, who knew how to gain the full confidence of King Karl (Charles), and so partly counteracted the bad influence of the Jewish favourites.
The worthy archbishop Amolon was without doubt a tool of divine providence for the defence of Holy Church and France against the destructive activity of the Jews. He not only fought energetically against them, but also fought with the pen and wrote his famous tractate against the Jews, in which he openly pilloried their infamous crimes against Christianity and called upon the clergy and laymen to combat this principal foe.184
Under the leadership of Amolon, the French bishops began an important struggle against the Jews at the Holy Council, which took place in the year 845 in Meaux, in the neighbourhood of Paris. This Synod approved a series of anti-Jewish measures, which were relayed to the King for carrying out. Among these fell Church Canons which had been valid since Constantine, the laws of Theodosius’ II, who forbade the Jews to occupy public and honorary offices, the edict of the Merovingian king Childebert, who excluded the Jews from the positions of judge and tax-collector and commanded them to respect the clergy.
The problem of the secret Jewish Christians who originated from false converts, which became more and more grave in France, naturally attracted the special attention of the Holy Synod, which drew into the list Church Canons approved at Synods of other lands, the anti-Jewish Church Laws of the Councils of Toledo against the baptised who remained Jews in secret, and the Church Canons which ordered that their children be taken from them, in order to be brought up as Christians.185
As we have already seen, these measures were to prevent secret Jewry from being passed on eternally in secret from one generation to the other. As one sees, this Holy Council of the Church wished to free France from the Jews – to fight great evil through great healing methods – and combated both open as well as secret Jewry to life and death.
Unfortunately Charles the Bald – doubtless still influenced by his mother’s education – when he received knowledge of the resolutions of the Synod, in no way had a high opinion of the decisions, but had the Council dissolved by force, although his advisor and friend Hincmar had taken part in this Council. This proves that at that time the Jews still retained a decisive influence at the French court.
However, archbishop Amolon did not allow himself to be intimidated through this act of the king, and began again from anew. He sent the clergy a pastoral letter which, according to the report of Graetz, “was poisonous and slandered the Jewish race.” He then writes further that “the poisonous letter was just as unsuccessful as that of Agobard and the Edict of the Council of Meaux. But gradually the poison spread from the clergy to the people and the princes.”186
The Jewish historian Josef Kastein writes about this event and asserts that the Church “with the battle cry that the Christian religion was threatened, set in operation the most dangerous weapon, namely the uneducated masses of the nation. To minds which easily allowed themselves to be impressed by every cause, they constantly presented the same argument, which they had sooner or later to take up. The consequence of this was that the masses, who lived together with the Jews, became their enemies. As a result the Church secured the great advantage of altering the conduct of the rabble in the desired manner. This occurred independently of political conditions at a given moment.”187
Kastein, as well as Graetz and the other important Jewish historians, regard the Church as the actual mother of mediaeval antisemitism, in which respect they are without doubt also right, for they regard every movement as antisemitic which defends Christianity against Jewish imperialism and its revolutionary activity. On the other hand it is understandable that, with more or less semitophilic governments and such an influential Jewry as in France at that time, the most effective way and means to preserve Christianity from Jewish control consisted in convincing the people and revealing to it the extent of the Jewish danger and its threat to religion and the people itself. This conviction had success at that time, as the Jewish historians themselves confirm to us when they complain that it was successful for Holy Church to cause that Semitophilic conduct of the people in the France of Ludwig the Pious and of Charles the Bald to change later into a hostile behaviour towards Jewry. This shows us also that this decisive battle, which the Jews nearly won, ended with the victory of Holy Church and the defeat of the “Synagogue of Satan.”
When the Jewish historians assert that the Church applied the most effective weapon, the uneducated rabble, then in this they are incredibly cynical, for this was particularly the weapon which the Jews have always used and still use even today.
This work of personal enlightenment, which the Church then undertook, opening the eyes of the people about the Jews and alluding to the danger, can alone today also save the world in its present situation. It is thus urgently necessary to imitate what the Church did in that difficult time, and short but clear pamphlets must be printed for the working masses and books for the educated classes, which must be distributed for the greater part gratis to individual households and to individual persons, so that all the world is enlightened about the danger of Jewish imperialism and its revolutionary activity.
This work of enlightenment must be directed especially at the leaders and officers of the army, navy and airforce, soldiers, rulers, teachers, political leaders, financiers, journalists, academicians, the personnel of radio and television, the working masses and the youth of all strata of society. And especially to the members of the clergy of the Catholic and the other Christian churches, which, unlike our clergy, usually, on grounds of a series of circumstances which we will investigate later, do not recognise the danger. The convincing and making known of the Jewish danger must proceed at the fringe of political activity, among the members of all political parties and of all religious confessions, so that from all these domains the natural defensive movements emanate, which must be coordinated.
If the majority of the peoples and the domains which have in their hand the vital forces of a nation as well as the means of propaganda, open their eyes and recognise the danger of enslavement threatening us all and the enormous wickedness of Jewish imperialism and its dark intentions, the way to freeing of this nation and of the whole world is prepared.
The method of writing books in order to sell them in bookshops, so that a few persons obtain knowledge from them, is insufficient, for this alarm cry should be accessible to all houses and all men. The pamphlets or books should be distributed in the houses and given into the hand or, if possible, sent through friends to the recipients.
