The Jewish deicide is a theological position that holds that Jews as a people group will forever hold a collective responsibility for killing Jesus, even throughout the successive generations following the period he lived.
It arose in early Christianity, the charge having been made as early as the 2nd century by Justin Martyr and Melito of Sardis.
Louis H. Feldman,  Studies in Hellenistic Judaism, BRILL, 1996    pp.309ff.
The accusation that the Jews were Christ-killers fed into Christian antisemitismRainer Kampling, ‘Deicide,’ in  Richard S. Levy (ed.), Antisemitism: A Historical Encyclopedia of Prejudice and Persecution, Vol. 1  ABC-CLIO, 2005   pp.168-169 p.169  and spurred on acts of violence against Jews such as pogroms, massacres of Jews during the Crusades, expulsions of the Jews from England, France, Spain, Portugal and other places, torture during the Spanish and Portuguese inquisitions and the Holocaust genocide.
In the catechism produced by the Council of Trent in the mid-16th century, the Catholic Church taught that the collectivity of sinful humanity was responsible for the death of Jesus, not only the Jews.Norman C. Tobias, Jewish Conscience of the Church: Jules Isaac and the Second Vatican Council,  Springer, 2017 p.115.
In the Second Vatican Council (1962–1965), the Catholic Church under Pope Paul VI issued the declaration Nostra aetate that repudiated the previous doctrine of collective Jewish guilt for the crucifixion of Jesus.
It declared that the accusation could not be made "against all the Jews, without distinction, then alive, nor against the Jews of today".
Nevertheless, a number of groups within the Catholic Church reject the declaration of the Second Vatican Council and continue to support the charge of Jewish deicide.
Most other churches do not have any binding position on the matter, although some denominations have issued declarations against the accusation.Evangelical Lutheran Church in America "Guidelines for Lutheran-Jewish Relations" November 16, 1998World Council of Churches "Guidelines for Lutheran-Jewish Relations" in Current Dialogue, Issue 33 July, 1999 Sources
Matthew 27:24–25
Justification of the charge of Jewish deicide has been sought in Matthew 27:24–25:
The verse which reads: "And all the people answered, 'His blood be on us and on our children!
is also referred to as the blood curse.
In an essay regarding antisemitism, biblical scholar Amy-Jill Levine argues that this passage has caused more Jewish suffering throughout history than any other passage in the New Testament.
Many also point to the Gospel of John as evidence of Christian charges of deicide.
As Samuel Sandmel writes, "John is widely regarded as either the most anti-Semitic or at least the most overtly anti-Semitic of the gospels."
Support for this claim comes in several places throughout John, such as in John 5:16–18:
Some scholars describe this passage as irrefutably referencing and implicating the Jews in deicide, although many, such as scholar Robert Kysar, also argue that part of the severity of this charge comes more from those who read and understand the text than the text itself.
For instance, John renders the character of the Ioudaioi, the Jew, as a clear antagonist and Christ-killer, although the notion that the Jew is meant to in fact represent all Jews is often disputed.
While the New Testament is often more subtle or leveled in accusations of deicide, many scholars hold that these works cannot be held in isolation, and must be considered in the context of their interpretation by later Christian communities.
Historicity of Matthew 27:24–25
According to the gospel accounts, Jewish authorities in Roman Judea charged Jesus with blasphemy and sought his execution, but lacked the authority to have Jesus put to death (John 18:31), so they brought Jesus to Pontius Pilate, the Roman governor of the province, who authorized Jesus' execution (John 19:16).The Historical Jesus Through Catholic and Jewish Eyes by Bryan F. Le Beau, Leonard J. Greenspoon and Dennis Hamm (Nov 1, 2000)  pages 105-106 The Jesus Seminar's Scholars Version translation note for John 18:31 adds: "it's illegal for us: The accuracy of this claim is doubtful."
It is noted, for example, that Jewish authorities were responsible for the stoning of Saint Stephen in Acts 7:54 and of James the Just in Antiquities of the Jews without the consent of the governor.
Josephus however, notes that the execution of James happened while the newly appointed governor Lucceius Albinus "was but upon the road" to assume his office.
Also Acts relates that the stoning happened in a lynching-like manner, in the course of Stephen's public criticism of Jews who refused to believe in Jesus.
It has also been suggested that the Gospel accounts may have downplayed the role of the Romans in Jesus' death during a time when Christianity was struggling to gain acceptance among the then pagan or polytheist Roman world.Anchor Bible Dictionary vol. 5. (1992) pp.
399–400.
Bantam Doubleday Dell.
Matthew 27:24–25, quoted above, has no counterpart in the other Gospels and some scholars see it as probably related to the destruction of Jerusalem in the year 70 A.D.Craig Evans, Matthew (Cambridge University Press, 2012) page 455.
Ulrich Luz describes it as "redactional fiction" invented by the author of the Gospel of Matthew.Ulrich Luz, Studies in Matthew (William B. Eerdmans Publishing, 2005) page 58.
