Tractatus de imposturis et ceremoniis Iudaeorum nostri temporis

into the public view so that this false and empty glory may be torn from the hearts of arrogant men, by which, puffed up, they do not fear to boast that they are born of the seed of Abraham. For they are so far from being worthy of the name of Abrahamites that they should rather be held to be a brood of vipers, the excrement of Satan, and finally the most stubborn enemies of Christ, whom they lacerate with wicked crime before their congregations. For they are adorned with these splendid and magnificent titles by John the Baptist, Matthew, and Paul. Furthermore, the opinion of those is to be diminished who, moved by some appearance of mercy, judge that they should be tolerated because they were the kinsmen and relatives of Christ and the Apostles. For to what end is this? For the fact that the Apostle, deploring the misery of the Israelites, reports that the branches are holy because of the holy root: and that he testifies elsewhere that he is of a propense mind toward them because of their fathers, although they are judged to be enemies according to the Gospel, does nothing for the modern Thalmudists. For he speaks there of the Israelites of his own time, to whom he bears this testimony, that they have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge. If our Thalmudists are compared to these, the dregs, to speak truly, will be compared to wine. For you would have said the others were games and jokes compared to the rage of these. But since Paul appears to some to act as a patron of the Thalmudists, let us hear, I beseech you, what he says elsewhere: "Behold" (he says to the Romans 2) "you are called a Jew, and rest in the law, and boast in God, and know His will, and discern what things differ, instructed from the law; you trust that you are a guide of the blind, a light of those who are in darkness, etc. How therefore do you teach another, but do not teach yourself? You who preach that nothing should be taken by theft, do you yourself steal? You who say that adultery should not be committed, do you commit it? You who abhor idols, do you commit sacrilege? You who boast of the law, and dishonor God through transgression?" Likewise, "For he is not a Jew who is one only in public, nor is that circumcision which is in public, circumcision." And elsewhere, "For not all who are from the father Israel are Israel, nor are they Jews, nor because they are the seed of Abra-