The clergy, the rich and all others who have money, should lay aside their chronic, sinful greed and work at the financing of this work of enlightenment, for if they do not help, there awaits them – according to the doctrines of Marx, Engels and Lenin, which predict the destruction of the clergy and of the Bourgeoisie – execution or concentration camps, should the Socialists dictatorship of Communism triumph.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
JEWISH TERROR IN CASTILE IN THE 14TH CENTURY
After the treachery of the Jews which led to the fall of the Christian Visigoth kingdom and its conquest through the Musulmans, began the so-called “Reconquista”. It was introduced by the Christians who had become powerful in the mountains to the north of the peninsula under the Visigoth Pelayo. This fight for freedom was to extend over nearly eight centuries and naturally began with bloody retaliatory measures against the Jews, who were held responsible for the fall of the Christian states and for the murder of Christians after this catastrophe.
This anti-Jewish outlook lasted through several centuries. Resulting from this, the Jews understood how on basis of their own slyness and skill to use all opportunities to dissipate these reproaches, in that they especially provided valuable services to the Christian kings of the peninsula, when they made Spain into a place of refuge for the Israelites, who fled from the whole of Europe. At first they were persecuted by the Christian monarchs and later by the Holy Papal Inquisition, which reacted violently when the “Synagogue” attempted to conquer the Catholic states and to dismember Christian society.
In addition, the Jews at the beginning of the 10th century practised treachery on the Musulmans, whose allies they had once been, began to introduce the decomposition of Islamic society, and attempted to control it through secret organisations and false doctrines. The most important of these organisations were the criminal sects of murderers – undoubtedly a forerunner of modern freemasonry – whose secret power extended to the entire region of Islam and even to Christian Europe, until it was finally destroyed chiefly through the invasion of the Mongols. At all events the Musulman kingdom in the 12th century was facing a dangerous decline which is partly attributed to the manifold revolutionary activity of the Jews. The dynasty of the Almohades, which in North Africa and in Islamic Spain followed upon that of the Almoravides, wished to save Islam from a catastrophe and began to wage a war of life and death against Jewry. This resulted as usual in thousands of seeming conversions to Islam and the flight of many Jews from Christian Spain in consequence.
The monarchs of the Iberian peninsula, who were occupied with the driving out of the Saracens from their territory, forgot the former treachery of the Jews and used them in the Reconquista as money-lenders, tax-collectors and even as spies. Now the roles were exchanged. The Jews represented in Islamic Spain the “Fifth Column” in favour of Christian Spain and thus practised treachery on their former allies. Once again a historical event was repeated: the Jewish population of a Musulman monarch became a dangerous “Fifth Column” favouring the external enemies of this state – then the Christian kingdom of Iberia (Spain), which, on the grounds of the valuable services which they provided it, promoted the Jews to government members and even to ministers or royal state treasurers. As a result they violated the decisions of the Holy Church Councils, which excluded the Jews from government offices.
The Jews turned back once again to their traditional tactics, to gain their enemies through seeming good conduct and effective services, thus obtaining valuable offices which made it possible to them to later conquer the states which had offered them protection.
They therefore left no opportunity unused in order to get into their hands control over this Christian kingdom, which had already become a second Palestine to them, into which they streamed ready and willing.
The Jews came to Castile at a time when they had reached the high point of their power. Peter the Cruel was then king, and for several years they controlled his government. The manner in which they conquered this Christian kingdom is extremely interesting.
Peter the Cruel ascended the throne in 1350, as a child of 15 years, and was soon subject to the influence of the Jewish leader Samuel Ha-Levi Abulafia. The latter incited the passions of the young prince and flattered him. Thus he was successful in eliminating the king’s guardian, Juan Alfonso de Alburquerque and also the favourable influence of the queen mother. At first he was appointed as royal treasurer and in fact later to supreme minister of the kingdom.188 As a result this Jew attained a political power like no other Jew before him in a Christian kingdom. In the ensuing time the influence of the Jewish counsellor on the monarch increased to such an extent that he was regarded by many as dangerous.
Even in the first years the outrages which the young king committed on the instigation of his wicked advisors called forth a general rebellion in the kingdom. The queen mother, the half-sister of the monarch, his aunt Leonora, Queen of Aragon, and many powerful nobles formed a league which made it its task to withdraw the young king from the influence of the Jewish counsellors and the evil-willed clique surrounding him. To the latter also belonged the relatives of his mistress, Maria de Padilla, on account of whom he had left his wife, the young Bianca of Bourbon, sister of the Queen of France.
When Peter saw himself abandoned by most of the nobles of the kingdom, he agreed to place himself under the guardianship of his mother. He therefore betook himself to Toro in the company, among others, of Samuel Ha-Levi – as Pero Lopez de Ayala, a Chronicler of this time, reports – who, according to the assertions of this Chronicler, “was his great favourite and advisor.”189
There his mother and his aunt prepared him a hearty reception, at which, however, the taking captive of his retinue and also of the influential Jewish minister Samuel Ha-Levi took place.
