Blood libel
Blood libel refers to a historical and false accusation against Jews, particularly during the Middle Ages, alleging that they murder Christian children to use their blood in religious rituals. The earliest recorded accusations date back to the era of the Temple, but the phenomenon intensified following the First Crusade in 1096, leading to widespread violence against Jewish communities in Europe. Notable cases, such as the murder of William of Norwich in 1144, exemplified the brutality of these claims, which often lacked any basis in fact. Despite Pope Innocent IV's denouncement of blood libel in 1247, the myth persisted, fueled by cultural representations and literature of the time, including works by Shakespeare and Chaucer, which reinforced harmful stereotypes. The accusations were rooted in anti-Semitic sentiments and often resulted in violent reprisals against Jewish populations. Blood libel continued to resurface in various forms throughout history, including during the 19th and 20th centuries, where it was exploited for political and propagandistic purposes. Despite its historical origins, blood libel remains a symbol of enduring prejudice and has had lasting impacts on Jewish communities worldwide.
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Blood libel
A blood libel was a false accusation leveled against the Jews in the Middle Ages that they regularly murdered Christian children to use their blood for religious and ritualistic purposes. The allegations of the purported use of the blood could vary, but primarily, the Jews were charged with mixing it into the unleavened bread (called matzah in Hebrew) that was consumed on Passover. Others claimed that the Jews drank the blood as a cure for hemorrhoids or to replenish the blood lost during circumcision. A blood libel is also known as a blood accusation with both terms indicating that the claims were inherently not true. In 1247, Pope Innocent IV officially denounced the canard of the blood libel.
Brief History
The first recorded accusation targeting ritualistic murder occurred during the Temple era when the Jewish historian Josephus Flavius defended the Jews against the charges made by the Greek scholar Apion. In Flavius’s polemic, he mentions Apion’s contention that Jews would capture a Greek, fatten him up, slaughter him in the Temple, and eat his internal organs while swearing an oath of everlasting enmity toward the Greeks. The esteemed Greek philosopher Democritus shared this belief of human sacrifices and commented that every seven years, the Jews catch strangers for sacramental purposes and would subsequently slaughter them and shred their flesh. For many centuries afterward, there was no mention of blood libel. With the advent of the first Crusade of the Holy Roman Empire in 1096, however, manifestations of anti-Semitism came to the fore. Massacres of entire Jewish communities in Trier and Metz in France, and in Worms, Germany, were deemed justified because the Jews were guilty of being Christ killers. Rumors spread that the Jews ritually murdered Christians and were culpable of host desecration.
In 1144, these accusations came to a head when twelve-year-old William of Norwich was brutally murdered with gruesome wounds on his head and body. His uncle, a priest, was quick to blame the Jews and claimed that the stab wounds on his head were to simulate Christ’s crown of thorns. Although there was no record of blood being drained from the boy’s body, historians consider this the starting point of the blood libel of the modern era. Decades later, Pope Innocent IV investigated the incident and, in 1247, concluded that the accusations were false.
In 1255, a boy in England named Hugh of Lincoln was found dead, and nineteen Jews were killed during anti-Jewish riots. Hugh of Lincoln was sainted as a martyr who died for his faith and became the subject of the popular song and story "Little Saint Hugh." The blood libel was especially rampant in medieval Europe, with individual and sometimes whole communities of Jews suffering violence and death in retaliation.
Overview
Arguments in favor of the absurdity of the blood libel accusations include that the Jewish Bible, the Torah, prohibits Jews from ingesting any blood—animal or human. Furthermore, Jews are prohibited from killing another human being. In regard to all Jews being Christ killers, crucifixion was a Roman invention, and the Book of Matthew in the New Testament of the Christian Bible clearly states that the Romans took Christ’s life.
Many Europeans in medieval times were also swayed toward believing the allegations against the Jews in no small part thanks to one of the most celebrated authors of the time. In William Shakespeare’s play The Merchant of Venice, the Jewish Shylock demands payment of a loan owed to him or the right to cut a pound of flesh from the borrower. Portia invokes the Christian attribute of mercy while pleading with Shylock and makes reference to the blood libel.
Further mention is made in Geoffrey Chaucer’s "The Prioress's Tale" in the fourteenth-century classic The Canterbury Tales. Additionally, songs of the day perpetuated the untruths: in a compilation of English and Scottish ballads compiled by Francis James Child, Jews were ridiculed and derided as bloodthirsty.
Furthermore, thirteenth-century Christians were led to believe that Jews sought to desecrate the host. The Church declared that a wafer blessed by the priest would turn into the body of Christ, and wine would take the place of his blood, a belief known as transubstantiation. Jews in Switzerland were then accused of stealing wafers to torture Christians, and members of the Jewish community near Berlin, Germany, were burned alive after being charged with stabbing a stolen wafer and causing blood to pour out of it.
Despite being proven false, the age-old antisemitic blood libel persisted throughout the ages. Modern examples of blood libel include the trial of Jewish factory worker Menahem Mendel Beilistrial in Russia in 1913, the Dreyfus Affair, also known as L'affaire, in late-nineteenth-century France, and the frequent mention made by the Nazis in their propaganda blitz to legitimize the genocide of the Jews in the mid-1900s. In the twenty-first century, examples of blood libel antisemitism continued to exist. In Israel and the Middle East, leaders of religious groups continued to express their belief that Jews used Christian children’s blood to perform rituals throughout the 2010s. Following the Hamas-led attack on Israel in October 2023, which sparked war between Israel and Palestine, many anti-Israel messages reverted to using blood-libel-like themes. Social media posts, cartoons, posters, and other mediums claimed Israelis were stealing the organs of Palestinians. Others claimed killing children was an Israeli ritual.
Bibliography
"Blood Libel Accusations Resurface in the Wake of Oct. 7." Anti-Defamation League, 26 Jan. 2024, www.adl.org/resources/article/blood-libel-accusations-resurface-wake-oct-7. Accessed 9 Jan. 2025.
"Blood Libels throughout History." US Holocaust Memorial Museum, encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/blood-libel. Accessed 9 Jan. 2025.
Gottheil, Richard, et al. "Blood Accusation." Jewish Encyclopedia, www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/3408-blood-accusation. Accessed 9 Jan. 2025.
Markoe, Lauren. "The History behind the Myth of ‘Blood Libel.’" The Huffington Post, 20 Nov. 2014, www.huffpost.com/entry/jewish-blood-libel‗n‗6192318. Accessed 9 Jan. 2025.
Teter, Magda. Blood Libel: On the Trail of an Antisemitic Myth. Harvard UP, 2020.
Wesker, Arnold. Blood Libel. Bloomsbury Publishing, 2020.
"Wolf Challenges Leader on 'Blood' Remarks." CNN, 4 Sept. 2024, www.cnn.com/videos/us/2014/08/04/tsr-intv-osama-hamdan-blood-comments.cnn. Accessed 9 Jan. 2025.