Persecuted Minorities In Medieval Europe Essay

The Jews have always been a persecuted minority, especially in the Medieval Europe. Judaism had a small amount of followers, as they did not force people to convert, but it was still an important religion, for it provided the foundation on which Christianity and Islam were both formed. Their holy book was called the Talmud or the Torah. After the Jewish diaspora, Jews fled to either the Middle East, Africa, or Europe. Anti-semitism was always a major issue in Europe at the time, and many countries exiled Jews in the Middle Ages. Between 1100 and 1800, there were 1366 total violent events against Jews in Medieval Europe (Anderson, Johnson, and Koyama 3). Although the Jews were persecuted and discriminated against for centuries as a minority in medieval Europe, the Jewish people maintained their heritage because of their

Firstly, Jewish methods of education in Medieval Europe were based off of lines from the Talmud in order to maintain their own identity and culture. To start out, there was a scripture in ancient times that was adapted into a law in Medieval European Jewish communities that stated that it was a mitzvah (good deed) for “fathers to teach their sons how to read and study from the Torah” (Krasner). The law encouraged Jewish people to learn more about their culture and teach their children about their Jewish heritage, as Jews rely upon the Talmud for ruling themselves and making laws. That ensured that the knowledge about Judaism would be passed down l’dor vador, which meant from generation to generation, and that it would never be forgotten, even as the Jews were persecuted everywhere. Furthermore, when a Jewish boy began school once he was six, he had a new student ceremony. The boy dresses up and is carried into the synagogue by either his father or teacher. He was given a wooden slate with two letters of the Hebrew alphabet and an inscription describing how Moses had commanded the Jewish people to learn the Torah. On the tablet