The death of Juan Alfonso de Alburquerque, who, so it is asserted, was poisoned190, was a heavy blow for the league, for this magnate represented the connecting-link between very unusual men and interests. In the following we now give a summary of the report by Prosper Merimee, the famous French historian of the last century. He shows us how Samuel Ha-Levi understood how to utilise the new situation and skilfully created disputes, in order to destroy the league, by his offering the Infanta of Aragon castles and rich districts in the name of the King in exchange for her releasing him. In addition the sly Jewish counsellor offered estates and knighthoods to numerous magnates until such time as he was successful in destroying the league and one day could flee with the young monarch when they were at the hunt.191
J. Amador de los Rios, another historian of the past century, reports to us the following concerning this crafty enterprise: “Thanks, however, to the clever action of Samuel, it was successful for the son of Alfonso XI to obtain again the freedom which his mother and sisters had taken from him. Thanks to the gold which he knew how to distribute, and thanks to the promises in the name of the King, he had carried mistrust and disunity into the league and rendered null the plans of the Bastard. The King was soon surrounded by powerful servants who promised him eternal loyalty. Samuel had gained the absolute confidence of the king.’’192
Through the regard of the Jewish minister, the Jews gradually gained more and more influence in the kingdom. Concerning this the Jewish historian Bedarride gives us exact details, asserting that the Jews had reached “the high point of their power” under Peter the Cruel in Castile.193
Unfortunately, however, history proves to us that every time the Jews in a Christian or pagan state attain “the high point of their power”, a terrible wave of murders and terror is unleashed, and Christian or pagan blood flows in streams. Thus it also occurred under Peter from the moment when the Jews obtained decisive influence upon education and government. This intelligent child – who later showed himself as far-sighted, had great illusions and possessed enormous energy – would perhaps have been one of the most important monarchs of Christianity, if he had not been destroyed in his youth through the bad example and the still worse advice of his Jewish favourites and counsellors. The people held them guilty for the wave of crimes and ambushes which were unleashed under this bloody government. The Jews attained high regard and the synagogues prospered, while the Churches decayed and the clergy and the Christians were disgracefully persecuted.
Many contemporary and later Chroniclers report concerning the decisive influence of the Jews on the young monarch and their malicious power in relation to the cruelties during this stormy time of government. The French contemporary Cuvelier asserts that Henry, the half-brother of the king, “was begged and implored by the Spanish nobles to once again bring to the notice of the King that he acted badly in allowing himself to be counselled by the Jews and to expel the Christians”... “When Henry came into the royal palace of his brother, the latter was just having a council with several Jews. No Christians were present.” “Henry implored Peter, nevertheless, not to listen to the counsels of the Jews.” The Chronicler reports in addition of a Jew named Jacob who was present and clearly stood very close to Peter.194Paul Hay de Chartelet, another well-known French Chronicler, adds further to this episode in reference to the aforementioned counsellor of King Peter, that Henry of Trastamara could not conceal his anger “when he saw a Jew named Jacob”, who enjoyed the full confidence of Peter and whom was held to be the instigator of all his cruel actions.195
Concerning the terrible crimes during the bloody period of government of Peter the Cruel report the “Prima Vita Urbani V”, the Italian contemporary Chronicler Matteo Villani, and the Mohammedan Chronicler – likewise contemporary – Abou Zeid-Ibn Khaldoun, who makes the assurance among others, “that Peter cruelly oppressed the Christian people and on account of his tyranny made himself so greatly hated that they rebelled against him.” In the Chronicle from the time of Peter of Aragon the criminal action of this government is described in a hair-raising manner, and in his renowned Chronicle of reminiscences the Frenchman Jean Froissard mentions not only the cruelty and tyranny which were characteristic of this government, but particularly stresses the hostile conduct of Peter the Cruel towards the Church and the Papacy.196
In the Annals and Chronicles written towards the end of the 15th century by Nicolas Gilles, Peter the Cruel is called “the great tyrant” and “rebel against the religion of Jesus Christ and his tragic end attributed to punishment by God.197 Fernandez Nino, however, the loyal collaborator of Peter, who served him up to his death, writes in his renowned report – contained in the Chronicle of Pedro Nino – that the Monarch had selected “a Jew named Samuel Levi as confidant, who taught him to despise great men and to respect the little ones . . . he separated himself from many, drew his knife and exterminated many in his kingdom. Therefore he was hated by the majority of his subjects.” In this Chronicle the preference of the young King for astrology is also spoken of.198 This fact is politically very important, since in fact the astrologers of Peter were Jews – among them Abraham-Abel-Zarzae especially distinguished himself – who influenced his political measures. For before every important measure the astrologers were asked if success was to be hoped for or not. It is interesting in this connection that Peter on the eve of his fall reproached this Abraham in that both he as well as the other astrologers had advised him to conquer Musulman territory as far as Jerusalem. But since things stood far worse than good, it was clear that they had deceived him.199 It is understandable that, when the Musulmans defended themselves heroically against the Jewish threat and the Jews already controlled Castile, they accordingly wanted to get Peter to conquer the North of Africa as far as Jerusalem. In this way they wished to once again conquer their Islamic enemies with the help of foreigners, in order to perhaps even realise their desired dream of freeing Palestine. This last intention, which they had to abandon when Peter was overthrown, they achieved centuries later, when they were successful in controlling England and caused it to liberate a part of Palestine from the rule of the Arabs. Through astrology it was possible that the Jews controlled the policy of many Kings in times when this superstition was in mode.
