Tractatus de imposturis et ceremoniis Iudaeorum nostri temporis

adversaries, he sustained and finally defeated them in such a way that, with Christ as victor, he easily carried off the palm of victory. For the things he subsequently committed to writing he drew not only from the writings and discourses of those who had come to the knowledge of Christ, but he excerpted them from the very books of the Thalmudists those who follow the Talmud, in such a way that he skillfully and forcefully slew them with their own sword. This holy man is overwhelmed and lacerated with unworthy insults and lies, as if he had written these things not out of a love and zeal for the truth, but driven by anger and hatred, after having been rejected when he sought some sum of money. How falsely these and other slanders of this kind are spread, anyone can see, so that there is no need for a longer refutation. To the records of these men I shall here annex the things which I myself have seen, heard, and experienced, and of which I was a large part. If anyone should disdain to place faith in these, I believe he should be warned to prefer to grow wise at the expense of others rather than his own. The dishonesty of this race is truly so great that it can scarcely be conceived in the mind, let alone explained in words.

In the Apocalypse of John, chapter 2, the Lord says: "I know the slanders and blasphemies of those who call themselves Jews, but are not: but are the synagogue of Satan." By these words it is made plain that the Jews who, after the advent and manifestation of Christ, persist in blindness and hardness of heart and reject the saving Lord, are to be rejected and cast into the outer darkness. If we seek the true denotation of the name, it is clear that the title of an evil slanderer applies to them rather than that of "Jew," which was once a most honorable term, now rendered hateful by abuse. For the true Jew is he who acknowledges the true God and celebrates Him with his confession. Therefore, what will be brought forward hereafter is not to be referred to those who, born from the family of Abraham,
continues from previous page: derived their name from Judah, the son of Jacob, of the Davidic line from which the Savior emerged, nor to those who, after the most brilliant sun of the Gospel had risen and shone, having overthrown a more than Babylonian impiety, became members of Christ, but to those blinded and hardened stocks who, dispersed throughout the whole world, wandered here and there in search of homes and dwellings. The Lord calls these the disciples of Satan, through whose mouths every kind of most putrid lie and blasphemy is vomited and poured forth, by whose work and ministry the seed of the ancient dragon, with whom the seed of the woman has a perpetual, cruel, and irreconcilable war, is increased and promoted. And in this way, by the testimony of Christ himself, the name of "Jew" has been taken from them. Furthermore, even if this name were taken from them by Scripture, they could still be called into doubt as to whether they drew their origin from the true lineage of the Jews, who, in their long exile, have been driven so often from their seats that they cannot even have the signs and traces of their families and tribes distinguished into their respective classes. Moved by this reason, I would indeed rather call them Ishmaelites, or Edomites, or Egyptians, who likewise can boast of Abraham as their father, since the sons of Ishmael were born of his own seed and received Jewish ceremonies, which the Saracens and Mahometists do today. Since the destruction of the Jewish kingdom, 1534 years have passed, during which they were partly scattered to all the corners of the world and partly destroyed in certain places to the point of annihilation. Therefore, it does not seem likely to me that any remnants of the true Abrahamic lineage survive, and I would believe them to be rather interlopers and those born of the corrupt seed of Ishmaelites, Saracens, or Edomites: since, as I have said, their families are not contained in any records distinguished into certain classes. If they were the sons of Abraham, they would at least produce works worthy of their parent, which, however, are most alien to their nature and character. Furthermore, it is an argument that they are unworthy of this title because they not only abandoned the Levitical law of Moses,