An original stamp

The diaspora of the Jewish people is not only the consequence of the destruction of the Temple of Jerusalem in 70 AD, but is also linked to the travels and trade of Jewish merchants in the Mediterranean, from the 3rd century BC onwards, in particular from Alexandria in Egypt. “The most ancient communities of the Jewish diaspora also settled in Rome and, later, from the 5th to 8th centuries, in the southern Italian regions of Apulia and Sicily, in Spain and in Provence”. An historical map of the diffusion of Jewish population and culture in Europe was traced by ANNA FOA , historian at the University of Rome “La Sapienza”, in her recent intervention in the 29th European Week held at Gazzada (Varese) and promoted by the Paul VI Ambrosian Foundation in cooperation with the Catholic University of the Sacred Heart in Milan. The theme of the conference was: “Religious history of the Jews in Europe”. “The interweaving of the Jewish tradition with the other cultural and religious forms present in Europe” enjoyed “periods of fruitful exchange over the centuries” but it also experienced moments of appalling violence. And yet, “the contribution of Jewish culture to the history of the old continent” is undeniable, in particular “thanks to the original stamp of Jewish thought and knowledge”, underlined SANTE GRACIOTTI , member of the Accademia dei Lincei and coordinator of the conference. ITALY AND GERMANY. “In the first centuries of the Middle Ages – explained Foa -, the Talmud penetrated the West through the intermediary of the Jewish communities in southern Italy”. Migrations towards central and northern Italy, and from there to France and the Rhineland, began between the 7th and 9th century. So-called ashkenazi communities (from Ashkenaz, Jewish name for Germany) spread to Germany in the 10th century; they gave rise to a flourishing phase of Jewish culture of the diaspora, characterized by an efficient organization of the community and good relations with the Christian world”. But this phase entered into crisis “due to the persecutions that followed the First Crusade (1097)” and experienced its most tragic moment with the outbreak of the Black Death in 1348 “which led to the destruction of the Jewish communities in Germany and migration to Italy and Poland”. SPAIN. The second great Jewish ethnic and cultural branch is that of the Sephardi, present in Spain since the 4th century with “its own specific character in Aragon and Castille”. At the end of the 14th century, with the decline and fall of what Graciotti called “the golden age of the Spain of the three religions” (i.e. Christianity, Judaism and Islam), Jews in Spain began to be victims of persecutions and violence “which culminated in 1492 with their expulsion from the Iberian peninsula”. From there, continued Graciotti, the Sephardi “spread to France, Holland, Italy and even the Balkans. ITALY . “ Neither ashkenazi nor sephardi – explained Foa -, Italian Jews were called itakim and embarked on migration from the South to the North of the peninsula between the 13th and 14th century”. In the late 13th century “small communities of moneylenders spread in central Italy”, while “the Jewish community in Rome was the only one of the whole Western diaspora to survive without any interruptions since Antiquity”. In the 14th century Italy was also populated by immigrant Jewish groups from Germany, Spain and Provence. The creation of the famous ghetto in Venice dates to 1516; it was followed by that of the ghetto in Rome in 1555. EASTERN EUROPE. Between the 16th and the 17th century the Jewish world expanded in Poland, Lithuania and Russia. From the 18th century onwards the majority of Jews, Foa pointed out, “were settled in Eastern Europe, a still impoverished and backward world”. The gulf between the Jews of East and those of Western Europe grew wider in the 19th century: “in the West Jews became part of modernity, while in Eastern Europe anti-semitism grew, and from Russia began the exodus of millions of Jews bound for the New World. Simultaneously Zionist emigration to Palestine began”, and was enriched by groups from Poland and Germany. FROM THE SHOAH TO THE PRESENT DAY. “With the advent of Nazism the Jewish world of Eastern Europe was completely suppressed. Its reconstruction began in 1948 and led to the foundation of the State of Israel, emigration from Europe and the persistence of the diaspora”. “There are three main poles of Judaism today – Anna Foa concluded -: Israel, the American diaspora and Europe. It is this latter that is now struggling to find an independent role for itself and to create for itself a renewed identity”.