The renowned historian Bishop Rodrigo Sanchez, who died in 1471, compares Peter of Castile with Herod200, and Paul Hay, the second Chronicler of Bertrand du Guesclin, with Sardanapal, Nero and Domitian.201
The French historian P. Duchesne said in connection with the return of Peter to Castile, when the English troops set him back upon the throne: “Peter came to Castile like a ravening bloodthirsty wolf in a flock of sheep. Before him ran terror, death went at his side, and bloodbaths streamed behind him.’’202
In his general history of Spain the Jesuit Father Juan de Mariana describes the disastrous period of government of Peter the Cruel in the following way: “In this manner the fields and cities, landed estates and castles, the rivers and the sea, were spotted with innocent blood, and everywhere one found signs of violence and cruelty. It is not necessary to assert that the terror of the people of the kingdom was very great. All feared that the same could happen to them, each individual was concerned for his life, and none could be certain of it.”203
It is worthy of note that this report, written almost 400 years ago, describes with astonishing accuracy the present situation of terror in the Soviet Union and in the other lands under the Socialist dictatorship of Communism. In addition there is an important concordance. In the Kingdom of Peter the Cruel the Jews attained, according to the renowned Jewish historian Bedarride, “the highest point of their power”. In the Soviet Union and the other Socialist states the Jews have also reached the high point of their power. This is a remarkable and tragic concordance of situations, which are separated from one another through six centuries.
As in every state, in which the Jews reach “the high point of their power”, Holy Church in Castile was persecuted under Peter while the Jews occupied high posts. The consequence of this were energetic protests by the Castilian clergy, which are recorded in interesting documents. Among these is found a work which was already prepared in the lifetime of the monarch, and in which the Chaplain of the Church of Cordoba describes Peter as a “heretical tyrant”.204
The Holy See broke with this protector of Jews and oppressor of Christians. The Pope excommunicated Peter and declared him in the Church Council as unworthy of the crown of Castile. He released the Castilians and other subjects from their oath of loyalty and invested Henry of Trastamara or the first successor to the throne with the dignity of king.205 This made easier the formation of a coalition of the kingdoms of France, Aragon and Navarra, which under the protection of the Pope, undertook a kind of crusade for the freeing of the kingdom of Castile from oppression.
While the Christian clergy and laymen were murdered, taken captive and oppressed in every way, Jewry attained such high regard as never before in Christian Spain. Toledo then was practically the capital of international Jewry, just as in the ensuing time it was to be Constantinople, Amsterdam, London and New York. In this city the powerful minister Samuel Ha-Levi held a Synod or a general Hebrew congress, in which delegates of Jewish communities from the remotest lands participated, in order apparently to admire the new synagogue, which Peter allowed Samuel to build against the orders of the Church.
Witness to this great assembly is given by two inscriptions – veritable historical monuments – in this synagogue, which later temporarily served as a church. From the text of these inscriptions it is revealed that Samuel Ha-Levi himself was the chosen leader, who clearly became the Baruch of that time, which, however, did not prevent that years later au influential circle of his Jewish enemies accused him of having stolen the royal state treasury and as a result hastened his overthrow and death. These envious Jews accused him of having deceived Peter for twenty years, and even occasioned the king to torture him, so that he might confess where the three giant mountains of gold, stolen by him, were to be found. But Samuel died without revealing his secret, and the Chronicler reports further: “And it (his death) caused the King much sorrow, when he learned of it, and upon the advice of these Jews he commanded to bring him all his possessions. The houses of Samuel were searched, and they found a subterranean chamber with three mountains of gold and silver coins, bars and pieces. Each individual one was so high that a man could hide behind it. And King Peter inspected them and said: “If Samuel had only given me the third part of the smallest of these heaps, then I would not have had him tortured. But he preferred to die, without telling me.”206 The fact that Jewish treasurers or finance ministers stole was not new. Many had been deposed for this reason. However, this occurrence shows us that even among the Jews themselves, in spite of brotherhood, astonishing cases of envy and disunity exist, which take a tragic course, like that described here. The Jews, however, continued to exercise their influence on the government of Peter. Merely the persons were exchanged.
In order to overthrow Peter, he was not only accused of having handed over the government to the Jews, but he was also reproached with being a Jew himself. For King Alfonso XI, who had no male successor, was so enraged about this that he had seriously threatened the Queen, if the next child should again have been a girl. The Queen, in order to save herself, had therefore agreed to exchange the girl with a boy. The son of a Jew was brought, who had just been born, and who now grew up as heir to the throne, without King Alfonso knowing that he, whom they said to be his son, was a Jew. It was asserted in addition that Peter had secretly had himself circumcised when he learned of his Jewish origin, and for this reason also he handed over the government completely and utterly to the Jews. The renowned Chronicler and writer Pero Lopez de Ayala, who was in no way favourably disposed to King Peter, did not expressly mention this suspicion. But the fact that he describes Peter as the legal son of Alfonso XI allows it to be concluded that he did not recognise this accusation. In the same sense historians and Chroniclers express themselves who base themselves on the writings of Lopez de Ayala. If we also hold it to be correct that praise is given to this highly respected Chronicler in respect of this matter, then one must nevertheless take into consideration that he wrote a Chronicle about Peter when Catalina of Lancaster, the daughter of this king, was already married to Henry II, the grandson of Henry of Trastamara.207 This marriage was concluded for political reasons and was intended to unite the two rival families and avoid future disunity. Since the Chronicle came into being at a time when the Castilian monarchy made efforts to wipe out the stigma of a possible Jewish origin, it is natural that Pero Lopez de Ayala was compelled to keep silent about everything which was connected with this and which could have injured the honour of Queen Catalina.