Some writers, viewing it as part of Matthew's anti-Jewish polemic, see in it the seeds of later Christian antisemitism.Graham Stanton, A Gospel for a New People (Westminster John Knox Press, 1993), page 148.
In his 2011 book, Pope Benedict XVI, besides repudiating placing blame on the Jewish people, interprets the passage found in the Gospel of Matthew which has the crowd saying "Let his blood be upon us and upon our children" as not referring to the whole Jewish people.
Historicity of Barabbas
Some biblical scholars including Benjamin Urrutia and Hyam Maccoby go a step further by not only doubting the historicity of the blood curse statement in Matthew but also the existence of Barabbas.Urrutia, Benjamin.
"Pilgrimage", The Peaceable Table (October 2008) This theory is based on the fact that Barabbas's full name was given in early writings as Jesus Barabbas, meaning literally Jesus, son of the father.
The theory is that this name originally referred to Jesus himself, and that when the crowd asked Pilate to release "Jesus, son of the father" they were referring to Jesus himself, as suggested also by Peter Cresswell.Peter Cresswell, Jesus The Terrorist, 2009Peter Cresswell, The Invention of Jesus: How the Church Rewrote the New Testament, 2013 The theory suggests that further details around Barabbas are historical fiction based on a misunderstanding.
The theory is disputed by other scholars.
Paul’s First Letter to the Thessalonians
Paul’s First Letter to the Thessalonians also contains accusations of Jewish deicide:
According to Jeremy Cohen: 2nd century
The identification of the death of Jesus as the killing of God is first stated in "God is murdered"Stephen G. Wilson Anti-Judaism in Early Christianity: Volume 2: Separation and Polemic 0889205523 2006 "could all have been developed without reference to the Marcionites, but in the context in which Melito worked it seems ... and the assertion that 'God is murdered' (line 715) fully justify Hall's succinct summary: 'Melito does attribute to Christ all... as early as 167 AD, in a  tract bearing the title Peri Pascha that may have been designed to bolster a minor Christian sect's presence in Sardis, where Jews had a thriving community with excellent relations with Greeks, and which is attributed to a Quartodeciman,  Melito of Sardis,Lynn Cohick, 'Melito of Sardis's 'PERI PASCHA' and Its 'Israel, The Harvard Theological Review, Vol. 91, No. 4 (October 1998), pp.
351–372.
a statement is made that appears to have transformed the charge that Jews had killed their own Messiah into the charge that the Jews had killed God himself.
If so, the author would be the first writer in the Lukan-Pauline tradition to raise unambiguously the accusation of deicide against Jews.Abel Mordechai Bibliowicz, Jews and Gentiles in the Early Jesus Movement: An Unintended Journey, Palgrave Macmillan, 2013 pp.
180–182.Christine Shepardson, Anti-Judaism and Christian Orthodoxy: Ephrem's Hymns in Fourth-century Syria, CUA Press 2008 p.27.
This text blames the Jews for allowing King Herod and Caiaphas to execute Jesus, despite their calling as God's people (i.e., both were Jewish).
It says "you did not know, O Israel, that this one was the firstborn of God".
The author does not attribute particular blame to Pontius Pilate, but only mentions that Pilate washed his hands of guilt."
On the passover"  pp.
57, 82, 92, 93 from Kerux: The Journal of Northwest Theological Seminary 4th century
John Chrysostom (c. 347 - 407) was an important Early Church Father who served as archbishop of Constantinople and is known for his fanatical anti-Semitism, collected in his homilies, such as Adversus Judaeos.
The charge of Jewish deicide was the cornerstone of his theology, and he was the first to use the term deicideFred Gladstone Bratton, [The Crime of Christendom: The Theological Sources of Christian Anti-Semitism], Beacon Press, 1969 p. 85. and the first Christian preacher to apply the word deicide to Jews collectively.Malcolm Vivian Hay, Thy brother's blood: the roots of Christian anti-Semitism, Hart Pub.
Co., 1975 p.30.
He held that for this putative 'deicide', there was no expiation, pardon or indulgence possible.
The first occurrence of the Latin word deicida occurs in a Latin sermon by Peter Chrysologus (c. 380 – c. 450).Wolfram Drews, The unknown neighbour: the Jew in the thought of Isidore of Seville, Brill, 2006 p.187.Charleton Lewis and Charles Short, Latin Dictionary In the Latin version he wrote: Iudaeos [invidia] ... fecit esse deicidas, i.e., "[Envy] made the Jews deicides".Sermons of Peter Chrysologus, vol. 6, p. 116, "Sermo CLXXII" Recent discussion
The accuracy of the Gospel accounts' portrayal of Jewish complicity in Jesus' death has been vigorously debated in recent decades, with views ranging from a denial of responsibility to extensive culpability.
