the PoPe and the


rabbi sUsAN KIKoLeR


and the Chief Rabbi, Elio Toaff. The depth of this friendship was again


acknowledged when the present Pope, Benedict XVI, attended the same synagogue on 17 January 2010. Before entering the building, Pope Benedict commemorated the terrorist attack on the synagogue in 1982 by laying a wreath inmemory of Stefano Gaj Tache, the young child killed in the attack, andmeeting his family and other survivors. There then followed a very touching and warmembrace between Pope Benedict and Elio Toaff outside the Chief Rabbi’s house. InMay 2010 a special greeting was sent by Pope Benedict to Elio Toaff on the occasion of his 95th birthday. Such personal rapport does not, of


Pope John Paul II meets Rabbi Toaff in 1986


One of themost important events in the history of the relationship between the Vatican and the Jews occurred on 13April 1986, when Pope John Paul II visited the Great Temple in Rome. He was the first pope ever to pray in a synagogue. Behind this event is a touching story of friendship. Pope John Paul II had been a witness to


the Nazi persecution of the Jews in his native Poland. He had helped to shelter Jews and, it is reported, even spokeYiddish. Elio Toaff, who greeted the Pontiff on his historic visit and prayed with him, was originally fromLivorno and had been Chief Rabbi of Rome since 1951. Today as Emeritus Chief Rabbi of Rome, since his retirement in 2001, he remains a hugely respected figure throughout Italy. The twomen had firstmet in 1981 and


the Pope’s visit followed a personal invitation fromthe Chief Rabbi. Over the years there were further privatemeetings and a deep bond of respect and friendship grew between them, somuch so that the Chief Rabbi was one of only a handful of visitors allowed to see the dying Pope in his final days. He was also one of the few admitted to pay his private respects when the body of the Pope was still in theVatican’s Clementine Hall before it was removed to St Peter’s Basilica, where heads of state and the public were admitted. Lastly, although Pope John Paul II left nomaterial property, he did leave a testament in which only two people werementioned by name – the Pope’s Secretary,Archbishop Stanislaw Dziwisz,


course, preclude vital questions and disagreements between theVatican and world Jewry. The ambiguous figure of the wartime Pope, Pius XII, his exact role and responsibility in not openly condemning Nazi persecution of the Jews whilemany ordinary Catholics, nuns and priests, sheltered them, and the fact that the relevant Vatican archives are still closed to public scrutiny, caused great arguments and a threat of a schismwithin Rome’s Jewish community before Pope Benedict’s visit. That afternoon among the gathering of politicians, including PrimeMinister Berlusconi, and Jewish dignitaries, including Nobel PrizeWinner Rita LeviMontalcino, pride of place was given to the Holocaust survivors of Rome’s Jewish community, easily distinguished by their striped scarves. Their presence was noted in the address of welcome and Pope Benedict spontaneously stood to pay themhomage. SubsequentVatican-Jewish relations


have not always been so sure-footed: the Pope’s initial welcome to excommunicated Holocaust denier, Bishop RichardWilliams, was recanted immediately after an outcry. Middle Eastern politics often proves a minefield. However, Pope Benedict’s Jesus of Nazareth Part 2, published thisMarch, in which he rejects the idea that Jews were responsible for the death of Christ and emphasises the deep connections between Christianity and Judaism, has been seen as a major step in implementing the second phase ofVatican II. It is all a far cry fromthe 6th century


when the Pope, asVicar of Rome and then temporal lord over all the Papal States, became the de facto ruler of all the Jews in his lands.Aglance at the Timeline (p. 14) immediately reveals the unpredictable and alternating attitudes of the popes towards their Jewish subjects – both as a protected source of funds in time of war and as a


reviledminority to be kept separate from Christian society – especially when the Catholic Church felt itself threatened during the Crusades and the Counter-Reformation. However, some, such as theMedici


popes, were favourably disposed towards the Jews. Indeed, Leo X who, likemany other popes, had a Jewish doctor, was so supportive – bestowing titles on Jewish musicians, encouraging the establishment of a Hebrew printing press – that the Jews of Rome began to believe it was a sign of the imminent arrival of theMessiah andmade contact with their brethren in Jerusalemto see if they too had seen such portents. There have even been apocryphal tales


of ‘Jewish popes’: a Sephardi story of how a convert became PopeAndreas and saved his former brethren; theAshkenazi tale of Elchanan, son of R. Simeon ofMyence, who finally returned to the faith of his fathers. Yet examples of forced conversion


continued into the 19th century. The Vatican’s involvement in the snatching and conversion of Jewish children,most notably EdgardoMortara, who was kidnapped from his Jewish family in Bologna in 1858 after his non-Jewishmaid, fearing hemight die, had baptised himwhen he was sick, caused an international outcry and the intercession ofMosesMontefiore.Yet it was all in vain. Mortara remained within theVatican and later became a Catholic priest and missionary. The temporal power of the Pope ended


in 1870 after the Italian unification. Jews had distinguished themselves in the fight for a united and free Italy both in the support they gaveMazzini, Cavour and Garibaldi and by their individual participation in politics and themilitary. It should be remembered that there were 50 Jewish generals fighting in Italy’smilitary forces inWorldWar I. Today Italy’s Jewish population is a


mere 28-30,000 out of a total population of 60million and they are no longer the only significant religiousminority. Over the last 15 years or so Italy and theVatican have struggled to come to terms with an influx of Muslims, Chinese, Eastern Europeans and NorthAfrican refugees who arrive daily in their boatloads fromEgypt, Tunisia and Libya. The Jews of Rome in particular, led by the present Chief Rabbi Riccardo di Segni, have been in the forefront of the fight for civil rights and toleration for these new minorities – for example present as observers when police raided the Roma camps to check on children living there. The Jewish experience in the past is now proving a way forward towards the future.


JewIsh ReNAIssANCe oCtoBeR 2011


19


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32  |  Page 33  |  Page 34  |  Page 35  |  Page 36  |  Page 37  |  Page 38  |  Page 39  |  Page 40  |  Page 41  |  Page 42  |  Page 43  |  Page 44  |  Page 45  |  Page 46  |  Page 47  |  Page 48  |  Page 49  |  Page 50  |  Page 51  |  Page 52  |  Page 53  |  Page 54  |  Page 55  |  Page 56  |  Page 57  |  Page 58  |  Page 59  |  Page 60