On the other hand, history has proven to us that the Jews in their striving for world domination are capable of everything, whether it be a matter of replacing a girl child through an Infanta or undertaking any other kind of deception which opportunity offers. However, in the case which we investigate here, the opinions expressed by the defenders of Peter the Cruel seem most probable – Freemasons or Liberals – who assert that the accusation of exchanging of Infantas were made out of thin air, and were spread by Henry of Trastamara in order to justify his claim to the throne. However, this fairy-tale was held to be true in Castile and abroad and firmly adhered to in Chronicles of that time.
In the same measure, it seems possible to us that, if it really was a girl in question, that this was invented by the Jews themselves, who surrounded and influenced the young monarch, in order to convert him to Judaism and thus to be able to control him fully.
In favour of this possibility speaks the constant striving of the Jews to control Christian or pagan monarchs for whom they fabricated a Jewish origin. They wished to prove to Francis I of France that he was a Jew, however he laughed at them. Emperor Charles V became for the same reason so enraged that he had the Jews who wished in this way to influence him on behalf of the Synagogue burned. For Charles II of England they even carefully forged a family tree and convinced him to such an extent that he made them some concessions. Even the Emperor of Japan they wished to so deceive and make him believe that he originated from the ten lost tribes, in order to win him for Judaism and thus to control the land of the rising sun. But fortunately the Mikado held them to be lunatics. It is therefore certainly possible that they applied the same methods with Peter and the news seeped through into the hostile camp, where they later used Trastamara as a banner against Peter. However this may be, it is nevertheless evident that Peter, with his murdering of clergy, persecution of the Church and elevation of the Jews, acted more as a Jew than as a Christian, which had the consequence that the story of the exchange of children was believed.
The following Chronicles reveal that Peter was of Jewish origin: the Chronicle from the same period about Peter IV of Aragon, the Chronicle of the contemporary Carmelite Father Juan de Venette, the anonymous Chronicle about the first four Valois, the likewise contemporary Chronicle of Cuvelier among others. It is worthy of note that a century later it is mentioned in a couple of documents – in connection with Salomon-Halevi, the well-known Rabbi of Burgos, who by baptism received the name Pablo de Santa Maria, became priest and later archbishop in the same city – that this prelate was descended from the girl Infanta who was exchanged with the Jewish boy, who was later King as Peter of Castile. The girl Infanta married the father of the renowned Archbishop. The following documents mentioned this widespread rumour: “El libro de los Blasones” (Book of Arms) by Alonso Garcia de Torres (surname Torres), Manuscript Page No. 1306, and the “Recopilacion de Honra y Gloria mundana” (Concerning worldly honour and worldly fame) of Captain Francisco de Guzman, Manuscript Page No. 2046, Excerpt Page 28 and 29.208 Brother Cristobal de Sánchez assumed as certain, when in 1591 the first edition of his work “Vida de don Pablo de Santa Maria” (Life of Pablo de Santa Maria) was printed, that the renowned Rabbi and later archbishop was the son of the princess who was exchanged for the Jewish boy, who was later king of Castile.
In connection with the exerting of influence by Jews upon the government of Peter – beside the admission mentioned by the “Jewish Encyclopedia” and by respected Jewish historians – it is stated in the Chronicle from that time written in verse by Cuvelier: “He had the bad practice of allowing himself to be advised in all things by the Jews who dwelled in his land. He revealed to them all his secrets and not to his most intimate friends, blood relations or another Christian. Thus the man, who knowingly made use of such counsel, necessarily came to a bad end.210
Another Chronicler and contemporary of Peter, who as a second continued the Latin Chronicle of Guillermo de Mangis, asserts that the King and his government were controlled by Jews: “The monarch was reproached in that he and his house were controlled by Jews, who were present in Spain in great number, and that the whole kingdom was ruled by them.’’211
Paul Hay, the second Chronicler of Bertrand du Guesclin, speaks in this connection of the bad counsellors of Peter making difficulties throughout the whole of Castile, committing murders and calling forth dissatisfaction and disconsolation; that they in addition infected the monarch with a general disinclination towards the most highly regarded people in his kingdom and thus destroyed the mutual regard which binds good kings with their subjects and the peoples with their princes, that Peter called in the Church properties in order to reward the ministers for their ill-will, and – so it is stated – rejected his baptism in order to allow himself to be circumcised, and practised countless cruelties, which filled Spain with blood and tears. He combined in his person all the faults of a Sardanapal, Nero and Domitian, and his spirit was controlled by, principally Jewish, favourites.212
[84] Graetz, same work, Volume III. Page 51.