According to the Jesuit scholar Daniel Harrington, the consensus of Jewish and Christian scholars is that there is some Jewish responsibility, regarding not the Jewish people, but regarding only the probable involvement of the high priests in Jerusalem at the time and their allies.
Many scholars read the story of the passion as an attempt to take the blame off Pilate and place it on the Jews, one which might have been at the time politically motivated.
It is thought possible that Pilate ordered the crucifixion to avoid a riot, for example.
Some scholars hold that the synoptic account is compatible with traditions in the Babylonian Talmud.
The writings of Moses Maimonides (a medieval Sephardic Jewish philosopher) mentioned the hanging of a certain Jesus (identified in the sources as Yashu'a) on the eve of Passover.
Maimonides considered Jesus as a Jewish renegade in revolt against Judaism; religion commanded the death of Jesus and his students; and Christianity was a religion attached to his name in a later period.
In a passage widely censored in pre-modern editions for fear of the way it might feed into very real anti-Semitic attitudes, Maimonides wrote of "Jesus of Nazareth, who imagined that he was the Messiah, and was put to death by the court" (that is, "by a beth din").
Liturgy
Eastern Christianity
The Holy Friday liturgy of the Eastern Orthodox Church, as well as the Byzantine Rite Catholic churches, uses the expression "impious and transgressing people",Ware, Metropolitan Kallistos and Mother Mary.
The Lenten Triodion.
St. Tikhon's Seminary Press, 2002, p. 612 (second stichos of Lord, I Have Cried at Vespers on Holy Friday) but the strongest expressions are in the Holy Thursday liturgy, which includes the same chant, after the eleventh Gospel reading, but also speaks of "the murderers of God, the lawless nation of the Jews",Ware, Metropolitan Kallistos and Mother Mary.
The Lenten Triodion.
St. Tikhon's Seminary Press, 2002, p. 589 (third stichos of the Beatitudes at Matins on Holy Friday) and, referring to "the assembly of the Jews", prays: "But give them, Lord, their reward, because they devised vain things against Thee."
Ware, Metropolitan Kallistos and Mother Mary.
The Lenten Triodion.
St. Tikhon's Seminary Press, 2002, p. 586 (thirteenth antiphon at Matins on Holy Friday).
The phrase "plotted in vain" is drawn from .
Western Christianity
A liturgy with a similar pattern but with no specific mention of the Jews is found in the Improperia of the Roman Rite of the Catholic Church.
A collect for the Jews is also said, traditionally calling for the conversion of the “faithless” and “blind” Jews, although this wording was removed after the Vatican II council.
It had been sometimes thought, perhaps incorrectly, that “faithless” (in Latin, perfidis), meant “perfidious”, i.e. treacherous.
In the Anglican Church, the 1662 Book of Common Prayer contains a similar collect for “Jews, Turks, Infidels, and Hereticks” for use on Good Friday, though it does not allude to any responsibility for the death of Jesus.
Versions of the Improperia also appear in later versions, such as the 1989 Anglican Prayer Book of the Anglican Church of Southern Africa, commonly called The Solemn Adoration of Christ Crucified or The Reproaches.An Anglican Prayer Book (1989) Church of the Province of Southern Africa Although not part of Christian dogma, many Christians, including members of the clergy, preached that the Jewish people were collectively guilty for Jesus' death.
Repudiation
In the aftermath of World War II, Jules Isaac, a French-Jewish historian and Holocaust survivor, played a seminal role in documenting the anti-Semitic traditions which existed in the Catholic Church's thinking, instruction and liturgy.
The move to draw up a formal document of repudiation gained momentum after Isaac obtained a private audience with Pope John XXIII in 1960.
In the Second Vatican Council (1962–1965), the Catholic Church under Pope Paul VI issued the declaration Nostra aetate ("In Our Time"), which among other things repudiated belief in the collective Jewish guilt for the crucifixion of Jesus.
Nostra aetate stated that, even though some Jewish authorities and those who followed them called for Jesus' death, the blame for what happened cannot be laid at the door of all Jews living at that time, nor can the Jews in our time be held guilty.
It made no explicit mention of Matthew 27:24–25, but only of .
On November 16, 1998, the Church Council of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America adopted a resolution which was prepared by its Consultative Panel on Lutheran-Jewish Relations.
The resolution urged that any Lutheran church which was presenting a Passion play should adhere to its Guidelines for Lutheran-Jewish Relations, stating that "the New Testament ... must not be used as a justification for hostility towards present-day Jews", and it also stated that "blame for the death of Jesus should not be attributed to Judaism or the Jewish people."
Pope Benedict XVI also repudiated the Jewish deicide charge in his 2011 book Jesus of Nazareth, in which he interpreted the translation of "ochlos" in Matthew to mean the "crowd", rather than the Jewish people.
See also
Antisemitism and the New Testament
Antisemitism in Christianity
Sigmund Freud's Moses and Monotheism
Romany crucifixion legend
Faithful Word Baptist Church
Westboro Baptist Church
References
External links
