A central legacy of the poststructuralist turn in history has been a new self-consciousness about the narratives that both inform, and are formed by, historical writing. A heightened awareness of how the human need to tell a story can distort the historian's sense of past events has by now revitalized and sharpened scholarship in the historical disciplines for decades. Yet in the study of Jewish history, certain paradigmatic narratives have proved surprisingly persistent, and it is these at which Robert Chazan takes aim with his new analysis of medieval Jewish life in Europe.
Chazan's work opens with a simple claim: that the prevailing model of medieval Jewish history in Europe has been distorted by an exaggerated emphasis on Jewish suffering and oppression despite significant evidence to the contrary. To make this claim is one thing; to make and support it as broadly as this work aims to do, with evidence drawn from across medieval Europe between the years 1000-1500, presents a challenge feasible perhaps only for an author with more than four decades of engagement in the study of medieval Jewish history. The book is designed with a judiciousness reflective of this long perspective: it presents its case as a two-stage task, in which analysis of on-the-ground evidence concerning Jewish medieval life can be undertaken only after the dismantling of the several dominant, mutually reinforcing narratives that have shaped their interpretation- -or misinterpretation--in the past.
The first part of the book undertakes this fundamental work, laying out first the medieval Jewish and Christian narratives of Jewish history and then the modern historiography that still rests to a surprising extent on these models. Key here is the recognition of how the two medieval narratives resembled and reinforced each other, not just in their shared tripartite model of idyllic beginning, declining middle phase, and redemptive concluding stage, but also in the joint recognition of such symbolic turning points as the sack of Jerusalem in 70 CE (seen by Jews as the consequence of internal sinfulness but by Christians, of course, as punishment for the Crucifixion). Subsequent examination of the written history of Europe and the place of Jews within it conveys how recent and current scholars have grappled, successfully or not, with those tenacious medieval paradigms. While acknowledging the significant dent made by a newly sophisticated and international scholarship in what sometimes is called the "lachrymose" model of Jewish history, this section also reveals how little impact this thoughtful work sometimes has had upon wider, and especially popular, adherence to the old paradigm.
The book's second part takes on a more daunting goal: to examine evidence both for and against the prevailing view of Jewish disadvantage and oppression in medieval Europe in the central and later Middle Ages. Comprehensiveness in this endeavor is clearly impossible given the scope of the material, and this section is wisely structured to offer a sampling of evidence in five areas deemed especially reflective of the medieval Jewish situation: demography, economics, ecclesiastical and social status, relations with Christian majorities, and the preservation of Jewish identity. Within the limitations of the roughly twenty-page chapters allotted to each topic, this approach successfully opens the door to a reevaluation of traditional views on each subject. In the section on demography, the persistence of voluntary migrations into the more welcoming areas of Europe is offered in counterweight to more widely published instances of expulsion; in that on economics, the mutually beneficial aspects of the Jewish turn to moneylending and its frequent encouragement by medieval secular authorities are set against the well-documented popular resentment of such practices. Especially thought-provoking, although also at times most speculative, is the chapter on Jewish relations with non-Jews, which balances the many points of tension that characterized the medieval Jewish-Christian relationship against evidence that these crises often occurred against a backdrop of relatively peaceful daily dealings among individuals and communities. Without denying or minimizing the negative aspects of medieval Jewish life in Europe--these realities are fully and repeatedly acknowledged- -this section aims at, and generally achieves, the kind of analytical texture so difficult to capture in historical treatments of this scope.
Although an effort is made in both sections to include evidence concerning Jews in Spain, Italy, and other Mediterranean zones, the most powerful examples presented here are drawn from northern Europe and especially from France and Germany. This preference is logical enough, not only because of the author's longstanding authority on the Jewish history of these reasons but because the situation in the north, where Jewish population swelled suddenly between 1000 and 1500, presents a set of problems quite different from the more complicated ebb and flow of the older, diverse Jewish communities living in proximity to the Mediterranean. The Spanish and Italian evidence that is incorporated here is handled very well; it merely whets the appetite for additional consideration of these regions.
Chazan's patient presentation and understated writing gently encourages the kind of historical rethinking that his work intends, even on the part of those who may not think they need it. In this sense, it offers a valuable read for academic specialists with any interest in Jewish history and a promising resource for university teaching at all levels. Its appeal for a non-specialist audience will be aided by its exceptionally clear, if occasionally slightly repetitive, structure and its concise, accessible prose. The potential for this broader readership stands among this book's greatest strengths, since as the author himself argues, Jewish history is one area in which non-academic interest has significant potential to affect ongoing work in the field.