[85] Concerning the year in which the Council met, there are differences of opinion. Some, as for example Cardinal Aguirre, assert, that it was the 2nd year, on the other hand Tejada y Ramiro is of the opinion that the gathering took place in the 3rd year.
[86] Neglectu et cupiditate.
[87] 6th Council of Toledo. Law 3. Compiled by Juan Tejada y Ramiro, same edition. Volume II. Pages 333-334.
[88] 6th Council of Toledo. Canon 4. Compiled by Juan Tejada y Ramiro, same edition. Volume II. Pages 3 and 4.
[89] Graetz, same work, Volume III. Pages 51-52.
[90] J. Amador de los Rios, same work, Volume II. Pages 95-96.
[91] Amador de los Rios, same work, Volume I. Page 95.
[92] Council of Toledo. Canon 3. Compiled by Juan Tejada y Ramiro. Same edition, Volume II. Page 375.
[93] Graetz, same work, Volume III. Page 104.
[94] 9th Council of Toledo. Canon 17. Summarised by Juan Tejada y Ramiro, same edition. Volume II. Page 404.
[95] J. Amador de los Rios, same work, Volume I. Page 97.
[96] Mariana, Ibid, Book VI. Chapter XIII.
[97] Graetz, Ibid, Volume II. Pages 104-105.
[98] 12th Council of Toledo. Records. Visit of King. Compilation by Juan Tejada y Ramiro, same edition. Vol. II. Pages 454-455.
[99] 12th Council of Toledo. Canon 9. Compilation by Juan Tejada y Ramiro, same edition, Vol. II. Pages 476-477.
[100] Fuero Juzgo, Ed. Realacademia Espanola, 1815. Pages 186-192.
[101] Fuero Juzgo, same edition. Pages 192-193.
[102] Fuero Juzgo. Same Edition. Canon XIII.
[103] Fuero Juzgo, Edition of the Real Academia Espanola, 1815. Page 200.
[104] Fuero Juzgo, Book XII. Tit. III. Canon XX.
[105] Fuero Juzgo, Book XII. Tit. III. Law XXVII.
[106] Fuero Juzgo, Book XII. Tit. III. Law XXVII.
[107] 13th Council of Toledo, Law 9. Compilation of Juan Tejada y Ramiro, same edition, Vol. II. Page 505.
[108] 16th Council of Toledo. Canon 1. Compilation by Juan Tejada y Ramiro. Same edition. Vol. II. Pages 563-564.
[109] 16th Council of Toledo, Canon 8. Compilation by Juan Tejada y Ramiro. Same edition, Vol. II. Pages 602-603.
[110] 16th Council of Toledo. Records. Visit of the King. Compilation by Juan Tejada y Ramiro. Same edition. Vol. II. Page 593.
[111] 16th Council of Toledo, Records, Visit of the King. Compilation of Juan Tejada y Ramiro, same edition. Vol. III. Page 594.
[112] Ricardo C. Albanes: The Jews in the course of centuries. Pages 167-168.
[113] Marcelino Menendez Pelayo: History of the heterodox Spaniards, Printer F. Marato e Hijos. Vol I. Page 627.
[114] Reinhard Dozy: Histoire des musulmans d’Espagne, Leiden 1932, Page 267, and Jewish-Spanish Encyclopaedia, same edition, Vol. IV. Word “Spain”.
[115] Rodericus Toletanus: De Rebus Hispaniae, Book II. Chapter 15 and 16. Cronicon [short chronicle]. Lucas Tudensis: “Cronicon”, Hispania Ilustrata. Vol. IV.
[116] J. Amador de los Rios. Same work. Vol. I. Pages 102-103.
[117] Father Juan de Mariana, S.J.: General History of Spain. Valencia, 1785. Vol. II. Chapter XIX. Pages 369-371.
[118] Ricardo C. Albanes. Ibid. Pages 171-172.
[119] Chronicon Moissiacense and Chronicon Sebastiani: Holy Spain, Chapter XIII, Page 477.
[120] Lucas Tudensis; Cronicon in Hispania Ilustrata, IV Father Juan de Mariana, S.J. Ibid, Vol. II. Chapter XIX. Other historians doubt that it went so far as to separate the Visigoth Church from Rome.
[121] Father Juan de Mariana, S.J. Ibid. Vol. II. Pages 372-373. Chapter XIX.
[122] Father Juan de Mariana. S.J., same work. Vol. II. Chapter XXI. Page 375.
[123] J. Amador de los Rios, same work, Vol. I, Pages 103-104.
[124] Lucas de Tuy: Cronicon Era 733. Rodericus Toletanus: Rerum in Hispania Gestarum. Book III. Chapters XV and XVI.
[125] Marcelino Menendez Pelayo: History of the heterodox Spaniards. Edition of Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Cientificas [Supreme Council for Scientific Research], 1946, Vol. I. Chapter III. Page 373.
[126] Ricardo C. Albanes, same work, Page 173.
[127] Ricardo C. Albanes, Ibid. Pages 173-174.
[128] Abjar Machmua. Translation by Emilio Lafuente y Alcantara. Collection of Arab works on history and geography. Publication of the Real Academia de la Historia, Madrid, Vol. I.
[129] Al-Makkari, quoted by Ricardo C. Albanes in his quoted work. Pages 175-176.
[130] Encyclopedia Espasa Calpe, Vol. XXI. Word “Espana”, Page 906.
[131] Father Juan de Mariana, S.J. same work, [Ibid]. Vol. II. Chapter XXI. Page 377.
[132] Marcelino Menendez y Pelayo, same work, Vol. I. Chapter III. Pages 372-373.
[132] Marcelino Menendez y Pelayo, same work, Vol. I. Chapter III. Pages 372-373.
[134] Abraham Leo Sacher: History of the Jews, Edition Ercilla. Santiago de Chile, 1945. Page 227.
[135] Deborah Pessin: “The Jewish People, Book II. Edition United Synagogue Commission on Jewish Education, New York 5712-1952. Pages 200-201.
[136] Josef Kastein: History and Destiny of the Jews, translated from the German by Buntley Paterson, New York, 1953. Page 239.
[137] Graetz, Ibid, Vol. III. Page 109.
[138] Rabbi Jakob S. Raisin, same work. Page 429.
[139] Abjar Machmua, Publication quoted, Vol. I. Page 23 ff.
[140] Al-Makkari, quoted by Vicente Risco, History of the Jews, Surco Publishers, Barcelona, 1960. Page 212.
[141] Ibn-el-Athir: Chronicle El Kamel and Ibn-Khaldoun: Histoire des Berbederes. Translation from the Arabic into the French by Baron Freiherr von Salane. Algerian edition. 1852. Vol. I.
[142] Chronicle of Lucas Tudensis. Hispania Ilustrata. Vol. IV.
[143] Graetz, Ibid, Vol. III. Page 109.
[144] Encyclopedia Espasa Calpe, Vol. XXI. Word ‘Espana’.
[145] J. Amador de los Rios, same edition, Vol. I. Pages 105-106.
[146] The differences in the orthography of the word “Tarif”, “Tarik”, “Taric”, etc. are to be traced back to the different quoted sources, whose text was taken over liberally.
[147] Jewish-Spanish Encyclopaedia. Word “Spain”. Vol. IV. Page 144.
[148] Council of Agde, Canon 34. Compilation by Juan Tejada y Ramiro, same edition, Vol. I. Page 403.
[149] Trulanian Council, Canon I, Compilation by Juan Tejada y Ramiro, collection quoted. Volume III.
[150] 2nd Council of Nicaea, Canon 8. Compilation by Juan Tejada y Ramiro, same collection. Vol. III. Page 819.
[151] Juan Tejada y Ramiro, same collection. Vol. III. Page 808.
[152] 2nd Council of Nicaea. Canon 9. Compilation of “Acta Conciliorum et epistolas decretales, ac constitutione Summorum Pontificium”, Study by P. Johannis Harduini, S.J., Paris 1714.]
[153] Graetz. same work. Vol. III. Pages 122-123.
[154] Councils of Epaone, Orleans, Third and Fourth of Macon, quoted by Graetz, same work, Vol. III. Pages 37, 38 and 39.
[155] St. Gregory, Bishop of Tours; Historia Francorum, Vol. VI. Page 17.
[156] Rabbi Jakob S. Raisin, same work. Page 440.
[157] Council of Paris, quoted by Graetz, same work, Vol. III. Pages 39 and 40.
[158] Rabbi Jakob S. Raisin, same work. Page 438.
[159] 4th Council of Orleans. Quoted by Rabbi S. Raisin, same work, Page 439.
[160] Josef Kastein, same work. Page 229.
[161] Rabbi Jakob S. Raisin, same work.
[162] Graetz, same work, Vol. III. Pages 40 and 41.
[163] Graetz, same work, Vol. III. Chapter V. Page 142.
[164] Rabbi Josef Kastein, same work, Page 4. Page 252.
[165] Rabbi Jakob S. Raisin, same work. Page 441.
[166] Graetz, same work, Chapter V. Pages 141 and 142.
[167] Graetz, work mentioned, Chapter V. Pages 141 and 142.
[168] Rabbi Jakob S. Raisin, same work. Chapter XVI. Pages 441 and 442.
[169] Rabbi Josef Kastein, same work. Page 252.
[170] Graetz, same work, Vol. III. Chapter VI. Page 261.
[171] Pope Stephen III. Quoted by Rabbi Josef Kastein, same work. Page 252.
[172] Graetz, same work, Vol. III. Chapter VI. Page 162.
[173] As we will investigate later, the deep content of Judaism, its doctrines and its secret policy were never revealed to the new converts at the threshold, but only to the hereditary good of the blood descendants of Abraham, i.e. of the people chosen by God.
[174] Graetz, same work, Vol. III. Chapter VI. Pages 162-164.
[175] The Jews, their history, their contribution to culture. Publication of the Jewish association of Argentina. Buenos Aires, 1956. Page 186.
[176] He was veritably revered for a long time in Lyon and was known as St. Aguebald. In the breviary of Lyon he had his own service of God. But we have no proofs that Holy Church approved this canonisation. Under these circumstances, it is explicable that Graetz, who was so cautious, held him for a real saint.
[177] Graetz, same work, Vol. III. Chapter VI. Page 164.
[178] Graetz, same work. Vol. III. Chapter VI. Pages 165 and 166.
[179] Graetz, same work, Vol. III. Chapter VI. Page 167.
[180] Graetz, same work. Vol. III. Chapter VI. Pages 167 and 168.
[181] Graetz, same work, Vol. III. Chapter VI.
[182] Graetz, same work. Vol. III. Chapter VI. Page 168.
[183] Graetz, same work, Vol. III. Chapter VI. Page 170.
[184] Amolon, Tractate against the Jews. Published in the Library Patrum Maxima, Vol. XII and XIV.
[185] Council of Meaux. Quoted by Graetz, same work. Vol. VIII. Chapter VI. Page 173.
[186] Graetz, same work, Vol. III. Chapter VI. Pages 172 and 173.
[187] Rabbi Josef Kastein, same work, Pages 252 and 253.
[188] Gutienre Diez de Gamez: Chronicles of Pedro Nino, Count of Buelna. This chronicle was written in the year 1495. The details are taken from the edition of Madrid, 1782. Chronicle of King Pedro by Pero Lopez de Ayala, Year I, II, III, IV ff. This Chronicle was hand-written by its author in the second half of the 14th century. Jose Amador de los Rios, History of the Jews in Spain and Portugal, Madrid 1876. Vol. II. Page 220 ff.
[189] Pero Lopez de Ayala: Chronicle of King Pedro, 5th Year. Chapter XXXIV and XXXV.
[190] Others hold this version not to be true.
[191] Prosper Merimee: Histoire de Don Pedro. Edition of Paris 1848. Pages 182 and 183.
[192] J. Amador de los Rios, same work, same edition. Vol. II. Chapter I. Pages 223 and 224.
[193] Bedarride: Les Juifs en France, en Italie, et en Bretagne. 12th edition, Paris, 1861. Michel Levy-Freres Editeurs. Page 268.
[194] Cuvelier, Histoire de Monseigneur Bertrand du Guesclin, Manuscript of the Chronicler in verse. In the year 1387, Estoneville was given the task of writing them in prose. Spanish translation: Berenguer. Madrid, 1882, Pages 108 and 110.
[195] Paul Hay, Seigneur de Chartelet: Histoire de Monseigneur Bertrand du Guesclin, Paris 1666.
[196] Prima Vita Urbani V. Editio Bosqueti. Col. cum vetustis Codicibus MMS, published by Baluzius, in Vitae Paparum Avenionensium, Paris, 1693. Vol. I, Pages 374, 375 and 386. History of Matteo Villani. Florence 1581. Book I. Chapter LXI. Pages 30 and 31. Abou-Zeid-Abd-er-Rahman Ibn-Khaldoun: History of the Berbers, French translation: Baron de Slande, Algiers, 1586, Vol. IV. Pages 379 and 380. Froissard Jean: Histoire et Chronique Memorable. Paris 1574, Vol. I. Chapter CCXXX. Pages 269, and Chapter CCXLV. Page 311.
[197] Nicole Gilles: Les Annales et Chroniques de France, Paris 1666. Page 93.
[198] Gutierre Diez de Gamez: Chronicle des Pedro Nino, Count of Buelna, same edition. Pages 14 and 21.
[199] Summary of Kings of Spain. Chapter XC.
[200] Ferrer del Rio: Critical historical investigation of the government of Peter of Castile, edition unanimously recorded by the Royal Spanish Academy, Madrid 1851. Pages 208 and 211.
[201] Paul Hay, Seigneur de Chartelet: Histoire de Monseigneur Bertrand du Guesclin, edition mentioned. Page 93.
[202] Duchesne, Teacher of the Infanta of Spain: Short history of Spain. Spanish translation: P. Jose Francisco de la Isla, Madrid, 1827.
[203] Father Juan de Mariana, S.J.: General History of Spain. Madrid, 1650.
[204] Academy for History, Privileges of this Church. Page 18.
[205] Paul Hay, Seigneur de Chartelet: Histoire de Monseigneur Bertrand du Guesclin, same edition. Book III. Chapter VI. Page 94.
[206] List of the Kings of Spain. Summary in the edition of Llaguno y Amirola of the Chronicle of Pedro-Nino. Madrid 1782.
[207] Pero Lopez de Ayala in Chapter XIII of the 5th Year of his Chronicle of King Peter says about Catalina: “who is now the wife of the King of Castile.”
[208] For information about such valuable manuscripts we have to thank the zealous learned historian J. Amador de los Rios, History of the Jews in Spain and Portugal, Madrid 1876, Vol. II. Chapter IV.
[209] Sitges: The wives of King Pedro. Madrid 1910, Pages 178 and 179.
[210] Cuvelier: Histoire de Monseigneur Bertrand du Guesclin, written in prose by Estonteville, same edition. Page 107.
[211] Continuatio Chronici Guillemi de Mangis. published in “Specilegium sive Collectio Veterum Aliquot Scriptorum qui in Galliae Bibliothecis delituerant”, Paris 1722, Vol. III. Page 139.
[212] Paul Hay, Seigneur de Chartelet: Histoire de Monseigneur Bertrand du Guesclin, same edition, Book III. Chapter VI. Pages 92, 93 and 94.
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